Union Lane street sign

Image: © Adrian S Pye Taken: 12 Sep 2022

Union Lane lead to the old Mutford and Lothingland Union, otherwise known as The Workhouse, The Poor House or the House of Industry. Whatever it was called it was the last place anyone wanted to be. It was built in 1765 at a cost of nearly £6,000 which included the governor's apartment, the chapel, mortuary and various offices. There were four large workrooms where the inmates treated hemp to make rope and sacks, spun wool for clothing and made fishing nets for the Lowestoft drifters. In the late 1800s two infirmary blocks were added. However after 1930 it underwent a change of use and became an infirmary for the "mentally afflicted" and renamed The Lowestoft Hospital. The original building was demolished in the 1960s leaving the two infirmary blocks only to be demolished 30 years later. For a while the remaining chapel was used as part of an ambulance station. A care home was constructed on the site in which the conditions for the elderly are somewhat more pleasant. Now nothing remains of the Union except the road name and a page of history https://www.workhouses.org.uk/Mutford/

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