How to commit your unwanted, naggy or rich wife to a mental hospital

Husbands who committed their unwanted wives to a mental hospitals

Historic psychiatric false imprisonment

"Wife-be-gone"

Wanna get rid of your disobedient, naggy or rich wife? Commit her to a Mad House against her will!

Even if the myth that schizophrenia is a medical condition (instead of behaviour) were true, it is illegal to force medical treatment on someone against their will. A doctor who forces treatment or drugs a non-consenting person who knows they are sick will go to jail even if it saves their life. A psychiatrist who commits someone who is suicidal to an asylum and force drugs them is guilty of a double crime. Psychiatric committal is a violation of the criminal code and doctor-patient ethics.

Introduction:

If you want to learn how to commit your unwanted, disobedient, naggy or rich wife to a mental hospital, you have come to the right place. The first thing you need is a time machine set to the date 1725 AD! But it is going to cost you a lot of money! We also don't recommend it, since it is immoral and breaks several of the 10 commandments!
If you had the money, you could get almost anyone committed to a mad house for almost any reason!
The rise of wicked husbands throwing their virtuous, rich wives in jail began around 1720 AD. First you have Haywood's novel "Love in a mad-house" in 1726, then in 1728 AD, Daniel Defoe, writes about this evil in his, "Augusta Triumphans".
It is clear that mad houses were systems of social control: "As Foucault points out in Madness and Civilization, the mental hospital emerged during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as a means of social control." (The distress'd orphan or, Love in a mad-house, Eliza Haywood, 1726 AD, introduction by Deborah Nestor, 1995)
"It is likely that outrages did occur, due to the deficiencies of the legislation; the machinations of self-interested and malicious relatives or associates of the alleged lunatic; the conduct of unscrupulous, mercenary proprietors and the complicity of ignorant and corrupt medical men, who signed the necessary certificates." (The Trade in Lunacy, William Ll. Parry-Jones, 1972 AD, p 290)
Men like Alexander Cruden, the man of God who created "Cruden's concordance", was cast into a mental house three times because he would go around like John the Baptist and condemn the ruling class of sin, corruption and adultery! In a twisted kind of way, it cost both of them their "heads"!
The poor "street people" were cast into asylums to clean of the streets and parks of lazy, dirty vagrants.
There were many people in these asylums that were intelligent and sane, like the case of William Norris in 1815 AD below in the Report From The Committee On Madhouses In England, 1815 AD, Testimony of A. Mr. E. Wakefield.
Women were expected to be "quiet, respectful and submissive" to their husbands like the Bible says and when they rebelled and disobeyed, their husbands punished them by casting them into a mental hospital. This is wrong. The Bible does not authorize husbands to punish their wives! Of course, biblical submission of women to their husbands is something the husband has no control over. It is entirely up to the wife to chose to obey her husband. If she refuses to submit to her husband, there is nothing the Bible says he is to do. But the men of the 17th century sinned by attempting to force their wives into submission. Submission is always a free will thing.
Many women were cast into mental hospitals because they were not obedient or would not conform to social standards of the day. "hostility to ordinary middle-class values is associated instantly, automatically, with insanity; and insanity with confinement." (The distress'd orphan or, Love in a mad-house, Eliza Haywood, 1726 AD, introduction by Deborah Nestor, 1995)
Sometimes wives were cast into the mental hospital so they could not inherit their own or their husband's family fortune! Other times husbands cast their rich wives into prison in order to get their wives fortune!
On the other hand, there were cases of wives faking mental illness in order to escape their duties. These were committed to mental hospitals by loving husbands trying to fix their broken wives. The treatments that seemed to cure were moral treatment like water boarding as seen in Patrick Blair's cure of a wife who was "mad, neglected every thing, ... kept her room, would converse with nobody but kept spitting continually". see Cure of Mad Persons by the Fall of Water, Patrick Blair, 1725 AD. "But the Irish physician Patrick Blair was equally clear that a wife's refusing to love her husband was a sign of madness, and that her saying, after the most horrendous treatment, that she would do so after all and would go to his bed that night was therefore a sure sign of her cure." (Patterns of Madness in the Eighteenth Century, A Reader, Allan Ingram, 1998 AD, p 120)
See the case of "Waterfall" where a woman who hates her husband goes insane but is cured by torture.

