The “absorbing and powerful” (Wall Street Journal) story of two pioneering suffragette doctors who shattered social expectations and transformed modern medicine during World War I. A month after war broke out in 1914, doctors Flora Murray and Louisa Garrett Anderson set out for Paris, where they opened a hospital in a luxury hotel and treated hundreds of casualties plucked from France’s … of casualties plucked from France’s battlefields. Although, prior to the war and the Spanish flu, female doctors were restricted to treating women and children, Flora and Louisa’s work was so successful that the British Army asked them to set up a hospital in the heart of London. Nicknamed the Suffragettes’ Hospital, Endell Street soon became known for its lifesaving treatments.
In No Man’s Land, Wendy Moore illuminates this turbulent moment of global war and pandemic when women were, for the first time, allowed to operate on men. Their fortitude and brilliance serve as powerful reminders of what women can achieve against all odds.
It’s a sad truth that wartime opens up opportunities for marginalized groups. Think of “Rosie the Riveteer” during WWII, and how manufacturing jobs of that caliber were closed to women before the war.
It’s the same in the medical profession. No Man’s Land: The Trailblazing Women Who Ran Britain’s Most Extraordinary Military Hospital During World War I is a fascinating history of two amazing suffragette surgeons who were barred from practicing in most hospitals in early 20th C. England, so when World War I broke out they created their own hospital–the first and only British Military Hospital staffed entirely by women.
This is a true “hidden figures” tale, meticulously researched, which tells the story of a couple devoted to each other and to their patients and staff. Against all odds, Drs. Flora Murray and Louisa Garrett Anderson took on the British medical and military establishment, first by traveling to France to set up a hospital for British troops there, then by creating a wartime hospital on Endell Street in London to serve wounded troops. They had no experience with wartime trauma surgery but with their capable staff and their own skills created an amazing facility while maintaining their personal relationship as well as their professional one.
This is a lively and engrossing tale of interest to readers who enjoy medical history and women’s history, and kudos to author Wendy Moore for another fascinating deep dive into the medicine of yesteryear and its practitioners.
As a woman and a nurse who served in the military, though not in wartime, I am in awe of these women doctors, nurses, and ordered who served in such primitive conditions in WWI. I know little of WWI, the suffragette’s movement in England, and the 1918 flu pandemic but because of the events of 2020 I have, of course, looked to the past to understand today. This book covers the struggles of Dr. Flora Murry and Louisa Garret Anderson as suffragettes and doctors to obtain the vote for women and equal rights for women under the law. The way women were treated and still are is appalling. By the way, women in England did not get full access to medical school until 1975!!! Another fun fact, Louisa Garrett Anderson was the daughter of Elizabeth Garrett Anderson the first female doctor in England. Until WWI the few female doctors there were regulated to treating women and children only and barely paid.
WWI begins, the Army run by men, is proved to be incompetent and the medical core is overwhelmed the first day, and thousands of wounded die for lack of care. Enter Dr’s. Murray and Anderson and their staff and they open a model hospital under the French Red Cross and start saving lives. Other women also come to the rescue of the wounded with hospitals and ambulance. What Dr’s. Murray and Anderson’s face is heart-wrenching. Get the tissues out as you read the stories about these brave women treating these brave soldiers. Be angry at the governments and the paper pushers who stood in the way of get getting things done for the better. Be angry at the stupidity of 20 million people dying over a strip of land in France which is what it boiled down to though not all died right there. I digress.
Dr’s. Murray and Anderson did so much good in France they were tapped to open a 575-bed hospital in London for the wounded. Though most of the military doubted they would be successful in their hospital and their satellite hospital turned out to be the best hospitals in London for the wounded. Prepare to be awed by the staff’s commitment to the wounded working long hours 7 days a week with few breaks to serve their country and the wounded with food being rationed no less. They had to deal with infections and no antibiotics, lice and no bug killer, war wounds, and no fancy equipment, summer, and winter with no central heat and air. The stories are unbelievable. I could not put the book down. I could not have done it. Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for allowing me to read this book for a review.
No Man’s Land is an extraordinary story, and beautifully told.
The story of the extraordinary women who ran the ‘Suffragettes’ Hospital’ is visceral, timely, urgent, and spellbinding. Wendy Moore’s book is utterly involving and deeply thought-provoking, and all I can do is urge you to read it.
Few authors write as colorfully and compellingly about the past as Wendy Moore. In her deft hands, the horrors of the First World War and the heroic efforts of the suffragette surgeons are conjured back to life. Meticulously researched and beautifully executed, No Man’s Land is an important book that shows Moore to be the masterful storyteller that she is.
No Man’s Land is an absolute delight. Wendy Moore has performed an incredible feat of historical detective work, and the result is a gripping account of courage and determination in the face of death. It is impossible not to love the ‘suffragette surgeons’ as they fought for the wounded abroad and for women’s rights at home.
How can a spectacular story like No Man’s Land just disappear? Luckily for us, it fell into the hands of one of our finest biographers. Wendy Moore’s rich storyteller’s voice has brought back the lives and achievements of these brave and brilliant women.