Edith and Florence Stoney, two sisters born in Dublin and working in London, responded to the summons of suffragists and offered themselves for medical service in World War I. Each had a strong scientific background and experience that they were able to use in setting up and running radiological services in Belgium, France, Serbia and Macedonia. The British War Office was reluctant to employ women doctors but the work Florence and her colleagues achieved persuaded Sir Alfred Keogh that Florence should be the first woman doctor to be employed in a military hospital in England.
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References
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Entry in Newnham College Register, Newnham College Cambridge1979; 3: 107–8.
2.
Extract from the notice in the Magazine of the London (Royal Free Hospital) School of Medicine for Women November 1932, supplied by the archivist.
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Women were not permitted to graduate from Cambridge before 1948. Trinity College Dublin awarded degrees to Cambridge women on the basis of their degree examinations at that time.
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Also spelt Guevgueli.
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Letter from Florence Stoney to Mrs Laurie 24th November 1915 justifying Edith's purchase. SWH collection.
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McIlroyAL (op. cit. ref. 17).
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Report of an address by Louise McIlroy on the work of the Girton and Newnham Unit 20 October 1917, Newham College Letter private circulation 1917:41-3.
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Correspondence from Edith Stoney mainly to Mrs Laurie dated 21 September, 30 September, 1915, 10 and 18 March, 21 September 1915, 17 October 1916, 21 November 1917 SWH collection.
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War Work 1914-1918 (op. cit. ref. 11).
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Letter from ES to Mrs Laurie 21 August 1917 SWH collection.
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Letter to Mrs Laurie from Edith in London. 28 July 1918. SWH collection.
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Letter from ES to Mrs Walker 30 June 1918 and from Florence Stoney [FS] to Mrs Laurie 17 June 1918 SWH collection.
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CroftonE, SavillA, NavarroA, (op. cit. refs. 3, 4 and 11).
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Letter from ES to Miss Kemp, no date. Letter from FS to Mrs Laurie 24 November 1915 SWH collection.
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Letter from FS to Mrs Laurie 11 October 1918, from Edith to Mrs Laurie 27 October 1918. SWH collection.
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Her correspondence with Mrs Laurie.
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Letter ES to Mrs Laurie 06 July 1917 SWH collection.
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Florence Ada Stoney OBE, MD (Lond) DMRE (Camb) ObituaryBritish Journal of Radiology1932; ns 5: 853–8.
47.
Mabel Annie St Clair Stobart (1862-1954), an ardent feminist, had in 1907 founded the Women's Sick and Wounded Convoy Corps which set up a hospital in Kirk Kilisse for the Belgian Red Cross. Her visit to Brussels in 1914 coincided with invasion of the city by the German Army and led to her arrest as a spy. She narrowly escaped being shot. In 1915 she redirected her energies to Serbia and set up a tented hospital and dispensaries for the Serbian Relief Fund. (H Blodgett, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography 1904).
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van der EssenLéonInvasion and the War in Belgium London 1917: 254–264.
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StoneyFA. The Women's Imperial Service League Hospital.Archives of the Roentgen Ray1915; 19: 388–393.