A. Play written in 1726 AD "Love in a mad-house"

Here is the link to more: The distress'd orphan or, Love in a mad-house, Eliza Haywood, 1726 AD
This play written by a woman exposing the common habit of husbands and relatives sending their wives to the mad house!
It was very typical of the time and the depiction of the mad house is typical of what continued at real mad houses like Bedlam.
"The Distress'd Orphan focuses on a young woman whose wicked guardian locks her up when she refuses to comply with his matrimonial plans for her. ... In the eighteenth century, the fear of wrongful incarceration and the potential loss of sanity that might accompany it was not entirely imaginary, especially for women. ... Daniel Defoe, among the earliest of such critics, addresses the issue in the Review (1706) and in Augusta Triumphans (1728) where he documents several cases of women incarcerated in private madhouses by their relatives for financial or sexual convenience. ... Thirty-five years later, the medically unjustified confinement of women in such institutions was still commonplace according to a 1763 parliamentary committee's published report on the abuses of the private madhouse: all but one of the cases reported by the committee involve women committed by relatives - usually husbands-for no valid medical reason. Looking beyond the immediate financial considerations that might motivate a husband or family to commit an unwanted heiress, Max Byrd argues that many of these women "are put away because they have refused to be good bourgeois daughters," and he suggests that, in many eighteenth-century minds, rebellion against accepted ideological beliefs constituted grounds for imprisonment: "hostility to ordinary middle-class values is associated instantly, automatically, with insanity; and insanity with confinement." As Foucault points out in Madness and Civilization, the mental hospital emerged during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as a means of social control. In England the private madhouse was an especially powerful instrument for those with funds to pay for such incarceration of friends, enemies, or relatives." (The distress'd orphan or, Love in a mad-house, Eliza Haywood, 1726 AD, introduction by Deborah Nestor, 1995)
"The Hour appointed for the Execution of this Enterprize being near at hand [ie the time she was cast into the mental hospital], Giraldo order'd all his Family to retire to their. Beds, except one Servant, in whom he plac'd great Confidence, and was the same who occation'd his discovering the Correspondence between Marathon and Annilia, by giving him Intelligence out of what place he had seen Ofepha come. The unhappy Niece of this barbarous Man was compell'd to rise out of her Bed, where the was sleeping as secure as her Discontents and Fears would let her, and oblig'd to put on her Clothes at that unseasonable Hour ; not that the would have done it at his requeft, but the appearance of all thofe ill-look'd Fellows in her Chamber, (he having without any regard to Decency, or the Modefty of her Sex, brought them to her Bed-side made her, with all the haste the could, throw on a loose Night-Gown, which the had no fooner done, than like a Lamb among a Herd of Wolves, the was feiz'd by there inhuman Ruffians; and fome stopping her Mouth, and threatning her if the attempted to refill ; and another taking hold of her, the was rather dragg'd than carry'd down Stairs, and thrust into the Coach, where the three Keepers immediately