The scenic and therapeutic values of the Hanmer Springs area had long been recognized by both Maori and early European settlers. In 1860 the Nelson Provincial Government recognised the springs' significance and created a reserve of some 2,560 acres (1,072 hectares) around the springs including the land which is part of the Queen Mary Hospital grounds. After the abolition of the Provincial Government the area became part of the Canterbury Province. By the mid-1880s the Lands Department had built baths at the site, and the springs became nationally recognised as a Government spa resort, with the planting of trees beginning at this time and continuing into the 1890s. Through the following decades thousands of trees were planted. There was also an increasing focus on garden beds around the spa. Ten years later the Government responded to consistent calls for accommodation for those of fragile health who were taking the waters and, in December 1897, a Sanatorium was opened adjacent to the springs. The Sanatorium offered accommodation for 16-18 people, but initially did not provide medical support services. By 1908 the Health Department had rethought their position and the Sanatorium was staffed by nurses and a resident medical officer. Unfortunately the building was destroyed by fire in August 1914. In 1914 local runholder and hotel owner Duncan Rutherford offered The Lodge, Hanmer Springs' hotel, for use as a convalescent home for servicemen. He also established the Amuri Red Cross which provided the home with a matron, housekeeper, cook, domestic staff and food supplies, while the government paid for a doctor, military officer and medical supplies. The rather awkward mix of volunteers working under military command functioned with remarkable unanimity for about two years during which 215 servicemen were cared for (Clarke, p76). A more formal arrangement soon followed when the government organised the construction of a specially designed hospital alongside the hot springs complex. The success of the temporary convalescent home had cemented the government's belief in the value of an association with the thermal pools and was a prime factor in the choice of Hanmer Springs for the South Island military hospital. Hoggard, Prouse and Gummer had been asked to provide hospitals for sick and wounded soldiers by designing appropriate buildings which allowed free access to fresh air and sunshine. They took the basic idea for their plan from the temporary but very successful use of the octagonal shaped race-course tea kiosk at Trentham as a hospital ward in 1914. The design they prepared was first used at the Trentham and Featherston military camps and as it was considered to be completely satisfactory in its practicality and speed of construction it was used again for both the King GeorgeV hospital completed at Rotorua in January 1916 and Hanmer Springs' Queen Mary Hospital for Sick and Wounded Soldiers (now known as the Soldiers' Block) which opened on 3 June 1916. As at Rotorua, the thermal springs and associated facilities were taken over for the benefit of the returned servicemen and it was recognised that there were special healing qualities in the whole aesthetically pleasing Hanmer Springs environment. In 1917 the Surgeon General reported to the Minister for Health, "I am now confident that the climate and the surroundings of Hanmer are particularly suitable for shell-shock and neurasthenic case. They certainly do better there than at Rotorua" (Rockel, p. 71). When the hospital was established the focus on improving the environs of the site was maintained and continued. Though there have been many minor changes in garden plot layout and placement the presence of notable individual tree specimens and groupings has always been a significant feature of Queen Mary Hospital. The hospital initially functioned as a convalescent home, but increasingly it specialised in the treatment of shell-shock, neurasthenia and other functional nervous diseases. Captain Chisholm was one of two doctors sent for further training at Maudsley Neurological Hospital in England in 1919, returning at the end of that year to take charge of Queen Mary Hospital. By this date the hospital, sited alongside the pools complex, provided the patients with access to a park-like environment offering leisure activities including golf and tennis - all elements which would assist the healing process. The hospital remained under military control until 1921 when it was handed over to the Department of Health with Dr Chisholm as the Medical Superintendent. The self-sufficiency of earlier days continued with the farm providing milk for the hospital and most of the village. Although large numbers of male servicemen continued to receive treatment here, there were increasing numbers of civilian patients and more accommodation was required, in particular for women. At the same time members of the public continued visiting to bathe and ingest the waters at the hospital-managed springs in order that their various ailments might be healed. The hospital acquired property within the township to house staff and patients though this was not always satisfactory and a special "women's pavilion" was proposed. In 1926 a large ward block was built to house female patients (known by 1952 as the Chisholm Ward in honour of long-serving Medical Superintendent Dr Chisholm). This fine, well preserved example of hospitals built in this era is an expansive single storeyed complex which functioned independently from the earlier Soldiers' Block, with its own kitchen, laundry