Barbara Ella Dommett 1 2
- Marriage: Richard Simpson in 1943 1
 Noted events in her life were:
• Occupation: Military nurse, 1942-1945, Torbay, England. 3
Barbara married Richard Simpson in 1943.1
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Sources
1
Barbara Simpson.
2
Western Morning News, Plymouth, Devon, Wednesday, 11 August, 1999. Western Morning News, 11th, August, 1999
Nurse who cared for Blitz refugees
• WAR SERVICE: Barbara Simpson, who enrolled as a nursing auxiliary when
war broke out, felt it was a chance to show what her generation could do.
ON the morning of Sunday, September
3, 1939, Barbara Simpson - now living in
Comwood, Ivybridge, and aged 79 - was
enjoying the sunshine in the garden of her
house in Colebrook, Plympton, when her
parents called her in just before 11am. to
hear Mr Chamberlain's sombre announcement
that Britain was at war with Germany.
"It was just four days after my 19th
birthday and I little realised the horrors of
the Plymouth blitz, and having been
brought up on stories of the Great War I
only felt this was our chance to show what
our generation could do.
"For the last year, ever since the
Munich crisis, I had been attending all
the civil defence lectures on first aid,
home nursing and anti-gas. I had always
been interested in nursing and had provisionally
enrolled for civil defence
work as a nursing auxiliary at the possible
first aid post in Plympton.
"I ended, up working full time there for
the next two-and-a-half years. It was a
happy crowd who worked. there and I
made many fiiends in the lull before the
March/April blitz of 1941.
"The school was open at night to
receive up to 1,000 refugees fiom Plymouth
before returning to see if their
homes were still standing. The noise was
tremendous, and I particularly hated the
whistling bombs. Our work was chiefly
taking care of the sick elderly people and
preparing bottle feeds for the babies.
"We also did practice runs with 'our
mobile first aid van, which was used to go
to give anti-diphtheria injections.
"This was not considered a reserved
occupation, so when I became 21 in 1941 I
applied and was accepted for training at
the Torbay Hospital and in 1945 I
achieved my ambition at last of being a
qualfied nurse. I followed with midwifery
training at Devonport and the Three
Towns Nursing Association in Dumford
Street, and had a very happy and fiilfilling
career for over 30 years.
3
Mrs. Barbara Ella (Dommett) Simpson, MEMORIES OF S.R.N. TRAINING AT THE TORBAY HOSPITAL: 1942-1945. MEMORIES OF S.R.N. TRAINING AT THE TORBAY HOSPITAL
1942 - 1945
written by Barbara Ella (Dommett) Simpson, June 6, 2001
Before my generation all depart, I thought present-day nurses might like to read
some memories of S.R.N, training in the 1940's when the Torbay was a voluntary
hospital. It certainly made us very conscious of never wasting anything.
I had wanted to be a nurse from about the age of four, so when the Government
offered free First Aid and Home Nursing classes during the Munich Crisis year of
1938 I eagerly attended and later signed on for Civil Defence as a nursing auxiliary
at the nearest First aid Post. I spent the first two and a half years there, mostly
helping to look after up to a thousand refugees from Plymouth during the
March/April blitz in 1941.
From there I applied to the Torbay Hospital to do my general training, and in March
1942 I was accepted for a three months' trial after an interview with Miss Swift and
a medical. We were given the material for our uniform without clothing coupons,
but had to arrange and pay for them to be made up.
In those days every nurse, without exception, had to reside in the Nurses Home.
Our rooms had a bed, chair, wardrobe, dressing table and a wash-basin, and
rudimentary heating from one hot water pipe. I left home, (Plympton) at 12.45 p.m.
on 7th April, 1942, and got to the Hospital about 3 p.m. my trunk having been sent
on a few days in advance, which was the usual thing. A nurse came to my room to
show me how to make up my butterfly cap and I then went on duty on E.N.T. at
5 p.m. until 8 p.m., looking after children who had had T's & A's done that day - talk
about thrown in at the deep end!
At first I had a half day off a week (and two hours sometime during the day), but in
August 1942 we started having a day a week. Not that we could go very far on our
pay, which was £20 PER ANNUM for the first year, then £25 and £30 for the next
two years. (As a shorthand-typist in a previous job I had been earning 15/- (75p) a
week) BUT we had food, accommodation, laundry and uniform, and the priceless
gift of nursing training.
