V.A.D NURSE SISTER M.R.WILSON

[BIFFO]

I have just started to research a ww1 nurse,first for me ,

she was born 1886 in Nottingham,I have a list  many of the hospitals she served in,entitled to wear BWM,VM, no number other than brc st j.jshe joined 

in England 30-3-15,then served abroad 19-8-16,terminating with the rank of sister 9-12-1919,in my information there is mention of certificate number 10073.?

as I say this is a first for me,for some reason I have it in mind that she emigrated to Canada.

Im looking for a red cross or st johns "expert"

she is sadly missed anyway but wouldn't Sue Light get her teeth into this post

Biffo

[alf mcm]

Biffo,

  Happy New Year,

  Your Nurse is Marion Rosina Wilson. There is a record here on FMP  https://www.findmypast.co.uk/transcript?id=GBM/REDCRO/9874

  10073 would be her Red Cross membership number.

  Her Red Cross record card is here https://vad.redcross.org.uk/Card?fname=marion&sname=wilson&id=230106&last=true  Her character reference is interesting!

 

Regards,

 

Alf McM

[alf mcm]

Biffo,

  You may find some details of Nurse Wilson, or the hospitals she served in, in the British Journal of Nursing. Their archive can be searched here http://rcnarchive.rcn.org.uk/cgi-bin/keyword_search.pl#

 

Regards,

 

Alf McM

[Kimberley John Lindsay]

Dear Biffo,

Alf has got it exactly right, and is a credit to the GWF membership.

Indeed, I researched another valiant nurse, Sally Round, who had volunteered for Lady Paget's Serbian Relief Fund, then volunteered yet again, for the QAIMNSR. Only the Serbian Relief Fund is noted on her Medal Index Card (although the Medal Roll shows her 1914 Serbia and later Salonika service dates). I have her Kaisar-i-Hind in Bronze (Third Class), named on the presentation case.

At the time, Sue was most helpful, guiding me to the BJM, as Alf has so ably done. I eventually found Sally's elusive Image...!

Kindest regards,

Kim.

Edited 1 January , 2019 by Kimberley John Lindsay

[BIFFO]

I have just started to re research this brave nurse.

I have her on the 1891 English census,cannot find hide nor hair of her on 1911.

This morning I received an e mail with part of her service record, where are these hospitals ?

what is TF ?

I cannot read much of her service record.

When she left  nursing 1919 for some reason I think she emigrated on her service it did say she had worked in U.S.A.

I cannot find her on the 1939 census.

Any further help would be good

BTW 3 cheers for Tew who has helped me 

Edited 1 April , 2019 by BIFFO

[Dai Bach y Sowldiwr]

"Present Occupation: Operating Nurse for Dr. Harvey Cushing, Boston, USA."

 

Wow.

Just Wow!

[BIFFO]

is that good then vicar ?

 

[seaJane]

Not half!

 

TF usually Territorial Forces.

Wiki: Shortly after the entry of the United States into the First World War, Cushing was commissioned as a major in the U.S. Army Medical Corps on May 5, 1917. He was director of the U.S. base hospital attached to the British Expeditionary Force in France. Cushing also served as the head of a surgical unit in a French military hospital outside of Paris. During his time at the French military hospital, Cushing experimented with the use of electromagnets to extract fragments of metallic missile shrapnel that were lodged severely within the brain. He was mentioned in a dispatch by Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig in November 1917.

[Dai Bach y Sowldiwr]

11 minutes ago, BIFFO said:

is that good then vicar ?

 

Here's a few thing that he did (totally off the top of my head and in no particular order).

 

Harvey Williams Cushing (April 8, 1869 – October 7, 1939) was an American neurosurgeon, pathologist, writer and draftsman. A pioneer of brain surgery, he was the first exclusive neurosurgeon and the first person to describe Cushing's disease. He wrote a biography of William Osler in three volumes. Together with Ernest Sachs, he is known as the Father of Neurosurgery.

During his time with Kocher, he first encountered the Cushing reflex which describes the relationship between blood pressure and intracranial pressure.

 

At the age of 32, he was made associate professor of surgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital, and was placed in full charge of cases of surgery of the central nervous system.

 

He became a professor of surgery at the Harvard Medical School starting in 1912.^[6] In 1913, he was made an honorary F.R.C.S. (London). He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1914.^[7] In 1915, before the Clinical Congress of Surgeons in Boston, he showed the possibility of influencing stature by operating on the pituitary gland.^[5]

[Insert Jane's bit here].

In the beginning of the 20th century, Dr. Cushing developed many of the basic surgical techniques for operating on the brain. This established him as one of the foremost leaders and experts in the field. Under his influence neurosurgery became a new and autonomous surgical discipline.

• He considerably improved the survival of patients after difficult brain operations for intracranial tumors.
• He used X-rays to diagnose brain tumors.
• He used electrical stimuli for study of the human sensory cortex.
• He played a pivotal role in development of the Bovie electrocautery tool with William T. Bovie, a physicist.
• He was the world's leading teacher of neurosurgeons in the first decades of the 20th century.

Arguably, Cushing's greatest contribution came with his introduction to North America of blood pressure measurement.

Cushing's name is commonly associated with his most famous discovery, Cushing's disease. In 1912 he reported in a study an endocrinological syndrome caused by a malfunction of the pituitary gland which he termed "polyglandular syndrome."

 

Cushing was also awarded the 1926 Pulitzer Prize for Biography or Autobiography for a book recounting the life of one of the fathers of modern medicine, Sir William Osler.

 

A synopsis that is longer than most doctors' entire CVs.

Truly , one of the All-Time-Greats.

