Somerville College, Oxford University, Oxford, UK

Somerville College is a college of the University of Oxford in England. It was founded in 1879 as Somerville Hall, one of the University's first two women's colleges. Somerville College began admitting men in 1994.

In April 1915 during the First World War Somerville College, together with the Examination Schools and other Oxford buildings, were requisitioned by the War Office to create the Third Southern General Hospital, a facility for the Royal Army Medical Corps to treat military casualties.   For the duration of the war, Somerville students relocated to Oriel College. 

Because many male students had left Oxford to enlist in the military, Somerville was able to rent St Mary Hall Quad which they bricked off from the rest of the college to segregate it from Oriel's remaining male students. Many students and tutors were involved in work during the conflict and some of them went to the Western Front in France.

Patients in Somerville during WW1 include poets Robert Graves, Siegfried Sassoon and R. E. Vernède. Sassoon arrived there on 2nd August 1916. Graves and Sassoon later reminisced about their time at Somerville Hospital: "How unlike you to crib my idea of going to the Ladies' College at Oxford" Sassoon wrote to Graves in 1917, and called it very much like Paradise.  At Somerville College, Graves met his first love, a nurse and professional pianist called Marjorie. About his time at Somerville, he wrote: "I enjoyed my stay at Somerville. The sun shone, and the discipline was easy." 

Once the war ended, the return to normality between Oriel and Somerville was delayed, sparking both frustration and an incident in the Spring of 1919 known as the "Oriel raid," in which male students made a hole in the wall dividing the sexes. In July 1919 the principal - Emily Penrose - and fellows returned to Somerville. Alumna Vera Brittain wrote about the impact of the war in Oxford and paid tribute to the work of the principal, Miss Penrose, in her memoir "Testament of Youth".

Sources:  University Challenge on BBC television 12th October 2026 and Wikipedia 

Photo from https://www.some.ox.ac.uk/news/somerville-hospital-then-and-now/

Eduardo De Filippo OMRI (1900 – 1984) - Italian actor, director, screenwriter, and playwright

Eduardo De Filippo was born in Naples, Italy on 26th May 1900. He was the second son of playwright and actor Eduardo Scarpetta, the "king" of Neapolitan theatre, and theatre seamstress and costumier Luisa De Filippo.  He and his siblings Annunziata "Titina" and Giuseppe "Peppino" were extramarital because Scarpetta was actually married since 1876 to Rosa De Filippo, Luisa's paternal aunt. Scarpetta had six more illegitimate children from various affairs, including actors Ernesto Murolo and Eduardo Passarelli. Scarpetta never acknowledged Eduardo De Filippo and his siblings, which is why the son took his mother's name.

Near the end of the First World War in 1918, Eduardo was drafted into the Italian military. He received a temporary discharge at the end of that year following the Armistice. Because his full compulsory military service was not finished, he was recalled in 1920 to serve in the 2nd Bersaglieri Regiment in Rome.

During his peacetime service, Eduardo’s commanding officer tasked him with organizing theatrical performances for the soldiers, allowing him to write, direct, and act while in uniform. He completed his service and returned to his professional theatre career full-time in 1921.

OMRI = Ordine al Merito della Repubblica Italiana, which translates into English as The Order of Merit of the Italian Republic.

Eduardo De Filippo received the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic (OMRI), specifically being made a Knight of the Grand Cross in 1973, for his high artistic merits and major contributions to Italian culture and theat

Source:  Wikipedia 

Sir Barnes Neville Wallis (1887 – 1979) – British engineer and inventor

 With thanks to The Reverend Nicholas Pye for discovery of this information

Barnes Wallis was born in Ripley, Derbyshire, UK  on 26th September 1887. His parents were General Practitioner Charles George Wallis (1859–1945) and his wife Edith Eyre (1859–1911), who was the daughter of Rev. John Ashby. The Wallis family went to live in New Cross in South London, living in "straitened, genteel circumstances" after Charles Wallis was crippled by polio in 1893. 

Barnes was educated at Christ's Hospital in Horsham and Haberdashers' Aske's Hatcham Boys' Grammar School in southeast London, leaving school at seventeen to start work in January 1905 at Thames Engineering Works at Blackheath in southeast London. He then went as an apprentice to J. Samuel White's, the shipbuilders based at Cowes on the Isle of Wight. He originally trained as a marine engineer and in 1922 he took a degree in engineering via the University of London External Programme.

