Army Nurse Jane Eleanor Turner

In this post we look at another World War One Army Nurse with a connection to the Casey Cardinia region. Jane Eleanor Turner was born in Lysterfield on October 27, 1887 to Josiah Stansfeld Milne Turner and his wife and Lucy Ida (nee Billington) (1).  Soon after her birth, the family moved to Kilcunda Road, Kongwak and that is where her six sisters were born. They family operated a sheep and cattle farm (2).

Jane's birth notice 

The Leader November 5 1887 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article196496197

Jane undertook her training at the Heathcote Hospital and qualified in November 1914 and worked there until her enlistment (3). As a matter of interest, her sister Bon commenced her nursing training at Heathcote in June 1914 and completeted it in May 1919 at Colac (4).

Jane Eleanor Turner successfully passes her Victorian Trained Nurses' Association examinations.

Bendigonian December 29, 1914 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article92054275

Jane enlisted in the Australian Army Nursing Service on July 13, 1917 at the age of 29 (5).  The Great Southern Advocate (6) reported  that on July 23, a very successful farewell social was tendered to Staff-nurse Turner, of Kilcunda Road on Monday night by some of her many Friends, prior to taking her departure for Salonika to fulfil military duties. Mr F. Bunn, on behalf of the residents, on presenting Nurse Turner with a handsomely engraved set of solid silver brushes, mirror and comb and a purse containing a considerable amount of money, said that he was in a position to know that their guest possessed many fine qualities as he had known her from childhood, and he felt very proud of her (7). 

Jane embarked from Sydney on August 31, 1917 and was assigned at the 31st General Hospital at Abbassia, Cairo where she commenced duty on October 5, 1917. 

31st General Hospital at Abbassia, Cairo, where Jane worked. 

Photographer: John Dougal Cramb. Australian War Memorial Image J05644

Jane left Abbassia on June 13 1918 and arrived at Salonika, Macedonia nine days later where she was assigned to the 52nd General Hospital and later to the 42nd and 43rd General Hospitals. During this time she was admitted to hospital with Influenza (8).

Jane also worked at the 52nd General Hospital

Patients' huts at 52nd British General Hospital. Australian War Memorial Image H15755

Not only did the nurses, soldiers and patients have to battle disease, they also had to battle mosquitoes, at the 52nd General Hospital as this amusing photo, below, shows. 

 A group of Australian Army Nursing Service nurses at the 52nd British General Hospital at Kalamaria ready for night duty wearing headdress provided for protection against mosquitoes. 

Kalamaria is just south of Salonika.

Australian War Memorial Image H15761

On March 3 1919, Jane departed Salonika for England. After arriving in London, she was granted leave to attend a Motor Driving course at the Mansion Motor Training Garage. She finally left Engand on August 9, 1919 to return to Australia, arriving on September 27 (9).  

Nurse Turner was welcomed home at a function held at the Bena Mechanics' Institute on Friday October 10. Once again the Great Southern Advocate (10) reported on the function - The Bena Mechanics' Institute was crowded to the doors on Friday evening last when a public welcome home was tendered to Staff-Nurse Turner, just recently returned from active service. Nurse Turner has seen two years' service in Egypt, two in Solonica (11) and some time in England, but despite the fact that she has gone through all the many hardships involved in the ardous life of a Red Cross nurse she has returned looking exceedingly strong and well......A very fine collection of musical talent had been got together, and the large audience highly appreciated each item....At the conclusion of the musical programmne, Mr Whittet called upon Nurse Turner, for the purpose of presenting her with an inscribed gold medal, in honor of her return......congratulating Nurse Turner on her safe return and good health; and trusted she would live long in the freedom she had helped to gain.  You can read the full report, here.

