Matron Jessie Brown Jaggard the second female casualty of the Canadian Army Medical Corps and CEF in the Great War. Jessie happened to be a cousin of Sir Robert Borden, Canada’s Prime Minister during wartime.
“WHAT I ASPIRED TO BE AND WAS NOT COMFORTS ME”
Rabbi Ben Ezra by Robert Browning
Early Life of Jessie Whidden Brown
Jessie Whidden Brown born on 28 May 1873, Wolfville, Kings County, Nova Scotia.
Annapolis Valley
Rockcliffe, Ontario
Jessie the daughter of John Lothrop Brown and Elizabeth Whidden Brown, later of 161 Manor Road, Rockcliffe, Ottawa.
Renamed 161 Manor Avenue, the Brown home rebuilt circa 1938. It recently sold for two million dollars.
Massachusetts General Hospital
Jessie received her training at the Massachusetts General Hospital. On completion of her course, her ability well marked, she became Superintendent of the Morristown State Hospital, Philadelphia. Later, she filled the same post at the University Hospital, Philadelphia.
On 17 September 1900, Jessie Whidden Brown resigned to marry a prominent American, Herbert Jaggard, President of Pennsylvania Railroad railway. Herbert born 22 Jan 1865 in Altoona, Blair, PA. The Jaggard’s parents of at least 3 sons (Herbert Jaggard 1902-1979, Armstrong Jaggar 1902-deceased, and John Lothrop Jaggar 1905-deceased).
Following the departure of the First Canadian Contingent, Mrs Jaggard volunteered her services to the Canadian Expeditionary Force. Her services promptly accepted and she received an appointment as Matron in the CAMC. Equivalent to a Captain among servicemen of the Canadian Expeditionary Force.
Canadian Army Medical Corps
On arrival in England in May, 1915, Matron Jessie Brown Jaggard posted to Shorncliffe, where a Canadian hospital established at Moore Barracks. Here she worked hard and earnestly, and succeeded in getting the hospital in good working order. On 1 August 1915 the unit of which Mrs. Jaggard was Matron ordered to the Gallipoli front.
Full of enthusiasm, with which Jaggard inspired her staff, they sailed for Lemnos with No. 3 Canadian Stationary Hospital (CSH). Alexandria reached on the 11th, and the unit sailed aboard HMHS DELTA for Mudros Harbor on 13 August 1915.
Lemnos
1st and 3rd CSH arrived in Lemnos on 16 August 1915. Because of its position, the island of Lemnos played an important part in the campaigns against Turkey during the Great War. Near this village is an ancient fountain known as Nero’s fountain.
Lemnos occupied by a force of marines on 23 February 1915 in preparation for the military attack on Gallipoli. The 1st and 3rd Canadian Stationary Hospitals, the 3rd Australian General Hospital and also other medical units stationed on both sides of Mudros bay. And, a considerable Egyptian Labour Corps detachment employed.
Gallipoli
Matron Jessie Jaggard one of about 70 Canadian nurses stationed at Lemnos, treating the wounded fighting at Gallipoli. Twenty six Sisters under her command with No 3 CSH. On top of helping the wounded, the medical staff had to deal with extreme heat, poor sanitary conditions, regular exposure to illness, poor diet, and water shortages. Dysentery became a great problem in the camp. Inevitably, the medical staff also fell ill.
Dysentery
In September 1915, Nursing Sister Mary Frances Munro and Matron Jessie Jaggard both succumbed to dysentery, and became the first women to die in wartime while serving in the CEF.
Conditions at Lemnos, at first found to be difficult and trying. Many of the Nursing Sisters fell ill, and in her endeavour to make everything as comfortable as possible for both nurses and patients, Matron Jaggard undermined her own strength. On 16 September 1915, she, herself became a patient, and died just over a week later. Matron Jaggard died (dysentery) 25 September 1915, age 44 years old.
Nursing Sister Anne E Ross
“…our dearly beloved matron… gave up a life of luxury to serve her mother land”
Nursing Sister Anne E Ross
Nursing Sister Kate Wilson
“Our very much loved matron Jaggard had taken ill. With little thought for herself and a keen interest in her nursing staff she carried on. So anxious would she become at night that many time she would go from hut to hut of her sleeping nurses, assuring herself that they were alright and not suffering from want of blankets when the nights were extra cold.
Lying with the picture of her seventeen year old son smiling down at her, one night she closed her eyes for the last time and slept. In her service blue uniform…covered with a British flag…and carried by boys who knew and loved her , she was laid to rest. Forever she will remain in the hearts of those who were privileged to serve under her.”
Nursing Sister Kate Wilson
British Journal of Nursing
She was a woman of strong and determined character, a zealous, earnest, assiduous and conscientious worker. Of no one can it be more truly’ said ” Gladly did she live and gladly did she die.”
British Journal of Nursing
Funerals
Albert William Savage, a photographer of Moore Park, Sydney, born in Kent, England. He enlisted in Sydney aged 25 and marked unfit for active service due to eyesight, then marked fit as a special case. He embarked for Lemnos on board RMS Mooltan, 15 May 1915 and posted as a private to No.3 Australian General Hospital.
