Hospital commissioners purchase land

Sunday, January 1, 1832

In 1832, an Act of Parliament named a commission to "superintend and manage the erection and completion of a hospital in or near the town of Kingston.” This news could not have come at a more opportune time, as the region was hit hard that same year by an outbreak of cholera.

The hospital commissioners bought 6 acres of land from Reverend George Okill Stuart, who subsequently became Archdeacon Stuart. To commemorate his involvement in the origins of the hospital, five streets close to the hospital were named after him: Arch, Deacon, George, Okill, and Stuart. All but one of these streets is in existence today; Deacon Street was closed off as a road in 1999 to make way for the Queen’s University BioSciences Complex and changed into a walkway.

Construction began on the hospital building in 1833 and ended in 1835.