Violet Pearce

Place of birth: Swansea

Service: Booking clerk, NWR

Death: November 1918, Swansea, Influenza / y ffliw

Notes: Violet Pearce was a booking clerk at Swansea Victoria Station when she died of Spanish Influenza in early November 1918.

Reference: WaW0373

Newspaper report

Report of the death of Violet Pearce. Cambrian Daily Leader 5th November 1918.

Annie Sanders

Place of birth: Cardiff

Service: Post Woman, Post Office / Swyddfa Bost

Notes: Litlle is known of Annie Sanders, except that she was associated with Roath Road Wesleyan Methodist Church, Cardiff. The Roath Road Roamer, published monthly from November 1914, contained information about women war workers as well as men. Annie was one of ‘our Lady Roamers’. Her blue serge uniform was introduced by the Post Office in 1914. Image and information courtesy of Glamorgan Archives (DWESA6).

Sources: https://archifaumorgannwg.wordpress.com/

Reference: WaW0108

Annie Sanders, Postwoman

Annie Sanders, Postwoman, Cardiff, in her navy blue serge uniform

Frances Ethel Brace

Place of birth: Manorbier

Service: Nurse, QAIMNS, 16/06/1916

Death: 1916-09-21, Military Hospital, Malta, Malaria

Memorial: War Memorial, Cosheton; Llanelwy, Pembrokshire, Flintshire

Notes: Frances Brace trained at Carmarthen Infirmary, and joined QAIMNS in 1916. She was posted to Salonika as a staff nurse. There she contracted malaria and dysentery, and was transferred to Malta. She died there on 2ist September 1916, aged 30.

Sources: http://www.wwwmp.co.uk/pembrokeshire-war-memorials/;http://www.flintshirewarmemorials.com/memorials/st-asaph-memorial/st-asaph-cathedral-welsh-nurses-ww1/brace-frances-ethel/

Reference: WaW0001

Cosheton War Memorial

Frances Ethel Brace's name on War Memorial, Cosheston

Memorial plaque in Malta

Died in Military Hospital, Malta

Frances Ethel Brace on the left

Frances Ethel Brace and a colleague

Nurses

Frances Ethel Brace's name on the Nurses' Memorial, St Asaph

Frances Ethel Brace

Nurse Frances Ethel Brace before she joined QAIMNS

Newspaper report

Report of the death of Frances Ethel Brace, Herald of Wales 30th September 1918

Fanny Irene Sprake Jones

Place of birth: Carmarthen

Service: Nurse, QAIMNS

Death: 1919-06-11, Cause not known

Memorial: War memorial, Carmarthen, Carmarthen

Notes: aged 36. Qualified at King's College Hospital, London, May 1913.

Reference: WaW0037

Welsh National Book of Remembrance

Name of Frances Sprake-Jones in the Welsh National Book of Remembrance

Jane (Jennie) Roberts

Place of birth: Bryncrug

Service: Staff Nurse, QAIMNS

Death: 1917-04-10, HMHS Salta, Drowning / Boddi

Memorial: Cathedral Nurse, Llanelwy, Flintshire

Notes: aged 30. She died when His Majesty’s Hospital Ship “Salta” was sunk off Le Havre on 10 April 1917. She was lost at sea and her body was never recovered. Her name appears on the Salta Memorial at Ste Marie Cemetery, Le Havre, Normandy, France, and on the memorial plaques in the porch of St Cadfan's Church, Tywyn

Sources: http://www.flintshirewarmemorials.com/memorials/st-asaph-memorial/st-asaph-cathedral-welsh-nurses-ww1/roberts-jane/http://www.mawddachestuary.co.uk/warmemorials/#TywynChurch

Reference: WaW0052

Nurse Jane Robert's name on the Nurses' Memorial, St Asaph

Jane Robert's name on the Nurses' Memorial, St Asaph

Tywyn Church

Name of Jane Roberts in the memorial porch, Tywyn Church

Jane (Jennie) Roberts

Jane/Jennie’s photograph was collected by the Women’s Subcommittee of the Imperial War museum as part of its collection of women who died during the War

Mabel Mary Tunley

Place of birth: Pontypridd, 1870

Service: Acting Principal Matron, QAIMNS, 1903 - 1925

Notes: After serving in the Boer War, Mabel Tunley joined QAIMNS in 1903 as a staff nurse, rising to become Acting Principal Matron in France and Flanders during WWI. Among other awards, she received the Military Medal for 'exceptionally good work in assisting getting all the patients, 260, down to the cellars, so that when the Clearing Station was eventually hit not one of the patients received a scratch. Her cheeriness and courage were instrumental in keeping everyone who came in contact with her up to the mark. She was slightly wounded and remained at duty.' Bethune, 7th August 1916.

