The long-deserted Medfield State Hospital makes for a haunting site, inspiring filmmakers for years with its dark, shadowy corners and long, and often sorrowful, history
Inside creepy Boston asylum once used as a location for Shutter Island
Eerie photos show the interior of an abandoned asylum, which has featured in several seriously creepy films.
Urban explorer Ben Stevens ventured to the long-deserted Medfield State Hospital, formerly known as the Medfield Insane Asylum, after learning it was used as a shooting location for the 2010 psychological thriller, Shutter Island.
Starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Shutter Island sent a chill down the spines of moviegoers, not least because of its depiction of the strikingly eerie Ashecliffe Hospital for the Criminally Insane.
Like the fictional Ashecliffe, Medfield treated many thousands of psychiatric patients over the years, from 1892, right up until April 2003. Nowadays however, it lies empty and silent – and is said to have a “sinister” feel.
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Brave Ben Stevens told What’s The Jam: “It felt very cool to be there as I’m a very big film fan. I found out about it because I wanted to know where they filmed Shutter Island.
“Obviously, they dressed up a lot of the building as a set for the movie. But I just liked the whole feel of the place, it felt very New England with the red buildings and the leaves.”
As well as Shutter Island, Medfield, situated just outside of Boston, in the US state of Massachusetts, has also provided an atmospheric filming location for movies such as The New Mutants and The Box.
And photos snapped by Ben aptly demonstrate why it’s the ideal site for jump scares.
Once inside the former infirmary’s walls, Ben, from Cambridge, UK, came across plenty of old equipment left behind when the last patients left, forgotten and gathering dust.
This included long-disused wheelchairs parked motionless in corridors, and beds which hadn’t been slept in for years, complete with mattresses.
Ben, 31, revealed: “I even found a patient’s shoes. The whole place was very sinister because I know they conducted a lot of experiments on their patients.
“They also had a very high security wing, which apparently mobsters were sent to, which is pretty cool.”
Extraordinary photographs taken by Ben show the derelict state of the asylum, which once housed as many as 2,200 patients.
The gloomy interior is in a well-worn state, and it’s difficult to believe so many people once lived and worked there. Many rooms are extremely dark, and certainly not for the faint of heart.
Continued deterioration ultimately led to Medfield closing its doors one final time.
However, it’s also understood that concern from Medfield residents over criminally insane patients brought over from Bridgewater State Hospital, also in Massachusetts, also contributed to this decision.
Those who wander the grounds may come across The Medfield State Hospital Cemetery, the final resting place of 841 residents who passed away between the years 1918 and 1988.
Established after the Great Influenza outbreak of 1918, as per John Thompson’s A Short History of Medfield State Hospital, 1890-2016, up until 2005, gravestones were marked only by small concrete squares bearing a number.
Then, in September 2005, more personal markers, complete with names and dates, were added to each of the graves.
Following restoration, the grounds of the old facility are now open to the public, making this the only abandoned asylum in the US where the grounds are free to roam.
Trespassing past dark is forbidden; however, with local Medfield Police tasked with patrolling the facility at night to ensure it remains as quiet as the grave.
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