crowding in, render'd frustrate all the faint Hopes the had conceived of escaping. She saw little of the Horrors of her Prison that Night, every Wretch, whom either the Malice of their false Friends, or the Misfortune of their own Distemper, had brought there, being close lock'd into their several Apartments; and all the Family, who profited by their Misery, retir'd to Bed, except two Women-Servants, who humouring this new guest in all the Extravagancies her Wrongs enforc'd her to utter, made her know that it was to a Mad-Houfe the was brought, and that they took her for one labouring under that unhappy Circumstance. They compelled her to go into a Bed they had prepar'd for her, but 'tis not to be imagin'd the could admit the Approach of Sleep that Night; and earlier than the Day, was the disturb'd with Sounds, which struck so great a Dread into her, that nothing is more strange, than that she did nor die with the Fright, or fall indeed into that Disorder of which the was accus'd. The rattling of Chains, the Shrieks of those severely treated by their barbarous Keepers, mingled with Curses, Oaths, and the most blasphemous Imprecations, did from one quarter of the House shock her tormented Ears while from another, Howlings like that of Dogs, Shoutings, Roarings, Prayers, Preaching, Curses, Singing, Crying, promiscuously join'd to make a Chaos of the most horrible Confusion: but the Violence of this Uproar continued not long, it being only occasion'd by the &II Entrance of the Keepers into the Cells of those Wretches who were really Lunatick, and had, for the Addition of their Anguish, so much Remains of Sense, as to know what they were to suffer at the Approach of these inhuman Creatures, who never came to bring them fresh Straw, or that poor Pittance of Food allowed for the Support of their miserable Lives ; but they saluted them with Stripes in a manner so cruel, as if they delighted in inflicting Pain, excusing themselves in this Barbarity, by saying that there was a necessity to keep them in awe ; as if Chains, and Nakedness, and the small Portion of wretched Sustenance they suffer'd them to take, was not sufficient to humble their Fellow- Creature. Besides, what is there to be feared from those helpless Objects of Compassion, who being Hand-cuffed, and the Fetters on their Legs fast bolted into the floor, can air no farther than the length of their Chain ! Yet with Barbarity do these there pityless Monsters exert the Power they have over them, that whoever is witness of it, would imagine they were rather placed there for the Punishment of some Capital Crime, for which Law has provided no sufficient Torture, than for the Cure of a Disease, by their nearest and dearest Relations. To find herself in such a Place, and that it was made so secure by Locks, by Bolts, and Bars, that all Thoughts of making her Escape would be in vain, was enough to have made a Woman lets endued with Fortitude, consent to any thing for her Enlargement ; but she, in the middle of her Distress, justly reflecting that those who could be capable of using her in this inhuman manner to force her to a Compliance, might hereafter, when satiated with Enjoyment, or the leak Disgust, have recourse to the fame means to get rid of her, as now they took to gain her, resolved rather to die, than yield to put a greater power into the hands of Persons, who had made so detestable a Use of what they had already." (The distress'd orphan or, Love in a mad-house, Eliza Haywood, 1726 AD, p 40-43)

