Virtual
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Australia

Daughter of Thomas Mitchell KING and Jane Maria nee MacDONELL
Of "Loorauah", Balaclava Road, Balaclava, Vic.
Enlisted in QAIMNS 31 May 1915
Embarked for France 09 June 1915
Wounded by shrapnel in France 29 November 1917
Miss Loughran said she remembered the wounding of Sister King. In France, in 1917, they were at a casualty clearing station, and the Germans commenced to badly shell the area. The day sisters had all gone to bed when warning was received, and the patients were prepared for quick transference. Sister King was amid the din, but took no notice until she was thrown down, and, being unable to move, it was found that she was struck in the thigh and calf of the leg. She is convalescent, but still unable to get about.

She was wounded by Hostile Bombs while on duty as above sustaining:
(1) Left Leg - A large deep wound 5" x 3" on post aspect lower half of leg, a smaller wound to inner side; calf muscles blown away and only deep ones left.  Post Tibial nerve partially injured and she had 3 bruises on the left foot subsequently due to application of hot bottles to anaesthetic areas.
(2) Right thigh - wound of entry 2" x 1" outer side of mid third; exit wound 2" x 1" on post surface at higher level. No injury to bone, blood vessels or nerves.
Present state - wounds healed. Burns practically healed.  Has some ...... power of left ankle which is rapidly improving - she can walk with crutches.  She was suffering from great shock when admitted but is now much improved. - Recommended 2 months leave.
Her left leg which was seriously injured breaks down whenever she works for any length of time.  The Board held on Feb 4th 1919, found that Sister King was unfit for work for a prolonged period, and recommended her return to Australia.
Medical Board finding on 05 July 1918 -Wounded GSW of Right Thigh and Left Leg - explosion of bomb - right thigh no disability, left leg great destruction of tissues of calf - limps - can walk 3 miles 

"My old leg gives me quite a lot of trouble and the one that was not so badly wounded is not behaving at all well.  I suppose it's because it has most of the work to do.
Col. Syme operated soon after I got home and broke down adhesions.  I was in Hospital for over three months with that and when I left was practically as bad as before I started.
About a fortnight ago I started to take Millinery lessons, but don't know if I will be able to go on with these as I find it very tiring.  I only hope I will as I have to do something and I will never be able to nurse again.  I am getting a pension at the rate of £50 a year and that will be up in June.  I do wish they would come to some definite arrangement so that I would know how my future stands, of course I am entirely dependent on myself and when one has not the strength its very hard to make a living at all, especially as things are at present."

Awarded Military Medal 29 January 1918
Permanently unfit 14 June 1918
Directed to join as Sister for Nursing Duty at the Sisters' Hospital, 71 Vincent Square, London on 15 July 1918
Passed fit for Home Service 22 November 1918
"I am directed to acquaint you that there is no regulation under which a Nurse could be granted a gratuity in respect of wounds." - 19 September 1919
Service terminated  07 June 1919 - 3 years 9 months service abroad
Applied for passage to Brisbane, Qld.- address listed as 'Glen Almond', St. Albans - father living in Qld 
Embarked for Australia 08 May 1919 per 'Roda'
Eileen was one of 115 killed when a torpedo struck the Melbourne Star in April 1943.

Queensland Nurse Wounded.

Mr. K. M. King, secretary, and solicitor to the Local Authorities' Association, has received a cablegram from the War Office, London, stating that his sister, Nursing Sister Eileen King, was admitted on 3rd December to the 14th General Hospital, Wiirameru, France, suffering from severe bomb wounds. The left leg and right thigh were injured. Sister King is a daughter of Mr. T. M. King, I.S.O., of Brisbane, and was nursing in Melbourne, on Lady Dudley's staff, before enlisting for war service.  A vote of sympathy ' with Mr. King was passed by the Coorparoo Shire Council last night.

The Telegraph Tuesday 11 December 1917 page 7

Sister Eileen King, daughter of Mrs. T. M. King, formerly Auditor General of Queensland, and sister of Mr. Hubert King, accountant at Reynolds, No 4 Bridge Street City, has been decorated by the King for bravery on the battlefield.  Although wounded, Sister King remained and attended to the wounded soldiers.  She is attached to the British Army Nursing Service.

