West Bar Surgery Opened in 1872 When Dr Boissier Practised from Shrublands, No 3 West Bar

A History of West Bar Surgery – prepared by Brian Owen, member of the Patient Participation Group and the Editor of the Surgery Newsletter & Website.

West Bar Surgery began with a Dr Arthur Boissier in 1872, he was a hard-working doctor and he lived in the red brick Victorian house with the address of Shrublands, 3 West Bar Street, Banbury, Oxon, which is the red brick house by the DVSA Test Centre. He lived in the entire house, and had a tiny annexe in which he saw patients, he had a groom and a gardener who had cottages in the' garden, and stables for his horses and his trap. Many of his visits, of course, were done on horseback, or by horse and trap.

Dr Arthur Boissier was a single handed GP and Bloxham School medical officer, many of his visits were done on horseback, or by horse and trap. One of his relatives, the Rev. Frederick Scobell Boissier, was the second Headmaster of Bloxham School from 1886-1898, and so there is a very long connection between West Bar Surgery and Bloxham School.

The social life in Banbury at the time the practice was initiated was mid-Victorian. As the practice grew all the formalities were observed, as far as the medical profession was concerned, e.g. a junior partner’s wife was expected to call on the senior partner’s wife and leave a card, with the normal custom of turning the corner down to indicate that she was a new arrival; the senior wife would then visit her or invite her to tea.
Sunday was still a Victorian Sabbath, this being a town with a very strong Quaker tradition and consequently the social life of Banbury was really fairly strict. On market day the country folk used to come into town, a lot of them with their produce, usually on privately owned buses which were based in their villages.

1908 Dr Neville Penrose and Dr Faulkner bought the practice from Dr Arthur Boissier.

Dr Penrose kept horses, sometimes rode to hounds, and occasionally visited patients on horseback, or on a very high bicycle:

Over the years a succession of doctors joined the practice, being attracted to the very high standards there.

1925 During the 1914 to 1918 war Dr CJ “Jimmy” Wells had been a dental officer. He came from a family of Plymouth brethren. Jimmy Wells, as he was always known, achieved his medical
qualifications after the war, left the army Dental Corps and joined Dr Penrose at West Bar Surgery.

1932 West Bar Surgery had a small purpose-built consulting suite with an operating theatre and dressing room between; two consulting rooms, a dispensary, small office, urine testing room and waiting room, an X-ray room and X-ray apparatus.

Dr Wilfred Hudson had experience of radiology and started the X-ray department at the Horton where he eventually became the consultant radiologist.

The partners ran a club for the poorer patients whereby they paid a modest sum each week and in return received any medical advice, treatment and medicines they required. The "Practice" really survived on a sort of "Robin Hood" system whereby those who could afford paid adequate fees subsidising those who could not. It may be of interest that the top asking fee in Banbury was ten shillings and sixpence and in a village such as Turweston or Kineton two guineas.

Although the Practice did not have a "manager" in name it employed for many years a wonderful woman by name Miss Savage, always referred to by Dr. Well as "La Belle Savage", designated as the Dispenser as West Bar Surgery did all its own dispensing until the start of the NHS in 1948.
Miss Savage, a martinet by nature not only "did" the dispensing but with the aid of a young girl took and dealt with all the incoming telephone and other calls, ensured that they were dealt with and in addition managed the total finances of the partnership telling us when there was sufficient money in the bank for "a divide"! In addition Miss Savage kept all the patients accounts and the partners would meet at 11am on the first Sunday each quarter when she would present the ledgers and patients accounts all ready to be posted, they all disliked this particular Sunday each quarter when the affair continued until about 6pm with an hour's interval for lunch. sometimes the exhortations to the bad payers such as Please Remit, ASWOB (a settlement will oblige). One long overdue account owed by a thought to be well off hunting country gentleman had had all the usual messages to no avail when Dr. Penrose wrote on his account "Hope you get a winner soon" which produced the necessary cheque within a week. Mrs. Penrose helped the West Bar on these occasions by addressing envelopes.

