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"They were in what seemed to be a crowded reception area where rows of witches and wizards sat upon rickety wooden chairs, some looking perfectly normal and perusing out-of-date copies of Witch Weekly, others sporting gruesome disfigurements such as elephant trunks or extra hands sticking out of their chests. The room was scarcely less quiet than the street outside, for many of the patients were making very peculiar noises... Witches and wizards in lime-green robes were walking up and down the rows, asking questions and making notes on clipboards like Umbridge’s. Harry noticed the emblem embroidered on their chests: a wand and bone, crossed."
— Description[src]

St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries is a wizarding hospital located in London, England. It was founded by famous Healer Mungo Bonham in the 1600s.[1] The emblem of St Mungo's is a wand crossed with a bone.

Residents of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry that are injured at school are usually treated in the Hospital Wing by Madam Pomfrey, the school matron. However, some cases are serious enough that the individual must be sent to St Mungo's Hospital for more advanced treatment.

It appears that the hospital serves the entire wizarding population of Great Britain. Although the "department store" building housing the hospital may be relatively small, this is not an indication of the true capacity of a magical building.

Entering the Hospital

Mungo Bonham

Mungo Bonham, the founder of St Mungo's

To enter the premises, one may step through the window of what appears to be a red-bricked, condemned department store called Purge and Dowse, Ltd. This acts as a magical gateway to the main building, much like the barrier at King's Cross Station to Platform Nine and Three-Quarters. The interior, on the other hand, looks exactly as a hospital should. One way one individual can enter the building is speaking to an apparently inanimate dummy in the department store.[2]

The hospital is located where it is because no one could find a better place to house it. Everywhere in Diagon Alley was too small, so people came up with ideas to build it underground like the Ministry of Magic, but it was decided that underground was too unhealthy. Eventually, a normal Muggle building was purchased so that patients could come and go and fit in with the crowds.[2]

Although the hospital is meant for the magical community, as with all other wizarding institutes, Muggles are admitted when they fall prey to magical attacks, such as two Muggles who lost their fingers to Willy Widdershins' biting doorknobs and must have their bones regrown, or Herbert Chorley who had his mind addled from a poorly performed Imperius Curse and had to remain in the hospital to recuperate as well as to prevent him from posing a danger to anyone.[3]

There is a strict guidelines of gifts that are allowed into the hospital, for the safety of the patients. As such, each and every one would be searched and inspected thoroughly and would be determined whether it is safe to be given. This is shown when Miriam Strout neglected the rule and allowed a cutting of Devil's Snare, mistook it for Flitterbloom, into the ward, thus assassinating Broderick Bode.[4][5]

Healers

Harry Potter: "Are they doctors?"
Ron Weasley: "Doctors? Those Muggle nutters who cut people up? Nah, they're Healers."
— Discussion of Healers and doctors[src]
Healers

Healers

Medics at the hospital are known Healers. Their uniform robes are lime green. Requirements to become a Healer include N.E.W.T.s of at least grade 'Exceeds Expectations' in the subjects of Transfiguration, Potions, Charms, Herbology and Defence Against the Dark Arts.[6]

Dilys Derwent was a St Mungo's Healer from 1722-1741. Afterwards, she became Headmistress of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry from 1741-1768. Another Healer at St Mungo's was a man named Lancelot.