Evening News (Sydney) Saturday 23 November 1918 page 4

ON NURSING DUTY.
Sister Amy King and Sister Eileen King, M.M., daughters of Mr. T.M. King, I.S.O., returned to Brisbane during the past week, and are at present staying with their sister, Mrs. P. A.Blundell, Erica, Coorparoo. Sister Amy King left in 1914 with a nursing unit.  She was stationed in Egypt, and was one of those devoted women who bore the brunt of the arduous work in attending to the first returned wounded from Gallipoli in hospitals equipped for a comparatively small number only.  Subsequently Sister Amy King was engaged in transport duty, and was tnen stationed in different places in France, including the clearing hospital at Aubigny, near Arras, where the work was very arduous and often heartbreaking. Sister Eileen King is the first Queensland nursing sister to bring back the Military Medal—an unusual honour for the nursing service. She left Australia with her unit early in 1916, and was sent on Special duty with the Queen Alexandra Nursing Unit to France, where for a year she was stationed at St. Omer. There were about 19 Australians included in the staff. Sister King was stationed later at Wimmereux, and subsequently at No. 63 clearing station, a post of danger near the firing line at Poperinghe, near Ypres, in Belgium. It was for her bravery there and her great devotion to duty under most trying circumstances that she was awarded the coveted decoration. The hospital in which were a large number of wounded soldiers was bombed, and the heroic women did the most gallant deeds in their work of rescue, continuing to remove their patients under fire to some of the wards which had been untouched.  Sister King - was wounded, and still carries evidence of it in her lameness. "I was only able to save six of my men who had been injured," she said sadly. There were seven wards, and until the hospital was closed the wounded were cared for in the portions least affected by the bombs. Sister King was a patient in hospital for a considerable time, but the cheeriness of the Australian girls is on a plans with that of the Australian boys, who minimise troubles and find a gleam of sunshine somewhere.

Queenslander Saturday 09 August 1919 page 7

Awarded Military Medal
29 November 1917
The hospital in which were a large number of wounded soldiers was bombed, and the heroic women did the most gallant deeds in their work of rescue, continuing to remove their patients under fire to some of the wards which had been untouched.

Sister Eileen King,. MM, who has many friends in Australia, and who was seriously wounded in 1917 at a casualty clearing station, near the lines in France, on February 22, was invested at Buckingham Palace with the Military Medal for bravery on the field.  The King made the investiture, and Nurse King was afterwards entertained at Marlborough House by Queen Alexandira, who personally presented her with a photograph and a book.  She has now been invalided out of the service, she having been one of the first Australian nurses to enlist for active service.

Queensland Times Saturday 17 May 1919 page 8

Bravery on the Field
Sister Eileen King, a trainee of the Homoeopathic Hospital, is the fourth Victorian nurse who has been awarded the Military Medal. Through injuries received during a bombardment at Proven, France, in 1917, she has had to give up all idea, of continuing her nursing career. One thigh has been injured, and part of the other limb blown away by a bomb. Notwithstanding her severe Injuries, Sister King would not desert her patients during the attack, and even when put right out of action the soldiers heard her say, "I have been hit. If you want anything come to me. I cannot reach you." Her condition was so critical that she had to be detained at a casualty clearing station for some time. Later she went to England and volunteered for duty, refusing a discharge and pension offered by the Imperial authorities. Sister King was a member of the Queen Alexandra Imperial Nursing Service. Her physical strength, however, was not equal to spirit and courage and very reluctantly Sister King left the service. She returned a few weeks ago by the Roda and is now in Brisbane gaining strength for another operation to her leg. Sister King is a niece of Mr Stephen King, Carlisle street. East St. Kllda.

SISTER EILEEN KING, Military Medallist of the 1914-18 war, has now been presumed lost with other passengers on the Melbourne Star who were returning to Australia in April, 1943. Of the ship's passengers only two survivors are on record. Sister King was among the first 40 nurses to leave Australia in April, 1915, and was the youngest of these nurses who were on loan to England and enlisted with the Queen Alexandria Imperial Military Service Reserve. She did not return to Australia until 1918.

