Katie Louisa Ardill

Katie Louisa Ardill, (3 August 1886 – 3 January 1955) was an Australian medical doctor. She was the first woman to be appointed as a divisional surgeon in New South Wales, and a year later was among the first female doctors when she joined the British Expeditionary Forces in Egypt in 1915.

Early life and education Born in Chippendale, a suburb in inner Sydney, to two evangelist social workers, George Edward Ardill, an Australian politician, and Louisa Ardill née Wales, a matron-superintendent of the Home of Hope hospital which was eventually renamed the South Sydney Women's hospital. Schooled at Wellesley College, Ardill graduated from University of Sydney on 9 April 1913 with a degree in medicine.

Career In 1913, Ardill completed a one-year internship at the Prince Alfred Hospital and served as an honorary anaesthetist and out-patients medical officer at the South Sydney Women's Hospital. Ardill therefore travelled to Britain, signing up with the British Red Cross who in September 1915 deployed her to serve at the Anglo-Belgian Hospital in Calais. In mid-1916, Ardill become one of the first women doctors in the British Expeditionary Forces field services, when the army changed their policy to allow the to enlist on a contractual basis. Serving under the Royal Army Medical Corps, Ardill was deployed to the County Middlesex War Hospital, St. Albans, England. This was previously an asylum, but in September 1915 it was reopened as a hospital to treat wounded soldiers as they arrived from the Western Front, and had 1600 beds and the capacity to treat 250 men in its specialist military mental health unit. She then worked at the Anglo-Belgian Base Clearing Military Hospital at Étaples in France, and was later promoted to the rank of captain.

Awards and honours In 1929 Katie Louisa Ardill was appointed a life member of the St John Ambulance Association. She was admitted to the Order of St John as a member in 1938, was promoted to Officer of the Order in 1943, and in 1947 was promoted to the Commander of the Order. She was promoted "Dame of Grace" of the order of St John of Jerusalem in 1952, having served as a sister from the date of her admission to the order in 1938.