Angels or aliens? Refugee nurses in Britain, 1938 to 1942

Medical History

Volumn 47, Issue 2, 2003, Pages 149-172

  Stewart, John ^a  

^a OXFORD BROOKES UNIVERSITY   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ARTICLE; EMPLOYMENT; FEMALE; FOREIGN WORKER; HISTORY; HISTORY OF MEDICINE; HUMAN; LEGAL ASPECT; REFUGEE; UNITED KINGDOM; WAR;

EMPLOYMENT; FEMALE; FOREIGN PROFESSIONAL PERSONNEL; GREAT BRITAIN; HISTORY OF NURSING; HISTORY, 20TH CENTURY; HUMANS; REFUGEES; WAR; WOMEN, WORKING;

EID: 0038142398     PISSN: 00257273     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/s0025727300056696     Document Type: Article

References (109)

1. Peter Nolan, 'Annie Altschul's legacy to 20th century British mental health nursing', J. Psychiatr. ment. Health Nurs., 1999, 6. 262-72. I am grateful to Professor Nolan for bringing his article to my attention. See also Altschul's obituary. Guardian, 8 Jan. 2002, p. 18.
2. Peter Nolan, 'Annie Altschul's legacy to 20th century British mental health nursing', J. Psychiatr. ment. Health Nurs., 1999, 6. 262-72. I am grateful to Professor Nolan for bringing his article to my attention. See also Altschul's obituary. Guardian, 8 Jan. 2002, p. 18.
3. Among the most important works are' Louise London, Whitehall and the Jews, 1933-1948, Cambridge University Press, 2000; A J Sherman, Island refuge Britain and refugees from the Third Reich, 1933-1939, 2nd ed., Ilford, Frank Cass, 1994; Gerhard Hirschfeld (ed.), Exile in Great Britain. Leamington Spa, Berg for the German Historical Institute, 1984.
4. Among the most important works are' Louise London, Whitehall and the Jews, 1933-1948, Cambridge University Press, 2000; A J Sherman, Island refuge Britain and refugees from the Third Reich, 1933-1939, 2nd ed., Ilford, Frank Cass, 1994; Gerhard Hirschfeld (ed.), Exile in Great Britain. Leamington Spa, Berg for the German Historical Institute, 1984.
5. Among the most important works are' Louise London, Whitehall and the Jews, 1933-1948, Cambridge University Press, 2000; A J Sherman, Island refuge Britain and refugees from the Third Reich, 1933-1939, 2nd ed., Ilford, Frank Cass, 1994; Gerhard Hirschfeld (ed.), Exile in Great Britain. Leamington Spa, Berg for the German Historical Institute, 1984.
6. Sibylle Quack, "Introduction', in Sibylle Quack (ed.), Between sorrow and strength: women refugees of ihe Nazi period. Washington, DC, German Historical Institute; Cambridge University Press, 1995, pp. 1-10, on p. 1; and Jill Davidson. 'German Jewish women in England', in W E Mosse (ed.), Second chance: two centuries of German-speaking Jews in the United Kingdom, Tubingen, J C B Mohr, 1991, pp. 533-52. Interestingly, neither of these essays mentions nurses On doctors and medical scientists, see, for example, Paul Weindling. 'The contribution of central European Jews to medical science and practice in Britain, 1930s-1950s', in ibid., pp. 243-54.
7. Sibylle Quack, "Introduction', in Sibylle Quack (ed.), Between sorrow and strength: women refugees of ihe Nazi period. Washington, DC, German Historical Institute; Cambridge University Press, 1995, pp. 1-10, on p. 1; and Jill Davidson. 'German Jewish women in England', in W E Mosse (ed.), Second chance: two centuries of German-speaking Jews in the United Kingdom, Tubingen, J C B Mohr, 1991, pp. 533-52. Interestingly, neither of these essays mentions nurses On doctors and medical scientists, see, for example, Paul Weindling. 'The contribution of central European Jews to medical science and practice in Britain, 1930s-1950s', in ibid., pp. 243-54.