B. Unwanted rich wives cast into madhouses:

In 1728 AD, Daniel Defoe, author of Robinson Crusoe, believed that a husband could drive his sane wife mad by sending her to a mad house. He believed insanity was caused by life circumstance, not a disease saying, "it is much easier to create than to cure madness".
He wrote about a new phenomonea "a practice scarce heard of till of late years" of the rise of private mad houses and the jailing of unwanted rich wives by treacherous husbands in some of these mad houses. Whereas mad houses had been run for altruistic purposes by church ministers, Defoe shows the rise of many new mad houses by non-church ministers for profit by housing the relatives of rich people or their unwanted wives. "the vile practice now so much in vogue among the better sort as they are called, but the worst sort in fact; namely, the sending their wives to madhouses, at every whim or dislike, that they may be more secure and undisturbed in their debaucheries; which wicked custom is got to such a head, that the number of private madhouses in and about London are considerably increased within these few years."
Since mad houses were originally started by ministers of churches, this sudden surge in the number of mad houses marks the beginning of the profit motive of running mad houses by non-ministers. There is simply no way that altruistic ministers would jail unwanted wives so their husbands could spend the wive's money on their new mistress. "How many, I say, of beauty, virtue, and fortune, are suddenly torn from their dear innocent babes, from the arms of an unworthy man, whom they love, perhaps, but too well, and who in return for that love, nay probably an ample fortune and a lovely off spring besides, grows weary of the pure streams of chaste love, and thirsting after the puddles of lawless lust, buries his virtuous wife alive, that he may have the greater freedom with his mistresses?"
But Defoe also believes that the causes of insanity is life circumstances and not a disease. He notes, "If they are not mad when they go into these cursed houses, they are soon made so by the barbarous usage they there suffer ... Is it not enough to make any one mad to be suddenly clapped up, stripped, whipped, ill-fed, and worse used? To have no reason assigned for such treatment, no crime alleged, or accusers to confront? And what is worse, no soul to appeal to but merciless creatures, who answer but in laughter, surliness, contradiction, and too often stripes ... be not sufficient to drive any soul stark staring mad, though before they were never so much in their right senses"
Defoe traces the etiology directly back to the husband as the cause of insanity, not some disease: "When by this means a wicked husband has driven a poor creature mad, and robbed an injured wife of her reason, for it is much easier to create than to cure madness, then has the villain a handle for his roguery; then, perhaps, he will admit her distressed relations to see her, when it is too late to cure the madness he so artfully and barbarously has procured."
Another factor is that it was the rich who initially paid for mad houses for the upkeep (or jailing) of their relatives. In this case it was the wife who was rich and the husband who used her money: "and he has not a shilling but what came from her" ... "for if a man is weary of his wife, has spent her fortune, and wants another, it is but sending her to a madhouse and the business is done at once."
Defoe calls for all mad houses to be regulated and seeks for new licenced mad houses to be created in various parts of town. "In my humble opinion, all private madhouses should be suppressed at once, and it should be no less than felony to confine any person under pretence of madness without due authority. For the cure of those who are really lunatic, licensed madhouses should be constituted in convenient parts of the town, which houses should be subject to proper visitation and inspection, nor should any person be sent to a madhouse without due reason, inquiry, and authority."
Defoe is an important marker in history for he shows the genesis of mad houses run by non-church ministers for rich people. (Augusta Triumphans, Daniel Defoe, 1728 AD)

