CAMERON, Edith Clare

For many of the Great War nurses linked with East Melbourne, the connection was primarily a professional one, that is they trained or nursed in one of the suburb's hospitals. Some, however, were brought up and/or lived in East Melbourne for a number of years.

Edith Clare Cameron was one such nurse with a strong East Melbourne connection, living in the family home at 87 Powlett Street during her schooling in the early 1900s and later in the 1920s on her return from active service. 

Her life however began in the western district of Victoria. She was born in 1889 in Merino near Coleraine, one of the four children of Ewen Cameron (1860-1906) and Emma Harriet Nunn (1862-1935). Somewhat unusually (among the East Melbourne Great War nurses at least), she was a second generation Victorian, both parents having been born in the young colony. Ewen followed in his Scottish father's profession of station manager on properties around Hamilton before becoming a grazier himself near Condah. He then entered politics, and was elected to the Victorian Legislative Assembly as member for Portland (1900-04) and then Glenelg (1904-06).

Ewen needed a city base while attending parliament, and he, Emma and children lived at 87 Powlett Street, where they  were close by to his wife's family. Emma's father Philip Nunn (whose older brother had been the 'Nunn' of 'Buckley and Nunn') was a long-time East Melbourne resident, first at 125 Hotham Street and then at 'Claverings', 120 Powlett Street. 

Edith and her two sisters, Maud (1886-1973) and Winifred Barbara (1895-1979), attended Presbyterian Ladies College, then located nearby on Albert Street, East Melbourne. Their father was known as a studious and literary man, and it is not surprising that his children distinguished themselves at school (Portland Guardian, 30.12.1903).  

Both Maud and Winifred went on to university to study arts and medicine respectively. Edith 'went nursing' and trained at the Melbourne Hospital in Carlton from 1911 to 1914. 

War Service

Three months after Edith qualified as a nurse, war broke out in Europe, and three months after that Edith applied to join the Australian Army Nursing Service (AANS). She was the only one of her siblings to enlist in the war. She was 25 years old and according to her application, had had experience as a staff nurse and sister in charge of a ward.

Within weeks (during which time she had to equip herself with the necessary uniform and kit), she sailed from Melbourne on the Hospital Ship 'Kyarra' with 160 other nurses and medical officers who made up the 1 and 2 Australian General Hospitals.  After a fine farewell from the Royal Victorian Trained Nurses Association (Punch, 26.11.1914), the group left on 5 December 1914. There were other nurses from East Melbourne in the group, including at least one other PLC girl Alice Ross King. The nurses of the 1AGH were led by Jane Bell, Principal Matron who as lady superintendent of the Melbourne Hospital had signed Edith Cameron's AANS application. The seven week voyage with its seasickness, lectures and deckgames was recorded in the diary of Staff Nurse Elsie Cook (Peter Rees, The Other ANZACs: Nurses at War, 1914-1918, pp. 7-11, 15). 

'Kyarra' reached Egypt on 20 January 1915. 1AGH was set up in the Heliopolis Palace Hotel, a four story luxury facility in the Cairo suburb of Abbassia. Edith Cameron was attached to 1AGH throughout its duty in Egypt, a time of near continuous high drama. The deluge of casualties evacuated from the Gallipoli peninsula placed enormous physical and emotional demands on the nursing staff which was expanded with reinforcements as the number of beds expanded (see Rees, The Other ANZACS, pp. 44-45, 48-49). In addition, there was the battle for authority between Principal Matron Bell and 1AGH Commanding Officer Colonel Ramsay Smith that led to the recall of both to Australia in July 1915, a formal inquiry and termination of their appointments (Jan Bassett,Guns and Brooches: Australian Army Nursing from the Boer War to the Gulf War, 1992, pp. 34-39). 

In March 1916, 1AGH including Edith Cameron packed up and relocated to Rouen in northern France, as the troops and battle fronts moved to the Western Front. A small number of 1AGH nurses including Cameron were detached from 1AGH and sent forward to the Boulogne area with its massive concentration of military camps, hospitals and equipment (Janet Butler, Kitty's War: The remarkable wartime experiences of Kit McNaughton, 2013, p.113) .

She went first to 26 [British] General Hospital in Etaples and then weeks later further forward to the 1 Australian Casualty Clearing Station at nearby Estaires where 'temporary duty' extended into a year (May 1916-May 1917). There she nursed the deluge of casualties that came from the battles of the Somme (July-November 1916) and Arras (May 1917). 1 ACCS was located in a convent and tents. Lt Col Henry Newland, commanding officer and renown surgeon, described the 1916-17 winter with its wind snow and frost as one of the worst on record in years (1ACCS War Diary, AWM). It was the 'Somme winter'.

After a fortnight's leave in Rouen in the summer of 1917, Edith Cameron rejoined her old unit, 1 AGH, for four months, from July until November. The unit was still camped on the race course as it had been since its arrival in April 1916, nursing in huts and tents under the most trying conditions. The hospital had 1040 beds, around 20 medical officers and between 75 and 90 nurses. In the period Cameron was there, several thousand sick and wounded troops were admitted each month and a day rarely passed without a death, but there were plenty of beds available. Cameron would have been there when Queen Mary paid an official visit on 9 July 1917 (see picture below, AWM K00019).