8. Sibylle Quack, "Introduction', in Sibylle Quack (ed.), Between sorrow and strength: women refugees of ihe Nazi period. Washington, DC, German Historical Institute; Cambridge University Press, 1995, pp. 1-10, on p. 1; and Jill Davidson. 'German Jewish women in England', in W E Mosse (ed.), Second chance: two centuries of German-speaking Jews in the United Kingdom, Tubingen, J C B Mohr, 1991, pp. 533-52. Interestingly, neither of these essays mentions nurses On doctors and medical scientists, see, for example, Paul Weindling. 'The contribution of central European Jews to medical science and practice in Britain, 1930s-1950s', in ibid., pp. 243-54.
9. On the SMA. see John Stewart, 'The battle for health': a political history of the Socialist Medical Association, 1930-1951, Aldershot, Ashgate, 1999. Ch. 6 of this work deals with the organization's attitude to refugees.
10. Introduction', in A M Rafferty, Jane Robinson and Ruth Elkan (eds), Nursing history and the politics of welfare, London, Routledge, 1997, pp. 1-9, on p. 4.
11. London Metropolitan Archives (hereafter LMA) LCC/PH/STA/1/7, memorandum from Medical Officer of Health to Herbert Morrison. May 1937: 'Introduction', in Rafferty, Robinson and Elkan (eds), op. cit., note 5 above, p. 7.
12. A lower figure is given in F L Carsten. 'German refugees in Great Britain 1933-1945', in Hirschfeld (ed.), op. cit., note 2 above, pp. 11-28, on p. 15; a rather higher estimate is given by Sherman, op. cit., note 2 above, p. 7.
13. A lower figure is given in F L Carsten. 'German refugees in Great Britain 1933-1945', in Hirschfeld (ed.), op. cit., note 2 above, pp. 11-28, on p. 15; a rather higher estimate is given by Sherman, op. cit., note 2 above, p. 7.
14. University of Hull, Brynmor Jones Library. Socialist Medical Association Archive (hereafter DSM), DSM/1/1, Report of the Executive Committee. 1938/9; Report of the Executive Committee, May 1939-April 1940
15. Gerhard Hirschfeld, 'Introduction", in Hirschfeld (ed), op. cit., note 2 above, p. 2.
16. Public Record Office, Kew (hereafter PRO) LAB 8/93, memorandum of 2 Sept. 1940.
17. Davidson, op. cit., note 3 above, p. 539.
18. Sherman, op. cit., note 2 above, p. 7.
19. Franc̈ois Lafitte. The internment of aliens, Harmondsworth, Penguin. 1940, p 50.
20. Carsten, op. cit., note 7 above, pp. 21-8.
21. LMA LCC/PH/STA/1/8, memorandum of 15 Jan. 1941. Pre-war some 11,700 nurses had been employed by the Public Health Department, and by January 1941 this had fallen by around 1,200. S A Kirby. 'The London County Council Nursing Service, 1929-1948', unpublished University of Nottingham PhD thesis, 2001.
22. See London, op. cit., note 2 above, for the roles of the various ministries.
23. London, op. cit., note 2 above, pp 46-7.
24. PRO MH 55/447, letter from the College of Nursing to the Ministry of Labour, 22 Nov. 1933. and subsequent memoranda. I am grateful to Dr Stephanie Kirby for this reference.
25. For the SMA's role on the LCC, see Stewart. op cit., note 4 above, ch. 5.
26. DSM (2) 5. General Correspondence 1930-1940, correspondence between Ewald Fabian and Charles Brook, Aug. and Sept 1937.
27. On the significance of "networks", see Weindling, op. cit., note 3 above.
28. Frank Honigsbaum, The division in British medicine, London, Kogan Page, 1979, p. 260.
29. German Jewish Aid Committee, While you are in England: helpful information and guidance for every refugee, n.p., n.d., pp. 2, 22. I am grateful to Liselotte Adler-Kastner, daughter of refugees, for showing me this publication.
30. Lafitte, op. cit., note 13 above, pp. 48-9; Sherman. op. cit., note 2 above, pp. 99, 131.
31. Lafitte, op. cit., note 13 above, pp. 48-9; Sherman. op. cit., note 2 above, pp. 99, 131.
32. London, op. cit., note 2 above, p.14.
33. LMA Acc/2793/01/13/01. Central Council for Jewish Refugees. Report for 1941, London, 1942, p. 4.
34. PRO LAB 8/93, undated (but late 1940/early 1941) memorandum from International Labour Branch. It is not clear what became of this proposal from the files consulted, but, as is noted below, a Miss Powell was responsible for the Branch's nursing section.
