Maud McCarthy

Who was Maud McCarthy?

Dame Emma Maud McCarthy, GBE, RRC was a nursing sister and army Matron-in-Chief. She was the eldest child of William Frederick McCarthy, a solicitor, and his Sydney-born wife, Emma Mary à Beckett. McCarthy was educated at Springfield College, Sydney, Australia, and passed with honours the University of Sydney's senior examination. After her father's death in 1881 she helped her mother to rear her brothers and sisters

By 1891 she was in England, on 10 October 1891, she entered London Hospital, Whitechapel, to begin general nursing training as a probationer. Hospital records state that "she had an exceptionally nice disposition" and was "most ladylike and interested in her work" although "she found it hard to control others, or to take firm action when necessary". She was nonetheless promoted to sister in January 1894.

Maud McCarthy was Nursing Sister-in-Charge of the Sophia Women's Ward at the outbreak of the Boer War, and was one of the six sisters selected from London Hospital by Princess Alexandra to go to South Africa as her own "military" nursing sisters.