Papers of Margaret Brears, 1946

Case book kept by Margaret Brears as a pupil midwife at the General Lying-in Hospital, York Road, South London (September - November 1946) recording deliveries attended by her and presented for the Central Midwives Board examination, including details of the mother, her pregnancy and labour, and the delivery outcome; together with a short biography written by her daughter (2014), and copies of two photograph of her in uniform, one at Aylesbury in 1949.

Margaret Brears was born in Australia to English parents, who returned to England in 1930 and settled on the Isle of Sheppey. On the outbreak of war, Margaret applied for a post as a trainee nurse at the West Kent General Hospital, Maidstone, and qualified as a state registered nurse in 1945. She moved to East Grinstead Hospital, and then undertook midwifery training in London, taking the first part of her midwifery course at the General Lying-in Hospital in 1946. She became a night sister in 1947 in Saffron Waldon, Essex, and took up nursing positions in subsequent years in Stafford and Aylesbury. Margaret met her husband while working at the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital, Birmingham, and following her marriage settled in Birmingham, working part-time in Selly Oak Hospital.

Closed for 100 years due to patient data

Donated to the RCM Archive by the daughter of Margaret Brears in January 2015