Barnes was briefly involved in the First World War. He attempted to join the Royal Navy as an engine room artificer and later the Army (including the Artists' Rifles). He received a temporary commission as a Sub-Lieutenant in the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve (RNVR) and served with the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) helping develop military airships.

However, as the British Admiralty initially halted airship work, he and his colleagues were soon recalled by the War Office to resume vital civilian design work on military airships. Throughout the war, he worked as an aeronautical engineer for Vickers, helping design rigid airships for the war effort. R9 airship and later became heavily engrossed in designing the advanced R80 rigid airship toward the end of the conflict.

Barnes was chief assistant on the design of the British R9 airship and was then involved in designing the advanced R80 rigid airship toward the end of the conflict.

After a long and illustrious carrer – particularly during the Second World War - Barnes died on 30th Octobewr 1979.

Initial source: https://x.com/RevdPye

Additional information from Wikipedia. 

 

The Order of the British Empire (OBE)

 On 4th June 1917, King George V established the honour known as The Order of the British Empire (OBE) to fill gaps in the British honours system and honour those who had served in a range of non-combat roles during the First World War. . 

Dr Wilfred Balgarnie of The British Red Cross Society was the first recipient.

With thanks to The Revd Nicholas Pye via Twitter - X

@RevdPye 

Wallasey Town Hall, Wirral, UK

 Wallasey Town Hall, a Grade II* listed building on Brighton Street in Seacombe, Wirral, UK, is an iconic, monumental structure overlooking the River Mersey. The building was designed by architects Briggs, Wolstenholme & Thornely in the Neoclassical style and built by Moss and Sons of Loughborough. 

The foundation stone was laid by King George V accompanied by Queen Mary on 25th March 1914. 

In 1916, the completed building was placed under the command of the 1st Western General Hospital in Fazakerley and used as a military hospital for soldiers who had been wounded in action during the First World War. After the war it was converted for its intended use as a municipal building and was officially opened as Wallasey Town Hall on 3rd November 1920.

Wallasey became a Municipal Borough in 1910 and a County Borough in 1913

Original source: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1363397549157766&set=a.455674626596734&type=3&comment_id=1969778613934035&notif_id=1774800824142418&notif_t=feedback_reaction_generic&ref=notif

Photo and information Wikipedia. 

Sir Auguste Charles Valadier (1871 – 1931) – A Franco-American dentist who pioneered new techniques and equipment for treating maxillofacial injuries of soldiers during the First World War

Auguste Charles Valadier was born in Paris, France on 12th January 1871.  His parents were Marie-Antoinette Valadier, née Parade, and Charles Jean-Baptiste Valadier, a pharmacist. In 1878 their parents took Auguste and his two younger brothers to live in the United States.  There Auguste attended Dr Sachs' Collegiate Institute before studying dental surgery at Columbia University (1882-1892), taking his B.A.. He received his M.A. in 1895.uguste entered the Philadelphia Dental College as a student c. 1898, and qualified as Doctor of Dental Surgery (DDS) in 1901. He then sat the State examinations, which allowed him to practice in Pennsylvania and New York, practicing in the latter for five years.  In July 1899 in Philadelphia he married Marion Stowe but marriage was later dissolved.

By 1910 Marie-Antoinette was widowed and wealthy and living in Paris and when her other son died she persuaded Auguste to join her there. As he had no French dental qualifications, Auguste Valadier studied at l'Ecole Odontotechnique de Paris from November 1910 to June 1911 and received the certificate of Chirugien Dentiste (Tr. Dental Surgeon) from the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Paris in July 1912.   After that he was permitted to practice in France. In July 1913 he married Alice Wright, the granddaughter of Robert Clinton Wright, a former United States Minister in Brazil.

In October 1914 Auguste joined the British Red Cross Society (BRCS) in Paris who sent him to Abbeville. “The History of the Great War” (1922) records: "Dental surgeons commenced to arrive in France in early November and were allocated to clearing hospitals and to the bases. An eminent dentist, M. Valadier, a citizen of the United States, who had been sent from Paris to Abbeville by the BRCS, was also accepted for duty with the British troops on 29 October."   

Auguste appears to have been the first dental surgeon to provide dental treatment for the British troops in France. The dental surgeons sent over by the War Office were given temporary commissions while attached to the Royal Army Medical Corps, and Auguste Valadier was gazetted as an honorary Lieutenant, and in 1916 was promoted to the rank of Major.