1939 Dr CJ “Jimmy” Wells was 45 years old, too old to re-join the army but he did re-enlist in spite of everything. He joked that he had to keep his cap on so nobody saw how bald he was, and he had his knee massaged before he went to his interview, so that they couldn’t see how stiff that was! He was accepted as a Captain Regimental Medical Officer to the 63rd Anti-tank Regiment which was an Oxfordshire unit. He was sent out to Belgium in the autumn of 1944, after the bridgehead was firmly established and somebody then discovered how old he was. He was obviously too old for a Regimental Medical Officer and so he was pulled back to Montgomery’s rear army headquarters. As he was going on home leave to the UK, Capt. Jimmy Wells was ordered to report to the Police Headquarters. Capt. Wells was to recall that, "Police Headquarters was an odd place to be wanted urgently at 10 o'clock at night”. He was met by Sgt Maj Edwin Austin who, after going through the usual process of identification, asked if he knew why he had been sent for, but Capt. Wells had no idea. He was ordered to examine the prisoner Reichsfuhrer SS Heinrich Himmler, the second most powerful man in the Nazi Reich, It was close to midnight on 23rd May 1945 when Himmler bit down on the cyanide capsule hidden in his mouth, it was all over, and Capt. Jimmy Wells’s was the last face seen by Reichsfuhrer SS Heinrich Himmler. After the war Dr Jimmy Wells did not come back to West Bar but went for a while into practice in Oxford. He didn’t settle down so went then to the Radcliffe Infirmary and became the first medical officer to the nurses and medical students there. He did this until he was 70 when he was pensioned off, after which he joined one of the oil companies as a ship’s doctor on an oil tanker. Not satisfied with this he came back ashore, studied for holy orders and became a priest when he was 84.

1946 The junior partner was expected to live over the Surgery, and this was more hard work than many people would realise today. The junior partner and his wife lived above the surgery where the flat upstairs had 6 bedrooms. They were entirely responsible for the surgery, for manning the telephone, taking messages, for repeated ringing of the front doorbell, and also both handing out all the medicines and pills which people continually came for out of surgery hours; in fact, there was no question of discipline in patients, they had to be encouraged in case they left and went to the opposition, because there was strong competition among doctors in those days. The surgery staff were only there from 9-00.a.m. until 12-00.noon, 2-00.p.m. until 4-00.p.m. and 6-00.p.m. until 8-00.p.m. Week-ends, public holidays and out of hours, the doctor and his wife had to man the place. The partnership gave the doctors a servant allowance, as long as they could find one, and when they went on holiday they had to find someone to live in and take on these duties.

1967 the bulldozers moved into Shrublands, what was then Dr Gilchrist’s garden, it was time to move out. That marked the end of an era in which the Junior Partner was expected to live in the flat over the practice premises.

A new state of the art West Bar Surgery was built in the garden of the old practice, and conveniently took the unused number, 1 West Bar, it was the pride and joy of the senior partners who had helped designed and create it.

When the building was opened it was felt that they had moved into an enormous palace.

But by the early 1970's they were beginning to feel that there were certain areas where they had under-estimated their needs.

1971 Dr Gilchrist was appointed as clinical assistant in the Chest clinic when Richard Adam came, he did mainly follow-up and he & Dr Gilchrist agreed on a discharge policy for old treated TB patients. In the past they had been kept on forever. The result was that he started with about 25 patients in a clinic and ended up after about 3 years with two.

Dr Robert Gilchrist decided that he would like to get in to teaching and took the MRCGP and passed, was made College tutor and in 1972 set up the vocational training scheme, and then ran it for the next 20 years.

1976 Computerisation was still a thing of the future so everything was done by hand, including writing prescriptions and making appointments, and of course all letters were typed on typewriters!

The partnership at this time consisted of seven male doctors. The surgery itself was relatively new but had already been extended upwards to accommodate the Health Visitors. Having a treatment room staffed by nurses was still a relatively new concept at the time. The work expanded into the space so it wasn’t long before they needed to start thinking of expanding again. Being a training practice was always a stimulus to keep up to date. The surgery was at the forefront of GP education and development in the area.

