Simpson and his donkey typifies the WW1 work Australian medics did on the battlefield but student Alexia Moncrieff has discovered more to the story

THE image of Simpson and his donkey often comes to mind when thinking of the medical field during World War I.

Alexia Moncrieff is a phD student working on a thesis about medicine during World War 1. Picture Roger Wyman

THE image of Simpson and his donkey often comes to mind when thinking of the medical field during World War I.

But as PhD student Alexia Moncrieff says, there is more to remember beyond soldier John Simpson Kirkpatrick and the donkey he led to carry the wounded.

“It’s the iconic image of medicine in World War I but Australian medicine encompassed so much more than that,” she says.

“One of the fundamental things that comes out of Gallipoli is the desire for Australian medical officers to have control over Australian casualties and for the Australian Army Medical Corps to become increasingly independent of its British counterpart, the Royal Army Medical Corps.”

Moncrieff, who is doing her PhD on the work of the Australian Army Medical Corps during World War I, will explore why Gallipoli was a critical turning point for the AAMC at a research seminar on Tuesday (April 14) at Adelaide Uni.

As Moncrieff says, the way the Australians practised medicine during World War I changed significantly in structure over the course of the war.

When the troops landed at Gallipoli, there was little structure to the medical field. The AAMC was subordinate to the British.

“The entire infrastructure broke down and had to be improvised from the first morning after the landings of Gallipoli,” she says.

“The arrangements were flawed from the beginning and there was no proper concept of the scale of the casualties.”

Moncrieff says the medical services had been going through a transition period within the British army and most of the experienced medical officers were at the Western Front.

So the medical units at Gallipoli were supplemented by doctors who had been brought out of retirement.

Colonel Neville Howse VC, the Assistant Director of Medical Services, 1st Australian Division, would later go on to describe the arrangements as inadequate to the point of “criminal negligence” on the part of the authorities.

Moncrieff says she pursued her PhD topic because of her combined interest of World War I and medical history.

“I was intrigued by the role of the doctor in war who is simultaneously trying to treat his

patients but is doing so under the aegis of the state,” she says.

“I hope to provide new insight into the provision of medical care to Australian soldiers in the

First World War, not just in practical terms but by examining when, how and by whom

decisions about that care were made.”

Other presenters at the seminar on Tuesday include Professor Alexander C McFarlane, who will discuss the lessons of World War I in the field of mental health, and Professor Robin Prior, who will expose some of the many myths of Gallipoli.

Gallipoli Revisited - Research Tuesdays seminar, The Braggs Lecture Theatre, Adelaide University, Tuesday, April 14, 5.30pm-6.30pm. Visit eventbrite.com

Originally published as Simpson and his donkey typifies the WW1 work Australian medics did on the battlefield but student Alexia Moncrieff has discovered more to the story