Chapter 3: Creating Community
Living and Working in the BMH
Part Two
Colleagues of then-Private Elisabeth Saint Quentin, gathered along the road outside of Margaret House.
Ralph ‘Dodger’ Green at a corner of the NAAFI Canteen, manning the record player.
For most of the hospital staff who were part of the Army Medical Services, room and board were provided onsite. There were married quarters onsite but space was not always enough for everyone. Staff members like Corporal Trevor Mansell, a pharmacy technician who arrived with his wife and newborn son in 1969, had to live offsite at Pasir Panjang Garden Estate.
Other billets for the QAs included the Elizabeth and Alexandra houses. Corporal Edward Kelly from dietetics found himself billeted in the NCO bunks at the barracks block, a building to the right of the main hospital entrance now known as Block 29.
As an acting duty sergeant, Corporal Kelly got his own room, but many of the male servicemen billeted at the barracks block were not so lucky. “The main floors were divided and subdivided. Each floor accommodated 32, so you had 64 people in that building. When guys wanted to play their music, you had to hear their music even if you’re having a rest,” he related.
Then-Corporal Trevor Mansell at Pasir Panjang Garden Estate along Tamas Mas Merah. Trevor’s experiences at this place of abode later became the subject of his memoir ‘21 Houses’.
Then-Seargeant Mike Essam worked at the Pathology Lab, which was later known as Block 21. He is seen pictured (on the left) outside of the Married Quarters. The photo in the centre depicts his son Phil on a rocking horse outside of the main quartermaster’s stores, and the photo on the right shows Phil posing with his mother and a couple of local friends from the nearby orphanage, outside of the Married Quarters.
With regional conflicts and the start of the Cold War, demand for British military forces increased worldwide and National Service was put in place from 1948 to 1962. Following army protocol, British personnel dispatched overseas had no say in where they were to be posted.
However, the prospect of working in tropical Singapore instead of the familiar, temperate surroundings of the British hospitals was exciting for some. “It was very different and I wanted to try it all,” recounted Private Elisabeth Saint Quentin (later known as Elisabeth Gadsby) on learning of her posting to Singapore.
Like many of the other staff members posted there during the 1960s, she travelled via military plane, stopping midway at regional airports like Beirut in Lebanon and Gan in the Maldives. She arrived late at night.
“My first impression was of walking off the plane into a greenhouse. It was so hot and humid. And then, the night noise. Bullfrogs, crickets, and the noises of the night. They were fantastic.”
Upon arrival, Private Saint Quentin was billeted in the Margaret House, a site now known as Block 20 after the demolition of its original building in the 1990s. QARANC nurses and their male counterparts of the RAMC were billeted separately.
Servicemen celebrating Christmas in 1957 at the NAAFI Canteen, in this photo provided by Sammy Coleiro.
Foreign staff members who were not part of the enlisted Corps also had to live offsite. Civilian nurse Patricia Fell-Smith (later known as Patricia Leon) arrived in 1964 from Melbourne, Australia, to work at the BMH in the officers’ and families wards.
For 18 months, she stayed in the Young Women’s Christian Association (YWCA) women’s hostel at Fort Canning Road and was the only Caucasian living there permanently. “I was the only Australian at the time in the civilian system. I think there might have been a couple of Australian QAs. But I never met them,” recounted nurse Fell-Smith. As a civilian nurse, her duties were the same as those of any other enlisted nurse in the hospital, and she was even occasionally put in charge of her own wards during night shifts.
Unlike enlisted QARANC nurses like Private Saint Quentin, who was posted here by the British army, nurse Fell-Smith decided to come to Singapore on her own accord. At the age of 24, she was already a registered nurse in Australia.
However, some struggles in her personal life pushed her to desire a change of place. “My friend, her name was Penny. She was working at [the] BMH. We had worked together at a hospital in Melbourne and we became very good friends. She encouraged me to come.“
“My father had had a stroke and I was having a very difficult time in Melbourne. And my doctor said you know, really, you should go away for a while. Well, I think I’ll go to Singapore. I didn’t really plan to stay as long as I did. And I had heard there was Gleneagles and several other hospitals in Singapore, and then Penny had said she was helping at [the] BMH,” Fell-Smith recounted. “It was quite difficult. I had to get a working permit and all that.”
