Page 51 - QARANC Vol 18 No 2 2020

The Gazette QARANC Association 49
Miss Margaret Kathleen Irles Harpin
10 March1917–21 April 2020
Margaret was born in Huddersfield on 10 March 1917 to Flora and Henri Harpin. Her father was fatally wounded on 3 May 1917 in World War 1. Margaret and her mother moved back to the family home in Leicester, so grandma Fudger could look after her whilst her mother did her nurse training at Plaistow Hospital in East London.
On qualifying, granny, mother and Margaret moved to Kegworth where Flora became the district nurse and midwife. Until the age of eight Margaret was home tutored, moving on to attend Our Lady’s Covent School. Aged 17 Margaret started ophthalmic nurse t raining at Nottingham Eye Infirmary. Then at 19 she went to Charing Cross Hospital.
Margaret joined the QAIMNS as a nursing sister and spent most of her time in the Middle East, Palestine and Egypt. After the war Margaret worked in Leicester, Derby, and York in eye theatres and in her later years St George’s Hospital, Lincoln until 1977 when she retired to look after her mother in Kegworth, until she died in 1987.
Margaret stayed on in the family home and enjoyed travelling around
the country in her car and visiting her friend Birkit in Sweden until early 2012 when it was obvious that she wasn’t coping. She went into care aged 95 years where she was able to celebrate her 100th birthday
I first became aware of Margaret when our previous Chair and Secretary were struggling to visit, so I volunteered to takeover.
Margaret was a very petite but fiercely independent and proud lady, who took a great pride in her appearance and home and garden. She was interested in many things, always enquiring about the QAs and the Midland Branch. Good manners and etiquette was a thing, always the finest bone china cups, plates and linen napkins, even with a biscuit. She had a great faith, having no truck with modern text in the Bible and prayer book.
Margaret organised her own 90th birthday celebrations at a nearby hotel with attention to detail for the comfort of her guests. It was wonderful and I felt very privileged to be invited. I met a couple of nursing friends from Lincoln. When Margaret was unable to drive I enjoyed taking her to meet up with them in Lincoln. Her mobility and eyesight were causing her problems
and she was often in a lot of pain from her hips, although she soldiered on. Her memory began to deteriorate and she went in to a care home. On my last visit just after her 103rd birthday she remembered who I was
Sadly, following a short Illness Margaret passed away peacefully in her sleep. Due to Covid-19 she had a private cremation on 16 May 2020.
Hopefully a Thanksgiving service will be held near to her birthday on March 10 2021
Condolences to Margaret’s nieces, cousins and friends. Rest in Peace.
Sue Reading Vice Chair
Vicky Leighton (Nee Dillon) 5 September 1944–1 July 2020
Vicky joined the Queen Alexandra’s Royal Army Nursing Corps as a student nurse in September 1962 and in March 1964 was posted to the British Military Hospital Singapore. It was a wonderful place to undertake nurse training and Vicky embraced all that nursing and the environment had to offer. She was a bundle of energy, discovering new places and getting to know people that often turned out to be lifelong friends.
She left the Corps after five years in September 1967, as an Acting Sergeant, and undertook a variety of nursing roles in the UK and overseas. She then went to Germany as a nursing sister in a British school for Service children where she met her husband Ken Leighton. Ken was a widower with three children, and Vicky found a new and fulfilling vocation which lasted for 39 years.
She never lost her love of nursing and the QARANC, and was an avid reader of the Gazette. As the years passed loose contact from Singapore days became close friendships and we, a group of five QAs and husbands, would have an annual reunion, meeting up all over Europe. It is extremely difficult to imagine future reunions without Vicky’s infectious humour, enthusiasm, curiosity and shopping tours. She will be sorely missed by us all.
Ann Fremd (nee Croft), Val Macintosh (nee Nelson), Joan Marsh, MO Serge (nee Doxey) Diana Wilson (nee Quarington)