BRITISH LADIES, GERMAN, FRENCH & SERBIAN MEDALS. 1870 / 71 WAR,

[Kev in Deva]

Hallo Gentlemen,

recently while surfing the net I came across a website created by an American gentleman, it's his family history and one of his female relatives a lady by the name of:

Miss LOUISA ELISABETH McLAUGHLIN (1836-1921), this lady in her time, served during the 1870-71 conflict as a British Red Cross Nurse, helping both the French and German wounded, she was awarded the following medals for her services:

Prussian 1870 / 71 Non-Combatant Steel Service Medal.

Sanitats Kreuz Militar of Hesse-Darmstadt.

Cross of Honour of the French Red Cross

Her colleague Miss EMMA MARIA PEARSON (1828-93) a novelist and travel writer, who was also a trained nurse, was awarded the same medals.

Louisa ? who spelled her name MacLaughlin ? and Emma were again decorated for similar work six years later, when Turkey battered Serbians struggling for freedom.

After this service both ladies were to receive (after Servia rewrote the statute that only men could win) the Gold Cross of the Order of the Takova so as to award it to the nurses.

There are two downloads available, to read about the ladies exploits in France and Serbia, as well as 22 other pages following the family history and some pictures of family gentlemen who were officers in the British Army, in all quite a fascinating read.

You can go directly to the Web-site from here:

http://webpages.charter.net/ghal/FirstRedCrossNurse

Enjoy, reading about these little known exploits I know I did.

Kevin in Deva.

Edited October 7, 2006 by Kev in Deva