Miriam Strout was a Healer around 1995. She was in charge of the Janus Thickey Ward, caring in a motherly fashion for the long-term residents there. However, she neglected the importance of the gift guidelines, thus allowing the Death Eaters to smuggle in a cleverly disguised Devil's Snare to assassinate patient Broderick Bode. Strout was suspended on pay as a result.[4][5]

Floor plan

Ground Floor

The ground floor is reception and artefact accidents. Inside, in a reception area filled with rickety wooden chairs and outdated issues of visitors are greeted by the Welcome Witch, though her demeanour (at least on busy days) is less than welcoming. This reception area seems to double as a visitors' entrance and an emergency room waiting area, as it is often filled with wizards facing strange ailments, such as hands sprouting out of their chests or steam pouring from their mouths, and Healers clad in uniform lime green robes hurry busily through the room.[2]

The receptionist helps anyone who is unsure where to go, incapable of normal speech, or unable to remember why they are at the Hospital.[2]

Artefact Accidents deals with cauldron explosions, wands backfiring, broom crashes, and so forth. Katie Bell would have been a patient on this floor when she was admitted to St Mungo's after touching a cursed necklace she was carrying.[7]

First Floor

The first floor is treatment for creature-Induced Injuries. After suffering a highly venomous snake bite in December 1995,[8] Arthur Weasley stayed in the "Dangerous" Dai Llewellyn Ward for Serious Bites. This ward is small and dingy and has only one window, which lies opposite the door. It is mainly illuminated by shining crystal bubbles clustered in the middle of the ceiling.[2] The ward is named for Dai Llewellyn, an extremely famous Quidditch player who was eaten by a Chimaera.[9] It is unknown whether this incident was the one that led the ward to be named for him, or whether there might be some other reason.

The staff in the "Dangerous" Dai Llewellyn ward includes Hippocrates Smethwyck (Healer-in-Charge) and Augustus Pye (Trainee Healer).[2] Pye was interested in complementary medicine and attempted to help Arthur by using stitches on his wounds, though of course they failed to work, given the potency of the poison.[4] There were two other patients in the ward during this visit; one was a wizard who had been bitten by a werewolf (who Lupin talked to during the Christmas visit), and the other was a witch who wouldn't reveal what she was handling when she sustained her injuries.[2][4]

Second Floor

The second floor houses the "Magical Bugs" ward, which treats is for treating magical ailments and diseases. Addresses contagious maladies such as; Dragon Pox, Vanishing Sickness, and Scrofungulus.

Third Floor

The third floor is treatment for potions and plant poisoning. Addresses rashes, regurgitation, uncontrollable giggling, and more.

Fourth Floor

Main article: Janus Thickey Ward
"This is our long-term residents’ ward. For permanent spell damage, you know. Of course, with intensive remedial potions and charms and a bit of luck, we can produce some improvement. "
— Description of the Janus Thickey Ward[src]

The fourth floor houses the Janus Thickey Ward, which is for treatment of spell damage. Addresses unliftable jinxes, hexes, curses, incorrectly-applied charms, etc.[4]

Herbert Chorley, Muggle Junior Minister, was admitted to the hospital, afflicted with a badly-performed Imperius Curse in 1996. The curse caused him to impersonate a duck. While being treated at the hospital, he tried to strangle some Healers.[3]

Professor Minerva McGonagall was admitted to this floor after receiving four Stunning Spells to the chest at the hands of Dolores Umbridge and several corrupt Aurors.[10] Nymphadora Tonks was a patient here after her duel with Bellatrix Lestrange in 1996, during the Battle of the Department of Mysteries. Someone who was there at the same time as the Weasley family had shoes that his brother had jinxed to bite his feet.

B5C23M1 Christmas at St Mungo's

The Closed Ward

Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger, and Ginny Weasley inadvertently visited this floor on Christmas day, 1995. While there they encountered Gilderoy Lockhart on the stairs and accompanied him to the Janus Thickey Ward (a.k.a. ward 49), where he was staying. There — in the long-term residents' ward — a motherly-looking Healer oversaw patients whose brains had been permanently affected by magic. Other residents of this ward included Broderick Bode and a witch named Agnes, as well as Frank and Alice Longbottom. During their visit, they ran into Neville and his grandmother and learned for the first time what had happened to them.[4]

Fifth Floor

The fifth floor is the visitors' tearoom and hospital shop. A place for visitors to relax and purchase gifts for patients.

