A History of Healing: Chelsea Heritage Quarter Short Course

Join us at Chelsea Heritage Quarter for our short course exploring the history of healing and medicine through the collections of our partner heritage sites.

About the event

About the course

From medicinal plants to developments in battlefield care, Chelsea’s history offers a distinctive perspective on the ways we understand and practise medicine.

Join historian Dr Emily Mayhew and a Chelsea Physic Garden guide for a day of learning across Chelsea Heritage Quarter’s three partner institutions. Combining a lecture with guided tours, this course explores the connections between medical knowledge, innovation and care, and considers what the experiences of the past can teach us today.

Chelsea Physic Garden was founded in 1673 for the study of medicinal plants. The Royal Hospital Chelsea has provided a home and care for Army veterans since 1692, while the National Army Museum’s collections reveal the history of military medicine and the people who shaped it. Together, these institutions offer a rich setting in which to explore the history of healing.

Opening Lecture:

Listening to the Past: how today’s most pressing medical problems have their solutions in our history with Dr. Emily Mayhew.

The lecture examines how historical medical challenges can help modern clinicians understand current problems, including antimicrobial resistance and battlefield medicine. Drawing on examples from the First World War, the NHS, and contemporary conflicts, Dr Mayhew explores how historical solutions continue to inform modern medicine.

Your day:

10:00 AM: Opening lecture at the Royal Hospital Chelsea
Listening to the Past: how today’s most pressing medical problems have their solutions in our history. Dr Emily Mayhew explores how historical medical challenges can inform our understanding of the problems facing clinicians today, from antimicrobial resistance to the treatment of battlefield injuries.

Drawing on examples from the First World War, the NHS and contemporary conflicts, she examines how people responded to urgent medical needs, how treatments developed and why these experiences remain relevant. Her lecture brings together archival research and her work with civilian and military clinicians to consider the place of history in medicine’s future.

12:30 PM – 13:30 PM: History of Medicine Gallery Tour at the National Army Museum
Continue with Dr Mayhew on a guided gallery tour exploring the history of military medicine through the museum’s collections. Discover how the treatment and care of soldiers have changed over time, and how the challenges of conflict have influenced medical innovation.

3:00 PM: Medicinal plants tour at Chelsea Physic Garden

The day concludes with a guided tour of Chelsea Physic Garden. Explore the historical uses of medicinal plants and the Garden’s role in the study of medicine since 1673, tracing the connections between botanical knowledge and the development of healthcare.

Who is the course for?

This course is open to anyone interested in history, medicine, plants or Chelsea’s heritage. No previous knowledge of the subject is required. With a maximum of 20 participants, it offers an opportunity to explore these connected histories in a small group.

 

Additional information

The course begins at the Royal Hospital Chelsea and continues at the National Army Museum before finishing at Chelsea Physic Garden. It includes visits to all three venues and time outdoors in the Garden.

Book your place

About the speaker

Dr Emily Mayhew is a military medical historian specialising in the study of severe casualty, its infliction, treatment and long-term outcomes in 20th and 21st century warfare. She is historian in residence in the Department of Bioengineering at Imperial College London, and author of ‘Wounded: From Battlefield to Blight 1914-1918’, which was shortlisted for the Wellcome Prize 2014.