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Australia's Martial Madonna: the Army Nurse's Commemoration in Stained

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Australia's Martial Madonna: the Army Nurse's Commemoration in Stained Australia’s Martial Madonna: the army nurse’s commemoration in stained glass windows (1919-1951) Susan Elizabeth Mary Kellett, RN Bachelor of Nursing (Honours), Graduate Diploma of Nursing (Perioperative) A thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at The University of Queensland in 2016 School of History and Philosophical Enquiry Abstract This thesis examines the portrayal of the army nurse in commemorative stained glass windows commissioned between 1919 and 1951. In doing so, it contests the prevailing understanding of war memorialisation in Australia by examining the agency of Australia’s churches and their members – whether clergy or parishioner – in the years following World Wars I and II. Iconography privileging the nurse was omitted from most civic war memorials following World War I when many communities used the idealised form of an infantryman to assuage their collective grief and recognise the service of returned menfolk to King and Country. Australia’s religious spaces were also deployed as commemorative spaces and the site of the nurse’s remembrance as the more democratic processes of parishes and dioceses that lost a member of the nursing services gave sanctuary to her memory, alongside a range of other service personnel, in their windows. The nurse’s depiction in stained glass was influenced by architectural relationships and socio- political dynamics occurring in the period following World War I. This thesis argues that her portrayal was also nuanced by those who created these lights. Politically, whether patron or artist, those personally involved in the prosecution of war generally facilitated equality in remembrance while citizens who had not frequently exploited memory for individual or financial gain. Regardless of motivation, and unlike the Digger – who evolved from a tradition of using soldier saints to allegorise death during battle – the nurse’s portrayal in stained glass occurred without precedent following World War I. Hers reflected prevailing social and cultural attitudes towards women at war while simultaneously contesting the ascendant masculinity developing around civic remembrance. This thesis also challenges the belief that the Hall of Memory at the Australian War Memorial, Canberra, is a secular space. Analysis of a complex series of symbolic relationships in its stained glass reveals that artist M. Napier Waller allegorised Devotion – the nurse in the South Window – as the Virgin Mary. Subverting his patron’s brief for realism, he equated the nation’s sacrifice with that of Christ’s and created a religious scheme of glass. Drawing on a commitment to tradition, architectural relationships and his own philosophical beliefs and life experiences, Waller also embedded other aspects of sacrifice and loss in the form of the nurse. In doing so, he covertly contested prevailing societal attitudes about women and war to rectify a significant omission from the Australian commemorative landscape. ii Her experiences during World War II endowed the nurse with a greater commemorative presence than her World War I forbear. Elevated from a position of passive femininity a generation earlier, a greater public awareness of her experiences and the increased agency of women in Australian society also contributed to a more central and prominent position in commemorative windows commissioned in the first five years after the war. Artisans of trade firms created windows that reflected a community’s desire to recognise the active sacrifice of the nurse in its memorial but used existing expressions of remembrance or the work of others to do so. However, artists – men with an academy education – drew upon the philosophical as well as the applied underpinnings of their art and designed windows in which the nurse became an active participant in war alongside the Australian serviceman. For M. Napier Waller, combat was not an experience to be valourised but an opportunity for atonement and enlightenment. Drawing again on the medieval foundations of his art and using the nurse as a powerful symbol for man’s resurrection and redemption, Waller cemented her status as Australia’s Martial Madonna – allegorical Virgin Mary and mother of the nation – in stained glass. iii Declaration by author This thesis is composed of my original work, and contains no material previously published or written by another person except where due reference has been made in the text. I have clearly stated the contribution by others to jointly-authored works that I have included in my thesis. I have clearly stated the contribution of others to my thesis as a whole, including statistical assistance, survey design, data