35. Lancet, 1939, i: 544.
36. '"They seek a country": the problem of the refugee nurse". Nursing Times, 2 April 1939.
37. Although it should be noted that British consular officials sympathetic to refugees issued visas as a means of protecting those individuals, and that some 50.000 visas were in fact not taken up: Sherman, op. cit., note 2 above, p. 7.
38. PRO MH 58/336. letter from Medical Officer of Health, LCC, 19 Mar. 1940; and note of a meeting between the Ministry of Health, the Home Office and the Aliens War Service Department, 5 April 1940.
39. PRO MH 58/336, letter from A M Frey, Secretary, Nursing and Midwifery Department, Bloomsbury House, to E N Cooper, Home Office, 10 Aug. 1940; Lafitte, op. cit., note 13 above, p. 49; Lancet. 1939, ii: 626: Weindling, op. cit., note 3 above, p. 253.
40. PRO MH 58/336, letter from A M Frey, Secretary, Nursing and Midwifery Department, Bloomsbury House, to E N Cooper, Home Office, 10 Aug. 1940; Lafitte, op. cit., note 13 above, p. 49; Lancet. 1939, ii: 626: Weindling, op. cit., note 3 above, p. 253.
41. PRO MH 58/336, letter from A M Frey, Secretary, Nursing and Midwifery Department, Bloomsbury House, to E N Cooper, Home Office, 10 Aug. 1940; Lafitte, op. cit., note 13 above, p. 49; Lancet. 1939, ii: 626: Weindling, op. cit., note 3 above, p. 253.
42. PRO MH 76/515. report on Polish War Refugees in Seventh Meeting of the Central Committee for War Refugees from Holland, Belgium and France, 25 Feb 1941.
43. Royal College of Nursing Archives (hereafter RCN). RCN 3/14/2. Minutes of the War Emergency Committee. 4 July 1940.
44. Nursing Mirror and Midwives' Journal, 11 Oct. 1941, p. 16; Davidson, op. cit., note 3 above, p. 539.
45. Nursing Mirror and Midwives' Journal, 11 Oct. 1941, p. 16; Davidson, op. cit., note 3 above, p. 539.
46. LMA, Acc/2793/01/13/01, Central Council for Jewish Refugees. Report for 1939, London. 1940, p.14.
47. Nursing Times, 30 July 1938, pp 783-4.
48. Nursing Times, 10 Dec. 1938, pp. 1310, 1301, emphasis in original.
49. 'The refugee problem', Nursing Times. 18 Feb. 1939, pp. 191-2.
50. Nursing Mirror and Midwives' Journal, 18 Mar 1939, p. 839.
51. Nursing Mirror and Midwives' Journal, 11 Mar. 1939, p. 807.
52. University of Edinburgh, Special Collections, Lothian Health Services Archives (hereafter LHSA), LHB 1/1/70. Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh, Minutes of the meeting of the Managers, 20 March 1939 and 3 April 1939.
53. LMA LCC/MIN/2215, Minutes of a meeting of the Hospital and Medical Services Committee, 8 Dec. 1938.
54. LMA LCC/PH/WAR/3/83. memorandum of 13 April 1940 concerning the employment of aliens by the Public Health Department.
55. Lancet, 1939. ii: 573-4.
56. LHSA. LHB 13/9/12, Edinburgh Corporation, Minutes of the meeting of the Hospitals Sub-Committee. 14 Feb. 1939, and Minutes of the meeting of the Public Health Committee, 21 Feb. 1939.
57. Lancet, 1939. i: 183.
58. PRO MH 58/336, memorandum of the Central Emergency Committee for the Nursing Profession, 29 Aug 1939.
59. LMA H13/EGA/67, Minutes of a meeting of the Nursing Committee, 25 April and 23 May 1940. The nationalities of Miss Munz and Miss Illing are not clear, but they were obviously classed as "enemy aliens".
60. German Hospital, 95th annual report for the year ending 31st December, 1939, London, 1940, p. 7, and 96th annual report for the year ending 31st December 1940, London. 1941, p. 6.
61. German Hospital, 95th annual report for the year ending 31st December, 1939, London, 1940, p. 7, and 96th annual report for the year ending 31st December 1940, London. 1941, p. 6.
