I felt nervous when I saw Jess's writing ... I generally do feel anxious when I get letters from home and cannot read them quick enough as I am always afraid of getting bad news of mother.

Diary entry - May Cameron

Hôpital Anglais Militaire, Nevers, France

4 February 1916

Written by one of May’s sisters, Jess Cameron, the letter did indeed contain heartbreaking news; their beloved younger brother, Max, had died suddenly at the age of forty-five. This awful news had taken more than two months to reach May at the Hôpital Anglais Militaire in Nevers; a small medieval town situated on the Loire River about 160 miles south east of Paris.

May, on that fateful afternoon, was working her final shift and as a way of saying good-bye to the soldiers in her ward, she had organised a special afternoon tea. There were 'cakes of various kinds, cigarettes, and cigars ..., fruit, chocolate and tea'. The letter arrived just has she had everything ready but such was its affect that she left the ward after arranging for other staff to take over.

The hospital was located in the middle of a railway repair yard. Railway lines ran almost up to its doors which made the unloading of wounded soldiers from hospital trains more efficient. The more serious casualties were laid on the ground side by side on stretchers. Medical staff moved amongst them, triaging as they went, based on what colour label was tied to each soldier’s uniform. Red for the severely injured, blue for the less severe and white, for the rarely seen, slightly injured.

Originally a 110-bed hospital which later increased to 170, it was well fitted out with pleasant sunny wards, bathrooms, a heating system and an X-ray room next to the operating theatre. The staff were mainly British but many of the orderlies and the women who came in to mend clothes and look after the linen, were French.

May and her colleagues worked extremely hard particularly after major battles when it was not uncommon for them to be on their feet for thirty-six hours or more. Treatment of wounds without the yet to be discovered, Penicillin, was difficult. Apart from administering pain relief in the form of morphine, little could be done for abdominal wounds. Much time and effort went into keeping mirrors away from soldiers, whose faces had been horribly disfigured by their wounds.

Nevers, with its narrow winding streets, framed by stunning ecclesiastical architecture and feudal edifices was in stark contrast to Glenshee, the Cameron family’s sheep property, near Elmhurst, in the Pyrenees region of Western Victoria.

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Gold-rush immigrants flooded into Victoria in 1852. May’s Scottish born parents, Georgina and John Cameron, were amongst them. They like thousands of others, spent some years on the central goldfields searching for the lucky strike that never came. By the time May was born in 1868, John was working as a boundary rider on one of the local stations before he selected land at Nowhere Creek in Western Victoria.

Given that the average life expectancy for a woman in the early 20th century was around fifty-one years, it seems strange that May, aged thirty-five, chose in March 1903 to commence a three-year general nursing training course. What was it about her life circumstances that led to such an unusual choice at such a late stage in her life?

Nevertheless, May embarked on her nursing career at Beechworth’s Oven District Hospital where she ‘proved to be a nurse of rare ability’ and ‘by her kindness and consideration won the regard of the patients and all with whom she came in contact.’

A long article extolling the virtues of Matron Winning and her staff was published in the Ovens and Murray Advertiser, 31 December 1904.

After gaining her general nursing certificate in August 1906, May spent two years at Melbourne’s Queens Memorial Hospital for Infectious Diseases, later known as Fairfield. The hospital began its life as a fever hospital and treated patients with diseases such as typhoid, diphtheria, cholera and smallpox. May was familiar with the symptoms of typhoid in particular, as the Ovens District Hospital, like many hospitals on the goldfields had wards known as fever or typhoid wards.

On attaining her certificate of competency, she ‘occupied the position of staff nurse, sister and acting matron’ and was highly praised for ‘her management of the diphtheria ward during an epidemic.’

In the early winter of 1908, May, due to staff shortages, returned to the Ovens District Hospital as a staff nurse and when required, took on the role of Acting Matron. This held her in good stead for her appointment in July, 1909 as Matron of the Stawell Hospital and Benevolent Asylum. At the time, the hospital was one of only two major hospitals between Adelaide and Melbourne. Benevolent Asylums were built, in the mid to late 19th century, to house the destitute including homeless women, their children and orphans.

Keen as ever to add to her nursing knowledge, May in the latter half of 1913 studied and worked at the Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital in East Melbourne under Dr. Fitzgerald, a senior resident surgeon who spoke highly of her.

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In the two months after the outbreak of World War 1, Britain sustained a staggering number of troop casualties. Consequently, by October 1914, more than thirty British base hospitals and casualty clearing stations were established in France and Belgium. They were staffed by the Royal Army Medical Corps and nurses from both the Queen Alexandra’s Imperial Nursing Service (QAIMNS) and the Territorial Force Nursing Service (TFNS).

May arrived in France with the TFNS in early October 1914 and was with them until, August 1915, when she joined the nursing staff of the Nevers Hôpital Anglais Militaire.

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Only days after receiving Jess’s letter, a devastated May returned to London. Waiting for her were lots of letters but not the ones she wanted. ‘I do not know how or why he’d died, all the letters I received from friends were just the usual ones of condolence. God the misery of it …’ London’s weather which she described as ‘simply awful, mud and snow and rain day after day’ only added to her anguish.

Under the circumstances May, after having already devoted fifteen months of her life to France’s sick and wounded, could have ‘turned tail’ and sailed home to her family. Instead, in May 1916, aged forty-eight, she accepted an appointment as a staff nurse with the Queen Alexandra’s Imperial Nursing Service Reserve (QAIMNSR).

If she was hoping to return to France, she would have been disappointed when she was classified as ‘fit for home service’ and assigned to the Eastbourne Military Hospital on England’s south east coast.

When May, first applied for a QAIMNSR position in July 1915 she reduced her age by almost ten years stating she was born in 1879 rather than 1868. Perhaps, this was the reason, she was not seen as being suitable for overseas service.

Formerly the infirmary of the Eastbourne Workhouse, also known as St Mary’s, the hospital had twelve beds for officers and 312 beds for other ranks, large numbers of whom were brought to Eastbourne by train and then by ambulance to St. Mary’s. By mid-1915, St Mary’s was a major military hospital whose patients because of the blue uniforms they wore, were known as the ‘blue boys’.

Timeline

Selections from May's Autograph Book

Sources

© Anne Hanson, 2020     E-mail: Anne Hanson