Temporary Commissions Civil Contract and locally employed medical professionals WWI

[John Gilinsky]

Johnston's Roll in 2 volumes with the second volume covering 1898 to 1960 does NOT of course include that very large number of Temporary Commissions RAMC, locally employed and contact surgeons.  Apparently in 1920 or thereabouts most of the original commission records for these Temporary Commissions RAMC were weeded by the War Office.  Does anyone know of any updated sources such as major retrospective medical professional licensing bodies that specifically include war service particulars (commissions, branch, units, periods of service, awards, decorations, etc....) amongst their professional membership registries or related research in progress dbs etc....?  

[Guest]

20 hours ago, John Gilinsky said:

Johnston's Roll in 2 volumes with the second volume covering 1898 to 1960 does NOT of course include that very large number of Temporary Commissions RAMC, locally employed and contact surgeons.  Apparently in 1920 or thereabouts most of the original commission records for these Temporary Commissions RAMC were weeded by the War Office.  Does anyone know of any updated sources such as major retrospective medical professional licensing bodies that specifically include war service particulars (commissions, branch, units, periods of service, awards, decorations, etc....) amongst their professional membership registries or related research in progress dbs etc....?  

 

       JG-  the most extensive siource I know of for the war years in the British Medical Journal-  It has been digitised and is searchable through the British system called JSTOR- which should be available at a library not that far from you. 

[John Gilinsky]

  Whilst the Lancet and BMJ (et als) are digitized these are unofficial second hand reportage.  Due to the destruction by design or not for us now is irrelevant it is clear that the London England based professional medical journals for the sheer scale, editorial timeliness/space considerations, etc... precludes as comprehensive information source that as historians we wish for.  The Journal of Mental Science for example in 1918 published an excellent list of asylum doctors who had RAMC and RAMC(T) commissions but this list of course is not complete nor even comprehensive.  I don't know if during or POST-war records such as pension file requests, medical society honour rolls of service and not just casualty oriented honour rolls, membership/biographical/obituary medical regulatory bodies such as the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of England etc.... have other sources.  John  

[Guest]

  J-Nil Desperandum. I have to say I have found BMJ is good on following the gazettes-but you are right in that service,as opposed to casualty information  is a movable feast. And what is even worse is RAMC Other Ranks. Doctors are a professsion that are good at writing about each other-I find there is plenty of stuff hither and thither but no central source.  I don't know what your experience is but mine is that info. out there is extensive for the peacetime stuff-qualifications gained, prizes won, positions held, illuminati served under-but still very short on the wartime stuff. I have 3 doctors among my local casualties- the formal stuff is all there but the wartime stuff is elusive. Yet the war years were arguably among the most important for the development of medical practice in the UK- War is the locomotive of medicine, to alter the better-known version. 

[alf mcm]

John,

  You could try the Journal of the R.A.M.C. http://jramc.bmj.com/content/by/year

  Also available on DVD:- https://museumofmilitarymedicine.org.uk/product/journal-of-the-royal-army-medical-corps-1903-1998/ The accompanying illustration seems a mistake.

  These Journals include articles by Temporary Medical Officers, and the location where the officer was based when writing the article is sometimes given i.i. Stationary Hospital, CC.C.S. etc. This can be a great help in deciding which War Diaries to read.

 

Regards,

 

Alf McM

Edited 2 September , 2017 by alf mcm
additional info

[alf mcm]

John,

  Some Doctors worked for the British Red Cross before joining the R.A.M.C. You may find their records here http://www.redcross.org.uk/About-us/Who-we-are/History-and-origin/First-World-War/Search?duties=doctor

 

Regards,

 

Alf McM

[petestarling]

Not having a complete roll of RAMC doctors who served during the war was the bane of my life during the twenty years I ran the RAMC/AMS Museum. As has been stated above the JRAMC has London Gazette entries. There are quite a lot of Medical Schools who published their rolls of those who served, after the war. These can be found online by searching on Internet Archive. I have found these along with the BMJ and Lancet a great source for information when compiling various rolls of medical officers such as those awarded the MC, Regimental Medical Officers and those 911 RAMC Officers who lost their lives in the First World War.

Do not forget the medical directories/registers which state if the doctor served in the war.

There is also an Index of Doctors in Scotland during the First World War - http://smsec.rcpe.ac.uk 

 

Let us not forget that during the war something like 12,000 medically qualified people wore one coloured uniform or another.

The Museum of Military Medicine holds a volume containing details of 120 'Lady Doctors' who served in the war and also holds some rolls of RAMC Reserve and Militia Medical Officers pre war.

