Role: Nurse, Ambulance driver
Mairi Lambert Gooden-Chisholm of Chisholm was a Scottish nurse and ambulance driver in the First World War. She and friend Elsie Knocker, won numerous medals for bravery and for saving the lives of thousands of soldiers on the Western Front in Belgium. Dubbed “The Madonnas of Pervyse” by the press the two were among the most photographed women of the war.
Both she and Knocker ended up in Belgium as part of the Corps which included Dorothie Feilding, first woman to win a Military Medal and May Sinclair.
Chisholm and Knocker soon came to the conclusion that they could save more lives by treating the wounded directly on the front lines. In November, they decided to leave the Corps and set up their own dressing station five miles east in a town named Pervyse, north of Ypres, a mere one hundred yards from the trenches. Here, in a vacant cellar which they named “Poste de Secours Anglais” (“British First Aid Post”), the two would spend the next three and a half years tending to the wounded. No longer affiliated with the Belgian Red Cross, they began acting completely as free agents and had to support their work by raising their own funds. In January 1915, they were both decorated by King Albert I of Belgium with the Order of Léopold II, Knights Cross for their courageous work on the front lines.
They were also awarded the British Military Medal and both made Officers of the Most Venerable Order of St. John of Jerusalem. Chisholm was also decorated with the Queen Elisabeth Medal of Belgium and the British campaign medals, including the 1914 Star. The two became instant celebrities earning the distinction of being among the most photographed women of the War.
