Brattleboro Retreat
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Brattleboro Retreat
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entrance to the main building (2012)
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| Location | Linden Street and Upper Dummerston Road Brattleboro, Vermont, U.S. |
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| Coordinates | 42°51′31″N 72°33′44″W / 42.85861°N 72.56222°WCoordinates: 42°51′31″N 72°33′44″W / 42.85861°N 72.56222°W |
| Area | 620 acres (250 ha) |
| Built | 1834 |
| NRHP Reference # | 84003478 |
| Added to NRHP | April 12, 1984 |
The Brattleboro Retreat is a private not-for-profit mental health and addictions hospital that provides comprehensive inpatient, partial hospitalization, and outpatient treatment services for children, adolescents, and adults.
Located just north of downtown Brattleboro, Vermont, in the United States, the retreat is situated on more than 1,000 acres of land along the Retreat Meadows inlet of the West River. Founded in 1834, the retreat was "the first facility for the care of the mentally ill in Vermont, and one of the first ten private psychiatric hospitals in the United States". It is considered a pioneer in the field of mental health care in the United States.
The retreat is a member of the Ivy League Hospitals. More than 600 acres of the campus, including most of its buildings, were listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1984.
The Brattleboro Retreat was founded in 1834 as the Vermont Asylum for the Insane through a $10,000 bequest left by Anna Hunt Marsh for the establishment of a psychiatric hospital that would exist independently and in perpetuity for the welfare of the mentally disordered. The institution was renamed as the Brattleboro Retreat in the late 19th century in order to eliminate confusion with the state-run Vermont State Asylum for the Insane.
Taking its inspiration from the York Retreat in England, the retreat originated as a humane alternative to the otherwise demeaning and sometimes dangerous treatment of people with mental disorders. The focus on "moral treatment", an idea derived from a Quaker concept, introduced by William Tuke in the late 18th century, which approaches mental disorders as diseases and not as character flaws or the results of sins. This remains the institution's guiding philosophy.
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