Affiliates

Staff members

Wizard(s) Notes Date
Mungo Bonham Founder of the hospital[1] 1500s/1600s
Dilys Derwent St Mungo's Healer 1722-1741[11]
Augustus Pye Trainee Healer in the Dai Llewellyn Ward[12]
Hippocrates Smethwyck Healer-in-Charge of Dai Llewellyn ward[13] 1900s
Professor Helbert Spleen An "expert" from the hospital who helped write an advice column in the Daily Prophet[14]
Miriam Strout Healer in the Janus Thickey Ward, who let the fatal Devil's Snare cutting in under her guard[4] 1900s
Welcome Witch Plump blond witch who worked as the hospital receptionist.[2] 1995
Lancelot Cousin of Auntie Muriel who apparently was a Healer at St Mungo's at the end of the nineteenth century, and reported to her that Ariana Dumbledore had never been brought in.[15] 1800s

Hospital donors

Lucius Malfoy gave a very public "generous contribution" to the hospital, which led Cornelius Fudge to invite the Malfoy family to the top box at the Quidditch World Cup.[16]

Harry Potter in stark contrast to Lucius Malfoy's donation also donated a significant amount of money (well over ten Galleons, at least) by dumping his money anonymously into the Fountain of Magical Brethren at the Ministry of Magic, the proceeds from which were donated to the hospital.[17]

Celestina Warbeck recorded the Puddlemere United team anthem, "Beat Back Those Bludgers, Boys, and Chuck That Quaffle Here," and sold copies as a fundraiser for the hospital.

Patients

Wizard(s) Injury
Agnes Entire head covered with fur and barks occasionally; in the long-term residents' ward.
Katie Bell Handled a cursed opal necklace, suffering severe injury, barely escaping death.[7]
Barnabus Blenkinsop Vanished mysteriously from the hospital, leaving only a small tin of anchovies in his bed.
Broderick Bode Suffered spell damage from touching a prophecy sphere that didn't have his name on it, while under the Imperius Curse. He was killed when the Death Eaters sent him a Devil's Snare in the guise of a Flitterbloom as an anonymous Christmas present, which his healer did neglected to check thoroughly.[4][5]
Herbert Chorley Muggle Junior Minister to the Prime Minister had a bad reaction to a "poorly performed Imperius Curse," causing him to quack like a duck.[3]
Dawlish Auror sent to the hospital after a failed attempt to bring Augusta Longbottom to Azkaban, which resulted in him being fiercely assaulted by the elderly witch.[18]
Gilderoy Lockhart Suffered spell damage from a powerful Memory Charm that backfired,[19] giving him severe Amnesia. Never fully recovered.[4]
Frank Longbottom Permanent mental injury from sustained Cruciatus Curses.
Alice Longbottom
Minerva McGonagall Took four Stunning Spells to the chest when she tried to stop Dolores Umbridge and several corrupt Aurors from evicting Hagrid.[10]
Montgomery Young boy bitten by Fenrir Greyback. He died after reaching the hospital.
Nymphadora Tonks Injured during the Battle of the Department of Mysteries.
Arthur Weasley Bitten by Nagini whilst guarding the Department of Mysteries at night.[8]
Patients in the waiting room. A few perfectly normal-looking people
A witch or wizard with an elephant trunk
A witch or wizard with an extra hand protruding from his or her chest.
A sweaty witch whose head seemed to have turned into a teapot and was whistling and blowing steam.
A warlock who "clanged like a bell" every time he moved, vibrating his head.
A young wizard whose shoes were eating his feet.
A small girl who sprouted large wings, who was flying around, held down only by her father.
Unknown Wizard bitten by a werewolf, in the bed next to Arthur Weasley.
Woman who received a bite, but wouldn't tell the Healers what bit her; she also shared a room with Mr Weasley.
Witch with "a satsuma jammed up her left nostril" from a family Christmas argument.
Five wizards involved in a broom accident A witch and four warlocks, all late to a Celestina Warbeck concert in Liverpool, crashed over the Mersey River and fell into the water. Their condition at the hospital was described as "wet".
Purchasers of faulty wands Purchasers from "Honest" Willy Wagstaff were taken to St Mungo's and treated for burns.
Hit Wizards Each member of this squad gets his or her own regular bed at St Mungo's.
Wizard with his head on back-to-front In the hospital as the result of a Hallowe'en prank, and forced to stay there for many months, perhaps longer.

