Browne's Hospital, Stamford

William Browne, along with his brother John, was largely responsible for the extension and embellishment of the nearby All Saints Church. It is assumed that he and his wife lived in a house next to the hospital and so were parishioners of All Saints Church, where bronze plaques of three generations of their family can be seen.

In 1485 William was granted permission by Richard III to found the hospital, but after his death and that of his wife, Margaret, in 1489, the management of the hospital passed to his brother, Thomas Stokke.

You may remember the hospital as the Middlemarch Hospital in the film adaptation of George Eliot's novel Middlemarch, much of which was filmed in Stamford. The hospital now houses 13 residents. The cottages around the beautiful garden courtyard were converted into flats in 1963.

The main rooms to visit are the common room, the chapel, the staircase, the auditorium and the confrere's room. The hospital is open at weekends and on public holidays during the summer.