We can trace her life after she returned home through her address in the Electoral Rolls (12).  In 1926 she was living at Koo Wee Rup and working, I assume, in the Hospital. A Bush Nursing Hospital had opened in the town in July 1918 and in May 1923 a new Fallen Soldiers Memorial Hospital was opened in Station Street. In 1931 she was living with her parents at 14 Green Street, Ivanhoe. They had moved there from Kongwak.  Stansfeld Turner passed away at Ivanhoe in September 1927 (13) and Lucy in November 1937 (14).  The next address I can find is in 1943, where Jane is living in Kew. In 1949 she had returned to Heathcote, the town where she had undertaken her nursing training, and was living with her sister, Bon Tranter. In 1954 Jane was at Melvin Street in Frankston and this is where she died on May 28, 1957, aged 69 (15). 

Jane's death notice

The Age May 29, 1957

Footnotes

(1) Indexes to the Victorian Births, Deaths and Marriages; Birth notice in The Leader November 5, 1887.

(2) Kilcunda Road, Kongwak address came from this report of a party at their house in the Great Southern Advocate, August 8 1895, see here.  The sisters were Hester Lucy (1889), Sara Elizabeth 'Bessie' (1894), Bon (1896), Violet May (1898), Ruby Alison (1900) Marjorie Ada (1905). Farming activities  - advertisement for a sale of one of their Alderney bulls in the Great Southern Advocate January 16, 1891, see here and report of sale of their sheep Weekly Times, March 30 1912, see here.

(3) I am assuming that she only worked at Heathcote as that is the only place of work listed on her enlistment paper in her  First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920   https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=1920646

(4) Bon Turner -  her succesful application to be a Probationer Nurse at Heathcote Hospital is from the McIvor Times June 4, 1914, see here. Bon Turner's  completion of her nursing exams at Colac comes from The Age, June 28, 1919, see here.

(5) First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920, see here. 

(6) Great Southern Advocate July 26, 1917, see here.

(7) Great Southern Advocate July 26, 1917, see here.

(8) Details of service comes from her First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920, see here.   

(9) As per Footnote 8.

(10) Great Southern Advocate October 16, 1919, see here.

(11) They have mistakenly reported that she was away for four years - it was two years.

(12) Electoral Roll available on Ancestry.com

(13) Stansfeld Turner's death notice was in The Argus, October 1, 1927, see here.

(14) Lucy Turner's death notice was in The Age, November 24, 1937, see here.

(15) Jane's Death notice was in The Age May 29, 1957. Jane was cremated at Springvale.

Army Nurse Mary Alice Sherriff

Mary Alice Sherriff enlisted in the British India Nursing Service unit (1) of the Australian Imperial Forces on February 27, 1918. She was aged 27 and her next of kin was her mother, Mrs M. A. Sherriff,  of A'Beckett Street in Bunyip (2). Mary was born in Longwarry in 1890 to Alfred and Maria (nee Auchetto) Sherriff. She was the eldest of their seven children.  Alfred was a blacksmith and had a business in Longwarry for seventeen years, before moving his business to Bunyip and later to Tynong. Maria operated a  grocery and drapery in Bunyip (3). 

Alf Sherriff opens up a his business in Tynong. The claim that Tynong some day may be the queen city of the east was ambitious (and as it turns out, wrong)

Bunyip Free Press July 15, 1915 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article129630666

Maria Sherriff's business.

Bunyip and Garfield Express September 9, 1913

Mary completed her training at Warragul Hospital  in May 1917 when she passed the Royal Victorian Trained Nurses Association examinations (4). 

Nurse Sherriff was mentioned in this bereavement notice inserted in the Bunyip Free Press by Mr Fawkner after the death of his wife, who died on August 11, 1915 after a lengthy  illness that was borne with great fortitude (5).  Mary obviously made an impression on the Fawkner family to be mentioned in the notice. 

