Convict medical service which became a district hospital as transportation ended and the population expanded. Further demands saw the services absorbed by Westmead Hospital.
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Parramatta's General Hospital for convicts was located on Marsden Street overlooking the Parramatta River from 1789 to 1818. Initially two thatched sheds that were known as the Tent Hospital, these were replaced in 1792 by a Brick Hospital. However, conditions continued to be woefully inadequate and led to the construction of a third hospital for convicts, the Colonial Hospital, on the same site in 1818.
At the request of Governor Macquarie, a new convict hospital was built at Parramatta and opened in 1818. Designed by John Watts, the building was based on a military hospital and proved grossly inadequate: only half the expected number of patients could be treated there, men and women were placed side-by-side, and diseases such as dysentery, tuberculosis and syphilis were rife. The hospital officially closed on 31 March 1848, reopening as Parramatta District Hospital in June the same year and bringing the era of convict healthcare to a close.
