Thread by @RHUL_Library

The story of partners Louisa Garrett Anderson and Flora Murray needs to be made into a film immediately if not sooner. It’s a fascinating story of love and loss, war and peace, protest and pioneers, and it all starts at Bedford College.....

Louisa’s mother, Elizabeth, was the first female surgeon in Britain and a suffragist. So, following in her pioneering mother’s footsteps, Louisa attended Bedford College in the early 1890s then The London School of Medicine for Women.

Louisa's studies and involvement in the suffrage movement would dramatically shape her future, but more importantly, it was at The London School of Medicine she met Flora Murray and both their lives became forever intertwined.

They both qualified as physicians and had an active involvement in the suffragette movement. Louisa was arrested several times and even imprisoned for her militant protests, which included smashing a window, and attending the infamous Black Friday protest in 1910.

Louisa’s militancy caused a rift with her Aunt Millicent Fawcett, the leader of the NUWSS. Millicent wrote "I am in hopes she will take her punishment wisely, that the enforced solitude will help her to see more in focus than she always does." However, Louisa was undeterred.

Working and living together Louisa and Flora continued to support the suffragette movement. They worked at the Pembroke Gardens nursing home treating fellow suffragettes, like Emmeline Pankhurst, who were recovering from the effects of force feeding and other injuries.

They both shared a strong sense of social justice. In 1912 they founded the Women's Hospital for Children at Harrow Road providing health care to working class children. However, with the advent of war in 1914, everything changed.

They wanted to play their part so together they founded the Women's Hospital Corps and established a field hospital in Paris with the French Red Cross. The British War Office were so impressed they invited them to run the Endell Street Military Hospital in London.

Boldly Louisa and Flora largely staffed the hospital with suffragists and adopted the motto "Deeds not words", the motto of the WSPU. In the five years it was active, the hospital treated over 26,000 victims of the war.

Fellow suffragette Evelyn Sharp said "It was…a triumph for the militant movement that these two doctors, who had been prominent members of the W.S.P.U. were the first to break down the prejudice of the British War Office against accepting…women surgeons."

Flora kept a diary detailing her experiences during the war. It was published under the title ‘Women as Army Surgeons: Being the History of the Women's Hospital Corps in Paris’ and the dedication reads "To Louisa Garrett Anderson. Bold, cautious, true and my loving companion."

In recognition of their achievements they were both appointed to the Order of the British Empire as Commanders (CBE) in 1917. With the end of the war and the passing of The Representation of the People Act of 1918 a peace descended on their household in Buckinghamshire.

However, this peace was short lived. In 1923 tragedy stuck when, aged 53, Flora passed away following an operation to remove a cancer. Louisa was by her side.

Louisa lived for a further twenty years and died in 1943 aged 70. After her death an inscription was added to Flora’s headstone commemorating them both. It ends with the line “We have been gloriously happy.”

Your move @netflix