I Think LSD Gives People Hope

An Interview with Dr Ronnie Sandison

This interview is taken from historian Andy Roberts’ book Acid Drops.

No one knows with certainty when LSD was first brought to Britain. The British Secret Intelligence Services (MI5 and MI6) were aware of the drug’s use by the CIA in the 1940s, and it is possible the S.I.S. may have conducted LSD trials at Porton Down years before their ‘official’ experiments in 1953. The earliest certain date for LSD’s arrival in Britain seems to be in 1951 when it was trialed at the Crichton Royal in Dumfries.

The first LSD clinic in Britain had its beginnings in 1952 following Dr Ronald Sandison’s (then a Consultant Psychiatrist at Powick Hospital, Gloucestershire) return from the Sandoz Laboratories in Switzerland. He had personally been given a quantity of LSD by its discoverer Albert Hofmann. Sandison went on to use LSD in psychotherapy at Powick Hospital until 1964. After this, Sandison rarely gave interviews about his involvement with the drug.

During research for Albion Dreaming: A Popular His…