Army News Thursday 03 May 1945 page 2

Melbourne Star (Captain Hall, previously rescued from the Andalusia Star) left Liverpool on March 22, 1943, on a voyage to Australia, via Panama Canal. During the very early  hours of April 2 she was attacked without warning, and struck simultaneously by two torpedoes. She sunk in less than two minutes.

Heroine of the First World War, Victim of the Second….Sister Eileen King, MM - QAIMNSR

One of only eight Australian nurses to be awarded the Military Medal in the First World War, Sister Eileen King stood alone in the fact that she wasn’t serving with the Australian Army Nursing Service (AANS).  In early 1915, a request had come through from the Imperial Government for nurses to be sent to England to join Queen Alexandra’s Imperial Military Nursing Service Reserve (QAIMNSR).  Eileen was one of those selected by the Australian Department of Defence, and together with 28 other volunteers, she boarded the RMS Orontes at Port Melbourne on the 14th of April 1915.  Travelling with her in this little group were 3 other nurses, who like Eileen, had received their nursing training at the Homoeopathic Hospital in St Kilda Rd, Melbourne: Katie Heriot, Constance O’Shea and Estelle Doyle.

Eileen had followed in the footsteps of her older sister Amy who had also trained at the Homoeopathic Hospital; but Amy was already in Egypt, having sailed with the large contingent of AANS nurses on the Kyarra in November 1914.  The King sisters had been born in Queensland almost 7 years apart; daughters of Thomas Mulhall King, I.S.O., retired Auditor-General, and Commissioner of Railways of Qld, and his first wife, Jane MacDonnell.

The Orontes deposited her contingent of nurses at Tilbury Docks on the 23rd of May and they were taken under the wing of the War Office.  Eileen then embarked for France on the 9th of June, where she served in what she considered “a very pretty little spot” at the 7th General Hospital in St Omer (together with some of her other Orontes mates).  She remained here for almost a year; until following a month of sickness, she was transferred to the 14th General Hospital at Wimereux in the May of 1916.  Her matron at the 14th GH considered Eileen to be an excellent nurse – quiet and good tempered and much liked by her patients.  However, it was toward the end of the following year of 1917, while in Belgium not far from Poperinge, that she showed the greatest ‘bravery and devotion to duty’.

Two months after her posting to No. 63 Casualty Clearing Station (CCS) at Haringhe (named Bandaghem by the troops); Eileen escaped death, but not injury, when the CCS was bombed by enemy planes on the 29th November 1917.  The ‘London Gazette’ noted that “She was severely wounded in both legs and though suffering from shock and loss of blood, continued to give directions etc., as to the care of wounded.  She showed great pluck and presence of mind.”

Sister Mary Loughron, one of Eileen’s Orontes companions, had the following to say about the bombing: “The day sisters had all gone to bed when the warning was received, and the patients were prepared for quick transference.  Sister King was amid the din, but took no notice until she was thrown down, and, being unable to move, it was found that she was struck in the thigh and calf of the leg.”

The tented CCS consisted of seven wards, and while still under fire, the patients were moved to the least damaged areas, where they could be cared for until evacuated.  Eileen sadly noted that she was only able to save six of her men that had been injured.  Her own injuries as Sister Loughron noted, consisted of bomb wounds to the right thigh and the left calf, which resulted in a compound fracture of the left fibula, and destruction of the tendo achillis; as well as burns to her left foot.

When she too was evacuated back to the 14th General Hospital, this time as a patient, Eileen had the good fortune to be re-united with her sister Amy, who had been specifically transferred there to care for her.  The sisters where then transferred to England on the 2nd January 1918, where Amy continued to care for Eileen at Southwell Gardens in London.  This hospital had been opened in July 1917 to cater specifically for ill Australian nurses.  Located in a bright, cheery house with accommodation for 26 patients, and staffed by Australian nurses, it provided not only the necessary medical facilities, but also maximum comfort, for these ladies who were so far away from home and friends.

The Times carried news of Eileen’s award in February 1918: “It was announced on Jan 30th that the King has been pleased to approve of the award of Military Medal to the following lady for bravery and devotion to duty on the occasion of a hostile air raid on a casualty clearing station.  …..”

At the beginning of April Amy returned to duty in France, and after having her sick leave extended, Eileen eventually resumed nursing in the July.  She was posted to the Sister’s Hospital for the QAIMNS at Vincent Square in London for light duties only.  By this time her right thigh had quite healed, but her left leg was still weak, and caused her to limp slightly.  Over the following months she had various periods of sick leave as her left leg tended to break down whenever she worked for any length of time.

