Alexander I by Dawe from the Alexander Palace Portrait Hall

On the right side of the boulevard, stand the buildings of the Tsarskoe Selo Court Hospital, surrounded by a fence. The Chapel, the house for the attendants, the chemistry and the dwelling of the doctor face the boulevard. The main building of the hospital faces the Hospitalnaya street, the ambulance, the laundry, the quarantine house, and three temporary wooden barracks for dangerous infectious illnesses stand in the Garden. The ground floor of the main building is occupied by the town almshouse for 10 men and as many women, and by the Court almshouse for 25 men.

The almshouse has existed in Tsarskoe Selo from the time of Catherine I. Originally it was a wooden house near the palace and was supported from the Emperor's private purse. It had no fixed income of its own. On the accession of the Empress Elizabeth, a building was erected for it, opposite the church at the comer of the Srednaya and the Tzerkovnaya Streets; the palace department store house No. 13 stands there now. This building was rebuilt of stone, for 40 people of both sexes.

On the 9th of March 1809, an almshouse at the corner of the Moskovskaya Street with a hospital and a church, was ordered to be built.

The plans for a wooden hospital and a stone almshouse by the architect Geste received the imperial sanction only in 1812. After 40 years, it was decided to pull down the old hospital, and to erect, in 1852, a stone building.

In 1908 the hospital was slightly altered by the Architect Nikitin.

In 1908 the number of persons, taken care of in the palace almshouse, was augmented by five men and five women, and the women's, compartment was transferred to the Demidovo-Shelkovskaya Almshouse for women.

At the present time the hospital has 150 beds, and not only answers to the requirements of the court department, but is the only hospital of the town, where the inhabitants suffering from infectious illnesses are taken in, free of charge. The hospital has a church, which possesses a much honoured image of the Holy Virgin. In the chapel stands an iconostasis, brought from the palace in 1817, which formerly belonged to the Empress Catherine I, and which used to stand in one of the chambers of the original Catherine Palace. The holy vessels and bells of the hospital church, were, by Imperial order in 1817 taken from the Tsarevo - Konstantinovskaya church of Sophia, which was pulled down that year.

We hear of a story, told about the Emperor Nicholas I's first visit to the hospital, on the 16th of October 1852. When the stone hospital was ready, the Emperor expressed the wish to see it. He came in by the chief entrance and, on catching sight of the staircase, expressed his pleasure to the architect, saying, that it was fit for a palace. The more His Majesty saw of the building, the more he praised the architect, who was beside himself with joy and began ready to taste the reward of his labours. But, unfortunately for him, he had neglected to alter a very low doorway in the old part of the almshouse. The Emperor, talking to the architect, did not notice it, and bumped his head violently against the lintel. His Majesty got very angry, cut short the inspection and, instead of giving the architect a reward, ordered him to be sent to prison for neglecting a "stupid door".