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With the outbreak of World War One a number of wealthy families offered to turn their mansions into convalescent hospitals for wounded soldiers. Bishop鈥檚 Knoll War Hospital stands apart as it was the only 鈥渕ake-shift鈥� hospital in the area that accepted patients direct from the front. Eventually it was to be used only by Australian soldiers, and it was entirely paid for by former Gloucestershire cricketer Robert Edwin Bush.

Years before the war Bush played for the county alongside who was considered the greatest cricketer of all time; WG Grace, but after hanging up his bat Bush spent many years in Australia as a sheep farmer, and made a fortune. On returning to Bristol at the turn of the 20th Century he and his wife, Marjorie, took up residence at the beautiful Bishop鈥檚 Knoll.

With the outbreak of war Bush wanted to play his part and so set about converting his family home into a war hospital for wounded soldiers. Having made his fortune in Australia Bush wanted to repay the country that made him so wealthy, and so wanted his home to be used only by Australian soldiers. Initially, the Australian authorities refused his offer, before saying that if he wanted to do this then it would have to be staffed by Australians too. Bush disagreed, but finally won his battle in 1916, and for the remainder of the war only soldiers from down under were treated at Bishop鈥檚 Knoll.

One very happy soldier wrote this poem that was published in the Bishops Knoll magazine in 1917:

I lay upon a stretcher, a little girl tripped up,
My cigarette she lighted, and held my coffee cup
And 鈥淐ould she write a postcard to send to any friend?鈥�
Or, 鈥淲ould I like a pillow?鈥� She bucked me up no end.

I had no friends in Blighty, and when the pain got worse
I never could have stood it, without that little nurse;
A father, mother, sister and sweetheart all in one,
If I had not adored her, I must have been a Hun.

But what if I should lose her? I know, I鈥檒l put a ring
Upon her wedding finger, to claim the little thing;
And when the war is over, if I should lucky be,
That 鈥淰ery Artful Darling鈥� perhaps may cross the sea.鈥�

Hundreds of Anzac soldiers came through the gates of the Knoll including Victoria Cross winner John Patrick Hamilton. The care was reported as second to none with Bush himself working there as an orderly.

The hospital history reports that after the war a fight broke out in an Australian bar between two men who had been looked after in the West of England during World War One, both arguing that the place that they had been treated was better than the other. It was only after the fight that both men realised they had actually been treated at the same hospital 鈥� Bishop鈥檚 Knoll.

Following his death in 1939 Bishops Knoll was bought by The Bristol Aeroplane company and used as a school before being turned into a school for nurses by the Princess Margaret Hospital. But in the 1970s this once grand house was demolished and on the site today stands just over 100 flats.

Location: Former location of Bishops Knoll, Knoll Hill, Bristol BS9 1QU
Image: Courtesy of Patrick Casey

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