A BED FOR FRACTURES, GOUT, RHEUMATIZN, LYING-IN WOMEN, AND BEN- RIDDEN PERSONS, WHICH MAY BE MADE AND THE LINEN CHANGED WITHOUT INCOM- MODING THE PATIENT
Year: 1794

page_text: TO ALL TO WHOM THESE PRESENTS SHALL COME, I, HENRIETTE
CAROLINE BENTLEY, of the Town of Southampton, Spinster, send greeting.
WHEREAS His most Excellent Majesty King George the Third did, by His
Letters Patent under the Great Seal of Great Britain, bearing date at West-
minster, the Seventh day of August, in the thirty-fourth year of His reign, give
and grant unto me, the said Henriette Caroline Bentley, His especial licence,
that I, the said Henrietto Caroline Bentley, during the term of years
therein mentioned, should and lawfully might use, exercise, and vend, within
England, Wales, and the Town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, my Invention of
"A BED FOR FRACTURES, GOUT, RHEUMATIZN, LYING-IN WOMEN, AND BEN-
RIDDEN PERSONS, WHICH MAY BE MADE AND THE LINEN CHANGED WITHOUT INCOM-
MODING THE PATIENT;" in which said Letters Patent there is contained a
proviso, obliging me, the said Henriette Caroline Bentley, by an instrument
in writing under my hand and seal, to cause a particular description of the
nature of my said Invention, and in what manner the same is to be performed,
to be inrolled in His Majesty's High Court of Chancery within one calendar
month after the date of the said recited Letters Patent, as in and by the same,
(relation being thereunto had) may more fully and at large appear.
NOW KNOW YE, that in compliance with the said proviso, I, the said
Henriette Caroline Bentley, do hereby declare that my said Invention of a
bed, for fractures, gout, rheumatizm, lying-in women, and bed-ridden persons,
which may be made and the linen changed without incommoding the patient,
is not nor is meant to interfere with what is usually called or termed a feather
bed and bedstead, &c, as in common use, but consists of frames to be used

page_text: either therewith, or by being affixed to any frame of wood, beam, or cicling, by
means of certain machinery, and which Invention is particularly described in
the Plan and description thereof hereunto annexed, and in manner following,
that is to say-
The principal end, scope, and design of the machinery I have invented or
applied to the bed for fractures, &c", &c", is to procure natural relief to and
change of linen for persons confined to their beds by fractures, gout, rheunin-
tizm (or any kind of imbecility whatsoever) without in the slightest degree
altering the position of the body. This I have effected by suspending the
afflicted above the surface of the feather bed on a straining frame of four sides,
made of beach, oak, ash, mahogany, elm, fir, deal, alder, poplar, lignum-vitae,
walnut, or any kind of timber whatsoever, or of brass, iron, steel, silver, gold,
tutenagu, copper, compound metal, or any kind of metal whatsoever. This
straining frame is divided near the middle of each side, or at any place the
workman shall think necessary to suit the convenience of the patient, by a
double hinge made of brass, iron, steel, gold, silver, tutenagu, copper, or any
compound metal whatsoever, fixed on by screws, nails, bolts, or any other
means soever, or has a small frame annexed to its sides in such manner as to
raise the patient's head and alter and relieve the position, in the manner and
for the purpose of a bed chair, or may be occasionally used and removed when
either necessary or agreeable, which frame is covered with ticken sacking, silk
linen, callico, or any kind of linen or ticken whatsoever; to which are affixed
cords made of cotton-line, silk, hemp, tow, flax, yarn, thread, or any kind of
rope, line, or cordage whatsoever; and elevated by four pullies fixed or fastened
to the four corners of the frame or tester of the bedstead, which pullies are
made of brass, iron, steel, gold, silver, copper, tutenagu, compound metal, or
any kind of metal whatsoever (workel or cast) or of ivory, tortoiseshell, bone,
horn, hardened leather, or any kind of composition whatsoever, or of oak, ash,
elm, beach, mahogany, cedar, fir, lignum-vitæ, maple, walnut, box, yew, or
any kind of timber or hard substance whatsoever, operated upon by a small
jack, consisting of a wheel and axis, on the end of which is fixed a roller round
which the cord or cords wind up; this roller is made of iron, brass, &c., or of
wood, such as oak, beach, ash, clm, &e, or any kind of metal or timber
whatsoever, and thereby clevating the said frame; on the edge of this wheel
or any number of teeth that may be thought necessary, which net on a pinion
on another axis fixed in the same frame, on which axis is also fixed a fly of
any kind of metal or wood, to prevent the weight of the patient from acccle-
rating the motion too much in descending. In one of the said axis's is affixed
a rack wheel, on which a pall acts to prevent or stop the straining frame nt