By early 1915 Auguste had set up a 50-bed oral surgery unit attached to the 83rd (Dublin) General Hospital at Wimereux for the treatment of facial injuries.  Much of this reconstructive work was paid for out of his own pocket, while the staff in his dental laboratory in Paris fashioned the appliances necessary for the treatment of severe injuries to the jaw. As he was not a surgeon himself it was considered necessary that Auguste would require the assistance of a trained surgeon in the operating theatre and Harold Gillies joined his team. It is uncertain how long Gillies worked with Auguste, but it was certainly long enough to inspire in Gillies the interest to learn more about this radical new medical treatment.

When the war ended Auguste applied for and received the 1914 Star, the British War Medal and the Victory Medal with three Mentioned in Despatches (MiD) emblems.   In February 1920, in recognition of his service during the War, Auguste     Valadier was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire by the British government.  However because he was a French national the award was purely honorary. He had been appointed a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George (CMG) in June 1916  and an Associate of the Order of St John of Jerusalem in January 1917. In 1919 he was made a Chevalier of the Legion of Honour by the government of France. 

Auguste Valadier applied for British citizenship and in recognition of his service to the British Army it was granted on 16th March 1920. He was finally knighted by George V on 8th March 1921.

During the 1920s Auguste went back to his dental practice in Paris where he became President of the American Dental Club of Paris. 

Auguste died on 31st August 1931.

 Major Sir Auguste Charles Valadier at No.13 Stationary Hospital. 6th October 1916

Arthur Michell Ransome CBE (1884 – 1967) – British author and a foreign correspondent coveromg WW1 on the Eastern Front for “The Daily News”.

Arthur Ransome wearing his
Press Corps Uniform in WW1 

Arthur was born on 18th January 1884 in Leeds, UK.  He was the son of Cyril Ransome (1851–1897) who was a Professor of History at Yorkshire College (now the University of Leeds). and his wife Edith Ransome (née Baker Boulton) (1862–1944).   

Arthur was the eldest of four children - he had two sisters, Cecily and Joyce, and a brother Geoffrey who was killed in the First World War in 1918.   Joyce married into the Lupton family, well-connected industrialists and politicians; she named one of her sons Arthur Ralph Ransome Lupton (1924–2009), Her grandson is storyteller Hugh Lupton.

The Ransome family regularly holidayed at Nibthwaite in the Lake District, and Arthur was carried up to the top of Coniston Old Man as an infant. 

Educated first in Windermere and then at Rugby School (where he lived in the same study room that had been used by Lewis Carroll) where he did not entirely enjoy the experience, because of his poor eyesight, lack of athletic skill, and limited academic achievement, Arthur went on to study chemistry at Yorkshire College, where his late father had worked. His father's premature death in 1897 had a lasting effect on him. 

After a year at Yorkshire College, Arthur abandoned his studies and went to London to become a writer. He took low-paying jobs as an office assistant in a publishing company and as editor of a failing magazine – “Temple Bar Magazine”, while establishing himself as a member of the literary scene.

His mother did not want him to abandon his studies for writing, but was later supportive of his books. She urged him to publish “The Picts and the Martyrs” in 1943, although his second wife Evgenia hated it and was often discouraging about his books while he was writing them.

Arthur married Ivy Constance Walker in 1909 and they had one daughter  - Tabitha. It was not a happy marriage as Arthur found his wife's demands to spend less time on writing and more with her and their daughter a great strain; his biographer Hugh Brogan writes that "it was impossible to be a good husband to Ivy". The couple weredivorced in 1924.

In 1913 Ransome left his first wife and daughter and went to Russia to study its folklore..

After the start of the First World War in 1914, Arthur became a foreign correspondent and covered the war on the Eastern Front for “The Daily News”. He also covered the Russian Revolutions of 1917 and came to sympathise with the Bolshevik cause, becoming personally close to a number of its leaders, including Vladimir Lenin, Leon Trotsky and Karl Radek. He met the woman who would later become his second wife - Evgenia Petrovna Shelepina - who worked as Trotsky's personal secretary.

He also wrote about the literary life of London and about Russia before, during and after the Revolutions of 1917. His connection with the leaders of the Revolution led to him providing information to the Secret Intelligence Service, while he was also suspected by MI5 of being a Soviet spy.

In 1915, Arthur published “The Elixir of Life” (published by Methuen, London), which was to be his only full-length novel apart from the “Swallows and Amazons” series. He published “Old Peter's Russian Tales” - a collection of 21 folktales from Russia - the following year

After a long and successful life, Arthur died on 3rd  June 1967.