In the February of 1919 Eileen was invested with her Military Medal by the King at Buckingham Palace, following which she was entertained at Marlborough House by Queen Alexandra and presented with a photograph and a book.  That same month also saw another appearance before the Medical Board, where the decision was finally reached that she was unfit for work for a prolonged period, and should therefore be repatriated to Australia.  Matron Conyers (AANS) tried to arrange for her sister Amy to return home on the same boat with her, but to no avail; however it was arranged that one of Eileen’s original Orontes companions, Sister Madge Donnellan would travel with her.

Yet, although the King sisters sailed in different ships, they both began their journeys home only days apart: Eileen on the Roda, sailing on the 8th May 1919 and Amy on the Wahehe sailing on the 10th.  Arriving back in Brisbane in July, they spent some time with their family before returning to Melbourne, where Eileen received further treatment for her injuries at the 11th General Hospital in Caulfield.  Following an operation by Dr Syme, she underwent a period of massage and electricity therapy, but in March 1920 she was still experiencing problems when she wrote a letter to the Matron-in-Chief of the QAIMNS, Miss Beadsmore Smith:

“My old leg gives me quite a lot of trouble & the one that was not so badly wounded is not behaving at all well.  I suppose it’s because it has most of the work to do.  Col Syme operated soon after I got home & broke down adhesions.  I was in hospital for over three months with that & when I left was practically as bad as before he started.  About a fortnight ago I started to take millinery lessons, but don’t know if I will be able to go on with these as I find it very tiring.  I only hope I will as I have to do something & I will never be able to nurse again.”

Aware that Eileen was struggling financially, Miss Beadsmore Smith organized to have a draft of £25 sent to her from the QAIMNS Benevolent Fund in the hope that she would put it towards the cost of her millinery lessons.

Amy continued nursing in Melbourne; sharing a house with Eileen in South Yarra, and although Eileen said she would never nurse again, she eventually took on the position of assistant matron at Melbourne Grammar School, where she was considered as very efficient and well-liked by the boarders.  It was however noted in November 1926 that her health had broken down again, and she was once more spending time in the Caulfield Military Hospital.  In 1936, still in South Yarra, the sisters were living with their stepmother Aniella, with Eileen’s occupation by this time listed as ‘home duties’.

The following year at the end of January 1937, Eileen boarded the Mongolia for England, where she was intending to stay for some considerable time.   Her brother Reginald, a former Deputy Premier of Qld, travelled down to Melbourne to see her off, before following up with a trip to England himself some months later.

In April 1939 Eileen was honoured with an invitation to propose the toast of “Fallen Comrades” at the Diggers Abroad reunion dinner in London, which was also attended by the Duke of Kent and Field-Marshal Lord Birdwood.  During this time her sister Amy was also in England, and they took the opportunity of visiting Paris together.

Having already survived the blitz, Eileen made out her Will in the December of 1942, perhaps with some premonition, because just over three months later she was lost at sea.  Embarking on the merchant vessel, Melbourne Star on the 22nd March 1943, she was returning home via the Panama Canal.  Carrying a cargo of munitions and 31 passengers, the ship was crossing the Atlantic Ocean about 480 miles south-east of Bermuda, when she was torpedoed and sunk by the German submarine U-129 on the 2nd of April.  Of the handful of survivors that managed to scramble from the water onto intact life-rafts, only four crew members were eventually rescued.

Eileen is commemorated on the Commonwealth War Graves Commission website along with other Civilian War Dead.

Heather ‘Frev’ Ford, 2014 (update of article published in ‘Digger’ 2011)

Endnotes:

*Eileen was born on the 8/11/1888 in Qld – the daughter of Thomas Mulhall KING, I.S.O. (1842-1921) and Jane Maria MacDONNELL (1848-1905), who married in Vic in 1866.

*Her sister Amy Evelyn was also born in Qld, on the 11/1/1882 – WW1 Service: Sister (ARRC, MID), AANS – Enl 21/11/1914, disch 17/4/1921 – she died of pneumonia 14/12/1961 in Melbourne.