Page 47 - QARANC Vol 14 No 11 2015

THE GAZETTE QARANC 45
Lt Col (Retd) Sheila COATES RRC
TD (1932 – 2015)
Sheila trained at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham. Following that she worked in Woolley Sanatorium in Northumberland.
She moved to Harefield Hospital with Nancy Wilson and achieved her BTH certificate. She returned to Norman’s Riding hospital in County Durham, and then did her Queen’s District Nurse training in Gateshead. She did her first part Midwifery training at the Princess Mary Maternity Hospital in Newcastle and then transferred to the MRC unit. Her next challenge was liaison officer for post-graduate nursing in the Newcastle Hospitals and the Nursing officer/allocations until her retirement in 1987.
Sheila joined 1 Northern General Hospital (V) in 1958 and became Matron of 201 Northern General Hospital (V) from Nov 1976 until 31 Oct 1979.
Her retirement years were spent amidst the beauty of Northumberland with her dear friend Nancy Wilson who sadly died earlier this year.
She died in hospital on 13 June 2015. Her funeral in Newcastle was attended by members of the Association, 3 previous Commanding Officers of 201, Friends and Nursing Colleagues.
Ann Clouston
Chair QARANC Association Newcastle Branch
Lyndsey Anne Staerck
Lyndsey trained at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Gateshead. She worked at the Royal Victoria Infirmary Newcastle as an Anaesthetic Sister and Senior Nurse.
She joined 201 Field Hospital TA in 2001 as a Nursing Officer. She was appointed as Regimental Operational Support Officer (ROSO) at 201 Field Hospital Newcastle upon Tyne, where she gave tremendous support to those on Operations.
She was working at the RVI and Freeman as a Patient Services Manager.
As Branch Secretary of the QARANC Association Newcastle 2011-1015, she ensured members old and new were made welcome and kept informed.
Her sudden and untimely death is a huge blow to her mother, three sons, her friends and colleagues. Her funeral was very well attended.
Ann Clouston
Chair Newcastle Branch
Mary Couper (nee
Walsh) 1920-2015
Mary died peacefully in the John Radcliffe hospital, Oxford, on 7 May 2015 following a stroke which occurred at the end of a short period of illness.
Mary grew up in Cobh, Co
Cork, Ireland, and at the age
of 18 moved to England to
train at the Royal Free. At
the end of the war she joined
the Queen Alexandra’s Royal
Army Nursing Corps, and was
posted to India where she met her future husband, Edward, then serving as a Captain in the Royal Army Medical Corps. They were married in Lucknow in 1947 and returned to England soon after, setting up home in north-west Kent, where Edward joined a medical practice in Erith. Following a few house moves, they bought a dilapidated Victorian house in Chislehurst and set about turning it into a comfortable and attractive family home. Mary was active in the community, and very much involved in fund-raising for the local branch of the Royal Medical Benevolent Fund.
After a number of home-based years, Mary decided it was time to return to the workplace, initially joining the staff at Foyle’s bookshop and later the London office of the soon to be established independent University of Buckingham. However, the pull to return to nursing was strong and, following a period of retraining, Mary worked as Assistant Matron in a local nursing home until her retirement.
When Edward became disabled as the result of a stroke, Mary cared for him at home as long as she was able, but after a second stroke left him unable to walk and in need of nursing home care, they moved to Oxford to be near their daughter and her family. Mary entered enthusiastically into life in Oxford. She loved being near the wider family and, although at first she missed the proximity of London, she grew to love Oxford and all it offered. Her interests were many and she enjoyed attending Greek and Latin classes, visiting the theatre, opera and museums, and read widely. She had an exceptionally retentive memory and could quote at length in both poetry and prose.
Mary had a great zest for life and was always interested in the lives of others, often extracting the life stories of strangers she met on buses and trains. She loved her family and took a great interest in all seven of her grandchildren, their other halves, and in her two great-grandchildren. She was blessed with enormous energy and optimism, as well as good health for most of her life.
Although Mary’s service with the QA’s was fairly brief, she looked back with pleasure and pride on her time as an army nursing sister, and many were the anecdotes from those few years. She enjoyed her continuing associate membership and kept in touch throughout her life with some of those with whom she had nursed in India.
Edward died in 2004. Their younger son Anthony died tragically in 1984. Mary is survived by two half-sisters, Margaret and Sheila, two half-brothers, Chris and Patrick, and by her daughter Rosalind, her son David, her grandchildren Elizabeth, Catherine, Hannah, Sarah, Harriet, George and Alexander, and her great-grandchildren Phoebe and Edward.
A celebration of Mary’s long life was held in Oxford on 27 May and was attended by many friends and family members.