C. Unwanted Wives cast into Bedlam mental hospital:

Bedlam was the most famous mad house in history!
"The mid-eighteenth century saw a torrent of criticism of the unregulated state of private madhouses, fed by scandalous tales of alleged false confinement and intermittent, but influential, appeals for legislative intervention—all of which were met initially with official indifference. Eventually, however, the rising tide of complaints of corruption, cruelty, and malfeasance in the mad-trade provoked some feeble and flickering interest in parliament, and both Monro and Battie found themselves called upon to testify in the brief inquiry that was finally launched in 1763. The proceedings were cursory in the extreme, only four cases of alleged false confinement being considered, only two madhouses (Miles's at Hoxton, and Turlington's at Chelsea) being inquired into, and only eleven witnesses being named as having been summoned." They culminated in a printed report of just eleven pages, even though the limited testimony that was taken seemed calculated to raise rather than mitigate public anxieties. Each case involved women (namely, Mrs. Hester Williams, Mrs. Hawley, Mrs. Smith, and Mrs. Durant) who had allegedly been falsely confined by their husbands and other family members (adding ballast to Foyster's arguments about the manipulable role of the madhouse in marital disagreements), and in three of these cases there was clear evidence of abuse, with only one woman seeming to have been insane. Witnesses stressed the employment of ruses and trickery to initiate and perpetuate these confinements, and the obstruction of contact with the outside world, in particular through being locked up and mechanically restrained night and day, having visitors refused and correspondence barred, and being "treated with Severity" by keepers." The women themselves complained that they received no medicines or medical treatment whatsoever and were never even attended by a medical practitioner, or not, at least, until a habeas corpus was effected." (Undertaker of the mind: John Monro, Jonathan Andrews, Andrew Scull, 2001 AD, p 155)
"Battie and John Monro, the two most eminent psychiatric physicians of the day, supported the view that wrongful consinement in madhouses did take place. The former quoted, as an example, a case in which a man had tried to confine his wife in Battie's madhouse and had justified his conduct by the belief that the house was 'a sort of Bridewell, or place of correction'. [Report 1763 S.C., J.H.C., Vol. 29, p. 488] Reference to the findings of this Committee and to the prevailing abuses was made in 1866, by a writer who signed himself L.T.F.3 A description was given of a narrative, in MS., dated 1746, in which a lady of distinction was confined in a madhouse, by her husband's authority, because of her extravagance and indifference towards him. Other inmates of this particular madhouse, near Harrow, had been placed there for such reasons as drunkenness, violent tempers and, in the case of two young girls, to break off love-affairs which did not meet with their parents' approval. Also amongst those reputed to have been improperly confined in madhouses in the eighteenth century were individuals from the ranks of the early Methodists, the revivalist field-preachers and their followers, who were so often exposed, at this period, to persecution and derision." (The Trade in Lunacy, William Ll. Parry-Jones, 1972 AD, p 255)
"Have you visited Bethlem? I have, frequently; I first visited Bethlem on the 25th of April 1814. What observations did you make? At this first visit, attended by the steward of the Hospital and likewise by a female keeper, we first proceeded to visit the women's galleries: one of the side rooms contained about ten patients, each chained by one arm or leg to the wall; the chain allowing them merely to stand up by the bench or form fixed to the wall, or to sit down on it. The nakedness of each patient was covered by a blanket-gown only; the blanket-gown is a blanket formed something like a dressing-gown, with nothing to fasten it with in front; this constitutes the whole covering; the feet even were naked. One female in this side room, thus chained, was an object remarkably striking; she mentioned her maiden and married names, and stated that she had been a teacher of languages; the keepers described her as a very accomplished lady, mistress of many languages, and corroborated her account of herself. The Committee can hardly imagine a human being in a more degraded and brutalizing situation than that in which I found this female, who held a coherent conversation with us, and was of course fully sensible of the mental and bodily condition of those wretched beings, who, equally without clothing, were closely chained to the same wall with herself. ... Many of these unfortunate women were locked up in their cells, naked and chained on straw, with only one blanket for a covering." (Report From The Committee On Madhouses In England, 1815 AD, Testimony of A. Mr. E. Wakefield)
"T. Bakewell (1815) had stated that, at some madhouses, the pecuniary interest of the proprietor and the secret wishes of the lunatics' relatives, led not only to the neglect of all means of cure, but also to the deliberate prevention and delay of recovery, conduct which he considered a crime that may be perpetrated with perfect impunity as to human laws'. This statement is in keeping with what Mitford (1825 ?) claimed to be the rule at Warburton's house, namely: 'If a man comes in here mad, we'll keep him so; if he is in his senses, we'll soon drive him out of them." Similarly, 100 years previously, Defoe had stated that if persons were not mad on entering a madhouse, they were soon made so by the barbarous usage they there suffer . . . Is it not enough to make one mad to be suddenly clap'd up, stripp'd, whipp'd, ill fed, and worse us'd ? C. Crowther (1838) observed that in private-madhouses the rich did not recover in the same proportion as the poor"." (The Trade in Lunacy, William Ll. Parry-Jones, 1972 AD, p 241)

