The Royal New Zealand Nursing Corps (RNZNC) is a corps of the New Zealand Army. The corps was initially formed in 1915 from civilian nurses who volunteered for service during World War I, and who were granted honorary officer ranks. A Nursing Reserve had been formed as part of the New Zealand Medical Corps on 14 May 1908. Today, the corps is an officer-only corps that consists of commissioned officers who are employed for their specialist skills and knowledge as registered nurses, the corps works in conjunction with the Royal New Zealand Army Medical Corps and the Royal New Zealand Dental Corps to promote "health and disease prevention" and to provide "care for the wounded and sick". Nursing Officers in the New Zealand Army can be employed broadly in primary health, perioperative, surgical or emergency settings, which can see RNZNC personnel providing health services in a garrison health centre, in a civilian practice, or deployed on operations.
Up until 1945, the corps was a part-time only formation with personnel being called up for full time service during times of war only. However, since then the RNZNC has developed into a corps of both Regular and Reserve personnel. Throughout the corps' history, personnel have been deployed to various operational theatres. Aside from service during World War I and World War II, the corps has deployed personnel support to operations during the Vietnam War, and more recently to peacekeeping operations such as those in Bosnia and Somalia in the 1990s, the 1991 Gulf War, the East Timor intervention, Bougainville, Iraq and Afghanistan.
South African (Boer) War New Zealand nurses served overseas during the South African War of 1899–1902, several years before the establishment of the New Zealand Army Nursing Service. Although New Zealand sent more than 6,500 troops to South Africa, nurses were not initially organised as part of a formal New Zealand military nursing service.
New Zealand nurses volunteered for service soon after the outbreak of the war. The British authorities stipulated that nurses sent from New Zealand had to be hospital-trained. The New Zealand government officially sent 13 nurses, although it paid the travel costs of only six. Nurses from Otago and Southland were supported by public fundraising, while other New Zealand nurses already in Britain or travelling independently joined the British Army Nursing Service Reserve.
The first group of New Zealand nurses left for South Africa in early 1900. Four nurses from Christchurch Public Hospital—Gertrude Littlecott, Emily Peter, Grace Webster and Annie Hiatt—served at No. 4 General Hospital at Mooi River in Natal. Nurses worked in difficult field-hospital conditions and treated both battle casualties and the large numbers of soldiers suffering from disease.
The exact number of New Zealand nurses who served in South Africa is uncertain because surviving service records are incomplete. Contemporary historical assessments place the number at approximately 30 to 35. None of the New Zealand nurses is known to have died while serving in South Africa, although several became ill.
New Zealand nurses serving with the Army Nursing Service Reserve wore a fern leaf above the red cross on their armbands to distinguish them from nurses of other nationalities. Unlike British nurses, the New Zealand women did not initially receive the gratuity awarded at the completion of their service. Following repeated appeals, they were granted the £37 10s payment in 1903.
Service in South Africa provided some New Zealand nurses with their first experience of military nursing overseas. Several later served during the First World War, including Emily Peter, who subsequently travelled to Europe and nursed with the Red Cross in Serbia. The experience of New Zealand nurses in the South African War preceded the formal establishment of the New Zealand Army Nursing Service in 1915.
Establishment of a nursing reserve In 1907, Princess Christian, president of the British Army Nursing Service Reserve, encouraged the establishment of a New Zealand branch. Former South African War nurse Janet Speed, later Janet Gillies, supported the proposal and offered to serve as matron-in-chief. On 14 May 1908 the New Zealand Medical Corps Nursing Reserve was gazetted as part of the reorganisation of New Zealand's military medical services.
The reserve was intended to provide qualified nurses for military hospitals during hostilities. Members were required to be registered nurses and, once enrolled, were regarded as part of New Zealand's military forces when called for service. The reserve was organised into the classifications of matron-in-chief, matrons, sisters and staff nurses.
Gillies was appointed matron-in-chief in August 1908 but encountered difficulty obtaining funding and authority to recruit and organise the reserve. She resigned in 1910. Hester Maclean, assistant inspector of hospitals, subsequently became matron-in-chief and continued efforts to develop a military nursing organisation.
Samoa, 1914 At the outbreak of the First World War, New Zealand still lacked a fully operational army nursing service. Nevertheless, six New Zealand nurses accompanied the Samoa Expeditionary Force which departed New Zealand on 15 August 1914 to occupy German Samoa. A seventh nurse joined the group in Suva. The nurses worked at the hospital in Apia for several months before returning to New Zealand.
Samoan Expeditionary Forces 1914 New Zealand Nurses: Bertha Grace Nurse Fanny Wilson Vida MacLean Louise Alexa McNie Evelyn Brooke Louise Elizabeth Brandon Ida Willis
First World War The New Zealand Army Nursing Service was established in January 1915 to provide trained nurses for hospitals supporting the New Zealand Expeditionary Force. On 25 January 1915 the British Army Council accepted an offer from the New Zealand Government to provide 50 nurses for overseas service. Twelve New Zealand nurses departed with an Australian nursing contingent on 1 April, followed on 8 April by the first official contingent of 50 NZANS nurses aboard the Rotorua, escorted by Hester Maclean.
