Historic Site: The Public Hospital of 1773

The first American hospital devoted exclusively to treating the mentally ill. The Public Hospital of Williamsburg (also known as Eastern State Hospital or Eastern Lunatic Asylum) was first proposed to the Virginia House of Burgesses by Francis Fauquier in 1766 and admitted its first patient on October 12, 1773. Changes in how the British public perceived mental illness and political and economic goals within the colony drove Virginia leaders to establish this institution.