As the result of a meeting between seven gentlemen led by a 22 year old surgeon, John Harrison, which took place at the Feathers Tavern, Cheapside in 1740, the London Hospital was established as the London Infirmary in Featherstone Street, Moorfields.

Shortly afterwards the Infirmary moved to Prescott Street near the Minories and was renamed the London Hospital in 1748.

However, it wasn’t until June 1752 that it was reported in the Gentleman’s Magazine that "The first stone was laid for the foundations of the new London hospital near White-chapel Mount”, which was partially opened in 1757.

A rapid rise in the population of east London during the nineteenth century together with a successive number of cholera outbreaks between 1830 and 1866 drew attention to the inadequacies of sanitation and public health provision in the area, and led to increased public support and expansion of the hospital.

Among the nurses who worked at the London hospital during this period were the nursing sisters of English prison reformer, Elizabeth Fry (1780 - 1845) in 1840 and Florence Nightingale (1820-1911), who led a group of nurses during the Crimean War and who also became an honorary governor of the hospital.

Thomas John Barnardo, who set up the first of his Dr Barnardo’s homes to provide apprenticeship training skills for boys in Stepney in 1870, became a medical student at the London hospital in 1866.

Up until April 1890, The Elephant Man - real name Joseph Merrick - spent the last three of his 27 years in a private basement room of the East Wing at the London Hospital.

In 1990, the London Hospital was granted a Royal title by HM Queen Elizabeth II to celebrate the 250th anniversary of its opening on the Whitechapel site.

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