D. Sexual assault by the male "Keepers":

"Do you remember a keeper of the name of King, at Bethlem, who is now at Liverpool? Perfectly. Was not he employed as keeper of the female patients at Bethlem? He was occasionally. Was not King, when keeper of the female patients, charged by Mr. Till, the manager of the London waterworks, with being too familiar with a female patient of great beauty, such female having been a servant of Mr. Till? I do not know that he was charged by Mr. Till with too great familiarity, but the patient herself did charge him with that. He being the keeper of the female patients at that time? Yes; she complained to me of it. What was the result of that investigation? There was great asseveration on one side, and denial of it on the other; I do not know whether we got at the truth. Was not the regulation immediately made by the governors, for not again employing men as keepers of women? They had endeavoured to do that long before, upon another business. Did not the governors, from learning that fact, direct that no man should again be put as keeper of the women? I do not recollect that they came to any resolution upon that case; it was about three years ago." (Report From The Committee On Madhouses In England, 1815 AD, Testimony of John Haslam)
"Some years ago, a female patient had been impregnated twice, during the time she was in the Hospital; at one time she miscarried; and the person who was proved to have had connexion with her, being a keeper, was accordingly discharged." (Report From The Committee On Madhouses In England, 1815 AD, Testimony of John Haslam)

E. Laws passed regarding committal to Bedlam:

The abuses were being noticed and legislators in the British house of parliament began to draft private members bills to be passed into law.
At first it was proposed that a person could not be committed to a man house unless witnessed with the written consent of: the person's local preacher, 12 neighbors and two doctors. It also proposed that each person be visited by their own minister and a justice of the peace at least once every 14 days.
What ended up happening is that ministers were considered mentally ill themselves, since they believe in God, and were not only excluded from the process of committing a person to a mental hospital, they were barred from even entering the mad houses! Psychiatry has had a long history of being viciously anti-Christian!
"The author appealed for legislation requiring that no confinement take place without an attestation in writing from the patient's parish minister and twelve of his neighbors and a certificate of two physicians, "neither of them concerned in any such house." He also recommended severe penalties for an improper confinement: a fine of £50 for any convicted madhouse master or keeper, plus imprisonment for at least three years in a county gaol [jail]. Additionally, he urged that madhouse servants and keepers be encouraged to inform on their masters by the enticement of a £10 fine payable to them for reporting such cases. (The master himself was to have the [rather minimal] protection of a right of appeal to the King's Bench, though the act that was finally passed offered no protection whatsoever.) Concluding, the author of this grand scheme urged that each house should be visited by the local parish clergyman and JP at least once a fortnight [every 14 days], with the inspectors guaranteed complete freedom of access.'" ... Two years later (1774), the Act for Regulating Madhouses (14 George III c. 49) was finally passed. Perhaps, as Porter has suggested, the prolonged delay in enacting legislation should be seen as a function of the opposition of the College of Physicians, some of whose members "had a large financial stake in metropolitan madhouses." If so, it is somewhat ironic that parliament handed over the power to license and inspect madhouses in the metropolis to the College. (In the provinces, similar authority was granted to local magistrates.) There were other signs, too, that medical men had successfully lobbied behind the scenes to protect their interests: the 1772 appeal notwithstanding, commitment under the new act required only a single medical certificate, and local clergymen were firmly excluded from any officially sanctioned role in the process." (Undertaker of the mind: John Monro, Jonathan Andrews, Andrew Scull, 2001 AD, p 159)
"Through its [religions] emphasis on sin and the spirit world, on hellfire and damnation, it was said to be actually driving its adherents into madness." (Undertaker of the mind: John Monro, Jonathan Andrews, Andrew Scull, 2001 AD, p 80)

F. The case of the disobedient wife: Hannah Mackenzie

When the British parliament investigated the unlawful confinement in mental hospitals of wives by their husbands, the case of "Hannah Mackenzie" said it all!
Here is an immoral, wicked husband who sends his wife to the mad house because she protested over her husband having an affair with another woman! How dare Hannah even open her mouth when the husband, Peter wants to move the woman with whom he is having an affair into the same house as Hannah! How dare Hannah point out that her husband's mistress is his niece!
When Hannah's husband brought John Monro (the most famous mad doctor in England) into the home, Hannah had the nerve to actually run! But was captured, place under house arrest and dragged her off to a mad house where she was jailed and tortured!
This kind of unspeakable injustice was common in the 17th century and illustrates the evil beginnings of psychiatry. Remember, this did not only happen to wives, but by any one who was the target of a grudge and a sum of money!
"The surviving trial affidavits for the Mackenzie case, which have recently been admirably surveyed by Elizabeth Foyster, make it clear that this confinement was essentially about a marital conflict between Hannah and her husband, Peter. Indeed, Foyster's account suggests that, through their involvement in madhouse confinements, mad-doctors like Battie and Monro may have become, at times, complacent or perhaps unwitting tools, assisting errant husbands who sought to control their "deviant," unruly wives. As she shows, Peter Mackenzie initiated the confinement after attempting to make Hannah's niece (with whom he was having an adulterous affair) mistress of the household, and he seems to have felt he "had a right to treat his wife in that way." When Hannah refused to comply with his demands, his introduction of Dr. Battie into the home understandably provoked Hannah's flight. The ensuing home confinement under the supervision of a female keeper evidently specializing in the care of the insane entailed the customary methods of restraint, such as locking her in her room, battening down the windows, and straitjacketing her when she tried to escape—a recourse that Hannah claimed caused her "violent pain" and profuse bleeding. Days later, the unfortunate woman was conveyed to Peter Day's Paddington mad-house, from which she escaped with the aid of John Sherratt ("a lawyer and well-known campaigner against private madhouses") and others only to find her husband retaliating by issuing a writ of habeas corpus against them." (Undertaker of the mind: John Monro, Jonathan Andrews, Andrew Scull, 2001 AD, p 171)

