Dorothea
Dix was born in Hampden, Maine, on 4th April, 1802. At the age of
12 she went to live with her grandmother in Boston.
Within two years she was teaching in a school in Worcester. In 1821she
opened her own school for girls in Boston. Over the next few years
she wrote school textbooks and a hymn book. Dix ran the school until
1834 when suffering from tuberculosis
she decided to retire.
Dix spent the next few years studying the conditions in prison and
insane asylums in Massachusetts. She discovered that a large number
of people suffering from mental illness were confined in prisons and
were receiving no medical treatment. Even in mental asylums the patients
were often confined in cages and bound with ropes and chains. Shocked
by what she discovered, Dix decided to compare conditions in these
institutions with other countries. She visited Europe and from 1842-1845,
Dix travelled more than 10,000 miles during her investigations.
In January, 1843, Dix submitting to the Massachusetts legislature
a detailed report on her investigations. Her ideas influenced the
reform of the Worcester Insane Asylum. Her book, Remarks
on Prisons and Prison Discipline in the United States
was published in 1845. By 1854 Dix had helped to establish mental
hospitals in eleven states. She had also founded hospitals in Russia,
Turkey, France and Scotland.
On the outbreak of the American
Civil War Dix was appointed as superintendent of women nurses
for the federal government. Over the next four years she was responsible
for the recruitment, training and placement of 2,000 nurses treating
members of the Union Army.
After the war Dix resumed her work for the mentally ill. This included
travelling widely in Europe and Japan. Dorothea Dix died in Trenton,
New Jersey, on 17th July, 1887.
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