Sources: http://anurseatthefront.org.uk/names-mentioned-in-the-diaries/other-people/medical-colleagues/mabel-mary-tunley/

Reference: WaW0087

Mabel Mary Tunley

Matron Tunley

Mabel Mary Tunley (reverse)

Matron Tunley (reverse)

Catherine Williams

Place of birth: Colwyn Bay

Service: Staff Nurse, QAIMNS

Death: 1919-08-04, Cause not known

Memorial: War memorial, Colwyn Bay, Caernarvonshire

Notes: aged 38. Buried Bron-y-Nant cemetery Colwyn Bay.

Sources: http://historypoints.org/index.php?page=colwyn-bay-memorial-fww-surnames-s-y

Reference: WaW0064

War Memorial Colwyn Bay

Name of Catherine Williams on Colwyn Bay War Memorial

Gladys Mina Watkins

Place of birth: Abergavenny

Service: Staff nurse, QAIMNS

Notes: Gladys Watkins, born about 1882, joined QAIMNS in April 1909, and was sent to France very shortly after the outbreak of war. She was invalided home in September 1917, suffering from ’neurasthenia’; she seems to have had a complete mental breakdown. She spent much of the next two years in hospital, nursing homes, or staying with her sister Edith who was also a nurse. She faced numerous army medical boards, most of which declared her fit for home or sedentary service. Letters from Gladys herself, her sister and various doctors survive in her records in the National Archives. They describe her agoraphobia, suicidal tendencies and night terrors ‘associated with bursting shells’. She tendered her resignation from QAIMNS in the summer of 1918, though this was deferred and later withdrawn. By summer 1919 her health was improving: ‘I have been doing outdoor work, poultry etc, for the last three months and now feel much stronger’. She was passed fit ‘for home service’ in October 1919, and continued her career at Netley Military Hospital. The last record of her is summer 1923, when her file says ‘Warn for tour of foreign service’.Gladys was awarded the Royal Red Cross on her return from France in 1917.

Sources: National Archives WO 399_8743

Reference: WaW0279

Newspaper report

Report of the award of Royal Red Cross to Gladys Mina Watkins. Abergavenny Chronicle 26th January 1917

Letter

Letter from Gladys’s doctor in Ross on Wye describing her condition.

Letter

Letter from Gladys’s doctor in Ross on Wye describing her condition, continued.

Letter

Part of letter from Matron in Chief, QAIMNS, suggesting Gladys should be demobilised.

Official record

Record of Gladys’s medical boards.

Margaret Walker Bevan

Place of birth: Swansea

Service: Nurse, QAIMNS

Death: 1915 - 1919, Cause not known

Notes: Born in Swansea in 1883, Margaret trained as a nurse in Coventry and later worked in Barnsley. Early in 1915 she joined the staff of the Welsh Military Hospital, Netley. The Welsh Hospital was designed to be moveable, and it was soon packed up and sent, with its staff, to Deolali in India. Margaret worked there, and in Mesopotamia, until December 1919. After the war she became Matron of the new Memorial Hospital in Farnborough, Surrey.

Sources: People’s Collection Wales

Reference: WaW0429

Photograph

A ward at the ‘Welch’ Hospital, Deolali. Margaret is standing on the left. Thanks to Dave Gordon.

Photograph

Margaret in a hospital tent, possibly in Basra, Mesopotamia. Thanks to Dave Gordon

Magazine article

Description of the Welsh War Hospital, Netley. 'The Hospital' 24th October 1914.

Gwenllian Elizabeth Roberts

Place of birth: Llangynidr

Service: Sister, QAIMNS Reserve

Notes: Gwenllian Roberts was awarded the Royal Red Cross for her services at the Central Military Hospital, Chatham, Kent.

Reference: WaW0115

Gwenllian Elizabeth Roberts

Sister Gwenllian Elizabeth Roberts QAIMNSR wearing her Royal Red Cross medal

Gwenllian Roberts’s Royal Red Cross

Sister Gwenllian Roberts’s Royal Red Cross, awarded August 5th 1919.

Edinburgh Gazette listing Sister Roberts’s award

Edinburgh Gazette listing Sister Roberts’s award, August 5th 1919 (8th in the right hand column).

Newspaper report

Newspaper report of Sister Roberts’s award, Llais Llafur25th October 1919.