analysis, significant technical procedures, professional editorial advice, and any other original research work used or reported in my thesis. The content of my thesis is the result of work I have carried out since the commencement of my research higher degree candidature and does not include a substantial part of work that has been submitted to qualify for the award of any other degree or diploma in any university or other tertiary institution. I have clearly stated which parts of my thesis, if any, have been submitted to qualify for another award. I acknowledge that an electronic copy of my thesis must be lodged with the University Library and, subject to the policy and procedures of The University of Queensland, the thesis be made available for research and study in accordance with the Copyright Act 1968 unless a period of embargo has been approved by the Dean of the Graduate School. I acknowledge that copyright of all material contained in my thesis resides with the copyright holder(s) of that material. Where appropriate I have obtained copyright permission from the copyright holder to reproduce material in this thesis. iv Publications during candidature Peer-reviewed Papers: Kellett, Susan. "Truth and Love: The Windows of the Australian War Memorial." Journal of Australian Studies 39, no. 2 (2015): 125-50. Other papers: Kellett, Susan. “In the light of loss: the Clark Windows of St John’s Cathedral.” Journal of the Brisbane History Group (In Press). Conference Abstracts: Kellett, Susan. “Challenging the Myth: Masculinity, Memorials and the Nurse.” Paper presented at Embattled Men: Masculinity and War Symposium, Canberra: Australian National University, April 2011. Kellett, Susan. “Conflicting Agendas: Waller and the War Memorial.” Paper presented at the Australian Historical Association Conference: Conflict in History, Brisbane: The University of Queensland, July 2014. Kellett, Susan. “Shattering a foundational icon of Australian Commemoration: Waller and the Emasculated Anzac.” Paper presented at the Australian Historical Association Conference: Foundational Histories, Sydney: University of Sydney, 2015. Kellett, Susan. “Nursing a memory: Waller and the women who waited.” Paper presented at the Narratives of War Symposium: Traces of War, Adelaide, University of South Australia, 2015. Publications included in this thesis No publications included. Contributions by others to the thesis No contributions by others. Statement of parts of the thesis submitted to qualify for the award of another degree None. v Acknowledgments To the clergy, archivists and parishioners of the Anglican Church of Australia, the Catholic Church of Australia, the Uniting Church in Australia, the Presbyterian Church of Australia, Lutheran church of Australia and ecumenical chapels located around the nation, my sincerest gratitude in helping me locate and access the windows and then the archival resources relating to them. Special thanks are extended to: Desley Soden; Dr Robert Phillip; Gary Harch; Reverend Andrew Sempell, Rosemary Sempell; Reverend David Ould; Dr Rosemary Annable; Dr Louise Trott; Don McPhaill; Reverend Chris Brennan; Father David Smith; Reverend Stephen Davies; Father Peter King; Reverend Marian Free; Reverend Canon Keith Dean-Jones; Belinda Archer; Gionni Di Gravio; Barbara Fallow; Ian and Gale Watkins; Judith Weaver; Kim Bussey; Elizabeth Butt; Di Barnes; Leone Duncan; Costa at St Peter’s Eastern Hill; Vicar Roger Proud; Graeme Kitney; Cheryl Ford; Alan Jarrod; Diane Body; Margaret Morgan; Margery Lewis Jones; Stephen Webb; Deb Bennett; Caryn Rogers; Mardi Lumsden; Pastor Douglas Miller; Ray Herman; Eve Chappel; Allan and Joy Clark; Beth Doherty; Jo Robertson; Father Tony Caruana; Tony McNamara; Karla White; Deacon Chris Wallace; Reverend Lew Hewitt; Brett Richardson; Joy Bartholomew; Joanna van Vuurn; Hans Sommer; Darryl Lightfoot; Nadine Fenwick; Bob and Christine Woolner; Debbie Venz; Lyn Smith, Mike Connell; Peter Ellis; Patty Page; Ross Smith. For windows installed in hospitals, I am indebted to the help of: Lucy Fisher; Kylie Walker; Robert Winther; Hazel Ruggins; Wayne Hall, Arthur Garner; Jill O’Donnell; Helen Eccles; Alice Kang; Peter Jeffrey; Sylvia Bartian; Sue Patterson; and Damian Holgate along with the assistance of the nation’s Chief Nurses in 2010/2011: Ms Pauline Ross; Professor Debra Thoms; Ms Veronica Croome; Ms Katy Fielding; Associate Professor Fiona Stoker; Associate Professor Jenny Beutel; Associate Professor Catherine Stoddart; and Dr Greg Rickard. At Heritage Victoria, the assistance and support of Jenny Dickens, Susanna Collis, David Thompson and Gary McPherson were invaluable. I am grateful for the assistance of Major Ann Martin for disseminating my ‘call-to-arms’ among her colleagues in the Royal Australian Army Nursing Corps (RAANC) and also the support of ex-service organisations: Mickey
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