What images come to mind when you hear the term ‘lunatic asylum’? Perhaps shadowy figures, misunderstood conditions, or harsh treatments. For many, these institutions housed unknown individuals whose stories were lost to time. But what if we told you that some of history’s most recognizable names also walked those corridors? It’s a stark reminder of how mental health struggles can touch anyone, regardless of their fame or status.
Let’s delve into the lives of ten famous, and sometimes infamous, individuals who were confined to asylums, revealing a different side to their well-known stories.
10 King George III
King George III of England, who reigned from 1760 to 1820, experienced severe mental health issues. His struggles, though sometimes met with ridicule, also brought about a surprising shift. The realization that even a monarch could suffer from mental illness led to greater empathy for others in similar situations.
The king would often rant, have convulsions, act erratically, and suffer from depression. He was taken to Greatford House Asylum, a private facility in Lincolnshire. There, his treatment was typical for the era: painful and ineffective. Methods included bleeding, induced vomiting, and blistering the skin with hot glass vials. While some historians thought his condition was porphyria, a genetic blood disorder, recent studies from St. George’s University in London suggest it was more likely a mental health problem, possibly bipolar disorder, that affected the king.
9 Ronnie Kray
Ronald “Ronnie” Kray, along with his identical twin Reginald “Reggie,” was a notorious figure in London’s gangland during the 1950s and 60s. The Kray Twins were known for their stylish suits, celebrity connections, and brutal violence.
In 1956, Ronnie was imprisoned and separated from his brother, which caused his already fragile mental health to worsen. By 1957, he was committed to a secure ward at Long Grove Asylum in Surrey. His condition was so severe that he reportedly formed a relationship with a radiator and believed another patient was a dog.
A bold escape plan was put into action. Reggie and his crew visited, with Reggie dressing just like Ronnie. In the bathroom, Ronnie gave his signature black-rimmed glasses to Reggie. When they returned, Ronnie walked out with the group while Reggie stayed behind, fooling the staff. Soon after, Reggie removed his brother’s glasses, signed out, and rejoined the others in London. Both twins received life sentences for murder in 1969. Ronnie was transferred to Broadmoor Asylum in 1979, where he stayed until his death in 1995.
8 Louis Wain
Born in 1860, Louis Wain became known for his delightful drawings of cats engaging in human-like activities. He started drawing for newspapers and magazines in the 1880s to support his mother and five sisters after his father passed away. These cat cartoons brought him fame and some fortune.
However, after his beloved wife Emily died from cancer just three years into their marriage, Wain’s mental state began to decline. His cat drawings became increasingly abstract and bizarre. During this period, he also created some striking futurist pottery figures.
As his illness progressed, his trusting nature led to him being cheated out of most of his money. In 1924, he was admitted as a pauper to Springfield Asylum in London. A year later, he was discovered there, and a fundraising campaign, supported by figures like H.G. Wells, was launched. Wain was then moved to the more comfortable Bethlem Royal in Kent, and later to Napsbury Asylum. He continued to paint his stunning, psychedelic cat images until his death in 1939.
7 Vincent Van Gogh
In 1889, Vincent Van Gogh voluntarily admitted himself to the asylum of St. Paul de Mausole in Saint Remy, France. He was given two rooms: one for sleeping and another to use as a studio. The conditions were not intentionally harsh, but he received only basic food and water. His “treatment” mainly consisted of bathing.
Over time, he was allowed to walk in the beautiful gardens, and eventually, in the fields beyond the asylum. During his stay, he painted many images of the asylum and its surroundings. It was during this period, marked by a shift to darker colors in his art, that he created Starry Night, one of his most famous and evocative paintings.
6 Margaret Nicholson
Margaret Nicholson lost several good housekeeping jobs due to scandalous affairs. She eventually found herself struggling as a seamstress. Developing an obsession with the royal family, she came to believe she should be queen. In 1776, she managed to approach King George III and lunged at him with a knife. Fortunately, the king was unharmed; her weapon was merely a blunt cake knife.
Nicholson was then strip-searched to confirm she wasn’t a man in disguise. After declaring that “England would be drowned in blood for a thousand generations” if she wasn’t made queen, she was declared mad. This diagnosis saved her from almost certain execution, and she was sent to Bedlam asylum instead. King George III even wrote to request that she receive sympathetic treatment there.
At Bedlam, Nicholson became something of a celebrity. Many well-to-do visitors brought her gifts, eager to meet the “madwoman” who had tried to kill the king. She remained in Bedlam until her death at the age of 83.
5 John Clare
Born in 1793 in the small English village of Helpston, John Clare worked as a “potboy” at The Blue Bell Inn. To prevent his parents from being evicted, he sold his poetry, quickly finding success and early recognition.
However, when his last collection, The Rural Muse (1835), received praise but sold poorly, his existing mental health problems and alcoholism grew worse. After attacking an actor on stage, he was advised to go to High Beach Asylum in Essex. It’s said he believed he was Lord Byron and had two wives, one being his first love, Mary, who had died three years earlier. Missing his family, he left the asylum and walked 80 miles back home alone.
In 1841, Clare was admitted as a pauper to St. Andrew’s Asylum in Northampton. There, he was encouraged to continue writing and produced his most famous work, “I Am.” He remained in the asylum until his death in 1864. Though obscure by then, his work was re-evaluated over the next century, and he is now considered one of Britain’s most respected poets.
