Women as army surgeons

by Flora Murray

During the first two years the physician in charge of the medical side was Dr. Louisa Woodcock. When she died in February 1917, the staff lost one of its most brilliant and successful members. She was a woman of high professional attainment, of scientific mind and of noble character. Her influence in the hospital was always helpful, and her friendship was greatly valued and greatly missed by her colleagues. She was succeeded by Dr. Margaret Thackrah, who was appointed in May, and when the number of medical beds was increased in 1919, Dr. Ellen Pickard also joined the staff.

The women’s wards, at the top of the East Block, were the best in the hospital, and as the women were less destructive than men, it was easy to make them homelike and comfortable. The arrangement to take women was initiated as a temporary measure, but it continued for more than two years. The work was both surgical and medical. The recruiting for the women’s units had not always been prudent, and many women were sent home unfit, as the result of illnesses or operations occurring before enlistment. Most of these came before Invaliding Boards and were discharged. But the greater number of the patients sent home from France were debilitated, or anæmic and fatigued by long hours and an unaccustomed diet, and needed rest and good conditions to make them ready for service again. A rather large proportion of mental cases, all of whom had had previous attacks, and some serious injuries owing to accidents and to the bombing of camps, were received. The women’s wards were the most responsive wards in the hospital. They were credulous of rumours and false reports, susceptible to the influence of a ‘grouser’ or a change of Sister, but on the other hand they responded readily to wise handling, and were led and guided by their ward visitor, Mrs. Prior.

During the influenza epidemics of 1918 and 1919 men and women suffering from the disease trooped into the casualty room or sent messages for ambulances to fetch them. The extra beds were all full, and the number of men seriously ill with pneumonia might be fifty or sixty each day. The staff slaved over them. Extra nurses were procured; the doctors knew no rest. But the mortality was tremendous. In the months of November and December 1918 twenty-four men and women died; and in February 1919 thirty died. The hospital was accustomed to a death rate of eight per thousand per annum, and was aghast over three deaths in one day. Sorrowing and anxious relatives sat in the square and passages, watching the doctors’ faces as they went in and out of the wards, and patiently accepting the issue. Old people who had never been out of Ireland came over, and would not venture in the streets in case they should be lost or run over. Grey-haired fathers and mothers came from Scotland to sit, silent and enduring, beside the beds. The habitual gaiety of the place was hidden under the cloud. The staff could only work and wait. A dear old uncle and aunt arrived from the country to see a precious nephew, whose life hung in the balance for some days. One morning the doctor met them in the square and told them that their boy was better and should do well now. They both burst into tears, and presently the old lady, through her sobs, begged the doctor to excuse ‘Uncle,’ for ‘he was always so silly and took on so.’

Pte. B——, a Scottish shepherd, had wounds of hip and knee, and was so ill that his wife was sent for. She travelled all night, and for twenty-four hours sat steadily beside his bed. When it was suggested to her that she was tired and should lie down, Pte. B—— opened his eyes to say, ‘Och! the wife’s enjoying herself fine, sitting beside me here.’

The relatives were very brave and very pathetic. The men clung to their mothers, and many a careworn, weary woman sat night after night by the side of her son, grateful because she was allowed to be there.

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The hospital had its share of malingerers and self-inflicted injuries, and one or two cases of fraud. The cleverest of these was a man admitted for some slight ailment, who had only one arm, and who stated that he was awaiting admission to a limbless hospital. He was in the ward for ten days, and might have left undetected but for the thoroughness of the Chief Surgeon, who insisted upon seeing whether the stump was in a good condition before he left. The Sister said he was a very modest man and did not like to show his arm to ladies.

‘Surely he need not be modest about an arm,’ said the Surgeon. And the Sister unfastened his jacket.

‘Which arm did you say, Sister?’ she continued. ‘He seems to have the usual number.’

And so he had. He stood abashed before a half-fainting Sister, while Dr. Garrett Anderson and the orderlies pealed with laughter, and the whole ward joined in the joke.