The hens scratch happily around, unaware
that they are in the midst of the Orchard
smallpox hospital. Picture taken after 1904
— but not much after.

than: ‘the Farm continues to supply all the mutton, pork, milk, eggs, poultry and
vegetables required for the needs of the hospital’ so scrutiny of the farm
performance may not have been too exacting. Several disastrous years seem to
have passed by without adverse comment from the Guildhall. Take 1938. ‘The
period ended the 31st December 1938 proved to be the worst year for farming in
this district that any farmer of long residence can recall to memory. During the
first six months of the year the rainfall was only 5.63 inches. The only crop that
was satisfactory was the corn crop.’ A reminder that Dartford is in a low rainfall
area and noteworthy that they had a rain gauge, but regrettably the site and
records of the gauge have not been located.
Wartime inevitably brought changes due to rationing, but one welcome bonus
came in 1943 when the MS reported that 58 geese were available, ‘consequently a
most satisfactory Christmas dinner was supplied to both patients and staff’.
Presumably geese did not count as part of the meat ration, unlike pork.
The farm was sold in the 19505 after the NHS took over in 1948, but happily to
Dartford Council, who have converted it to a working farm open to the public and
much appreciated by a wide range of visitors. A few gnarled old fruit trees on the
hillside are all that remain of the orchard that in 1939, only a year after the disaster
of 1938, produced a record apple crop. Extra hands from staff and wives were
called in to gather the crop but no patients . . . they might have tried to jump off
the ladders!
Finally, the Burroughs Wellcome Materia Medica Farm (BW) operated from 1904
to 1947 and was devoted to the growing of various medicinal plants both on its
own land near Temple Hill and by contracting out to farmers in the neighbour-
hood. At some time or other five different herbs were cultivated: henbane,
belladonna, thornapple, foxglove and aconite. Little evidence of these now
remains except belladonna (deadly nightshade) which is quite common on waste
land nearby, and thornapple (Datura stramonium) has occasionally appeared, for
its seeds can survive years in the ground.
The only herb now grown commercially is foxglove (Digitalis /anata) which is not
native to England and all trace of it has disappeared from around BW’s works at Temple Hill, but it is still grown commercially for BW in Holland, to whose climate
it is better suited. Now most of the farm land is built on and the drugs, except
digitalis (c//Qgox/'n), made synthetically; but-~ for over forty years this unique farm
flourished near Dartford and was perhaps the most unusual of the cluster of in-
stitutional farms in the district.
But it was with our native purple foxglove (D. purpurea) that the modern story
began as Erasmus Darwin, Charles Darwin's grandfather, put it poetically in 1785:
‘The foxglove leaves, with caution given
Another proof of favouring heaven
Will happily display,
The rapid pulse it can ablate,
The hectic flush can moderate
And, blest by Him whose will is fate,
May give a lengthened day.‘
Note: Acknowledgements to Gordon Rundall for valued help with the section on the
Materia Medica Farm of Burroughs, Wellcome & Co. and to the Library 8taff at Joyce
Green Hospital for much appreciated assistance. The author's more detailed article on
Joyce Green Hospital Farm was published in ‘Bygone Kent’ Vol. 13 No. 2.
THE RACING COUNT
The Life of Louis Zborowski of Higham
By P.G. Elgar
On 19th October 1924 the villagers of Bridge were stunned to hear of the death
of one of their most prominent residents. Count Louis Zborowski, legendary
racing driver and one of the most colourful characters of his generation, had
been competing in the Italian Grand Prix at Monza. His supercharged Mercedes
left the track and hit a tree. He was four months short of his 30th birthday.
The Zborowski family's connection with Bridge began many years earlier.
Louis‘ father, Count Eliot Zborowski, a Polish aristocrat, became a naturalized
British subject. He married an American millionairess, granddaughter of wealtilwy
John Jacob Astor the First. Her family owned much property in Manhattan apd
elsewhere. The Zborowskis had a family seat at Burton Lazars, Leicestershire,
and a London house. Louis Vorow was born on 20th February 1895.