Ethel Anna Booker

Place of birth: Southerndown ?

Service: Nurse, Quartermaster, Commandant, VAD, 1915/04/01 – 1919/04/30

Notes: Ethel Booker began her service at Tuscar House as a voluntary kitchen-maid, but became an efficient quartermaster in August 1915. She became Commandant of the hospital following the death of her sister Nellie [qv] in 1917. Her record of service (filled out by her mother Caroline [qv]) says she lived at the hospital and took no leave for the last 18 months of her time there. Ethel and her sister Dulcie [qv] were the prime organisers of events both for fundraising and for amusing the patients at the hospital.rn

Reference: WaW0474

Red Cross record card

Red Cross record for Ethel Booker

Red Cross record card (reverse)

Reverse of Ethel Booker’s Card, detailing her service, and written by her mother. Caroline Booker.

Tuscar House

Tuscar House Red Cross Hospital, Southerndown. The house was used as a hospital in WW2 as well.

Newspaper report

Report of a Grand Matinée given at Bridgend Cinema by the soldiers of Tuscar House (and others). Glamorgan Gazette 29th November 1918

Newspaper report

Report of a presentation to Ethel and Dulcie Booker when Tuscar House hospital closed in April 1919. Glamorgan Gazette 4th April 1919

Etta J O Booker

Place of birth: Southerndown ?

Service: Nurse, Commandant, VAD, FANY, 1909 - 1919

Notes: Etta Booker served as Commandant of the Glamorgan [22] detachment when it was founded in 1909. In November 1914, she was part of a group of six nurses from Glamorgan sent to the French Base Hospital at Saumur for 6 months. After her return to Southerndown she worked for a while in the Tuscar House hospital, but then relinquished her rank as Commandant to go to Calais with the FANY. After a breakdown of health she was moved to Nice to work in the Officers’ Hospital, then back to northern France where she worked in several hospitals, ending as a charge nurse in the Anglo Belge Hospital in Rouen in 1919. She was nearly 40 years old by this time, and had had only short breaks at home, when she worked with her sisters [Booker qv] at Tuscar House. Etta seems to have remained a member of the Red Cross, as her medals include a Silver Jubilee medal (1935) as well as French and Belgian decorations.

Reference: WaW0471

Red Cross record card

Red Cross card for Etta Booker, heavily annotated.

Red Cross record card (reverse)

Reverse of Etta Booker’s Red Cross card, with details of her service (presumably written by her sister Ethel [qv].

Newspaper report

Report of Etta’s departure for France. Glamorgan Gazette 6th November 1914

Etta Booker’s medals

Etta Booker’s medals, which were sold at Bonhams, London for £1440 in 2013. They include the Medal of Queen Elizabeth; Belgium and the France, Ministry of the Interior, silver medal

Medal card

Record of medals awarded to Etta Booker. There are two separate cards in the National Archives, this one listing her as a Trooper then Nurse in the FANY

Medal card

Record of medals awarded to Etta Booker. There are two separate cards in the National Archives, this one listing her as VAD, French Red Cross and FANY

Mabel Booker

Place of birth: Southerndown ?

Service: VAD, VAD, May 1915 – May 1917

Notes: Mabel Booker was not so involved with Tuscar House Hospital as her sisters [Etta, Nellie, Ethel and Dulcie qv], though she was ‘ready to help when required’, and clocked up 500 hours service.

Reference: WaW0473

Red Cross record card

Red Cross record for Mabel Booker

Red Cross record card (reverse)

Reverse of Red Cross card for Mabel Booker, showing her activity.

Marion Crosland Soar

Place of birth: Kent

Service: Scientist, Chemist

Notes: Marion Soar entered University College, Bangor in 1913, and graduated BSc in 1917. She then became an assistant lecturer in chemistry at King’s College of Household and Social Science, specialising in bio-chemistry. In 1920 Marion was one of the first cohort of 20 women admitted as fellows to the Chemistry Society (along with Phyllis McKie [qv]), after a very long struggle. Women had been actively attempting admission since 1892.