62. PRO MH 58/333, letter from W Allen Daley, 1 June 1940; also circulars 2026 and 2045. For the formal, public announcement of the ban in London, see Minutes of the London County Council, 25 June 1940; PRO MH 58/336, letter from A M Frey, Secretary, Nursing and Midwifery Department, Bloomsbury House, to E N Cooper, Home Office, 10 Aug. 1940; PRO MH 58/335, letter from the Czechoslovak Welfare Association to the Home Office Aliens Department, 18 June 1940; PRO HO 213/521, letter and resolution from the Nursing and Midwifery Department to the Home Office, 30 Aug. 1940 - this file also contains official correspondence between various government departments on the Czechoslovak situation.
63. LMA LCC/MIN/2217. Minutes of the Hospital and Medical Services Committee. 10 Sept. 1940; PRO LAB 8/93, memorandum of 2 Sept. 1940.
64. PRO MH 58/336, letter from Home Office (Aliens Department) to Ministry of Health. 16 Aug. 1940.
65. See, for example, the correspondence in PRO LAB 8/93.
66. LMA LCC/MIN/2217 and 2218 passim.
67. LMA H13/EGA/67, Minutes of a meeting of the Nursing Committee, 13 June. 11 July, 14 Nov., and 12 Dec. 1940.
68. PRO HO 213/521 letter from Miss A M Frey, Nursing and Midwifery Department, to E N Cooper. Home Office, 18 Oct. 1940; PRO MH 58/336, letter from Miss A M Frey, Nursing and Midwifery Department, to E N Cooper, Home Office, 10 Aug. 1940.
69. Lancet, 1940. ii: 632
70. DSM 1/6, EC Minutes. 30 April 1942.
71. LMA LCC/MIN/2219, meeting of 8 Sept. 1942.
72. See Parliamentary Debates 5th Series (Lords), vol. 119, cols 31-6 for a debate on the staffing problems of hospitals; and Parliamentary Debates 5th Series (Commons) vol 370 For, first, a debate on 'Womanpower' in which Florence Horsburgh pointed to the need for more nurses (cols 362-8) and. second, for the subsequent statement by the Minister of Health, Ernest Brown, specifically repeating this point (cols 1168-73).
73. PRO HO 213/523, Home Office correspondence of 25 April and 23 May 1941; and PRO HO 213/523, copy of circular 100, Central Office for Refugees, 6 June 1941.
74. LMA Acc/2793/03/01/01, Minutes of the fourteenth meeting of the Central Council for Refugees, 10 Dec. 1942.
75. Lancet., 1942, i. 339.
76. University of Southampton, Special Collections, Schonfeld Papers (hereafter Schonfeld Papers), MS 183, 234, folder 1, Report from the Medical and Public Health Sub-Committee of the Council of British Societies for Relief Abroad. 1943.
77. DSM (2) 5, 'General Correspondence 1930-1940', correspondence Dec. 1938 between D F Buckle and James Middleton; DSM (3)/14/32, letter from D M Pryce, Secretary of SMA London Branch, to London Labour Party, 19 Nov. 1938: DSM (2) 5, 'International', Ewald Fabian to D F Buckle, 3 Feb 1939.
78. Lancet, 1939, ii: 295.
79. The young nurse was David Wright, now Lecturer in the Department of Mental Health and Learning Disability, University of Sheffield. I am grateful to him for sharing this recollection with me. in the first instance at the 'Cinderella Services' Conference at South Bank University.
80. On these, and the problems faced by refugee women doctors, see Anita Grossman. 'New women in exile: German women doctors and the emigration', in Quack (ed.), op. cit., note 3 above, pp. 215-38.
81. Marion Berghahn, "Women émigrés in England', in Quack (ed.), op. cit., note 3 above, pp. 69-80, on p. 76. This point is picked up in the same volume, p. 88, by Susanne Miller, a left-wing Austrian political activist exiled in Britain
82. I am grateful to Professor Paul Weindling for this point. On nursing under Nazism, see Hilde Steppe, 'Nursing under totalitarian regimes: the case of National Socialism', in Rafferty, Robinson and Elkan (ed.), op. cit., note 5 above, pp. 10-27. For a North American perception on the higher standing of British nursing compared with that in Europe, see Anne Marie Rafferty, "Internationalising nursing education during the interwar period', in Paul Weindling (ed.), International health organisations and movements, 1918-1939. Cambridge University Press, 1995, pp. 266-82.