Bunyip Free Press, August 19, 1915 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article129630758

The only other reference I could find to Mary during her period of  nursing training was an article  in October 1915 in the West Gippsland Gazette (6) where she and some of her fellow nurses sold buttons, on Button Day,  as a fund-raiser for the Warragul Hospital. Nurse Sherriff, Nurse Percy, Sister McLeod and Nurse West sold 750 buttons on the day and being Thursday, market day, Warragul was very busy. The townsfolk were enthusiastic and they raised over £23 that day. On the Tuesday two other nurses, Nurse Perry and Nurse Hawkins, had raised over £11 in Drouin making a grand total of over £35. The report said that the people were very generous in their responses to the winning allurements of the nurses (7). I am taking this to mean that the Nurses were well regarded and looked upon with affection by the Community, because many reports I have seen over the years suggests that this was the case all throughout Australia.

Part of the report on Button Day, the Warragul Hospital fund-raiser.

West Gippsland Gazette, October 26, 1915 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article68619794

Army Nurses had to be qualified and experienced, so Mary could not enlist before she finished her training. Mary left Melbourne on March 6, 1918 for Bombay (as Mumbai was then called) and commenced duty at the Colaba War Hospital on May 1, 1918. Whilst she was serving at Colaba she was admitted to the Hospital suffering from small pox. Disease was an ever present danger to the Nurses and Soldiers who served overseas.

This photo was taken at the Colaba War Hospital, where Mary served.

Group portrait of the medical and nursing staff of the Colaba War Hospital, Bombay.

Australian War Memorial Image P07133.005

In August, she was transferred to the Station Hospital at  Barrackapore and in July 1919 to the 34th Welsh General Hospital at Deolali, a British Army Camp. 

The 34th Welsh General Hospital at Deolali, where Mary also served.

Australian War Memorial Image H12551

On November 17, 1919 Mary embarked from Bombay  to Singapore on the S.S Dilwara, where she transferred to the S.S. Charon. She arrived in Fremantle on January 19, 1920 and then overlanded to Melbourne where she arrived on January 23. On her arrival in Melbourne Mary was accomodated at the Nurses' Hostel, Grand Hotel, Spring Street. The Grand Hotel is now the Windsor Hotel.  Mary was discharged in September 1920 (8). 

On January 28, 1922 Mary was married to Archibald Duncan of Black Rock (9). At the time of their marriage Archibald was working for the Victorian Railways and they moved to Newstead, near Castlemaine; then Maryborough and from around 1931, they lived at Chelsea (10). Archibald died November 1, 1957 and Mary in on January 28, 1984 (11).  I don't know if they had any children.

Marriage notice of Mary and Archibald

The Argus March 9, 1922 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article4689224

Footnotes

(1) The Australian War Memorial website has some information about Australian nursing in India during the First World War here https://www.awm.gov.au/articles/blog/nursing-british-raj

(2) Mary Alice Sherriff's First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920 see it here.
(3) This information is from the Indexes to the Victorian Births, Deaths and Marriages; from the book Call of the Bunyip: History of Bunyip, Iona and Tonimbuk, 1847-1990 by Denise Nest (Bunyip History Committee1990) and from the advertisment of Maria's business (shown above) from the Bunyip and Garfield Express September 9, 1913. Mary's siblings were Clarence, Hilda, Irene, Eileen, Albert and Roy.

Death notice of Alfred Sherriff, who died May 7, 1931. Maria died in September and is buried at Bunyip with Alfred.

The Age May 8, 1931 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article205848874

(4) The Argus June 7, 1917, see here.

(5) Bunyip Free Press, August 19, 1915, see here.

(6) West Gippsland Gazette, October 26, 1915, see here.  

(7) West Gippsland Gazette, October 26, 1915, see here.  