4 Richard Dadd
Richard Dadd was a gifted young painter chosen to accompany a grand tour of Europe and Asia. His role was to create sketches and paintings of the journey, a common practice for the wealthy at the time. While in Egypt, he suffered from intense headaches and sunstroke, and began to believe he could hear the voice of the sun god Osiris. By the time the group reached Paris in 1843, his behavior had become so strange that he was dismissed.
At St. Luke’s Asylum in London, he was diagnosed as insane. However, his father was hesitant to commit him and took him home. Believing Osiris was urging him to fight the devil, Dadd started seeing Satan in everyone around him. He isolated himself in his rooms, surviving only on ale and hard-boiled eggs.
Dadd’s father, hoping Richard would “unburden his mind,” took him for a meal and a walk on a local heath. Tragically, Richard stabbed his father to death there, believing his father was the devil in disguise. A search of his rooms revealed drawings of friends and relatives with their throats cut. Dadd fled to Calais, intending to kill the Emperor of Austria. After attempting to kill a fellow passenger, he was arrested and committed to Clermont Asylum at Fontainebleau. He confessed to the murder and was extradited to England.
Dadd was then committed to Bedlam and later moved to Broadmoor Asylum. It was there that he created many of his most celebrated works, including The Fairy-Feller’s Masterstroke (1864). He died in 1886. His paintings, now worth millions, can be seen in prestigious galleries like The National Gallery and the Tate Gallery.
3 James Tilley Matthews
By day, James Tilley Matthews was a humble London tea seller. However, he led a remarkable double life. During the French Revolution, he worked to broker peace between England and the new Republican leadership in France. When his allies failed to gain power, he was arrested as a suspected spy and imprisoned. After his release, he claimed the English government had abandoned him and that the Home Secretary was involved in numerous conspiracies. His wild, public claims of being a Scarlet Pimpernel-like double agent led to his committal to Bedlam asylum in 1798.
Two doctors declared Matthews sane, but Lord Liverpool insisted he was “a dangerous lunatic who should be confined in perpetuity.” This view was supported by Bedlam’s apothecary, John Haslam, who studied Matthews for his book Illustrations of Madness (1810). Many now consider this the first case study of paranoid schizophrenia.
Matthews believed a criminal gang constantly manipulated his mind through “pneumatic chemistry,” using magnetic waves from their “air loom” device. This machine supposedly inflicted pains like “lobster-cracking” (stopping his circulation) and “apoplexy-working with the nutmeg-grater” (tracking his thoughts and movements). Haslam’s book is still used today to illustrate the terrifying thoughts and conspiracies typical of schizophrenia.
Later research suggests Matthews might have indeed been in France with unofficial backing from the British government, who hoped to see certain people in power. These “invisible forces” then denied any knowledge of Matthews after his capture and maintained silence upon his return. This suggests his illness might not have been the sole reason he was conveniently locked away in an asylum.
2 Nellie Bly
Elizabeth Seaman (1864-1922), better known by her pen name Nellie Bly, was a pioneering journalist from Pennsylvania. She is famous for two major journalistic achievements. One was her journey around the world in just seventy-two days, a world record at the time, inspired by Jules Verne’s famous book.
Her first major impact came in 1887 with an undercover exposé on life in a lunatic asylum. To get committed, she checked into a women’s boarding house and tried to act as strangely as possible. However, she found that such behavior was so common there that it barely attracted notice. Eventually, she escalated her actions until she began to frighten other residents, leading to the police being called. She was finally committed to New York’s Blackwell’s Island Asylum for women.
Once inside, Bly’s goal was to act as “normal” as she could. She wanted to see how she would be treated, knowing she was sane and showing no unusual behavior. Her subsequent exposé, “Ten Days in a Madhouse,” highlighted how difficult it was for her to be taken seriously or gain her release, despite her clear sanity. She also documented the appalling conditions faced by other women in the asylum. Unable to convince anyone of her sanity, the newspaper she worked for eventually had to contact the asylum to arrange her release.
1 Jack the Ripper
The true identity of the world’s first celebrity serial killer, Jack the Ripper, remains a mystery. However, several suspects connected to the case ended up in asylums. One man, Aaron Kosminski, was even named as a prime suspect by two key police officers investigating the case.
Some historians believe there might have been a mix-up between Kosminski and another patient named Nathan Kaminsky. Kaminsky was arrested in Whitechapel in December 1888, right when the Ripper murders suddenly stopped. This theory suggests that when investigating officers visited the asylum, they might have been shown Kosminski, who didn’t fit the killer’s description, instead of Kaminsky.
Interestingly, Kaminsky was apprehended in a state of severe aggression less than a month after the final murder. At the asylum, he attacked anyone he could and had to be kept in restraints. While it’s only a theory, it offers a fascinating potential explanation for why the killings ceased: Jack the Ripper might have been locked up in London’s Colney Hatch Asylum.
The stories of these famous individuals offer a glimpse into a time when mental health was poorly understood and often harshly treated. Their experiences in asylums, whether brief or lifelong, remind us that behind every well-known name is a human story, often more complex and challenging than we realize.
What are your thoughts on these historical accounts? Do any of these stories surprise you? Leave your comment below!