G. The case of William Norris: Poor thrown into Bedlam

Here is a very sane normal man who was able to read books and the daily newspaper and have an intelligent conversation with government legislators.
"In one of the cells on the lower gallery [at Beldam] we saw William Norris; he stated himself to be 55 years of age, and that he had been confined about 14 years; that in consequence of attempting to defend himself from what he conceived the improper treatment of his keeper, he was fastened by a long chain, which passing through a partition, enabled the keeper by going into the next cell, to draw him close to the wall at pleasure; that to prevent this, Norris muffled the chain with straw, so as to hinder its passing through the wall; that he afterwards was confined in the manner we saw him, namely, a stout iron ring was rivetted round his neck, from which a short chain passed to a ring made to slide upwards or downwards on an upright massive iron bar, more than six feet high, inserted into the wall. Round his body a strong iron bar about two inches wide was rivetted; on each side of the bar was a circular projection, which being fashioned to and inclosing each of his arms, pinioned them close to his sides. This waist bar was secured by two similar bars which, passing over his shoulders, were rivetted to the waist bar both before and behind. The iron ring round his neck was connected to the bars on his shoulders, by a double link. From each of these bars another short chain passed to the ring on the upright iron bar. We were informed he was able to raise himself, so as to stand against the wall, on the pillow of his bed in the trough bed in which he lay; but it is impossible for him to advance from the wall in which the iron bar is soldered, on account of the shortness of his chains, which were only twelve inches long. It was, I conceive, equally out of his power to repose in any other position than on his back, the projections which on each side of the waist bar enclosed his arms, rendering it impossible for him to lie on his side, even if the length of the chains from his neck and shoulders would permit it. His right leg was chained to the trough; in which he had remained thus encaged and chained more than twelve years. To prove the unnecessary restraint inflicted on this unfortunate man, he informed us that he had for some years been able to withdraw his arms from the manacles which encompassed them. He then withdrew one of them, and observing an expression of surprise, he said, that when his arms were withdrawn he was compelled to rest them on the edges of the circular projections, which was more painful than keeping them within. His position, we were informed, was mostly lying down, and that as it was inconvenient to raise himself and stand upright, he very seldom did so; that he read a great deal of books of all kinds, history, lives or anything that the keepers could get him; the newspaper every day, and conversed perfectly coherent on the passing topics and the events of the war, in which he felt particular interest. On each day that we saw him he discoursed coolly, and gave rational and deliberate answers to the different questions put to him. The whole of this statement relative to William Norris was confirmed by the keepers." (Report From The Committee On Madhouses In England, 1815 AD, Testimony of A. Mr. E. Wakefield)

H. The case of false committal of Alexander Cruden

In 1738 AD, Alexander Cruden, who published Cruden's Concordance in 1735, was committed to Bedlam asylum. Cruden's problems began with his parents putting him into an asylum when he experienced a broken heart over love at a young age. This labeled him a mad man for life and was the primary reason for his second false committal to an asylum. Later in life, when his amorous advances were rejected by another woman, he was committed to Bedlam. This "psychiatric history" over love lost, was only one problem. Other reason he got committed, was that the mad doctors of Cruden's time, like James Monro, and his son John, viewed Christians as mentally ill, even preventing them from entering asylums for fear of making the patient even more insane by the visit! When he got out of Bedlam, Cruden sued James Monro for "false imprisonment for nine weeks and six days at five pounds an hour, being £8280, and the assault and other damages at £1720." At the time of his second committal, Cruden worked as a type corrector, which is where he got his nick name, "Alexander the Corrector". He cleverly spiritualized his job title as the name that designated his job as a Christian to "correct the sins of the people". Cruden viewed himself as a Christian whose responsibility under God involved pointing out the sins of England. That, of course is every Christian's job, even though few have the gut or boldness or faith to actually do such. No doubt he was annoying to many sinners and this is why he was cast into the asylum. A final reason for his committal, was the work he was doing in producing his "Cruden's Bible Concordance" three years earlier in 1735. Mad doctors of the time, believed that madness was caused by these three things: 1. overworking the brain with meticulous work. 2. concentrating on a single matter for a long time. 3. too much study late at night. Exactly what is required to produce a concordance. Cruden's assessment of the psychiatric industry is shockingly applicable to what we see today in chemical psychiatry: "tho' a person be not a conjuror he may set up to be a mad-doctor, the chief prescriptions being bleeding, purging, vomiting, and sometimes bathing: And if these are not effectual . . . the patient is incurable. . . . What is Dr. Monro? A mad-doctor; and pray what great matter is that? What can mad-doctors do? prescribe purging physic, letting of blood, a vomit, cold bath, and a regular diet? How many incurables are there? ... physicians . are often poor helps; and if they mistake the distemper, which is not seldom the case, they do a deal of mischief."
So Cruden had four reasons that all worked against him in getting a sane man committed to Bedlam: 1. parents wrongly labeling him at an early age as a mental patient over love lost. 2. he was a Christian who annoyed people by pointing out their sins. 3. his work in producing the concordance was believed to actually cause madness. 4. His reputation of love lost making him go insane. All four of these came together when he got dumped by a widow named Mrs. Payne, who was probably the instigator in all these matters behind the scenes over fears relating to the reason he was first committed by his parents. (Account of the Unparalleled Case of a Citizen of London, Alexander Cruden, 1738 AD)

