William Saunders Hallaran – Practical Observations on Insanity

This month's library item of the month, selected by the RCPI Librarian, is William Saunders Hallaran's 1810 work, An Enquiry into the Causes producing the Extraordinary addition to the Numbers of Insane.

The new RTE documentary programme Behind the Walls charts the history of Ireland's psychiatric hospitals and also highlights the pioneering work carried out by Dr. William Saunders Hallaran in Cork in the early 19th century.

Cork District Asylum

Hallaran was born around 1765 and received his medical education in Edinburgh. He was physician superintendant at the County and City of Cork Lunatic Asylum for 40 years and established a benign regime of active treatment for those suffering from mental illness.

In 1810, he published the first Irish textbook of psychiatry, with the full title of An enquiry into the causes producing the extraordinary addition to the number of insane, together with extended observations on the cure of insanity: with hints as to the better management of public asylums for insane persons. This short book of 111 pages was printed in Cork by the firm of Edwards & Savage and sold throughout the British Isles. A second extended edition of the work, under the title Practical observations on the causes and cure of insanity was published by the same firm in 1818.

Title page of 1810 edition

Hallaran's work shows evidence of his study of psychiatric illness and the beginnings of a scientific approach to the treatment of mental illness. He recognised that there were various forms of insanity of which only some admitted of a cure. Among the cures recommended by Hallaran were bleeding, emetics, purgatives, opium, camphor, blistering, mercury, baths and the circulating swing.

Hallaran's Chair

It is for this last apparatus that Hallaran is best remembered today. It owed its origin to a "circulating chair" devised by a Dr. Cox at the beginning of the 19th century, which was modified by Hallaran to become a swing capable of rotating a patient 100 times per minute. The device enjoyed considerable vogue for a time and favourable results from its use were claimed.

Whatever the success of his methods, Hallaran deserves his reputation as the first physician to advocate and carry out the humane treatment of the mentally disabled. He died in 1825 and, in 1830, the Cork Asylum was described as "one of the best and most extensive in Ireland and its success was attributed to the ability and benevolence of its excellent physician, Dr. Hallaran" (Cummins, p.27).

Robert Mills, RCPI Librarian

Further reading, all available in Dun's Library:

* Breathnach, C. S., 'Hallaran's circulating swing' in History of Psychiatry, 21(1), 2010, pp.74-81

* Cummins, N. M., Some chapters in Cork medical history (Cork, 1957)

* Fleetwood, J. F., The history of medicine in Ireland (2nd ed. Dublin, 1983)

* Hallaran, W. S., An enquiry into the cases producing the extraordinary addition to the number on insane (Cork, 1810)

* Hallaran, W.S., Practical Observations on the causes and cure of insanity (Cork, 1818)

* Kelly, B. D., 'Dr. William Saunders Hallaran and psychiatric practice in nineteenth century Ireland' in the Irish Journal of Medical Science 177(1), March 2008, pp.79-84.