(8) The information about Mary's War service is from her file at the National Archives of Australia, part of the First Australian Imperial Force Personnel Dossiers, 1914-1920, see it here.
(9) Marriage notice in The Argus March 9, 1922, see here. 
(10) Information from the Electoral Rolls, available on Ancestry.com
(11) Date of deaths from the Wills and Probate files at the Public Records Office of Victoria, www.prov.vic.gov.au

Sister Norah Lehman and Sister Aileen Lehman

The Cranbourne Avenue of Honour was officially opened on August 9, 1919. The Avenue represented 59 men and two women, Sister Norah Lehman and Sister Aileen Lehman. Norah and Aileen  both enlisted on July 17, 1915 into the Australian Army Nursing Service. They were the daughters of George John Lehman and Kate Mary O'Connell who married in Adelaide in 1877. George and Kate had five children in Burra (South Australia) - Stanley Hocking (born) 1878, George Reginald 1879, Norah Blanche, 1882, Ethel, 1884 and Aileen 1886. The next daughter  Cathleen Kate was born in 1888 in Queensland, then daughter Ada was born in  1892 in Dandenong and their last child, Sidney James was born in 1893 in Adelaide.

George Lehman took over the licence of the  Bridge Hotel in Dandenong in February 1889. There was an article in the South Bourke and Mornington Journal of May 10, 1893 saying that the Lehmans had resigned their interest in the licence of the Bridge Hotel. Mrs. Lehman's name was synonymous with attention, civility and good liquor- It is not improbable that they may return to Dandenong. This was prophetic as the same paper reported on July 1, 1896 that the Lehmans had returned to the Bridge Hotel which had been thoroughly renovated.  I presume, as their last child. Sidney, had been born in Adelaide that they had returned to South Australia in the intervening three years. In December 1897 the licence of the Hotel was granted to Kate Lehman (not sure how she had the time to run a hotel as she had eight children ranging in age from nineteen to four!) They operated the Hotel until the end of 1901.

The family was later living in Malvern East where John  was a 'stock dealer' and they were in East Caulfield when Norah and Aileen enlisted in July 1915. In the  1917 Electoral Rolls  George and Kate were at 'Springmeadows' Cranbourne and his occupation was grazier. At some stage they went back to Malvern East and that's where George died on July 27, 1932 at the age of 77. Catherine died on January 1, 1941 at her son's house in Moonee Ponds. It was her youngest son's house, Sid, who was a Doctor.

So back to Norah and Aileen. Aileen was 27 years old when she enlisted, in Egypt. She had trained and worked at the Melbourne General Hospital and also worked at the Albury Hospital.  Aileen served in France and then had a few bouts of pleurisy. Aileen was sent back to Australia on medical grounds, as 'exposure to cold' made her condition worse and she Returned to Australia on July 17, 1917.  On November 17 of the same year she married Cecil Paul Best at Kew. I believe it was a short lived marriage as by 1919 (according to the Electoral Rolls) Aileen (but not Paul)  is listed with her address as care of her parents in Cranbourne and from 1924 she is living at various addresses in Malvern East with her sister, Norah and sometimes other family members. Aileen died in December 12, 1953 aged 68. The death notice in The Argus listed her as 'late first A.I.F' and the mother of Dr Jim Best and the grandmother of three and no mention of the husband.

This lovely tribute to Aileen appeared in the Dandenong Advertiser.

Dandenong Advertiser October 17, 1918

http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article88816352

Norah had also trained at the Melbourne General Hospital and had been Matron at Albury Hospital before she enlisted in Egypt with her sister. She served in France and was Mentioned in Despatches for distinguished and gallant service and devotion to duty, this was promulgated on June 29 1917. Norah Returned to Australia  on April 19, 1919.  On her return to Melbourne Norah, as I said before, was living in the Malvern East area and hre occupation from 1924 was listed as 'Inspectress'  - she was a Health Inspector. I have found references to her working at the City of St Kilda around 1930 (see below)

Notice how Sister Lehman earns 240 pounds per annum and the male Health Inspector earns 400 pounds per annum!

Prahran Telegraph October 11 1929

http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article165009264

Sister Lehman died on May 24 1949 and this obituary appeared in the Dandenong Journal.

