Mental Illness and the quest for Mental Health in Natal and Zululand

463 Pages·2016·13.71 MB·English

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States of Mind:
Mental illness and the quest foYr
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mental health in Natal and Zululand,
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1868-1918
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Julie Parle
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A dissertation submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of
DoctoCr of Philosophy in History at the University ofKwaZulu-Natal
January 2004 -
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! I declare
that this dissertation has not been submitted to any other university
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that it is my entirely own w_ork
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that I have·given due acknowledgement of all sources.
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Supervisor
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Copyright by
Julie Parle
2004
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For
Steve Terry
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honour ofm y parents
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Judy Parle and Geoff Parle
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and
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in B
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memory ofmy grandmother
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Florence lvy Jackson (1906-1989)

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
ABSTRACT viii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ix
LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES xiii
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INTRODUCTION 1
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Mental illness, mental health, and the 'three sectors of healing' 7
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Psychiatrists, alienists and asylums 12
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Asylums in Africa: the creation of a colonial psycIhiatry 18
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The limits to psychiatry in Natal and Zululan d, 1868-1918 23
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Sources and Structure A 28
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CHAPTERl
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'Consistent with humanity itselr: ldeas of insanity in the nineteenth 33
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and early twentieth centuries
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Lunacy, law and liberalism in colonial Natal 33
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The Natal Custody ofLunatics Law, No. 1 of 1868 43
Mental health legislation in South Africa, 1868-1914 4 7
Minds over Matter: mental illness and the professionalization
of psychiatry 53
Body and mind: gender, class and race in Western psychiatry 67
States of mind: African and Indian therapeutic traditions 81
Conclusions: A plurality of paradigms 103
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CHAPTER2
The Fools on the Hill: The Institutionalisation of Insanity 107
in Natal and Zululand, 1860-1910
The Ambiguities of Asylum 109
'That miserable place': accommodating insanity, 1860-1880 118
'The Fools on the Hill': Dr. James Hyslop and the 'Red House', 1882-1909
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'The Fools on the Hill': Patients
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Race and Gender in the Admissions, 1864-1909 146
Prognosis: Recoveries, Discharges and Deaths, 1880-1909 153
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Aetiologies of mental illness, 1895-1909 159
Diagnoses, 1879-1909: Wild women aBnd melancholic men? 168
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Conclusions: Monster Asylums? L 174

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Witches, spirits, and hystSeria: the limits of colonial psychiatry 180
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Expressions ofpsychological distress 180
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Witchcraft or Madness? : The 'amandiki nuisance' of Zululand, 1894-1914 187
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Healing and conflict: lndiki, spirits and witches 201
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Madness, hysterical women, and protest 216
Conclusions: the possession of multiple meanings 226
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In Their Own Rands:. The Search for Solace Beyond the Asylnm Walls 229
The search for solace 230
Care in the community 236
'Dangerous to himself or others?' 246
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Home from home? 255
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'Delay breeds ruination ....W rite immediately and do no! be afraid':
the popular sector and the commercialization of cures A 265
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Conclusions: In their own hands 277
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CHAPTER5
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Deàth in Black and White: RaceI, suicide and the colonial state 280
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'This painful subject' 281
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Indians, mental illness Eand medicine in colonial Natal 289
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'The result ofthese enquiries proved beyond doubt that no blame
could be attacOhed to anyone but the Indians themselves': Indian
suicide and the colonial state in Natal 299
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'A taboo surrounded by silence': Suicide amongst Africans in Natal
and Zululand 323
'The Burden ofCivilization': Suicide and whiteness 331
Conclusions: Death in black and white 340
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CHAPTER6
The A-Z of Asylum Medicine and Management: 345
the Pietermaritzburg Mental Hospital and South African
Psychiatry, 1910-1918
'The whole scheme is inter-dependent - no part can be doue without another': 354
from lunacy to mental disorders, the establishment of a South African asylum
system
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The 'A-Z of Mental Disease and Asylum Administration': 381
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the Pietermaritzburg Mental Hospital, 1910-1918
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'The Night Long Song of a Hundred Mad Natives': R 395
The mad in the midst of Pietermaritzburg
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Conclusions: Professionals and the positioning ofI 410
South African psychiatry, 1910-1918 L

