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Ethel Williams (physician)

Ethel M. N. Williams
Ethel M. N. Williams
Personal details
Born8 July 1863
Cromer, England, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland
DiedJanuary 29, 1948(1948-01-29) (aged 84)
Domestic partnerFrances Hardcastle
EducationNorwich High School for Girls
London School of Medicine for Women
OccupationMedical doctor, suffragist, and pacifist

Ethel Mary Nucella Williams (8 July 1863 – 29 January 1948)[1][2] was the first female doctor in Newcastle upon Tyne.

Early life and education

Ethel Mary Nucella Williams was born on 8 July 1863[1][2] in Cromer, and attended Norwich High School for Girls and Newnham College, Cambridge.[3]

Ethel attended the London School of Medicine for Women and graduated in 1891. She had to gain her hospital experience abroad in Paris and Vienna, because at that time women were not permitted to train in British hospitals, and qualified in 1895.[4]

Career

Williams was the first female doctor in Newcastle upon Tyne, and in 1906, she became the first woman to found a general medical practice in the city,[5] where she worked alongside Dr Ethel Bentham.[4]

In 1917, she co-founded the Northern Women's Hospital,[6] which is now the Nuffield Health Clinic on Osborne Road.[3] She retired in 1924 and left her practice to another female doctor, Dr Mona MacNaughton.[7] Ethel was also one of the initial members of the Medical Women's Federation.[8]

Ethel Williams was Secretary of the Newcastle Women's Liberal Association, a member of the Literary and Philosophical Society, and served as a Justice of the Peace.[3]

Her obituary in the British Medical Journal also states 'She distinguished herself in 1906 by being one of the first women in the North of England to drive a motor-car.'[9]

Williams was the lifelong companion of Frances Hardcastle, an English mathematician and one of the founding members of the American Mathematical Society.[5] Together with Hardcastle she built a house by the Northumberland moors at Stocksfield in which she spent her retirement.[10] She became friendly with suffragette and later social worker and Tynemouth councillor Norah Balls through their interest in women's rights.[11]

Williams died in 1948, leaving an estate valued at £31,659, equivalent to £1,454,105 in 2023.[12]

Commemoration

In 1950, Newcastle University opened new student accommodation named the Ethel Williams Halls of Residence[13][14] in her memory.[7] This building was demolished in the late 1990s and the residential street now occupying the site is called Williams Park.[15]

In 2018, a plaque was placed at a house where she lived in Newcastle's Osborne Terrace, which reads, "ETHEL WILLIAMS / 1862-1948 / Lived and worked here 1910-1924. / Newcastle's first female general medical practitioner / A radical suffragist, pacifist, educationalist and / social welfare campaigner / Co-founded both / the Northern Women's Hospital and / the Medical Women's Federation / in 1917."[16]

Her suffragist banner from circa 1905 is one of the treasures of Newcastle University Library's Special Collections.[7]

References

  1. ^ a b "Ethel Williams (1863-1948)". Co-curate. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
  2. ^ a b "Williams, Ethel Mary Nucella, (8 July 1863–29 Jan. 1948), JP; Physician and Surgeon retired; late President, British Federation of Medical Women; late President, NE Federation of University Women". WHO'S WHO & WHO WAS WHO. 2007. doi:10.1093/ww/9780199540884.013.u233479. ISBN 978-0-19-954089-1. Retrieved 13 August 2020.
  3. ^ a b c Hellawell, Sarah (16 November 2015). "Ethel Williams, an activist on Tyneside". Reflections of Newcastle 1914-18. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
  4. ^ a b Todd, Nigel (1996). "Ethel Williams: Medical and Suffrage Pioneer". North East Labour History (30): 19–21.
  5. ^ a b Oldfield, Sybil (2001). Women humanitarians: a biographical dictionary of British women active between 1900 and 1950 : doers of the word. London: Continuum. pp. 276–277. ISBN 082644962X. OCLC 237674862.
  6. ^ "Special Collections". www.ncl.ac.uk. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
  7. ^ a b c "Marching On Together: Ethel Williams' Suffragist Banner - June 2013". Newcastle University Library. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
  8. ^ "Our History". Medical Women's Federation. Archived from the original on 28 December 2017. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
  9. ^ "Ethel Williams, M.D., D.P.H.". British Medical Journal. 1: 369. 21 February 1948 – via JSTOR.
  10. ^ Davis, A. E. L. (23 September 2004). "Hardcastle, Frances (1866–1941), mathematician". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/64021. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  11. ^ Harrison, Brian (1977). "Oral Evidence on the Suffragette and Suffragist Movements - Norah Balls".
  12. ^ "WILLIAMS Ethel Mary Nucella" in Probate Calendar for England and Wales (1948), p. 416
  13. ^ Historic England. "Ethel Williams Hall, North Tyneside (1025390)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
  14. ^ "Ethel Williams Hall, Newcastle upon Tyne, North Tyneside". www.britishlistedbuildings.co.uk. Retrieved 28 December 2017.
  15. ^ 55°00′40″N 1°34′24″W / 55.0111283°N 1.5734701°W / 55.0111283; -1.5734701
  16. ^ "Ethel Williams: Honour for Newcastle's first female GP - BBC News". Bbc.com. 6 February 2018. Retrieved 18 July 2018.
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