For several of us this was a first time leaving home experience, but we couldn't
have been better looked after. The food was excellent for war time rations, and if
there was any spare pudding Amelia, our dining room maid, was allowed to ask us
in her gruff voice "Want any more?" and we usually said "Yes PLEASE Amelia".
Sister Vowden stood at the door as we left and we had to take a vitamin pill - none
escaped her eagle eye. Can anyone else remember the mouth-watering beef
dripping with salt on a thick slice of bread which we occasionally had at our 9-ish
1/2 hour break, or the hectic dash from the very top of the hospital across to the
Nurses Home to make our beds and put on a clean apron. No douvets then, and
heaven help you if you hadn't stripped your bed or you'd find V.V. had stripped
them down to the mattress on her inspection round!
We made our dressings for sterilising; cotton wool balls from a big roll, gauze
squares from a roll with the edges neatly turned in so that they didn't fray. They
were sent to Theatre to be sterilised in round drums which had holes in the sides,
and the holes closed when they came out of the autoclave. Hypo syringes were of
glass and metal and sterilised in Lysol. You won't believe this, but needles were
used time and time again, after sterilising, and if one developed a hook it was sent
back to be fried. One of the tasks at the end of a busy day (but I can only
remember it happening in Warrington/Ainsley kitchen) was having to check the
cutlery book and get it signed by Staff Nurse. Many a time I've pleaded with the
patients "Please have you got a teaspoon in your locker? I don't want it, only to
count it."
During my first few weeks on E.N.T. I was sent across the iron bridge to relieve on
George Earle, the septic ward. My task was to wash and boil stained crepe
bandages, and I soon went off sick with a throat infection. Matron said it was
because I hadn't yet acquired my "hospital immunity".
If anyone was just "poorly", (and you had to be pretty incapable of working), V.V.
looked after us in our rooms, and in spite of her no nonsense attitude she was a
wonderful nurse, as well as being a superb lecturer. If you were actually ill enough
to be warded you were nursed on either Outside 1 or Outside 2, which were two
two-bedded wards just outside the swing doors to Private Patients. Here you were
treated royally, and were always examined by a Consultant in the presence of
Matron.
I remember several war time incidents; one where the Sunday School at St.
Marychurch at Babbacombe was bombed and nearly all the children were killed.
Another time the ammunition exploded in a gun being fired off Corbyn Head and
the crew were all badly burnt. On 3rd. August 1942 which was a Bank Holiday, the
beaches were machine-gunned, and a girl who had only been married on the
previous Saturday was hit. She was admitted but died of gas gangrene. We had
no antibiotics except for the sulpha M & B drugs, as penicillin was reserved for the
forces. Our very first dose, sometime later, was used to save the life of a child with
meningitis. We were all called back on duty on 25th October that year when the
Palace Hotel was bombed and we admitted 30 casualties.
As I write this, on 6th June, 2001, the T.V. is reminding me that it is 57 years since
the D.Day landings in France on Operation Overlord. On the night of 5/6th I was on
duty on Rowcroft Ward. When I went out on the balcony the Bay was a mass of
ships, which had all disappeared before daylight, and as I was writing the night
report the wireless announced that our troops had landed on the beaches, and
history was being made.
I haven't paid nearly enough attention or homage to Miss Swift, our Matron, Miss
Derry our Assistant Matron, Miss V . L Vowden, our wonderful lecturer, or all the
Consultants and Sisters who also taught us, and each in their way had some effect
on our future careers. My training days were some of the happiest of my life, and I
will always be grateful for them and the life-long friends I made during that time.
We started off as a set of twelve but some fell by the wayside, not all willingly. My
'best friend' Costello, was not allowed to continue her training after being very ill for many weeks with pneumonia which she had for the second time in her life - no antibiotics! Those who finally made it and qualified first time to become State Registered Nurses were Lardy, Vokes, Slee, Dommett (me), Vaughan, Culliford and Harvey.
I could go on for ever but I'm sure -I've bored you enough. I've probably made lots
of mistakes, and if anyone would like to drop me a line I'd be thrilled to hear from
them.
Mrs. Barbara Simpson,
8, Church Park,
Cornwood,
Ivybridge,
S.Devon. PL21 9ET
Tel. 01752 837298.