In mid November 1917, Cameron was detached from 1AGH in Rouen and sailed to England where she spent five weeks with 1 and 2 Australian Auxiliary Hospitals at Harefield Park and Southall. 1 AAH had over 900 beds, and fewer than a third of the sick and wounded were ambulant. 2 AAH was primarily for amputees who were being progressively repatriated to Australia. On 20 December 1917, she left England for Australia as a nursing sister on AT54 (Runic).

She arrived back in Australia in Janaury 1918. By then, she had been awarded the decoration Royal Red Cross (2nd class) 'in recognition of her valuable services with the Armies in the field' (London Gazette, 28.12.17).

Ten months passed before Cameron embarked for overseas again. She left from Sydney on the 'Wiltshire' on 7 November 1918 just days before the war ended, and disembarked at Suez on on 11 December. Cameron spent the next six weeks with British General Hospitals in Abbassia, the suburb of Cairo where she had been with the 1 AGH in 1915-16, presumably assisting with the repatriation arrangements for sick and wounded ANZACs. She herself spent an unspecified amount of time as a patient in 14 Australian General Hospital in Port Said, before departing Egypt for nursing duties on the troop transport Ceramic on 5 February 1919.

After the war

Soon after she returned to Australia,  Sister Cameron ARRC was discharged from the AANS on 23 May 1919. She had not yet turned 30 years of age.

Shortly after her return Cameron was a charge sister at 16 Australian Military Hospital in the Melbourne suburb of McLeod, which specialised in returned troops with mental illnesses.

Some of her colleagues spent the rest of their professional lives in military/repatriation hospitals such as Caulfield and Heidelberg, but that was not for Cameron.

In 1921, she registered the midwifery certificate she had completed at McKellar Maternity Hospital in Hamilton near her birthplace in the western district of Victoria. Later that year she was appointed superintendent of Victoria's Bush Nursing Association, a position that required travel around the state (Argus, 22.8.1921). The Association's main focus was provision of affordable care for mothers and babies in remote areas. Her role encompassed promoting the Association by speaking at fund-raising events, inspecting the Association's centres around Victoria and organising new centres, recruiting suitable staff (horse-riding skills were often required alongside midwifery skills), and agitating for more qualified nurses. She travelled widely and often, covering much of Victoria each year, and her visits were often reported in the local press. 

In 1926 she resigned from the position and took on the role of country branch organiser with the Victorian Red Cross Society. She spoke at various branches around the state about the peace-time work of the Red Cross, particularly among sick and disabled soldiers. She was keen to emphasise 'the desirability of having workers organised in case of such emergency [sic] as the influenza epidemic or anything else which affected the well-being of the community' (Traralgon Record, 9.11.1926). 

Cameron largely disappeared from press reports after late 1926. In 1927, she travelled to South Africa for a three month visit. She may well have renewed frindships there with army nurses from Victoria working there such as Nesta Edwards or those from the South African General Hospital once located at Rouen.  The  Melbourne Argus commented it was a well-earned holiday for someone who for five years with the Bush Nursing Association was 'perpetually travelling in other people's interests' (Argus, 7.10.1927). Her war service overseas was not mentioned. Like other members of the Returned Army Nurses Club, she also spoke to school children as part of Anzac Day observances (Argus, 23.4.1927, p18). 

In 1927, she was appointed nurse at the University of Melbourne, employed by the Melbourne University Union for £4 per week. She was still there in 1934 (Edith Cameron, Application, Edith Cavell Trust Fund, Box M290 [NAA]. For a number of years she was 'a valued and active member' of the committee of the Royal Victorian Trained Nurses Association even during the declining health of her mother (UNA, Vol.XXXIII (3), 1.3.1935, p78).

Cameron was also a successful exhibitor in garden shows (UNA, Vol.XXIX (5), 1.5.1931, p145). 

The family moved from Powlett Street, East Melbourne; according to the 1931 electoral roll, she (nurse), her mother (home duties) and her sister Winifred (doctor) were living at 40 Murrumbeena Rd, Oakleigh. From the  electoral rolls from 1937-1954 she resided at 770 Malvern Rd, Armadale, and then at 16 A'Beckett St, Armdale (1963, 1968). She always gave her occupation as nurse. 

In 1933 illness forced Cameron into hospital for several months. Unable to work for six months and faced with numerous costs including medicines and a private nurse, she applied for assistance to the Edith Cavell Trust Fund which provided small grants to army nurses who were sick or needy. She was granted £20 provided she supplied a medical certificate. It was her only application to the Fund. 

Her sisters were better known than she: Maud Martha Cameron MBE as headmistress of Firbank Girls Grammar from 1911-1954, and Winifred Barbara Meredith (nee Cameron) OBE, a prominent doctor and campaigner for women and babies health.

Edith Cameron ARRC died aged 80 in 1969. Both sisters outlived her. 

Cameron is commemorated on the World War 1 plaque in Holy Trinity Church, East Melbourne and on a Great War Honour Board at St Peter's Church, Eastern Hill, Melbourne. 

Cameron also featured in the East Melbourne Historical Society's exhibition 'For King and Country' held in April 2014. Her panel can be seen at cameron_print_140924.pdf