Notes: aged 47. SS Osmanieh was sunk by a German mine off Alexandria, Egypt. Grave in Hadra War Memorial Cemetery, Alexandria, Egypt. Born in the Workhouse in Dolgellau, she spent many years in Australia before returning to Britain to join the QAIMNS Reserves.
Nurse Margaret Dorothy Robert's name on the Nurses' Memorial, St Asaph
Margaret Dorothy Robert's name on the Nurses' Memorial, St Asaph
Margaret Dorothy Roberts
Margaret Dorothy Roberts
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
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
Catherine Williams
Place of birth: Colwyn Bay
Service: Staff Nurse, QAIMNS
Death: 1919-08-04, Cause not known
Memorial: War memorial, Colwyn Bay, Caernarvonshire
Name of Catherine Williams on Colwyn Bay War Memorial
Ethel Saxon
Place of birth: Abertillery
Service: Staff Nurse, TFNS
Death: 1917-09-03, Karachi, Appendicitis/Llid y pendics
Memorial: War Memorial; Nurses’ Memorial; Delhi Gate, Kingsland; Liverpool Cathedral; Delhi, Herefordshire; Lancashire; India
Notes: Born 1891, her father was a builder and joiner. She worked for some time in Liverpool before serving overseas. Her parents retired to Kingsland, Herefordshire where she is memorialised; her name also appears on the Nurses’ memorial in Liverpool Cathedral, the Nurses’ memorial in York Minster and the Indian war memorial the Great Gate at Delhi.
Reference: WaW0134
Kingsland War Memorial
Name of Ethel Saxon on Kingsland War Memorial
Roll of Honour, Kingsland Church
Name of Staff Nurse Ethel Saxon on the Roll of Honour, Kingsland Church
Death Notice
Death Notice of Ethel Saxon
Nurses's Memorial
Nurses’ Memorial, Liverpool Cathedral
Nurses’ memorial Liverpool
Name of Ethel Saxon on the Nurses’ Memorial, Liverpool Cathedral
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 Ann (Peggy) Lyons
Place of birth: Tregaron
Service: Staff nurse, QAIMNSR, 1915 - 1919
Notes: Peggy Lyons was born in Tregaron in 1875. She trained at Carmarthen Infirmary, and in 1900 moved to London where she worked in two hospitals, and with private patients. She applied to join QAIMNS in January 1915, and served in British military hospital for 18 months. In June 1916 she was posted via Bombay to Mesopotamia where she remained until she was invalided home in September 1919 suffering from malaria. After treatment she was demobilised with excellent references on 29th September 1919. She may subsequently have moved to work in South Africa. Peggy was awarded the Royal red Cross in June 1916. Her sister Kate Phyllis Davies [qv] worked as a sister at Aberystwyth Red Cross hospital.
Sources: National Archives WO 399_5063
Reference: WaW0280
Newspaper artcle and photograph
Photograph and report of Peggy Lyons’s receipt of the Royal Red Cross. Cambrian News 23rd June 1916.
Newspaper article
First part of a letter home from Peggy Lyons in Mesopotamia, published in the Cambrian News 24th August 1917.
Letter
Letter from Peggy Lyons concerning the treatment of her malaria, 21 September 1919 (1)
Letter
Letter from Peggy Lyons concerning the treatment of her malaria, 21 September 1919 (2)
Alice Lidster
Place of birth: Pontypool ?
Service: Station mistress, Great Western and Rhymney Railway
Notes: Alice, daughter of a GWR Chief Inspector, was appointed ‘station mistress’ of Troedyrhiw Halt in April 1915, probably the first such appointment in Wales. She seems to have been a trained nurse.