The Royal Maternity Hospital, Belfast. Fifty glorious years 1933-1983. Presidential address to the Ulster Medical Society, 20th October 1983.

THE hospital from which the Royal Maternity evolved was conceived 140 years before at a meeting in the Linen Hall on 23rd December 1793 by a group of 180 ladies who called themselves "The Humane Female Society for the Relief of Lyingin-Women". After a short gestational period of 11 days the first Belfast Lying-in Hospital was born on 4th January 1794. It was a house No. 25 Donegall Street rented for 12 guineas per annum and contained six beds. After 35 years, due to deplorable conditions, the hospital moved in August 1830 to Clifton Street opposite the Charitable Institution. Here it was to remain for 74 years before moving to Townsend Street where the new Incorporated Belfast Maternity Hospital was built with 26 beds. This hospital, later occupied by Melville Ltd, a firm of undertakers,