The nurses reached Egypt in June 1915 and were distributed among military hospitals in Alexandria and Cairo, where they cared for sick and wounded personnel evacuated from the Gallipoli campaign. Their work included the treatment of traumatic wounds as well as dysentery, enteric fever and other diseases common among troops serving in the eastern Mediterranean.
New Zealand nurses also served aboard the hospital ships Maheno and Marama. Eleven nurses sailed aboard Maheno in July 1915 and treated casualties evacuated directly from Gallipoli. Marama, New Zealand's second hospital ship, sailed from Wellington in December 1915 and later operated in the Mediterranean and between France and Britain.
On 23 October 1915 ten NZANS nurses were killed when the British transport Marquette was torpedoed in the Aegean Sea while carrying No. 1 New Zealand Stationary Hospital from Alexandria to Salonika. The ten nurses formed the largest single group of New Zealand servicewomen killed during the war.
Following the transfer of the New Zealand Division to France in 1916, NZANS nurses served with New Zealand stationary and general hospitals in France and Britain. No. 1 New Zealand Stationary Hospital operated at Amiens, Hazebrouck and later Wisques, while New Zealand general hospitals were established at Brockenhurst, Walton-on-Thames and Codford. Nurses cared for casualties from major battles including the Battle of the Somme, Messines and Passchendaele, and treated severe trauma, gas injuries, infection and psychological casualties.
Approximately 550 New Zealand nurses served overseas during the First World War as members of the NZANS, while around another 100 New Zealand women served with British, French and other nursing organisations. Sixteen New Zealand nurses died during the conflict, including the ten killed aboard Marquette.
The wartime service of New Zealand nurses also influenced civilian nursing practice. Many returned to civilian hospitals after the war with experience gained in high-volume trauma, infectious disease and military hospital administration.
Interwar period After the First World War the NZANS returned principally to a reserve role. Members continued to undertake military training and remained available for mobilisation in the event of another conflict.
Hester Maclean remained matron-in-chief until 1923 and was succeeded by Jessie Bicknell. During the interwar period nursing officers maintained links with civilian hospitals and the Department of Health while continuing military training. Ida Willis, who became matron-in-chief in 1933, had remained in the NZANS reserve after the First World War and regularly attended camps and instructed personnel of the New Zealand Medical Corps.
Second World War The NZANS was mobilised again following the outbreak of the Second World War. Approximately 650 trained nurses served in military hospitals, camps, transport vessels and overseas medical units during the conflict. Ida Willis, as matron-in-chief, coordinated the nursing service during the war.
NZANS personnel served in New Zealand and alongside the 2nd New Zealand Expeditionary Force overseas. Nurses worked in military hospitals in Egypt and the wider Middle East and later supported New Zealand forces during operations in the Mediterranean and Italy. Some also served aboard hospital ships and transport vessels carrying wounded and sick personnel between operational theatres and New Zealand.
Army nurse Pauline Hanrahan, for example, served aboard the Dutch hospital ship Oranje from 1943, transporting wounded servicemen between the Middle East, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Britain and Italy before serving at No. 1 New Zealand General Hospital in Cairo.
By July 1943 the Army Nursing Service comprised about 450 qualified nurses then serving or available for service in military hospitals in New Zealand and overseas, as well as on transports and hospital ships; its wartime strength subsequently increased.
The wartime mobilisation reinforced the need for a small permanent nursing component after 1945. Until the end of the Second World War, New Zealand military nurses had served full-time in the Army primarily during periods of war; following the conflict a nucleus of Regular Force nursing officers was retained so that nursing capability could be expanded rapidly if required.
Post-war reorganisation and royal title In the immediate post-war period the Army retained a small permanent nursing establishment. In 1949 the New Zealand Army reported a strength of ten nursing sisters and six Voluntary Aid Detachment personnel; some were seconded to the Royal New Zealand Navy and Royal New Zealand Air Force.
In 1953 the New Zealand Army Nursing Service was reorganised and renamed the Royal New Zealand Nursing Corps. The creation of the corps formalised military nursing as a continuing element of the post-war Army rather than a service mobilised principally during major conflicts.
The RNZNC subsequently developed both Regular Force and Territorial, later Army Reserve, components. Nursing officers also served on secondment with the other armed services, reflecting the increasingly joint character of New Zealand military health support.
Vietnam War RNZNC nursing officers served during the Vietnam War, including attachments to Australian military medical units at Vung Tau. New Zealand military nurses worked at the 1st Australian Field Hospital and other Australian medical facilities treating Allied casualties.
RNZNC nursing officers were generally deployed in small numbers. Former Territorial Force nurse Karen Pilcher recalled that only one or two New Zealand military nurses at a time were normally attached to Australian units in Vietnam.