Sources: Chemistry Was Their Life: Pioneer British Women Chemists 1880 – 1949. Marelene Rayner-Canham & Geoff Rayner-Canham Imperial College Press 2008

Reference: WaW0467

scientific report

Report of the formation of ferrous sulphide in eggs. Biochemical Journal April 1, 1920

Betty Morris

Place of birth: Haverfordwest

Service: Nurse, VAD, 1915/05/27 – 1918/07/12.

Notes: Betty Morris joined the VAD in May 1915, working originally in Cottesmore Auxiliary Hospital, Haverfordwest. In November she was posted to France, initially to Boulogne but was soon promoted to ‘a larger hospital’, where at 20, she was the youngest nurse. She was a fluent French speaker, and remained with the VAD until July 1918. Excerpts from some of her letters home were published in the Haverfordwest and Milford Haven Telegraph.

Reference: WaW0478

Newspaper photograph Llun papur newydd

Photograph of Betty Morris in outdoor VAD uniform. Haverfordwest and Milton Haven Telegraph 16th February 1916

Newspaper report

Newspaper report of Betty Morris’s departure to France. Haverfordwest and Milton Haven Telegraph 10th November 1915rn rn

Newspaper report

Report of Betty Morris’s Christmas in France. Haverfordwest and Milton Haven Telegraph 16th February 1916

Lily Briggs

Place of birth: Barry ?

Service: Prostitute

Notes: Lily Briggs was sentenced to twenty one days hard labour in July 1915 for ‘trying to entice young soldiers [from the camp at Nell’s Point, Barry Island] into the fields’. She also used ‘filthy language’ when arrested.

Reference: WaW0476

Newspaper report

Report of the court appearance and sentence of Lily Briggs, ‘a common prostitute’. Barry Dock News 9th July 1915.rnrn

M Hopkins

Place of birth: Barry ?

Service: Locomotive Ckeaner, Barry Railway Company

Notes: On 17th July 1917 M Hopkins is recorded in the Barry Railway accident book as having cut her hand on a piece of wire (potentially a serious injury, as blood poisoning was a possibility). She was 24 years old, and paid 18 shillings a week.rn

Sources: Women and the Barry Railway.\\r\\nBlog by Mike Esbester on March 22, 2021 \\r\\n

Reference: WaW0479

Photograph

Women locomotive cleaners at work

Maude Downs

Place of birth: Barry ?

Service: Locomotive cleaner , Barry Railway Company

Notes: The Barry Railway accident book reveals that Maud, aged 23, was injured while working underneath an engine on 17th September 1917. A large spring fell on her foot. Her wages are recorded as 23 shillings a week.

Sources: Women and the Barry Railway.Blog by Mike Esbester on March 22, 2021

Reference: WaW0480

Photograph

Women locomotive cleaners at work

Rachel Barber

Place of birth: Barry ?

Service: Locomotive cleaner , Barry Railway Company

Notes: On 10 September 1917 Rachel suffered a cut forehead when emerging from underneath an engine where she had been working, and meeting a swinging coupling. She was 23 and earned 25s 3d a week. Average pay for working women at that date were around 10 shillings a week.

Sources: Women and the Barry Railway.Blog by Mike Esbester on March 22, 2021

Reference: WaW0481

Photograph

Women locomotive cleaners at work

Blodwen Phillips (later Jones)

Place of birth: Landore

Service: Elocutionist, Clerk, WAAC, WFAF, 1917 0 1919

Notes: Blodwen Phillips was ‘the first lady from the area to volunteer for active service’. She was among the group of WAAC clerks to be sent to France in early summer 1917. She wrote to the Cambria Daily Leader about the WAACs’ reception in France, and about their activities. In 1918 she transferred to the WRAF. One of her WAAC officers was a Miss Ace, perhaps Ivy Ace [qv]. In December 1919 she married Mr H W Jones of Southport at Capel Gomer, Swansea.

Reference: WaW0488

Newspaper report

Report of Blodwen Phillips's impressions of WAAC life in France. The Cambria Daily Leader 14th May 1918.

Newspaper report

Report of Blodwen Phillips’s marriage to H W Jones. South Wales Daily Post December 24th 1919.