(By our London Correspondent)
Sir Charles Batho, Lord Mayor of London, attended in state the opening ceremony of the additions to the London Jewish Hospital completed in 1927. Dr. Goodman Levy, the Chairman of the hospital, in opening the proceedings, recalled that for the additions to the hospital they were largely indebted to Mr. Bernhard Baron. It was at a time of difficulty in the history of the hospital that Mr. Baron had come forward and promised to give them £ 10,000. It was when Mr. Baron was still long series of his great gifts to hospitals and other charities. The London Jewish Hospital was proud that it was one of his earliest choices.
Mr. Baron had made a stipulation that others should give sums equal to his own, and as a result the hospital had raised £ 50,000 towards which Mr. Baron had given £ 15,000. Mr. James de Rothschild, the Chairman of the Appeal Committee, had been largely instrumental in obtaining this successful result. The new buildings include four new wards with 44 beds, a children’s ward with 12 cots, 5 separate rooms for accidents and casualties, an X ray and artificial sunlight department, which was one of the finest of its kind in London, and accommodation for 35 extra nurses.
Dr. Levy welcomed Lord Knutstord, the Chairman of the London Hospital near by, who, he said, had come to bury a hatchet which never existed.
The Lord Mayor opened the building and the Chief Rabbi Dr. J. H. Hertz offered up a prayer.
Mr. James de Rothschild thanked the Lord Mayor and Sheriffs for thus associating themselves with this Jewish undertaking. “Ever since the days of Cromwell,” he said, “the Jews had played an honorable part in the City of London, from the days when the first synagogue was built in the City, two years after the return of the Jews.” He recalled that the first Jewish member returned to Parliament had been his greatgrand-uncle, Baron Lionel de Rothschild, who was returned by the City. He also recalled that when St. Paul’s Cathedral needed reconstruction the Jews in and outside the City had helped in raising the fund. The Lord Mayor, Mr. de Rothschild said, embodied a great tradition. The Jews were a people which lived by tradition. Today a new link had been forged in the great tradition of friendship between the City and Anglo-Jewry. This hospital made no distinction between creeds. Since its inception over 30 per cent, of the patients were non-Jews. He recalled the humble way in which the hospital had begun, with a small band of earnest, East-End Jews, headed by the late Mr. Berliner.
Lord Knutsford said Mr. de Rothschild had remarked that the Jews exist because of tradition. He thought they exist because when they are ill they are treated well. If they were not helped to get well there wouldn’t be much tradition left. He appealed to Jewish girls to take up nursing.
The Lord Mayor recalled that the list of the restoration fund for st. Paul’s had been headed by that great Jew, Lord Bearsted. There always had existed a close connection between the City and the Jewish community. They had always realized that no Lord Mayor should make any distinction between creeds. He had been very glad to hear that non-Jewish patients were treated in this hospital in such large numbers.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
