BUCKINGHAMSHIRE, OXFORDSHIRE AND READING JOINT BOARD FOR THE MENTALLY DEFECTIVE

Scope and Content

Under the Mental Deficiency Act 1913 (3 & 4 Geo V chap 28) County Councils were required to ascertain the number of people classified as various types of mental defectives (idiots, imbeciles, feeble-minded persons and moral imbeciles) and arrange guardianship or provide institutional accommodation. These powers were delegated to the Mental Deficiency Act Committee (see CC1/16). Initially, institutional accommodation for people classified as mental defectives was provided in some poor law institutions e.g. Chipping Norton, and outside the county (see H9/L). The Act also permitted local authorities to co-operate in the provision of institutional accommodation by setting up joint boards. A Provisional Joint Institution Committee (representing the Counties of Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire - Berkshire was also represented but withdrew later - and County Boroughs of Reading and Oxford) was set up in 1926, completing its proposals in 1931. It proposed the purchase of the Wyfold Court Estate at Checkendon (near Henley and Reading) to be converted into a Colony for 500 patients. This institution became known as the Borocourt Institution.

The Bucks, Oxon and Reading Joint Board (often abbreviated to BORJB) for the Mentally Defective was set up in 1931 under the Bucks, Oxon and Reading Joint Board for the Mentally Defective Order, 1931 (Ministry of Health). The Joint Board was established as a separate legal entity with its own common seal and power to hold land. Members were appointed by the constituent authorities. The Joint Board was required to report and submit accounts to these authorities. It possessed powers of a local authority under the Mental Deficiency Acts (subject to the reservation of certain rights to the constituent authorities). It was responsible for the running of the Borocourt Institution. F G Scott, Clerk to Oxfordshire County Council, 1928-1953, was appointed as its Clerk.

The Joint Board was disbanded and responsibility for the Borocourt Institution was transferred to the Berkshire Mental Hospitals Management Committee (part of the Oxford Regional Hospital Board) in 1948 as a result of the National Health Service Act 1946 (9 & 10 Geo VI chap. 81).

The records seem to be primarily administrative files and correspondence of the Clerk to the Joint Board and his Assistant Clerk, Robert East, rather than those of the Borocourt Institution itself. Although individual patients are named and discussed in committee minutes (particularly the House Committee)and correspondence files, there are no patient records as such. The Borocourt Institution continued to operate until 1993 and records of its later operation may be found at Berkshire Record Office and Oxfordshire Health Archive.

Catalogued by Christian Gilliam, archivist, in Nov 2011 from accession numbers 3401, 4543 & 4569

Administrative / Biographical History

Names of individual correspondence files not disclosed in published catalogue under data protection legislation:

H9/C5/1: Percy Briant & Cyril Smith (patients)

H9/C5/2: Percy Briant & Cyril Smith (patients)

H9/C5/3: Edith Rose Adey nee Wyatt (patient)

H9/C5/4: Bowen-Jones (staff)

H9/C5/5: O D Evans (staff)

Access Information

Some records may be closed under the Data Protection Act, please see the individual records for more details.