Women's History Month - guest post by Helen Stubbs
HELEN STUBBS’s stories are dark with pointy edges. She has been published in anthologies and magazines, including Next, Midnight Echo, and Winds of Change. Winner of the Aussiecon Four Short Story Competition, she was also a quarterfinalist in the Amazon Breakthrough Award. Find her @superleni or http://helenstubbs.wordpress.com.
Doctor James Barry
The life and career of Doctor James Miranda Stuart Barry are a brilliant reminder that the dominant ideology of the time can be wrong! In a time when women were denied a career in medicine-they were not permitted to enter universities as medical undergraduates-she gained admittance to Edinburgh University, graduated, and continued on to a long successful career as a surgeon in the army, all the while living under the persona of being a man.
The evidence discovered in 2001 by retired urologist Michael du Preez indicates that James Barry, who appeared in 1809 as he stepped onto a ship to Scotland (with his mother masquerading as his aunt), was the new persona of Margaret Bulkley, a grocer’s daughter born in 1789 in Cork. (Du Preeze, 2012)
Margaret’s father went to prison in 1803 and left her family in debt. Her mother, Mary-Ann Bulkley, wrote to her brother, James Barry, the well-known Irish artist and advocate for women’s education. It is not clear when the plan to educate her as a doctor was developed. Margaret’s uncle died suddenly in 1806 and left money for her education. She went to London and studied with his friends-the physician Edward Fryer gave her lessons, and General Francisco Miranda allowed her use of his large private library. (Pain, 2008.)
General Miranda was a Venezuelan revolutionary and assured Margaret work in Venezuela after she had graduated with her medical degree. However, he was imprisoned in a Spanish jail, so Dr Barry joined the army. Over a 46 year long career he brought in health reforms including better food and sanitation for soldiers, their families and native peoples and prisoners. (Paid, 2008.)
Rachel Holmes, in her biography, describes Dr Barry as ‘a strange figure, short in stature, squeaky of voice and different from his rowdy contemporaries.’ (Herbert, 2002).
For more information about Dr Barry, I recommend the following resources:
‘Dr James Barry (1789-1865): the Edinburgh years,’ HM du Preeze, Journal of Royal College of Physicians Edinburgh, Volume 42, Issue 3, 2012; Pages: 258-65
‘Histories: The ‘male’ military surgeon who wasn’t,’ by Stephanie Pain, New Scientist. Issue 2646, 6th March 2008.
‘Doctor Strange,’ by Roy Herbert, New Scientist. Issue 2346, 8th June 2002.
‘Revealed: Army Surgeon actually a woman,’ Nic Fleming, The Telegraph, 5th Mar, 2008.
‘Scanty Particulars: The life of Dr James Barry,’ by Rachel Holmes, Viking, £14.99, ISBN 0670890995.