It was a 37- to 40-hour work week for the staff. Shifts began from 8a.m. till lunchtime, before resuming till 8 p.m. The night staff then took over until the next morning. It was compulsory for the staff to complete a week of night duty after six weeks of working the day shift.
Corporal Kelly reminisced about working nights in the kitchen, catering for the patients and the nurses: “It was great because everybody got out of the kitchen, you squirt everything on, flush the whole kitchen out and that was your job done. Then, the night shift came on and that was very difficult because all the nurses were senior nurses; they had their own rations. You had to cook what they wanted individually. I like to think that every night was perfect because I still had a job at the end of it.”
Children and QARANC nurses at the paediatric ward on the eastern end of the hospital, now known as Block 7.
Other than dealing with the military casualties in the tumultuous region, the BMH was also an important centre for paediatric care in the Far East. Almost 20 percent of medical admissions and 25 percent of outpatient care were for children.
The pathology department provided day-to-day pathology for the hospital, as well as pathology services for the unit medical centres around the island. There was a ward for inpatients where the department looked after patients from the Royal Navy, Royal Army, Gurkha, and Malay regiments.
There was even an officers’ ward with an empty room in case a VIP patient, or even Prince Philip, arrived for a stay in Singapore.
A families ward catered to families of servicemen with medical and surgical problems. It was a long, old-fashioned ward with beds on either side, and included an air-conditioned ward for cases who required it and two others on the verandah for Gurkha and Malay ladies, respectively. The last two wards had about eight beds each.
The longer, main ward was usually filled with British, Australian, or New Zealander female patients. There was no segregation via rank in that ward. No one could be in a private room even if they wanted it, as even the air-conditioned units served two per room. According to nurse Fell-Smith, this was quite an interesting occurrence: “Some of the ladies whose husbands were [of] high rank were very upset if they were put next to a corporal’s wife.”
Patricia Fell-Smith tending to a patient at the Families’ Ward, which was also at Block 7.
The Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC) consisted of regular officers, short-term regulars, and national servicemen. They were trained in various specialisations like psychiatry or pathology and could pursue higher training depending on their preference.
There were also nursing orderlies (NOs) under the RAMC, but they were trained by the QARANC nurses. These nurses were state-registered and commissioned army officers who, on a rotational basis, served different departments every few months.
Higher-ranking QARANC nurses were also in charge of training new and incoming nursing orderlies. “There was myself and the lady in charge of the Sister Tutor Department who was a major,” described Nurse Joan Southwell, who served in 1966. “She and I taught the RAMC other ranks who enlisted. We taught them everything, preparing them for their final exams, which they took three years after enlisting in the army. If they passed those exams, they became nurses in the army.”
Leisure and Recreation
Not only did the staff at the BMH work hard to provide support for its patients around the region, they also had multiple avenues of recreation to relieve their stress. “I think it was because of the war, the Vietnam war,” recounted QARANC nurse Pat Wetherell, who had been deployed to Singapore in 1959. “The army looked after us very well. They treated us well when we were off-duty.”
With all the pressure they dealt with while on duty, it was only fair that they had the rest and recuperation they deserved. The hospital staff would often host parades, Christmas celebrations, and even New Year’s parties.
The badminton court behind Elizabeth House was a popular location for sunbathing. The football field at the back of the hospital continued to be a recreational mainstay for the hospital staff. To avoid the gruelling heat, they played for about 40 minutes each week, and only in the evenings. Christmas and New Year parties were also held there.
Corporal Edward Kelly recalled how a prank almost convinced him they were playing football over something terrifying: “I was gullible to anything that was said to me. I was told it was a mass grave. So I was very wary and very scared of it, until I found out after a couple of years what a wind-up that was.”
The Small Bar at the NAAFI Canteen was helmed by Mr. Boon, known affectionately to servicemen as ‘Boonie’.
