– but love, laughs and life too. Tuesday 14 October
Gail Alvarez writes:
Richard Wilcocks, Secretary of Headingley LitFest,
treated a large and supportive audience at the Ilkley Literature Festival
Fringe in the Ilkley Playhouse to an absorbing selection
of anecdotes from a wide range of sources. The medical practitioners – the VADs, matron, staff nurses, RAMC surgeons – and the patients all had a representative in the book to
tell their tale. Medical care and
practice in WW1 had many surprises: for examples the team of privately-sponsored
masseuses (yes, really), smoking in bed as the norm, a singular lack of
pain relief or antibiotics and the surgery that rebuilt faces and shattered lives.
Gail Alvarez writes:
Richard Wilcocks, Secretary of Headingley LitFest,
treated a large and supportive audience at the Ilkley Literature Festival
Fringe in the Ilkley Playhouse to an absorbing selection
of anecdotes from a wide range of sources. The medical practitioners – the VADs, matron, staff nurses, RAMC surgeons – and the patients all had a representative in the book to
tell their tale. Medical care and
practice in WW1 had many surprises: for examples the team of privately-sponsored
masseuses (yes, really), smoking in bed as the norm, a singular lack of
pain relief or antibiotics and the surgery that rebuilt faces and shattered lives.
His extensive interviews with surviving relatives in the
Yorkshire region had provided accounts based on personal memorabilia and
recollections and Stories from the War Hospital, first published in March
2014 by Headingley LitFest, details life at the 2nd Northern
Military Hospital in Headingley, known at the time as Beckett Park Hospital. Two years went into the research and
the writing, exemplified tonight by the extraordinary true tales of Private Robert Bass and VAD Nurse
Dorothy Wilkinson, just two from the dozens in the book.
Richard is an entertaining speaker/performer, with a talk
illustrated by snatches of song, poetry and racy gossip as well as some of the
starker statistics about the close to 60,000 patients who
passed through the doors of the former City of Leeds Training College for
teachers. He has a knack for
exploring the grim and the grime, to find the laugh, the life and even the love
story. For more on the book go to its website at www.firstworldwarhospital.co.uk
Richard is available for Powerpoint-illustrated talks and storytelling sessions based on his book, and is also offering teaching sessions and drama workshops in schools. Get in touch by emailing headingleyhospital@gmail.com
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