To me the real question is, as I suppose it constantly is to everyone, “What is God’s will in this case?” Elizabeth Garrett Anderson, August 10, 1861
March is Women’s History Month. We have been reviewing stories of women who made a difference in the world. On this website, Renew Your Thinking, we have focused on pioneer women physicians. Women take adequate medical care for granted today but this was not always true in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Even in the United States and Europe women died from a lack of care. Some women died because they were too modest to go to a male doctor. Men did not always understand women’s issues and some women died due to ignorance.
It seems like a no-brainer to us now that women are excellent doctors. But there was a time when men really thought that women were so inferior in intelligence and skill that females could not be in the medical field. It is truly tragic that so many women died due to male prejudice.
Thank God for women pioneer doctors like the Blackwell sisters (see March 13 post) Fanny Jane Butler (see March 20 post) and Elizabeth Garrett Anderson. these women faced opposition everywhere they went but they didn’t give up. Everyone owes these women a large debt of gratitude for persevering in spite of the ambivalence and often hatred against women for entering a supposedly “man’s field”.
In this last post for Women’s History Month 2019, we turn to the amazing life of a woman who wanted to help others by opening up the medical profession to women.
Elizabeth Garrett Anderson (1836-1917)
Elizabeth Garrett was born in east London as one of 12 children. Her father was a successful business man and sent all of his children to good schools. Elizabeth was expected to do the typical thing of her day and marry and have a family. However after meeting other successful women, Emily Davies and Elizabeth Blackwell she was encouraged to become a doctor.
Male prejudice against women in the medical field was very strong. Elizabeth tried to attend medical classes but was drummed out of a school after she gave a correct answer in class to a question that none of the male students were able to. They had her barred from any further classes.
When Elizabeth Garrett tried to obtain instruction in other medical classes, male teachers turned her down, often in very dismaying words. “I have so strong a conviction that the entrance of ladies into dissecting-rooms and anatomical theatres is undesirable in every respect, and highly unbecoming that I could not do anything to promote your end. … Ladies would make bad doctors at the best.”[1]
Elizabeth did not grow bitter or unhappy in spite of this adversity. She persevered until she had managed to work for one year in a teaching hospital in London. She received good training and fulfilled her desire to help in every way for the well-being of women. She said in a letter to a friend, “The passion of my life is to help women.”
After six years of hard work Elizabeth completed the courses necessary to sit for an examination for a medical diploma. No medical organizations would allow her to apply except for the Society of Apothecaries. The Society of Apothecaries was unable to exclude her because their charter forbade them to exclude women. When she first applied they wanted to ignore her, but she threatened legal action and at last she was able to sit for the exam, passing with credit. (Later the society changed the rules so no more women could sit for the exam.)
With the necessary financial help from her father, Elizabeth set up a house and began to help women, putting on her placard “Elizabeth Garrett, L.S.A”. She started St. Mary’s Dispensary which later became the New Hospital for Women. Elizabeth was determined to get a medical degree. In the next few years Elizabeth taught herself French and received a degree from Paris University, which had opened up its medical school to women in 1868. A foreign degree was not recognized by British hospitals, but it still gave her greater credibility. During this time, Elizabeth met her future husband James George Skelton Anderson. Together they reformed the Children’s Hospital in London.
Along with many other women during this time, Elizabeth began to work for the reforming of laws concerning women. One way to accomplish this, since the men seemed unwilling to do anything about the unfair treatment of women, was to run for office and change the laws themselves. Elizabeth ran for the school board in 1870 and won handily. This was a huge victory for the cause of women.
On February 9, 1871 Elizabeth married James G. S. Anderson. They had agreed that their careers would be independent, but this lent to a happier marriage. Both had tremendous respect for the other. It was a marriage of mutuality and a happy change for Elizabeth after so many years of disapproval by men. Elizabeth proved that a married woman can succeed in a profession and not neglect her family. She had 3 children (one of whom died at an early age). The family was close. Her daughter, Louisa Garrett Anderson, herself a physician, wrote a biography of her mother in 1939.[2]
By 1869 there were only two women practicing medicine in England, Elizabeth Garrett and Elizabeth Blackwell. Thanks to the success of these female doctors, medical schools finally began to admit women. On October 12, 1874 the London School of Medicine for Women opened. One of the students was the medical missionary, Miss Fanny Butler (see post March 20, 2019). On August 12, 1876 a law was enacted giving all British medical examining boards the right to admit women to examinations. Hospitals began to open up their wards to women as medical students. Elizabeth became the Dean of the Medical School for Women in 1883 and held the post for twenty years. She became President in 1903 and remained at that task until her death in 1917.
The New Hospital for Women was growing by leaps and bounds. This was in spite of the fact that women were asked to pay a fee for the opportunity of being treated by a woman. In the first few weeks 60 – 90 women and children consulted at the dispensary every afternoon. By 1871 more than 40,000 visits had been paid. There were 9,000 names in the dispensary books, and 250 midwifery cases had been attended in their own homes. It was now an undeniable fact that women wanted to be treated by women. The dispensary and hospital proved that women doctors were efficient and effective. Elizabeth Garrett Anderson was recognized for her success in the founding of the hospital, but even as important she was recognized for establishing the position for medical women in England.
In 1902 Dr. Anderson and her husband entered retirement from regular work. They moved to Aldeburgh on the Suffolk coast. James Anderson died in 1907. In 1908 Elizabeth ran for mayor and won! Elizabeth was the first female mayor in England.
Elizabeth died on December 17, 1917 and was buried in Aldeburgh beside her parents. In her biography, her daughter Louisa said, “Few people work for one cause from youth until old age. Elizabeth Garrett did so. … She carried happiness within her and by her work brought happiness to other women. … In her girlhood Elizabeth heard the call to live and work, and before the evening star lit her to rest she had helped to tear down one after another the barriers which, since the beginning of history, hindered women from work and progress and light and service.”
[1]From a letter written to Elizabeth Garrett by a doctor in Aberdeen, July 29, 1863.
[2]Louisa Garrett Anderson. Elizabeth Garrett Anderson 1836-1917(Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1939)
[1]From a letter written to Elizabeth Garrett by a doctor in Aberdeen, July 29, 1863.
[2]Louisa Garrett Anderson. Elizabeth Garrett Anderson 1836-1917(Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1939)