page_text: any point of suspension, till discharged by the person working the same, either
by pressing or by pulling it down at the other end. When he would have the
frame with the patient descend, the above-mentioned wheel-work is put in
motion or wound up by means of a small winch or winder, like those used to
clocks or jacks, applied to the end of either of the said axis's or to a third
axis with a pinion on it to act in the teeth of the wheel first described, or with
an everlasting screw to act therein, or by chords, chains, bells, straps, bandages,
or by pressure on or against each other in such manner as to set it in motion.
The said wheel work may be made of brass, iron, steel, gold, silver, tutenague,
mixed or compound metals, or of any kind or kinds of metal whatsoever, or
of wood, as oak, ash, elm, beach, fir, lignum-vita, or of any kind of wood or
timber whatsoever, or of ivory, bone, horn, tortoiseshell, hardened leather, or
any mixture of the said materials, or part of the one and part of the others;
the said different materials at the discretion of the workman, or degree of
neatness required, or expence bestowed. The said frame or apparatus to be
fixed under the bedstead by screws, nails, bolts, or otherwise, near the hind post
on the left side, so as to be worked by the right hand of the attendant, or to
any other part of the bedstead above or below, at the discretion of the workman.
Also directing pullies to convey the chords clear of the edges of the bedstead to
the rollers affixed to the jack work or machinery, wherever placed; the said
clevation may be effected by means of screws at the four corners, by rack work
or by pullies to be drawn or worked by the hand, without the said machinery or
wheel work, or by winding round a roller or rollers fixed or fastened by any
means whatsoever to any part of the bedstead, or to any beam or posts, or to
the floor of the room in any manner or with any materials whatsoever, so as
to procure the elevation of either of the frames, the one already described or
the fracture or inner frame, which I shall hercafter describe, in such manner
as to make the feather bed under the patient, or change the linen, &c", by
whatsoever means the same may be effected. 2d frame; see the Drawing
Q, Q, Q, Q. In order to render this description as easy and distinct aș
possible in my Specification I have first described the operation of the
machinery on the straining frame, which being thus elevated clears the feather
bed and raises the patient towards the tester of the bedstead; while that
operation is performed, by the elevation of this straining frame, I raise an
inner frame, which I call a fracture frame, placed above the under sheet, and
on which the patient lays. This is also a straining frame made of the same
limensions as the former, and of the same materials as beech, oak, ash;
elm, mahogany, fir, cedar, maple, poplar, deal, lignum-vitæ, or any kind of
wood or timber whatsoever, or of brass, iron, steel, gold, silver, tutenagu,

page_text: compound. metal, or any metal whatsoever (either worked or cast) laced at
.separate intervals with bars of strong linen, tape, cotton web, callico, or any
kind of linnen whatsoever, or of any mixture of the above-mentioned articles.
At the four corners of this fracture frame are fixed strong rings made of brass,
iron, steel, gold, silver, tutenague, or any compound metal whatsoever (worked
or cast), covered with leather and fixed by strong leather straps, or any other
method of fastening whatsoever, and by the machinery elevated to a certain
height, where it is received by four strong hooks made of iron, brass,
steel, gold, silver, tutenague, or any compound motal whatsoever, cast or
worked, fixed into four straps of leather or into ropes made of cotton linc,
yarn, hemp, silk, worsted, or any kind of rope or line whatsoever, strongly
secured to the four different posts of the bedstead, which fracture frame being
thus secured, the under straining frame is let down by means of the said
machinery, which is connected with and operated upon by the pullies
and wheel work already described, (both in the Specification and Drawing
hereunto annexed), with the under blanket and sheet, which are thus freed
from the weight of the person, changed at pleasure, and relaid, &c, &c, and
again wound up to receive the fracture frame whereon the patient lays and is
suspended, who is thus safely reconducted to a new-made bed, and the healthful
comfort of clean made linen, without in the slightest manner altering the
position of the body.
I ground my Patent upon the idea and invention of raising and elevating
the patient above the surface of the bed or mattress, which no other person
çan imitate, alter, or improve, without infringing upon my Patent.
In witness whereof, I, the said Henriette Garoline Bentley, have hereunto
set my hand and seal, this Sixth day of September, in the year of our
Lord One thousand seven hundred and ninots-four
HENRIETTE CAROLINE BENTLEY. (L.S.)
AND BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the same Sixth day of September,
in the year above mentioned, the aforesaid Henrietto Caroline Bentley came
before our Lord tho King in His Chancory, and acknowledged tho Specification
aforesaid, and all and every thing therein contained, in form above written.
And also the Specification aforesaid was stamped according to the tenor of
the Statute in that case made and provided.
Iurolled the same Sixth day of September, in the year above written.