The Faculty’s Involvement in World War II
From Faculty of Medicine Online Museum and Archive
The 1940s saw yet another tragic World War with many graduates and Faculty members serving in the armed forces or carrying out research and development work in Australia to support the war effort. As always, another war brought a new range of medical challenges: management of battle casualties, maintenance of the health of troops deployed in the tropics, care of fellow internees in prison camps, and, not least, prevention of the health of the civilian population and maintaining the training of medical students. Many newly graduated doctors also enlisted in the forces and, though denied the benefits of formal graduate training, developed their clinical skills under difficult and dangerous circumstances.
The forces directed some of these young doctors into specialist roles which determined their direction after the war, notably Charles Ruthven Bickerton Blackburn in the area of Haematology, Pat de Burgh in Immunology, and Blacket into studies of vitamin deficiency diseases such as Beriberi. The experience of our doctors was varied. George Heydon, for example, remained in Australia but investigated the prevalence of parasitic infection in Australian Army recruits. Charles Rowley Richards was captured during the Malayan Campaign and served as a doctor to the many interns working on the Burma-Siam railway making do with meagre supplies. Richards and Kevin Fagan were not so fortunate in their military careers, but were universally admired for their care of internees and personal fortitude in the prisoner of war camps. Likewise, Peter Hendry was interned but his work focussed on providing pathology.
Back home, William Keith Inglis was responsible for service Pathology at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital. Sir Earle Page, our long-term Deputy Prime Minister, was appointed a member of the War Cabinet in 1941 then later travelled to Papua New Guinea to study ways to prevent Malaria. Senior Faculty members contributed by placing their special expertise at the service of the war effort, with H K Ward developing blood transfusion services, Sir Edward Ford enlisting in the AIF as Commanding Officer, First Australian Mobile Bacteriological Laboratory in the Middle East, and the Department of Physiology’s Frank Cotton working with the RAAF to develop the 'Cotton aerodynamic anti-G flying suit', which minimized the effects of high-speed flying on pilots. Teaching was maintained by a depleted and aging staff, with a course streamlined and shortened to five years. The number of men in the course declined as many entered the forces directly from school, but women entered in unprecedented numbers.
Go to next article in timeline: The Development of the Faculty after World War II