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Two women’s deaths in 1825 snowstorm led to Dublin’s Coombe Hospital
The Coombe Hospital in Dublin was founded after two women died trying to reach the city’s only maternity hospital during a snowstorm in 1825. Their deaths prompted Margaret Boyle to help establish a maternity hospital in the Liberties, giving poor women closer access to care and, over 200 years, contributing to more than 743,000 deliveries.
The Coombe opened in 1826, supported by Boyle’s £100 founding gift and a bequest of rents from two Merrion Square houses. Childbirth remained difficult and often unsafe: many women delivered at home with little equipment or pain relief, alongside customs rooted in superstition. In 1967, Bernadette Dunne’s daughter Louise became the first baby born at the hospital’s new site.
In short
- Two deaths in a 1825 snowstorm helped inspire the Coombe Hospital.
- Margaret Boyle’s support enabled the hospital to open in 1826.
- The Coombe has recorded more than 743,000 deliveries.
Read the full article at the source →
Originally published by Daily Mail as “Over 200 years ago, two women died in a snow storm on the way to the Rotunda… giving rise to The Coombe and some 740,000 deliveries since including one mother who had 21 babies…”.