 

Pete

[John Gilinsky]

Sorry for the belated thanks to all who have contributed.  I am focused on ascertaining the origins of the Canadian Red Cross Society in the late Victorian era (1870s 1880s).  In this process I discovered just how significant the civilian, contract surgeons / doctors were throughout the PRE - 1914 period.  Doctors for somewhat the same reasons today did NOT wish to go into the armed forces (professional medical colleges in England had to cancel competitive examinations when medical students showed no interest in sitting for the army / navy medical officer exams for certain Victorian era years).  Tx especially petestarling for your information.  The LG notices republished in the online JRAMC which start from mid-1903 are quite useful for my Red Cross related research as listing ambulance, stretcher-bearer and related voluntary (read militia / volunteer battalions and from 1908 Territorial Force TF) medical units.  Army Lists also list these.  Unfortunately the Volunteer Rifles from 1859 unit records / archives (which units started to form stretcher-bearer units in the 1870s) are woefully incomplete and scattered.  What I have found is that even the PMO for various campaigns due to the pressures of work alone did NOT know typically how many nor even who these civilian / contract doctors / surgeons were.  Tx again,

John

[petestarling]

John

During the South African War and Boxer Rebellion the army used civilian Surgeons. The Museum of Military Medicine has a couple of volumes of their records. You may find something of interest in their too.

[John Gilinsky]

Hello pete.  Tx for your recent message.  How can I access or at least confirm the exact location, scope, breadth contents etc... of these volumes?  Are they a combination of archival and research notes based?  Do you have the archival or collections citation(s) and/or the specific contact person at the RAMC Museum?  The British Army used civilian or contract surgeons for a long time going back at the very minimum to the Peninsular and French Revolutionary War periods and increasingly such civilian medical personnel made up often over 50 per cent of the officially recognized 'military physicians' engaged in British imperial military expeditions and activities.  .  

[John Gilinsky]

Just checked the Military Medical Services Museum that I presume took over the RAMC Museum in Keogh Barracks Aldershot.  Presumably relocating to Cardiff Wales or nearby.  I am most eager to find out if anyone has done any lists of units, commanding officers, adjutants, officers, etc... for ANY PRE-WWI Volunteer medical units.  The origins and rise of the ambulance movements in Britain, the British empire and elsewhere is of the greatest research interest.  I have many bearer units or sections formed typically on the initiative of a few in many cases a solitary medical officer to volunteer units in the 1870s 1880s.  Has anyone ever written researched any of these units say between 1859 to August 1914?  Can anyone recommend me to some fairly recent modern research into the archives, histories of volunteer units generally and in particular the Volunteer Ambulance Association / Department established in the latter 1870s?  Many of these medical personnel at least from the late 1880's onwards saw WWI services of one kind or another.  I am in the process of actually starting a db of all such British volunteer ambulance - stretcher-bearer sections/units from 1870s to 1914.  Tx all.

[petestarling]

John

Have you looked at the British Army Lists for medical officer appointments? I do not have many but just looking at 1914 it gives you all the Territorial Force and if you look at all the original Army Lists including Harts it will give you the Surgeon's and Assistant Surgeon's name in each regiment. The Journal of the RAMC which started in 1903 also published officer's distribution lists from time to time. 

The raising of the Volunteer Medical Staff Corps, initially from university medical schools, is down to Sir James Cantlie. His story is documented in 'The Quality of Mercy' by Jean Cantlie Stewart. 

I gave a lecture some years ago on the raising of the volunteer units in Birmingham and found in the Wellcome Archives in the RAMC Muniment Collection some papers reference the raising of the Volunteer Medical Staff Corps but I do not have the reference to hand but if you go on to the Wellcome Library site and put that in the search engine something should come up. They are digitising things more and more so you may be in luck. 

Perhaps try searching on line for anything about the Brigade Bearer Companies many eventually  would become Territorial Force Field Ambulances.

 

Pete

[petestarling]

John

Just done a search on the Wellcome Library web site for Volunteer Medical Staff Corps and 1099 hits come up. A quick look will show that not all of them are relevant but some are digitised and available to view online. 

 

Pete

[John Gilinsky]

