| Administrative History | Hawkins, Mary Katherine, 1911-2002; 22 years in SCF; MBE, OBE, Croix de Guerre, This Is Your Life
Interim biog: (100 Women on Flickr wording):
Nurse Mary Hawkins was awarded the Croix de Guerre for conspicuous bravery in nursing under fire with the Free French Forces in World War II. She then joined the Red Cross and worked with displaced persons in Germany and what was then Transjordan. She joined the Save the Children Fund in 1950, after the first Arab-Israeli war, and was appointed to undertake nursing work in Lebanon. She helped set up one of the first Palestinian refugee camps and later worked in Jordan; after a time in Korea helping treat refugee children, she went in 1956 to Austria to work in the aftermath of the Uprising. In 1957 she returned to Korea, both training nurses and acting as matron of the Children’s TB Sanatorium. She later returned to Jordan and also worked for shorter periods in Algiers and Dubai, finally retiring from Save the Children in 1972. Her 1959 MBE was followed by an appearance in ‘This is Your Life’ in 1964, an OBE in 1969, and the award of the Save the Children medal by Princess Anne in 1998. |