Louisa Parsons

Louisa Parsons RRC (3 June 1855 – 2 November 1916) was a British nurse notable during the Mahdist War, at the University of Maryland and the Second Boer War.

Life Parsons was born in 1855 in Sidbury, Devon. Her mother was Emma Amelia Parsons and she was brought up as her mother's sister because there was no named father. Her mother later married and became Emma Rose. Louisa worked as a servant. In 1880 she became a trained nurse after completing training at the Nightingale Training School in London's St Thomas's Hospital. In time she would also receive the five sided star Khedive Medal bearing the image of a sphinx.

The University of Maryland credits her as their first Superintendent of their University of Maryland School of Nursing (UMSON) in 1889. Other sources note that she was chosen from 80 applicants to lead the new training school at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, in Baltimore. It was only a stop-gap appointment until Isabel Hampton Robb became free. She left the school £10,000 and her collection of medals. The school named a nurses home after her and in time commissioned an oil painting.