Thanks again Pete.  British medical journals ( at least 4 major ones in London alone contemporaneously ) provide comprehensive but very incomplete coverage of most of these volunteer medical components from the 1870s onwards.  I have accessed and used the Army Lists and Harts Army List pre-1914, JRAMC from 1903 to 1914 to encompass the last years of the volunteer and TF medical units that are relevant to how such units existed or thrived prior to 1914.  Remember that getting medical personnel overall for any military and naval service was very very difficult.  Militia and volunteer surgeon appointments were even considered in some medical journals and medical circles as a sinecure rather than an actual professional duty or activity.  If anyone has access to the FULL Vanity Fair magazine for 1876 they apparently published a cartoon or caricature during October or November 1876 that mocked (according to the Lancet) military doctors (the title is in fact I think Military Doctor).  I do NOT think that this caricature was a full page chromolithograph such as those by SPY etc... but probably a smaller black and white engraving.  Can someone please verify this last?  A full page chromo by SPY (i.e. Leslie Ward) was published in early November 1876 by Vanity Fair depicting Robert James Lindsay-Lloyd one of the founders and leaders of the British Red Cross Society (then National Aid Society for the Relief of the Sick and Wounded in War) entitled "Victoria Cross and Geneva Cross."  One of the great ironies and fascinating aspects in particular of this distinguished peer, regular army officer was that he was appointed as financial undersecretary of state for war (in other words whilst simultaneously serving the Red Cross he had his budgetary hands immersed in state coffers).  To date I have only scratched the surface but have found one of my Canadian volunteer militia stretcher-bearers who became a qualified Canadian doctor and served in the RAMC during WWI. It would be great as well besides the Vanity Fair confirmation of the "Military Doctor" caricature to also see if anyone has compiled a db of volunteer units from at least 1859 to 1914 in great detail listing all the professional medical personnel and indeed (ideally!) which of these numerous volunteer units (vast majority becoming 3rd and 4th battalions of line infantry) had stretcher - bearer units.  Wellcome does have some fascinating local histories pre-1914 of some of the bearer units.  Tx again.

[petestarling]

John

I am not sure if Barbara Janman is picking up this thread but her late father did a lot of fantastic work on RAMC History including Militia etc. I will email her and ask if she has seen this.

 

Pete

[BJanman]

John

 

I received a message from Pete.

 

My dad did a lot of research into the medical territorial units, going back to the volunteer companies. Most of the source material is packed away in boxes but I can dig it out to see if it helps.

 

I also have a copy of a write up called "History of the Royal Army Medical Corps (Milltia), formally Millitia Medical Staff Corps - compiled from records and correspondence in the orderly room of the RAMC Militia of Aldersht in 1908 by Captain A A Sinclair", which I transcribed for my dad in 2004.  It provides lots of names of personnel. The write up is on A3 paper but my transcript is on my PC if you want a copy. 

 

If you think any of the above is of interest then send me your email address via PM.

 

Regards

 

Babara

Edited 18 September , 2017 by BJanman

[Guest]

On 9/17/2017 at 17:40, John Gilinsky said:

Thanks again Pete.  British medical journals ( at least 4 major ones in London alone contemporaneously ) provide comprehensive but very incomplete coverage of most of these volunteer medical components from the 1870s onwards.  I have accessed and used the Army Lists and Harts Army List pre-1914, JRAMC from 1903 to 1914 to encompass the last years of the volunteer and TF medical units that are relevant to how such units existed or thrived prior to 1914.  Remember that getting medical personnel overall for any military and naval service was very very difficult.  Militia and volunteer surgeon appointments were even considered in some medical journals and medical circles as a sinecure rather than an actual professional duty or activity.  If anyone has access to the FULL Vanity Fair magazine for 1876 they apparently published a cartoon or caricature during October or November 1876 that mocked (according to the Lancet) military doctors (the title is in fact I think Military Doctor).  I do NOT think that this caricature was a full page chromolithograph such as those by SPY etc... but probably a smaller black and white engraving.  Can someone please verify this last?  A full page chromo by SPY (i.e. Leslie Ward) was published in early November 1876 by Vanity Fair depicting Robert James Lindsay-Lloyd one of the founders and leaders of the British Red Cross Society (then National Aid Society for the Relief of the Sick and Wounded in War) entitled "Victoria Cross and Geneva Cross."  One of the great ironies and fascinating aspects in particular of this distinguished peer, regular army officer was that he was appointed as financial undersecretary of state for war (in other words whilst simultaneously serving the Red Cross he had his budgetary hands immersed in state coffers).  To date I have only scratched the surface but have found one of my Canadian volunteer militia stretcher-bearers who became a qualified Canadian doctor and served in the RAMC during WWI. It would be great as well besides the Vanity Fair confirmation of the "Military Doctor" caricature to also see if anyone has compiled a db of volunteer units from at least 1859 to 1914 in great detail listing all the professional medical personnel and indeed (ideally!) which of these numerous volunteer units (vast majority becoming 3rd and 4th battalions of line infantry) had stretcher - bearer units.  Wellcome does have some fascinating local histories pre-1914 of some of the bearer units.  Tx again.

 

      It's out of place  for a GWF but there is also the whole class of medical involvement of voluntary bodies other than the Red Cross or the RAMC (in all it's forms) since Dunant and Solferino.  For instance, the Stafford House Committee for the Zulu War, Balkan War of 1876-8, the volunteer ambulances of Britons in the War of 1870 ( young Kictchener perchance), in which Henryy Labouchere was involved, the nurmeous volunteer hospitals and bits and bobs of the Boer War and the innumerable non-Red Cross units of the Great War.