etc. It was styled and finished in a less spartan manner, with an extended balcony across the frontage which adjoining rooms opened on to. This gave full access to fresh air and sunlight within a much cosier setting without the unglazed window openings of the military hospital built ten years earlier. Whereas large communal wards were considered fitting for the Soldiers' Block it was believed that women patients should be afforded more privacy, so though there were some small communal wards mostly single rooms, each with their own washbasin, were provided. The outlook from the building, which was planned to provide a therapeutic atmosphere, is particularly beautiful with expansive lawns, trees, garden plots and the mountains beyond. The construction of the womens' pavilion represents a phase in the hospital's development from a military facility for wounded soldiers to a specialist complex for the general public. The Queen Mary Hospital expanded further when in 1928 the Nurses' Home was built to provide more suitable living conditions for the now predominantly female staff, and for a short period it also had rooms for six female patients. There had been concern over the difficulty in retaining staff for the hospital and in 1929, after the Home was completed, appreciation of the improved situation was expressed in the Medical Superintendent's report (A.J.H.R.). Single rooms, each with a desk and wardrobe, were provided for the female nursing staff who shared the four blocks of bathroom facilities. Adjacent to the kitchen was a large dining room at the southern end of the building. It was connected by folding timber doors to the living room at the south-west corner where a terrace gave access to the grounds. There was a variety of communal living spaces which opened out to the west where the attractive and spacious outdoor area was an important feature of the environment established to create homely conditions for the residents. In 1940 a new and larger male ward was needed to replace the Soldiers' Block. Its construction was delayed as materials and workmen were in short supply in the first years of the war, but it was finally put into use and named the Rutherford Ward to commemorate the early support given to the Queen Mary Hospital by Duncan Rutherford. Meantime, it had been decided that the original building be retained after all and it was upgraded to again care for returning servicemen through World War II. Use of the baths was originally an important component of the hospital's treatment programmes, assisting in patients' rehabilitation. This use lessened as the hospital's direction turned more exclusively to the treatment of functional nervous disorders and from the 1940s to the detoxification of alcoholics. The Soldiers' Block provided wards for male patients until the late 1950s. After this period it had various hospital-related uses, including Occupational Therapy and Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. The building was also used for community-based activities, for example as a plumbers' store, library for the Hanmer Springs village and general community centre for dances, lectures, billiards and table tennis. In 1960 the control of the Queen Mary Hospital was given to the Hospital Division of Mental Hygiene and used for the treatment of alcohol and drug dependency. In the following decades Hanmer Springs' hospital was recognised as New Zealand's principal centre for the treatment of drug and alcohol addiction. In 1972 the North Canterbury Hospital Board took control of the hospital; later the Canterbury Hospital Board, the Canterbury Area Health Board, Health Link South and finally the Canterbury District Health Board. Over the period from the 1980s there were threats of closure. The Nurses' Home was altered in the 1980s to provide flats for staff as the traditional provision of an exclusive and strictly controlled home for female nursing staff was changed. From 1990 until 2003 the Taha Maori programme was conducted in the eastern octagonal ward of the Soldiers' Block. In 1997 the complex was leased to a private consortium (the Hanmer Clinic) which continued to operate as a drug rehabilitation clinic with the backing of government funding. When this was withdrawn in 2003 the clinic went into liquidation and ceased operating. The Canterbury District Health Board has resolved to dispose of the property and its future is currently uncertain. Queen Mary Hospital is unique. It evolved from a military-controlled hospital for healing shell-shocked soldiers and it was established in Hanmer Springs for the benefits to be derived from use of the thermal pools as well as the healing qualities of the environs. Its patients have always been integrated into the town's normal activities, so that they had no sense of shame being there, as often happened with people sent elsewhere for treatment of mental illnesses. A significant aspect of difference between Queen Mary Hospital and similar institutions is the date of its formation in 1916. This has meant that it was never been dominated by a grand but forbidding nineteenth century edifice as at Sunnyside (1868) in Christchurch, Seacliff (1878) near Dunedin, or Porirua (1887) near Wellington. It has never been associated with the colonial nomenclature "Lunatic Asylum" nor has it had patients with the type of illness that made them violent and requiring high security. All these factors have allowed Queen Mary Hospital to display the identity the early Maori recognized by naming Hanmer Springs, Wahi Oranga, the healing place.

