Built in 1862 as a drill hall and armoury for the XI Wiltshire Volunteer Rifle Corps, the cottage hospital building in Swindon’s railway village began life designed for a completely different purpose. However, by the end of the 1860s the pressing need in the railway community was for a hospital. The armoury was selected as being suitable for conversion and new premises was built for the Rifle Corps in the GWR Park. Accidents in the GWR Works were an everyday occurrence. A gravestone in St. Mark’s churchyard records the death of 19 year old Frederick James Tucker ‘killed by burst boiler at Swindon works’ on June 18, 1855. A decade later and safety precautions had improved little. Robert Hanks, 71, a fitter at the works, was crushed to death when a truck he was working under collapsed on top of him. Locomotive Carriage and Wagon Superintendent Joseph Armstrong proposed that the GWR Company pay for the conversion of the armoury property and that additional costs be me...