“The Shacks”, operated by a gentlemen known to customers as Mr. Merican, where patronage of this joint was discouraged by the superiors of staff at the hospital, who cited issues with hygiene. Nevertheless, its popularity endured through the years, as staff would sneak out for egg banjos there.
Nurses sunbathing behind Elizabeth House (now Block 19).
Another centre for recreational activity at the hospital was the barracks block. Other than billets for junior non-commissioned officers like Corporal Kelly, there was a social club where the staff were served light snacks in the evenings, and even beers if they had the right vouchers.
“The military in Singapore were allowed a duty-free ration of beer. This amounted to 30 cans of beer each month. We were issued with a ration card which was initialled by the Navy, Army, and Air Force Institutes (NAAFI) manager every time we bought all or part of our duty- free beer,” recounted Corporal Trevor Mansell.
One of the medical storemen found a way around this restriction. It turned out that their NAAFI manager’s signature upon their ration cards could be erased with a careful application of bleach.
As Christmas approached, the staff could draw up to three months’ worth of rations between November to January, amounting to a total of 90 cans. By bleaching out the signature several times—ultimately putting a hole through his ration card— he got an extra 90 cans, enough to last him the remainder of his time in Singapore.
The island of Singapore beyond the hospital held an adventurous allure for the staff. Directly opposite the hospital was the Highland Bar and a place affectionately known as “The Shacks.”
The Highland Bar held an Indian and Chinese restaurant with seating out on the pavement. The Shacks had a tin roof attached to the railway cutting fence. The only air conditioning within it was supplied by the draught from passing trains. This did not stop the latter from becoming a favourite haunt of the staff, who loved dropping by for curry, chapatis, and late-night egg banjos.
A popular shopping location just outside the hospital was the Dip, where the staff could obtain anything from camp food, leather goods, and souvenirs to tailored clothes and furniture.
The Dip was part of what used to be called Gillman Close, which has now become a portion of the AYE. The sloping dip into the shopping area inspired its name.
“For entertainment, we’d go down to Bugis Street. Every time somebody new came to our department, that was the first place you’d take him,” related Corporal Gerry Stanley, a psychiatric nurse who arrived in Singapore in 1966. The staff would go swimming at the pool in Gillman Barracks or at nearby hotels, join the Royal Singapore Yacht club for some sailing, or drive up to Malaysia for their leaves.
While most of the QARANC and RAMC staff had their own enclaves and events within the hospital due to their onsite presence, nurse Fell-Smith’s social life was lived largely outside of the hospital due to her rank as a civilian nurse: “I had wonderful friends, Chinese, Malay, Indian. I socialised with them, I went out with them, I went to funerals, I went to weddings. … One of my amazing, happy memories was my first Chinese New Year in Singapore. I was standing on the verandah of the officers’ ward and I had never seen anything like the fireworks [and firecrackers]. It was just amazing, all the fireworks. When I was going home in the morning, the ground was just covered in red from the fireworks.”
Life outside of BMH Singapore’s campus for Patricia Fell-Smith involved venturing out to various sights in the city, spending time with local acquaintances, and trying out local fare from roadside hawkers, a typical sight in the 1960s.
Community Building
The hospital staff were a diverse mix of British military personnel, British and Australian civilian staff, and even local personnel. As they lived, worked, and relaxed with each other, they also built close, lasting relationships. Some even met their future partners while working at the hospital.
Father John Harvey, who worked as a pathology lab technician in 1968 but took up the cassock after his military career, recounted a memory of his friend’s marriage in Singapore: “Colonel Mike Thomas, then Captain Thomas—still a great friend of mine now—his wife was then Lieutenant Sheila Thorpe, a QARANC nursing officer. They were married in the hospital chapel. I went to their reception for their wedding, and the reception was held up at the officers’ mess, up on the ridge. Happy days, happy days.”
Patricia Fell-Smith with a Gurkha patient at the families’ wards.
Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Edward Heath (far left), meeting then-Sergeant John Harvey at the Sergeants’ Mess.
Corporal Gerry Stanley got married in Singapore after his wife was sent out from the UK in 1966. Two years later, they had a daughter, Caroline. He served in the psychiatric ward, two floors below the maternity ward.