83. I am grateful to Professor Paul Weindling for this point. On nursing under Nazism, see Hilde Steppe, 'Nursing under totalitarian regimes: the case of National Socialism', in Rafferty, Robinson and Elkan (ed.), op. cit., note 5 above, pp. 10-27. For a North American perception on the higher standing of British nursing compared with that in Europe, see Anne Marie Rafferty, "Internationalising nursing education during the interwar period', in Paul Weindling (ed.), International health organisations and movements, 1918-1939. Cambridge University Press, 1995, pp. 266-82.
84. Schonfeld Papers, MS 183, 234. folder 1. circular of the Committee of British Societies for Relief Abroad, 20 Aug. 1943, refugee women doctors, see Grossman, op. cit . note 69 above, pp. 215-38.
85. 'Allocating the alien". Nursing Times, 2 May 1942, p. 297.
86. PRO MH 58/336, letter from A M Frey, Nursing and Midwifery Department, to E N Cooper, Home Office, 10 Aug. 1940
87. Nursing Mirror and Midwives' Journal, 11 Oct. 1941, p. 16.
88. Birmingham City Archives, GHB 133, General Hospital Birmingham, Register of Nurses, Oct. 1937-Jan. 1943. I am grateful to Stuart Wildman, University of Birmingham, for sending me this information, which derives from his own research in nursing history.
89. See the comments in PRO LAB 8/93, memorandum of 2 Sept. 1940; and PRO MH 58/336, letter from A M Frey. Nursing and Midwifery Department, to E N Cooper, Home Office, 10 Aug. 1940.
90. Weindling, op. cit., note 3 above, p. 254 and note 78.
91. The Hospital, Aug. 1940, p. 190.
92. LMA H9/GY/A26/1, meeting of the Emergency Committee of the Governors, 10 Dec. 1940
93. LHSA LHB 1/1/71. Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh, Minutes of the meeting of the Managers. 10 June 1940.
94. LMA H13/EGA/67, Minutes of a meeting of the Nursing Committee, 11 July 1940.
95. LMA H13/EGA/67, Minutes of a meeting of the Nursing Committee. 25 July 1940. The decision not to take on alien probationers was confirmed at the meeting of 13 Feb. 1941, and Miss Schindler's case was heard at the meeting of 10 July 1941: on Shanghai, see David Kranzler, 'Women in the Shanghai Jewish refugee community', in Quack (ed.), op. cit , note 3 above, pp 129-38.
96. Supplement to Nursing Mirror and Midwives' Journal, 5 April 1941.
97. Nursing Mirror and Midwives' Journal, 9 Mar. 1940, p.1.
98. PRO MH 58/335, letter from the Czechoslovak Welfare Association to the Ministry of Health, 8 July 1940; on the experience of Czechoslovakian refugees in general, see London, op. cit., note 2 above, especially ch. 6.
99. LHSA, LHB 13/9/12, Edinburgh Corporation, Minutes of the meeting of a Special Sub-Committee of the Public Health Commitee, 19 Dec. 1941.
100. Schonfeld Papers, MS 183, 981/1, letter from the Chief Rabbi's Religious Emergency Council to the Matron, Claybury Hospital, 17 Aug. 1942.
101. I am grateful to Kerry Davies, Oxford Brookes University, for this point.
102. RCN 3/14/2, Minutes of the War Emergency Committee, 5 Sept. 1940.
103. LMA Acc/2793/01/13/01, Central Committee for Jewish Refugees. Report of 1939, London, 1940, p. 14, and Report for 1941, London, 1942, p. 4.
104. DSM 1/1, Report of the Executive Committee, May 1939-April 1940.
105. Schonfeld Papers, MS 183, 234, folder 2, Chief Rabbi's Religious Emergency Council, Extract from Report of Activities, period ending 31st December 1941.
106. For a brief discussion of the historiographical debate as to how true this might have been of the refugee experience as a whole. see Sherman, op. cit., note 2 above, 'Introduction to Second Edition'.
107. On the issue of "caring" in nursing, see Tom Olson, 'Ordered to care? Professionalization, gender and the language of training. 1915-37", in Rafferty, Robinson and Elkan (ed.), op. cit., note 5 above, pp. 150-63.
108. PRO LAB 8/93. letter from Marion Nachemstein and Use Held to the International Labour Department, Ministry of Labour, 12 Aug. 1940. This was replied to on 15 Aug. but no further details are to be found in this file.
109. Quack, op. cit., note 3 above.