Dandenong Journal June 8 1949

http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article222210880

I have created a list of newspaper articles from Trove about the Lehman family, click here to access this list.

Sister Florence Vines - Army nurse

More than 3,000 Civilian nurses volunteered for service during the Great War and I wondered if any came from this area - so I went to Trove and typed in the keywords  'nurses' and 'Berwick', filtered the results down to the 1910 to 1919 period and came upon this article in a January  1919 South Bourke and Mornington Journal.

South Bourke & Mornington Journal  January 9, 1919  page 2.

http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article66195348

So, now I knew that Sister Vines from Berwick had served in the War, but what else could we find out about her? I looked up the Electoral Rolls on Ancestry Family History database and found this entry for Sister Vines in the 1914 roll and discovered her first name was Florence. 

Then I did another search on Trove with the key words 'Vines', 'Shepton' and 'Berwick' to try to find out what Shepton was - I thought it may have been the name of a house - but then I found this advertisement which was in  Berwick Shire News  from January to March 1914, which told us that Sister Vines  operated a private hospital in Berwick with Sister Duigan and  the hospital was called Shepton.

Berwick Shire News March 4,  1914

http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article89083297

The next step was to find out about  Florence Vine's war service and the National Archives of Australia (www.naa.gov.au) was the place to look, as they have digitised all the service records of Australian who served in the Great War. Florence joined the Australian Army Nursing Service at the age of 29 on June 25, 1915. Her birth pace is listed as Geelong and it also tells us that she did her nursing training at the Ballarat Hospital. She left Australia on July 17, 1915 on the HMAT Orsova. Sister Vines suffered from various illnesses including dysentry and attacks of rheumatic fever and returned to Australian in 1916 to convalesce, went back on active service and left Australia again on June 12, 1917 for Salonika (now Thessaloniki) in Greece but was finally invalided back to Australia in April 1918.

This is Florence's enrolment paper  to join the Australian Army Nursing Service, from her service record at the National Archive (www.naa.gov.au)

What else do we know about Sister Vines? She was the twelfth and last child of Joshua Vines and Mary Nicholls and was born in Geelong in 1885. Her own mother, Mary,  died ten years later at the age of 51 and her father died at the age of 72 in 1906. After the War I have traced Florence through the Electoral Rolls (available on Ancestry)  and it appears that she didn't return to live in Berwick but lived around Malvern, Armadale and Balaclava. In the 1924 rolls she is listed as living with her sister, Blanche, and her occupation is listed  as a Chiropodist (now called a Podiatrist). Florence remained  a Chiropodist until she retired. She died in 1979 at the age of 94.

Finally, we are lucky enough to have a photograph of Florence Vines. This is a photograph of  members of the Australian Army Nursing Service (AANS) most of whom embarked from Australia on the Orsova during July 1915, outside the Ivanhoe Hotel in London, taken about 1916. Florence Vines is on the third row, second from left.  

Australian War Memorial Image P03968.002    www.awm.gov.au

War Herald (web site)

There is an interesting resource developed by Cheryl Ward, called War Herald. This is how Cheryl describes her website - War and empire in Australian newspapers - one hundred years ago, today.  Looking back, the course of history appears inevitable, but how was it seen by the men and women of 1914? War Herald is generated from a daily search of Australian newspapers on Trove.

Cheryl has selected articles from newspapers around Australia from 100 years ago and they form a countdown to the Great War. http://throughtheselines.com.au/war-herald You can subscribe by email so the stories from 100 years ago drop into your inbox on a daily basis.

Cheryl Ward is a playwright who has written a play, Through these lines,  based on the letters and diaries of First World War nurses. The War Herald is a research tool for Cheryl's play. There is more information about the play on the website, http://throughtheselines.com.au/, but it does appear that the play is only touring New South Wales this year. More than 3,000 Civilian nurses volunteered for service during the Great War and in the next blog post we will look at the life of Sister Florence Vines from Berwick.