Entering the Queen Mary Hospital site from Amuri Avenue through the tree lined boundary the first building encountered is the Soldiers' Block. Its length extends on an east to west axis and leads the eye across to where the north/south orientated Nurses' Home is sited with its background of trees. Turning right from in front of the Nurses' Home the avenue of lime trees connects to the rear of the Chisholm Ward. This building's frontage faces north and can be accessed from Jacks Pass Road. The Queen Mary Hospital buildings are sufficiently different in style to require individual descriptions. These follow below: Soldiers' Block: The hospital is cruciform in shape, the dominating features being the two large, octagonal-shaped wards. Each ward has a central, octagonal-shaped, raised nursing station with glass walls and a lantern roof. The wards were each planned to accommodate 100 men with beds arranged in concentric circles. Forming the link and the other arms of the cross are the remaining rooms connected by corridors. The central section is also lit by a lantern roof. The building's overall appearance, with its three lantern-crowned sections of pavilion roofing, developed from its plan and does not relate to any particular historical or contemporary style. The building was originally described as containing, "dining hall, recreation room, non-commissioned officers' rooms, commandant's quarters, visitors' bedrooms, doctors' consulting and waiting rooms, dispensary, storerooms, kitchen, pantry, bathrooms, lavatories and all the necessary sanitary arrangements" . The verandah across the northern frontage of the dining hall was added in 1917. One of the design principles for the building in 1916 was the maximising of fresh air and sunshine, so the ward's windows were originally unglazed, with canvas available in sliding frames to provide some enclosure. When the hospital was being readied for re-use by returning soldiers in World War II, these windows were glazed . Over the years the structure has remained largely unaltered, though the usage of rooms changed and some of the smaller spaces became bedrooms. The large, centrally-located dining hall, capable of seating 250, served a double function from the beginning as a recreation room and in recent times has been used as a meeting room. In the 1980s, part of the north-facing exterior which was most affected by sun and driving rain was covered with a synthetic weather boarding as a maintenance saving measure, but it is understood that the original timber beneath is sound. Chisholm Ward The single storeyed Chisholm Ward was designed to provide all the facilities needed for a hospital unit. It contained two wings providing patient accommodation. The main entrance, sitting rooms, administration rooms, kitchen, dining room, laundry and store-rooms were within the central section. There were two small ward blocks and the rest of the wings held individual patient rooms, each with its own hand basin. All of the rooms along the frontage opened to a spacious verandah, with access onto the flanking lawn area. A central corridor with bathrooms at intervals linked the whole ward. The plan of the complex is symmetrical, its footprint resembling a splayed V with the two wings opening to the north and receiving full access to the sun. The central portion at the V's apex extends to the south, and this was where goods were delivered and service areas were located. There is a large basement section at the rear of the complex where the heating system is housed. The general style of this ward relates to current bungalow design with casement and bay windows, the repeated arch form and the extensive balcony. Considerable decorative detail is applied to the balcony and an attractive appearance was clearly the architect's objective, as well as a practical, functional building. The interior finishing shows similar attention to detail so that the more usual spartan character of institutions is avoided. This illustrates the recognition given at that time to the need for places of healing to be homely. Nurses' Home The two-storeyed building is in the form of a long oblong block running north and south with wings at each end to form a broadened "H" shape. Double-hung sash windows light the individual rooms around the building with the lower sash single-paned and the upper one with six lights. Larger single-paned glazing was used for the western communal spaces. The western elevation's central section has a variety of window forms whereas the eastern one is symmetrical and has a classically-styled main entrance portico as the dominating feature. Originally the first floor windows along the north elevation and on the two terminating wings of the eastern façade were decorated by shutters. Open fireplaces were provided in the living spaces so that the roofline was enlivened by six chimneys, only one of which remains. The main entrance is on the eastern side providing ready access for the nurses to the existing hospital wards, while the communal living areas face west to the broad lawn and surrounding trees. The 37 bedrooms were ranged throughout the building with bathrooms located at four points. At the south-western corner is a deep, partially glazed porch area, opening on to the western lawn. This was the nurses' living room connected by folding doors to the dining room behind with the kitchen adjacent on the south eastern corner. In the central position on the ground floor of the western façade was the sisters' sitting room, and the matron's suite alongside it. Box and store-rooms were provided. Two staircases give access to the first floor and three balconies facing west provided further living spaces for all the residents. In style and plan the Queen Mary Hospital Nurses' Home is comparable with contemporary accommodation blocks built for nurses, students or servicemen. The Environs These three key buildings at the former Queen Mary Hospital site are unified and linked by their curtilages. A road from Amuri Avenue runs in front of the Soldiers' Block to the Nurses' Home where it turns to the right towards the rear of the Chisholm Ward and passes around to the right of the building and exits to Jacks Pass Road. The whole of the Queen Mary environs is renowned for the magnificent trees many of which date back to the last decades of the nineteenth century, though there has been a continuous programme of enhancement. This has meant that the connecting roadway through the proposed historic place is surrounded by, and gives views to lawns, garden plots, orchard trees, the lime avenue which links the Nurses' Home to the Chisholm Ward, a mixture of boundary planting and specimen trees. The Nurses' Home's large western lawn is semi-screened by its enclosing trees, giving off duty staff a sense of privacy and distance from their work environment. The Soldiers' Block has a relatively small but appealing garden area immediately linked to it, though its residents could appreciate the wider views. Patients in the Chisholm Ward were treated to the mountain vista and a fine garden outlook. They were encouraged to get actively involved in gardening, with a separate bed made available for them, so there were the therapeutic benefits of this activity as well as the passive healing influence of the setting.