The maternity ward served a larger majority of Malay and Gurkha wives of the other ranks compared to that of British wives. He remembered how excitedly they responded to Caroline, particularly to her blonde hair, which they believed signified good luck: “They used to be amazed and go on to rub it and go ‘Ooh!’”
For the female officers within the QARANC, military protocol did not accord them the same privilege. Marriage meant an early end to their service in the army but it did not end their career in nursing. QARANC Nurse Joan Southwell was discharged at the end of her tour after marrying a man from the American military. However, she continued her nursing career for almost 50 years. She made several fond memories with her colleagues from her time at the BMH. Sadly, even though remembering them was easy, attempts to find and reconnect with them was a challenge.
“It is very difficult to find people, especially with women, because they usually get married and their name changes. So you think you’re doing a search but you’re searching for the wrong person, the wrong name. But you became very close with all of the people that you worked with because that’s what was there. You were thrown together into these situations, and you just worked and helped each other where you could.”
Civilian nurse Patricia Fell-Smith recalled the wonderful timeworking in the families ward: “I really loved it. I was so happy there; it was one of the nicest places. When you entered the entrance to the right, there was a large sort-of office where we used to have handovers. … We used to have morning and afternoon tea, and all the doctors sat smoking away. It was really lovely. They had tea, coffee, and orange juice.”
While she was good friends with the military personnel in her ward, as a civilian nurse, she hardly interacted with those beyond her ward.
She bonded instead with many local Chinese and Gurkha civilian nurses whom she worked with. Some other local BMH staff members whom nurse Fell-Smith bonded with were the amahs who cleaned the wards and served patients their food. Amahs were Chinese women who worked as domestic helpers in Singapore from the 1930s to the 1970s. These women sported buns or distinctive plaited hair down their backs and donned “uniforms” of black-and-white samfu.
These were two-piece, everyday garments popular with working Chinese women up until the mid-20th century, as they protected their modesty while allowing ease of movement.
These women swore themselves to celibacy, vowing never to marry.
As a civilian nurse, nurse Fell-Smith did not have the privilege that the QARANC nurses had of being ferried back to their quarters for lunch. Instead, she bought food from the road across the hospital. The amahs who worked in her ward would always save something special for her too.
“I liked the Gurkha and Malay food, and they used to save a spare meal for me. … The amahs knew I loved the food, and they saved me little bits and pieces,” recalled nurse Fell-Smith fondly. “I got to know them by name, and I was put in charge of doing their rosters. When I left, they gave me a jewellery box.”
Hospital personnel began to trickle back home as Singapore gradually transitioned from being under British control to self-governance. It was also increasingly expensive for the British to maintain troops overseas. This pushed them to pull out from their colonies.
“I could see the writing on the wall with the withdrawal coming and they were employing more local people. And I thought, I really should go back and see my mother anyway. That was when I made my decision to leave,” related nurse Fell-Smith.
Many of the military personnel posted to the BMH continued their medical career even after they were discharged. Just like nurse Southwell, Corporal Gerry Stanley continued nursing for forty years.
Corporal Edward Kelly was resettled by the army into a general hospital in London. He continued working in the dietetics department where he catered to nearly 1,800 patients.
Father John Harvey continued to work with the British Army even after being ordained and now serves as a chaplain to a field hospital in Aldershot, England.
The BMH grew quiet after the British Military finally pulled out of Singapore in 1971. The hospital would soon see a brand-new evolution under the incoming Singaporean Administration.
The year that the fight for reunification began in Vietnam, the State of Singapore Act was passed. The Act vested Queen Elizabeth with the power to convert Singapore from a colony into a self-governing state in 1959. After this attainment of self- governance, medical and health services in Singapore were unified under the Ministry of Health (MOH) by 1961.
In 1965, Singapore achieved full independence by withdrawing from the Federation of Malaysia. During the early years of Singapore’s independence, British troops were still stationed in Singapore and Malaysia as a means of maintaining security. However, the number of active servicemen dropped from 90,000 at the height of the Konfrontasi to only 43,500 in 1970.