Reading the Burial Service
Savage later transferred to the Australian Flying Corps in Abbeville, Apr. 1917 where he worked as a stores clerk. He was granted leave for photography, attending Hawksworth Wheeler & Co., Folkestone, June- Oct. 1919. He returned to Australia on the Pakeha, 24 November 1919.
The firing after the Burial
Nursing Sister Mary Frances Munro
Mary born in Wardsville, Middlesex County, Ontario, and attended Bishop Strachan School.
The First Funeral
Nursing Sister Mary Frances Elizabeth Munro of the 3rd Canadian Stationary Hospital died on 7 September 1915, age 49.
As Told By Nursing Sister Helen Fowlds
We all stood outside while they arranged the transport and then the soldier was carried out to the other waggon. #3 men were paraded and fell in after the waggons, and the officers after them.
It had been arranged previously that no Sisters would go to the grave and it was perhaps wise but it seemed too bad to see her go away without a single woman near her. In France all the English Sisters in Boulogne went to the grave when their Sisters died in Wimereux. But when they (#3) didn’t go, we couldn’t very well.
Desolation
It was one of the hottest days we’d had and the dust rose in clouds. As the little procession vanished over the hill we started home and kept it in sight till it crossed the river. It surely was a sad sight and awfully hard on her people to have her die out here. Such a desolate place for a woman to be buried and everything so different from what it would have been at home.
The dirty, springless waggon, the half wild mules needing the whip every few yards to keep them from breaking into a gallop, the white cap fluttering in the wind, the poor little Tommy in the next waggon with spades etc. that they did not trouble to hide, “the foot sore firing party and the dust and stench and staleness”, the millions of flies, the squad of buglers that joined the procession farther along, all jarred terribly on one’s nerves. It was so absolutely matter of fact, and military, strictly active service.
Last Post
Somewhere across the valley they have a graveyard, and later in the afternoon we heard the firing of the Salute and the “Last Post”.
It got me terribly, and every night since when they blow “Lights out” from all the camps around I think of that “Last Post” wailing across the valley. After all it is only “Lights Out” but that morning seems so far away.
PORTIANOS MILITARY CEMETERY
The PORTIANOS MILITARY CEMETERY situated in the hamlet of Portianos which is on the west side of Mudros Bay.
After the evacuation of Gallipoli, a garrison remained on the island and the 1st Royal Naval Brigade on Lemnos, Imbros and Tenedos for the first few months of 1916. On 30 October 1918, the Armistice between the Entente Powers and Turkey signed at Mudros.
Portianos Military Cemetery begun in August 1915 and used until August 1920. The cemetery now contains 347 Commonwealth burial of the Great War and also five war graves of other nationalities.
Treadwell Library Memorial Tablet
On 10 September 1920, a memorial tablet unveiled in the Treadwell Library, in memory of the graduates of the Massachussetts General Hospital Training School for Nurses who’d died in the war. These women were:
- FRANCES E. BARTLETT
- MARY F. EMERY
- LUCY N. FLETCHER
- JESSIE BROWN JAGGARD
- CONSTANCE M. SINCLAIR
“The seven nurses in whose memory we have met were all known to me. Mrs. H. A. Jaggard, nee Jessie W. Brown, left her home, husband, and child, and was one of the very first to go overseas. While she was chief of the unit and did her duty by day, she nursed the sick nurses by night and thus overtaxed her strength and contracted the disease which caused her death.
These nurses … went with high courage; they did their work faithfully; they suffered and laid down their lives with splendid courage and glad devotion to the cause. They will not have died in vain if the nurses who visit this beautiful spot of our revered and beloved Hospital stop a moment to read their names and to pledge themselves anew to all the splendid principles which alone make a nurse’s work glorious.“
Nursing Sister Maysie Parsons, 10 September 1920
Nova Scotia Legislature
HALIFAX, FRIDAY, APRIL 13, 2018
SPEAKER
Hon. Kevin Murphy
GOVERNMENT NOTICES OF MOTION
MR. SPEAKER « » : The honourable Minister of Labour and Advanced Education.
RESOLUTION NO. 1305
HON. LABI KOUSOULIS « » : Mr. Speaker, on behalf of the honourable Premier, I hereby give notice that on a future day I shall move the adoption of the following resolution:
Whereas today marks a day of tribute to Matron Jessie Brown Jaggard, a nursing sister serving in the Canadian Army Corps during World War I, and was one of 70 Canadian nurses to be stationed on the Greek Island of Lemnos to treat the wounded and sick Allied servicemen who fought during the Battle of Gallipoli; and
Whereas Matron Jaggard was born in Wolfville, Kings County, Nova Scotia, in 1873 to Elizabeth Whidden and John Lothrop Brown; and
Whereas the tomb of Matron Jessie Jaggard is at the Portianos Military Cemetery, and remains a visible reminder of her service and sacrifice and her passing while serving her country at war;
Therefore be it resolved that this House pay tribute to Matron Jessie Brown Jaggard by honouring the devotion and courage she displayed during the Great War.
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