The Partners started clinical meetings every Wednesday at 8 a.m. This “journal club” was the means of keeping each other well informed of new developments and made a major contribution to patient care.

1980 West Bar Surgery was the first surgery in the area to employ a Practice Manager, Mrs Kathleen Robinson. When she started there were seven partners and one Trainee (now called Registrars), as West Bar was considered a very innovative Training Practice.

There were no Christian names used at this time at the surgery – it was always “Mrs Robinson”; however after a few years this became a friendlier “Mrs R”, but the doctors were never called by their Christian names, Dr Tasker was the first who wanted to be known by his first name, so was called “Dr John.

Mrs Robinson was responsible for the complete running of the practice, together with the Partners. she did all the administration as well as all the finances and I was responsible for liaising with the bank manager, and the accountants, as well as the FPC, as it was known then, she had to keep up to date with all the changes in legislation in all areas of the NHS, including Employment Law which meant having Contracts for all members of staff which had to be agreed and signed.

When she began in 1980 the staff were paid in cash, weekly! That had to be changed as soon as possible, but needed the co-operation of all the staff, some of whom hated to make any changes, Salaries were worked out on the Kalamazoo system – very upmarket then, there was 44 staff at that time, including Treatment Room Nurses, plus attached staff.
Computerisation was still a thing of the future so everything was done by hand, including writing prescriptions and making appointments, and of course all letters were typed on typewriters! When the computers were first introduced into the reception area, all the receptionists felt that their jobs would disappear, as they would be “a paperless practice” and there would be no need for filing into the A4 folders which took up so much room in the reception area.

1983 by this time space was getting a bit tight so a second new extension was added to 1 West Bar, the opening of new extension was on Monday 5th July 1983.

People attending:

Lady Williams, Mr Roy Wilkins - Retired Administrator of the FPC, Mr Peter Target - Present Administrator of the FPC, Mrs J Tewson - Nursing Officer, Mr Malcolm Gate - Consultant Obstetrician and Gynaecologist (Horton General)

Building People involved:

David Gregory - Architect for Keevil & Gregory Architects, Alan Gage - Director of Simcock & Usher (Builders) Stuart Williamson - Accountant for Dr Gilchrist & Partners, Frank Rayner - Bank Manager, National Westminster Bank PLC.

Doctors within the area:

Dr D Hyslop - Windrush Surgery, Dr G J Biggam - Horsefair Surgery, Dr Veronica Fisher - Hightown Surgery, Dr P H Middleton - Byfield Surgery, Dr L Sharma - Romney Road Surgery, Dr Irene Mawby - Cropredy Surgery, Dr H F O'Donnell – Deddington, Dr George Mason - Orchard Health Centre Present Partners, Dr Robert and Elisabeth Gilchrist (Senior Partner), Dr Michael and Hilary Aldous, Dr Jamie and Rosie Martin, Dr David and Nikki Baugh, Dr Brendan and Sarah O'Farrell, Dr Roger and Gill Shapley, Dr John and Carol Tasker.

Past Partners:

Dr Ken and Mary Kilpatrick, Dr Pat and Brab Hewlings, Dr John and Judy Long.

Employed Staff:

Kathleen Robinson and John - Practice Manager, Janet Baker – Receptionist, Sarah Blackwell – Receptionist, Betty Brown – Receptionist, Diane Coleman – Receptionist, Kay Eleanor – Secretary, Mary Martin - Filing Clerk and Receptionist, Jean Matthews – Receptionist, Gillian Park – Receptionist, June Reddy - Staff Liaison Officer and Receptionist, Doreen Russon – Receptionist, Gladys Swepson - Registration Clerk and Receptionist, Ivy Vinall – Secretary, June Smith – Receptionist.

Nurses - Sisters in Treatment Room:

Wendy Andrews, Margaret Gray (Senior Sister), Paddy Mills (Senior Sister), Beth Perham, Judith Thomas.

Attached Staff District Nurses:

Jenny Attkins, Marjorie Harris, Gay Hayward, June Herbert.