Snapshot of the past: Lucy Hamnett Edwards

A photograph of army nurse Lucy Hamnett Edwards alongside her father Percy Edwards in London in 1953.
It was taken after Lucy was awarded the Royal Red Cross First Class Medal by Queen Elizabeth II for devotion to nursing duties.
The Courier-Mail reported Lucy, a Drouin resident, felt quite at home at Buckingham Palace.
In receiving the honour, the newspaper said she became the first Australian servicewomen - and officials think the first Australian woman - to receive an award from Queen Elizabeth II personally.
Lucy was born on August 29, 1907.
She trained as a nurse and enlisted in the army on October 18, 1940 at the age of 33.
Lucy was allocated three regimental numbers before settling on VFX 45577. The V stands for Vic, F for female and X for World War II.
During her army service, Lucy was posted overseas for 2085 days. Of those, 1273 days were operational days spent in a war zone.
All of her service was with the Australian Army Nursing Service, both with the Australian Imperial Force in the Middle East, including Singapore, and the Southwest Pacific.
On returning to Australia, Lucy remained in service and served in busy military hospitals looking after service personnel returning from overseas, including prisoners of war.
Lucy was then appointed matron of the British Commonwealth Occupation Forces General Hospital in Japan - called the Interim Army. This posting would have, on face value, seemed a dream job compared to World War II. However, all that changed with the outbreak of the Korean War in June 1950. Casualties, where possible, were medevacked to Japan and Lucy's responsibilities expanded tremendously.
The Australian and Canadian hospitals were integrated into the British 29th General Hospital.
An extract from a citation dated October 22, 1951 reads, "Due to her capable handling of a difficult situation, it can be attributed to her the smooth and efficient working of the wards in the hospital, and her wholehearted cooperation with the matron of the 29th British General Hospital and, in recent months, the senior sister of the Canadian section of the integrated hospital has done much to ensure the continuance of a high standard of nursing of patients from all the Commonwealth Forces". This was signed by Lt Gen Rowell, Chief General Staff.
The extract is part of a citation which resulted in Lucy being awarded the Royal Red Cross First Class Medal in 1952. This is a military decoration first awarded to Florence Nightingale. It is for exceptional devotion and competence in performing nursing duties over a continuous and long period.
Lucy was the only recipient of the award between 1947 and 1955.
The Major (temporary Lieutenant-Colonel) received the decoration in the King's/Queen's new year's honours in 1952.
Lucy was discharged on May 19, 1952 at the age of 44. It is unknown what she did after her discharge.
Lucy never married and died on June 11, 1990 aged 82-years-old. She is buried alongside her father Percy, mother Eunice and one of her sisters in the Drouin Cemetery.
Information as told by Brian Milner at the 2021 Drouin Cemetery Walk and soon to become a Story of Drouin. Photograph courtesy of Drouin History Group.