The
National Memorial Arboretum has a memorial to nurses who served in the first and
Second World Wars. The memorial includes the names of nearly 1,300 nurses who died during or as a direct result of their wartime service. The names were taken from research carried out by Yvonne McEwen. McEwen created rolls of honour for the two wars, and deposited copies in national libraries in Edinburgh, Aberystwyth, Belfast, Dublin and London. The London copy is on permanent display in the
Royal College of Nursing Library and can be accessed by appointment. Most nurses were part of the
Queen Alexandra's Imperial Military Nursing Service (QAIMNS). At the start of the war there were fewer than 300 nurses; four years later when the war ended it had over 10,000 nurses in its ranks. According to the
British Red Cross, "128 nursing members, 11 general service members and six Joint War Committee hospital members were killed."
Edith Cavell was executed for treason by a German firing squad on 12 October 1915 in
Brussels, Belgium.
Marjory Eva May Edwards served for three and a half years in Britain and France and died of
measles in England on 4 January 1918. Her name is listed on the village
war memorial at
St Mary's Church at
Streatley, Berkshire. Catherine Miller was working at the 1st Western General Hospital in Liverpool, England when she died on 24 December 1918. She had contracted malaria while serving in Russia.
Scottish nurses An estimated 150 British nurses were killed during World War 1. Of those killed 40 were Scottish. Four of the nurses were killed by enemy action including
Agnes Murdoch Climie, a staff nurse who trained at the
Glasgow Royal Infirmary. Miss Climie was a member of the
Territorial Force Nursing Service and based at a general hospital in France while she was on the staff of the 4th Scottish General Hospital,
Stobhill. Miss Climie was not on duty during the bombardment but returned to her ward and was killed while singing to a patient who was nervous. Miss Climie was killed instantly while in the same incident Sister
Mabel Milne of
Perth, who trained at
Edinburgh Royal Infirmary and was attached to the 2nd Scottish General Hospital died a short time after being wounded. Two
Voluntary Aid Detachments (VADs), Miss
Daisie Coles (2nd Scottish Hospital) and Miss
E Thompson (1st Scottish Hospital) were also killed. Three Scottish nurses drowned while serving on hospital ships during WW1. A further 33 Scottish nurses died from diseases acquired while on military service. Two nurses were members of the regular Military Nursing Service and the others were members of the
Queen Alexandra’s Imperial Military Nursing Service Reserve and the
Territorial Force Nursing Service. In March 1915, four Scottish nurses died in Serbia of
typhus. They were part of a group of Scottish women – nurses, doctors and volunteers – who had travelled to Serbia to establish
Scottish Women's Hospitals for Foreign Service: •
Margaret Neill Fraser •
Louisa Jordan •
Augusta Minshull •
Bessie Sutherland A memorial with the names of the 40 Scottish nurses killed in WW1 was erected by members of the Military Nursing Service, and unveiled at the
Cathedral of St Giles in
Edinburgh in 1921. The memorial is a bronze tablet set in green marble. Two of them belonged to the Queen Alexandria’s Imperial Military Nursing Service (QAIMNS): • Nellie Hawley • Dorothea Roberts and the rest belonged to the
Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD): • Gertrude Bytheway • Una Duncanson • Lilian Midwood • Hermione Rogers • Catherine Ball • Winifred Brown
Five Sisters memorial York Minster’s Five Sisters window is the only
memorial in the UK dedicated to all the women of the British Empire who lost their lives in
World War I. Ten oak screens were added to the north side of the St Nicholas Chapel. They list the name of every woman who died in the line of service during WWI. An inscription thereon reads, “This screen records the names of women of the Empire who gave their lives in the war 1914–1918 to whose memory the Five Sisters window was restored by women”. There are 1,513 names listed on the screens. == United States ==