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CONCLUSIONS R 415
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BIBLIOGRAPHY 428
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ABSTRACT
ln KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, many of those who search for salace from mental
illness draw on one or more of the three vigorous therapeutic traditions of healing to
which the region is heir. Western psychiatry and its formai institutions have a long
history in this region: in 1868, the Colony ofNatal passed southern Africa's first 'lunacy
legislation'; and in 1880, the Natal Government Asylum was opened on the Town Hill,
Pietermaritzburg. Although founded on the precepts of nineteenth century liberalism, by
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1910, the Pietermaritzburg Mental Hospital (as it was now known) increasingly reflected
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a national concern with a racialised 'mental science' and Natal psychiatry became
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somewhat marginalized within a broader network of national asylum administration.
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During World War 1, too, the white citizens of Pietermaritzburg sought to have future
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expansion of the asylum halted, and its inmates hidden from public view. Although the
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story of Western psychiatry in Natal and Zululand is important for any history of mental
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illness in South Africa, in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, colonial psychiatry
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had relatively limited significance for the majority of people. Since the nineteenth century,
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African understandings of and treatments for illness have proved especially resilient,
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interacting with and at times adoRpting- and adapting - elements of Western biomedicine,
as well aspects of healing Sstrategies whose origins lie in Indian concepts of health and
medicine first brought Ewith indentured workers from the 1860s. For whites, as well as
for Africans and IDndians, committal to the asylum came, most typically, at the end of a
lengthy quest to find a cure for mental illness. Throughout the nineteenth and early
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twentieth centuries, other sectors of healing proved to be remarkably flexible, offering
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new explanations for apparently new forms of illness - including insanity - that
accompanied the political, economic and social upheavals of the time, as well as
producing new therapies, strategies, and specialists to meet them. It is this variety of
responses to mental illness, and ways of attempting to negotiate a path to a state of mind
that might be termed 'mental health', that this dissertation traces.
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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This thesis has been a long time coming, as my family, friends and co!leagues will know.
To say that I am indebted to very many people will therefore corne as no surprise, but, on
paper at least, I should like to give some small recognition for the enormous generosity
with which very many people have helped and supported me in this, as in much else.
Dr and Mrs K Fismer and Mr Roly Le Grange shared both precious memories of and
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sources from Town Hill with me. Without these it would not have been possible to have
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told some of the staries of former patients reflected in these pages, and I hope that my
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telling of them has vindicated their trust.
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I began this dissertation when affiliated to the Department of Historical Studies at the
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University of Natal, Pietermaritzburg, where I wLas also a student in the 1980s. Bill Guest,
the late Ruth Edgecombe, John Wright, Paul Thompson, and John Laband, bear, then,
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some of the credit - and none of the b lame - for my training as a historian. Bill, Ruth,
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and more lately, friend and colleague, Jabulani Sithole, tried very hard to give me the
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time - and always the encouragement - to get on with "the PhD". l'm very grateful. The
staff at the UNP library Swere incredibly helpful: thanks to Carol Brammage, Jenny
Aitchison and Rose KEuhn especially, but also to the desk staff who fetched and carried
and reached levelDs I could not. Literally.
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Alongside and in what at the time seemed like a parallel universe, was the time I spent as
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a member of Life Line, Pietermaritzburg. To say that the friendships forged there were
and are essential, not only for myself, but also for, I hope, some of the insights that have
sneaked through into this 'academic' work, is an understatement. To Afra, Alma, Ann B,
Ann D, Alannah, Claudine, Debbie, Lesley, Morag, Nan, and other Core Group
Members, for their unconditional listening and support, I shall be etemally thankful. The
KZN Women's Narratives Group, in its various incarnations, has also proved to be a
wonderfully supportive space in which to voice my tentative thoughts and to try out my
words. Thanks to Bongiwe Bolani, Catherine Burns, Marijke du Toit, Janet Giddy,
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Ingrid Gouws, Mumsy Malinga, Thengiwe Magwaza, Vanessa Noble, Anne Shadbolt,
Fiona Scorgie, Yvonne Sliep, Louise Torr, Janet Twine, Cherry! Walker, June Webber,
and Astrid von Kotze.
Friends and family who have supported me, and whom I hope will forgive my thesis
induced negligence, include: Steve Terry, Judy Parle, Brian Spencer, Geoff and Val
Parle, Ann Tothill, Cheryl Lennox, Chris and Cathy Parle, Tim and Alison Parle, Cheryl,
Bruce, Connor and Caitlin Stobie, Melissa Stobie and Patrick Cuddihy, Mairi-Anne and
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Marius Ne!, Vivienne and Leon Macadam-Saad, Robert Houle, Floss Mitchell, Alix and
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the !ate Patrick Walker, Al Diesel and Mary Kleinenberg, Allison Drew, Jenny
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Wilkinson, Joan Gallagher, Allison Jones, the Jackson, Frost, and Matthews families, the
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Garlands, the Terrys, and the Sandercocks. Ail offered me continued interest in my issue
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of the moment and gave unstinting encouragement. Perhaps even more important, were
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the efforts to distract me when research and wLriting threatened to .overwhelm my own
state of mind.
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So many people have given assistance, advice and become friends along the way: My
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thanks to Nsizwe Dlamini, Mxolisi Mchunu, Mairi-An11e Ne!, Steve Sparks, Julian
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Brown, and especially the archiva! staff who really went out of their way to help me:
Pieter Ne! of the PietEermaritzburg Archives Repository must have special mention, as
well as Judith HaDwley, Unnay Narrine, Nisha Gopal, and Thami Ndlovu. At crucial
times, severalO academics - far more wise than I - have commented on earlier versions of
some of these chapters and given me references, encouragement, and invaluable advice
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that has saved me, I hope, from some embarrassing errors - Mark Coghlan, Bill Freund,
Gerry Maré, Thembisa Waetjen, Philip Warhurst, Shu!a Marks, Jonathan Sadowsky,
Lynn Thomas, Jeremy Martens, and Marcia Wright (the latter two who really rescued
chapter 5, but who bear, it must be said, no responsibility for its quirks of interpretation),
Karen Flint, Michael Mahoney, Vanessa Noble, Fiona Scorgie, and Helen Sweet.
I was fortunate enough to be awarded the University of Natal Doctoral Scholarship, and
this enabled me to travel to conferences in the UK and the USA, where I met kindred
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