H. The case of "Waterfall"

A woman who hates her husband goes insane but is cured by torture through water boarding.
Here is the machine that was used by Dr. Blair in 1725 AD to cure the schizophrenia of an adulterous wife who hated her husband and wanted to leave him.
She was strapped naked and blindfolded into the machine and huge amounts of water were poured on her head from 30 feet in the air.
She finally agree to go home and sleep with her husband and was proclaimed cured!

Conclusion:

Historically, there were women whose behaviours were so out of control that their genuinely loving husbands got them committed to mental hospitals thinking this was would fix their wife. He was mistaken. When a husband tried to get his wife committed to a mental hospital because she is "out of submission", naggy, bothersome or unwanted, it should have been viewed as a crime. You married her, live with it. She is your cross to bear!
Modern laws on committal were developed to prevent this historic injustice from happening. Today a person can only be committed if he is a physical danger to himself or others but even this is illegal.
In fact there is no reason why a person should ever be committed against their will to an asylum:

If they are danger to others or themselves, no law has been broken.
If they harm others, send them to a real jail.
If they harm or kill themselves, they have the legal freedom to do so.

Chemical psychiatrists have created their own "kangaroo court", where they alone possess the power to arrest and jail the insane and circumvent the criminal law altogether. On one hand psychiatrists alone decide, without any scientific evidence, that the insane are incapable of giving consent for medical treatment and are not accountable for their actions. On the other hand, psychiatrists alone define what behaviours are labeled a mental illness in the DSM-5. All psychiatric committals are a sham legal proceeding where psychiatrists are the lawmaker who defines insanity, the witness who gives his opinion on who is insane, the jury who renders the verdict, and the judge who signs the committal order. None of this happens in court. A psychiatrist has the power to commit you against your will if he merely forms an opinion, based upon his sole judgement. Psychiatrists label some but not all delusional thinking as schizophrenic. Once labeled "schizophrenic" a person is deemed incapable of giving medical consent based upon the opinion of the same psychiatrist. The truth is that "schizophrenics" clearly and forcefully refuse consent by bolding saying: "I do not want to be treated by psychiatrists and be locked up in an asylum... leave me alone to live my life how I choose." Psychiatric committal without consent, is therefore always illegal when it doesn't involve crimes, with real judges, trials and juries. When crimes are involved, we already have jails. Insanity is not a disease, it is a behaviour.
Even if the myth that schizophrenia is a medical condition (instead of behaviour) were true, it is illegal to force medical treatment on someone against their will.

A doctor who forces treatment or drugs a non-consenting person who knows they are sick will go to jail even if it saves their life.
A psychiatrist who commits someone who is suicidal to an asylum and force drugs them is guilty of a double crime.
Psychiatric committal is without exception, a violation of the criminal code and doctor-patient ethics.

By Steve Rudd: Contact the author for comments, input or corrections.

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