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Plumptre Hospital, Plumptre Square
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PLUMPTRE HOSPITAL, Nottingham, was founded in 1392 while Richard II. was on the throne, by John de Plumptre, who was sometime Mayor of Nottingham, and who lived in an imposing house on the site now occupied by the Flying Horse Hotel, and whose gardens stretched down to St. Peter’s-gate.
John de Plumptre dedicated his hospital to. the Blessed Virgin Mary, and decreed that it was for the sustenance of "thirteen poor women broken down of age and depressed of poverty." It was rebuilt in 1560, two years after Queen Elizabeth commenced her reign, by Huntingdon Plumptre, and it was enlarged in 1753. The present buildings in Plumptre-square are of respectable antiquity, for they date from 1823.
Nottingham people may well be proud of this charity, for it was one of the few to escape the great pillage under Edward VI. in 1547, when the endowments of nearly all charitable institutions were swept away.
So well was it managed that the commissioners appointed for the purpose could find no fault to justify them in confiscating its funds, and it remains now carrying on the beneficent work for which it was founded 536 years ago.