[alf mcm]

Biffo,

  Marion took a couple of years off her age for the last card in #5. She is in London in 1911, as a Nurse, and what's more, she was born in Wales!

The census is here https://search.ancestry.co.uk/cgi-bin/sse.dll?_phsrc=bmY25694&_phstart=successSource&usePUBJs=true&indiv=1&db=1911england&gsfn=marion&gsln=wilson&gsfn_x=1&gsln_x=1&cp=11&msbdy=1885&msbdy_x=1&msbdp=2&qh=XT2vN9yVKH/rx4NenJKElw%3D%3D&new=1&rank=1&uidh=9y4&redir=false&gss=angs-d&pcat=35&fh=7&h=828972&recoff=&ml_rpos=8

Her birth record is here https://search.ancestry.co.uk/cgi-bin/sse.dll?indiv=1&dbid=8912&h=61204061&tid=&pid=&usePUB=true&_phsrc=bmY25698&_phstart=successSource

In addition, FMP have her baptism in Swansea, St. James, Glamorganshire in 1899.

 

Regards,

 

Alf

[Dai Bach y Sowldiwr]

37 minutes ago, alf mcm said:

She is in London in 1911, as a Nurse,

That confirms, St.Mary's, Paddington then, as per her card in the first post.

[MaureenE]

The way I would read the first card is that the wording "Operating Nurse for Dr. Harvey Cushing, Boston, USA." was part of the Experience line above, and that the present Occupation was: " Working with American Amb[ulance] Paris", which was a Hospital

 

There is an online book War Letters of an American Woman by Marie Van Vorst. 1916 Archive.org. A novelist, she worked as a volunteer nurse at the American Ambulance [Hospital]. Wikipedia

 

Cheers

Maureen

[Dai Bach y Sowldiwr]

3 minutes ago, Maureene said:

The way I would read the first card is that the wording "Operating Nurse for Dr. Harvey Cushing, Boston, USA." was part of the Experience line above,

Yes, you're right.

But I'd already interpreted it all as past experience rather than her current job.

 

 

 

On 01/01/2019 at 11:37, BIFFO said:

she was born 1886 in Nottingham,

 

1 hour ago, alf mcm said:

and what's more, she was born in Wales!

Hmmm.

One or both of these facts is wrong.

Or, two people with same name maybe?

[BIFFO]

now your ALL diamond geezers BUT Alf your a diamond diamond geezer,I have checked her details on a research site starting with A,

works out that Marion drops Rosina from her name but her Mum is called Rosina so its almost deffo ? the correct nurse this time ? 

AND WELSH double good 

 

[BIFFO]

I have found the locations for all the hospitals on llt

But cannot find anything on the location of No2 Q.B hospital I will leave you all alone soon promise   

what does R.S stand for in V.A.D ?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited 2 April , 2019 by BIFFO
spot the deliberate mistake ??

[TEW]

I've found some refs to a Marion R Wilson Nurse but can't be 100% sure she is the same woman.

 

British Newspaper Archive.

The Scotsman - Friday 16 July 1926;

Edinburgh University Final Medical passes - Marion R Wilson Public Health.

 

Motherwell Times - Friday 29 June 1956;

See attachment.

She seems to have been with a Dr Crib? Cleveland Ohio from May 1914 having been under Prof. Bartianelli in Rome. Can't find an UK outward going passenger list for her so perhaps direct from Italy, but no Ellis Island matches either.

 

No hits for incoming ships either. Perhaps she went direct to France.

 

I think the QB is a mistake for AB as per the card 'American Base' is my guess.

 

VADRS is possibly the VAD Rest Station in Buchy. See Scarlet Finders

 

TEW

 

[DavidOwen]

Biffo

 

Doesn't it say in post #5 that No 2 was in Buchy? Or have I read it wrong (as usual!) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buchy,_Seine-Maritime

According to my source R.S. could stand amongst other things for "Reserve Status" - closest I could find.

 

Regards

David

 

Edit: now I have looked at the original as pictured - I got it wrong again!

Edited 2 April , 2019 by DavidOwen

[alf mcm]

Biffo,

  R.S. is for Rest Station Buchy  https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/quarry-bank/features/madges-war

  I think Q.B. should be A.B., looking at the writing on one of the cards. I f I am correct then it may mean {St. John's} Ambulance Brigade Hospital, as opposed to a Red Cross Hospital.

 

Regards,

 

Alf McM

[DavidOwen]

Well done Alf!

[BIFFO]

That's it,

Alf if we ever meet it will be my pleasure to let you buy me a pint 

Now she must have been some nurse,having read about Dr Harvey Cushing he  wouldn't have had any one in his operating theatre that didn't know what they were doing 

TTFN

Biffo

Edited 2 April , 2019 by BIFFO

[Dai Bach y Sowldiwr]

1 hour ago, BIFFO said:

he  wouldn't have had any one in his operating theatre that didn't know what they were doing

...except the poor soul on the pointy end of his scalpel!

[BIFFO]

[Marilyne]

interesting topic!!

I'm reading up on nurses for my project (although having survived she's not part of it) but just one thought: Cushing worked in Flanders for a while, around the -eghem CCSs.

Once I'm back at home I'll try to find out something about the hospitals he worked at.

 

M.

 

[kjharris]

Perhaps this was covered but Harvey Cushing wrote a book about his war experiences:

 

Cushing H. From a Surgeon’s Journal – 1915-1918. Boston: Little, Brown and Company; 1936

 

well worth a read for anyone interested in war surgery.

[Marilyne]

ion Cushing's memoirs (the archives.org version)

p42: there's a group picture featuring a nurse Wilson of the Harvard unit at the American Ambulance… that her???

all other references to "Wilson" refer to the President or a fellow surgeon

 

M.