Etymology

Mungo Bonham could have been named after Saint Mungo, aka Saint Kentigern, the patron saint of Glasgow.[20] His pregnant mother was abandoned by her family before his birth. He is considered the first bishop of Scotland. "Mungo" was also a nickname meaning "dear one" or "darling".

Behind the scenes

Appearances

Wiki
The Harry Potter Wiki has 85 images related to St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries.

Notes and references

  1. 1.0 1.1 J. K. Rowling's official site
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5 2.6 2.7 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Chapter 22 (St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries)
  3. 3.0 3.1 3.2 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Chapter 1 (The Other Minister)
  4. 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 4.7 4.8 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Chapter 23 (Christmas on the Closed Ward)
  5. 5.0 5.1 5.2 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Chapter 25 (The Beetle at Bay)
  6. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Chapter 29 (Careers Advice)
  7. 7.0 7.1 Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, Chapter 12 (Silver and Opals)
  8. 8.0 8.1 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Chapter 21 (The Eye of the Snake)
  9. Quidditch Through the Ages
  10. 10.0 10.1 Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Chapter 31 (O.W.L.s)
  11. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
  12. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
  13. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
  14. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
  15. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
  16. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, Chapter 8 (The Quidditch World Cup)
  17. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Chapter 8 (The Hearing)
  18. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Chapter 29 (The Lost Diadem)
  19. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, Chapter 16 (The Chamber of Secrets)
  20. Source: Pocket Dictionary of Saints, published by Image Books, 1983.
  21. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (video game) - (see this video)
St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries
Founder: Mungo Bonham
Locations
Alchemy Room · 'Dangerous' Dai Llewellyn Ward: Serious Bites · Entrance dummy · Hospital Ward · Janus Thickey Ward · Poisoning Department · Purge and Dowse, Ltd · St Mungo's Admissions Department · St Mungo's Certified Healer Insignia · St Mungo's student programme
Employees
Positions Healer · Mediwizard · Trainee Healer · Welcome Witch St Mungo's emblem
Healers Astrid Cole · Dilys Derwent · Omar Abasi · Eustace Burke · Ruby Honeysuckle · Lancelot · Chiara Lobosca · Rutherford Poke · Augustus Pye · Hippocrates Smethwyck · Helbert Spleen · Miriam Strout · Portrait of a Healer · Wiggins · Talbott Winger's mother
Patients
Katie Bell · Bilton Bilmes · Bitten St Mungo's patient · Barnabus Blenkinsop · Philbert Chivers · Herbert Chorley · William Dale · John Dawlish · Andre Egwu's sister · Fugitive werewolf · Dorian Fungbury · Grubby-looking St Mungo's patient · Rubeus Hagrid · Penny Haywood · Gordon Horton · Jacob · Tulip Karasu · Cecil Lee · Cassandra Mason's tenants · Minerva McGonagall · Tasmina McLaggen · Eloise Mintumble · Montgomery · Naasz · Esme Page · Miriam Strout · Laura Thorn · Nymphadora Tonks · Unidentified dragonologist · Unidentified St Mungo's patient · Unidentified werewolf · Arthur Weasley · Ginevra Weasley · Winged St Mungo's patient · Winifred Warrington
Long-term residents Agnes · Alice Longbottom · Broderick Bode (deceased) · Frank Longbottom · Gilderoy Lockhart · Zenith Xeep
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