Ramsay, Dr Mabel Lida, 4 Wentworth Villas, Plymouth
Mabel Lida Ramsay (1878 – 1954) was born in Wandsworth, London, on 14th November 1878, the daughter of Andrew John Ramsay, a naval officer, and his wife Annie Catherine (née Thiele). She was the middle of three children (Palmer Devoy b.1877 in Bermuda, Mabel, and Hilda Katherine b. 1881 in Greenock, Scotland). Her early childhood was spent in a variety of locations as her father was posted to naval establishments including Bermuda and Malta as well as Plymouth, Portsmouth and Scotland.[1]
She studied at the Medical College for Women. Edinburgh, and at Owens College, Manchester but before enrolling as a medical student she trained for two years as a gymnast as she believed that would help with the orthopaedic work in which she initially intended to specialise. She graduated M.B., Ch.B at Edinburgh in 1906, took the Cambridge D.P.H. in 1908 and two years later proceeded to M.D. In 1921 she was elected F.R.C.S. (Ed.) and in 1929 was admitted as a foundation Member of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.[2]
After graduation from Edinburgh University and qualification as a doctor, Ramsay held appointments as house surgeon at the Glasgow Maternity Hospital, as assistant medical officer of health at Huddersfield, and then as senior house surgeon at the Women and Children’s Hospital, Leeds.[3] She returned to Plymouth in 1908 where her by then widowed mother, Mrs Annie Ramsay (q.v.), was living. It was here that she set up her medical practice and was to spend the rest of her life.
Shortly after establishing her medical practice, Ramsay was approached by Miss Margaret Robinson, national organiser for the NUWSS, to help set up a Three Towns branch of the organisation, which she did, becoming its Secretary. The branch office was established at 4 Wentworth Villas, Plymouth, the address of her home and surgery. Both Ramsay and her mother became active in the suffrage campaign. As branch secretary, Dr Ramsay tirelessly organised meetings, wrote letters to the press advocating the cause of female suffrage, and quizzed prospective parliamentary candidates on their attitude to female suffrage. She was much in demand as a speaker at suffrage meetings and rallies throughout the region, speaking at meetings across Devon, Cornwall, and Somerset as well as at the meetings organised in Plymouth itself.[4] She also attended the national conferences and annual meetings of the NUWSS in London where she processed wearing her cap and gown.[5] During the 1911 census boycott Dr and Mrs Ramsay hosted a ‘census resistance party’ at their home at Wentworth Villas, where around twenty women joined them to evade the census enumerator.
Dr Ramsay also took part in the Women’s Land’s End to Hyde Park Suffrage Pilgrimage during the summer of 1913. She joined the pilgrimage when it reached Plymouth, taking part in the rally held at the Corn Exchange. She then marched to Plympton before returning to her medical duties in Plymouth, but each evening until the pilgrims reached Taunton, she took a train to the march’s overnight stop to join in the meetings before returning to her practice by train each morning.
In September 1914, Ramsay served under the Women’s National Service Unit at Antwerp with the Belgian Red Cross and was in Antwerp during the bombardment and the retreat to Ostend. She then worked with the French Red Cross at Cherbourg before returning to Plymouth in May 1915. Later service as a civilian medical practitioner with the Southern General Territorial Hospital followed.[6]
After the franchise was gained in 1918, the Plymouth branch of the NUWSS was reconstituted as the Plymouth Citizens’ Association, of which Ramsay was elected Hon. Secretary under the chairmanship of Mrs Clara Daymond (q.v.)[7] The Citizens’ Association was non-party political, its aims being to foster an impartial study of the wider social and political questions, and to stimulate interest and participation in municipal affairs. Whilst continuing to campaign for women’s enfranchisement to be on equal terms with that of men, it also helped to promote the candidature of women for the town council. When Viscountess Astor stood in the Sutton Constituency parliamentary by-election in 1919 the Citizens’ Association promoted her candidature also, Ramsay speaking for her at many meetings. Ramsay’s own political affiliations are unclear. She supported women candidates regardless of the political party they represented or whether they were standing as independent candidates.
In March 1923 whilst visiting Bermuda at the invitation of Gladys Misick Morrell, Ramsay addressed a public meeting at the Mechanics Hall in Hamilton about how best to achieve women’s suffrage there. Ramsay urged the Bermudan women to start a properly organised suffrage society. As a result the meeting concluded with a resolution to establish the Bermuda Woman Suffrage Society, of which Morrell became secretary. The campaign by the women of Bermuda was not ultimately successful until 1944.[8]
Through the Citizens’ Association, Ramsay espoused a wide range of social causes, especially those of concern to women and children, including the appointment of women police officers and women magistrates, the control of alcohol, adult education, the abolition of private slaughter houses, and the setting up of a Women’s Hospital Fund which ensured that women patients could be treated by women doctors should they so choose.
The Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act was passed in 1919 enabling Ramsay to sit for the examination of the Royal College of Surgeons, Edinburgh, where she became one of the first four women to gain admission in January 1921 specialising in Obstetrics and Gynaecology. In due course she became consulting gynaecologist to the City Hospital and to the Infirmary; consulting obstetrician to the Three Towns Maternity Home, to the Salvation Army Maternity Home and to the counties of Devon and Cornwall: and consulting surgeon to the Plymouth Public Dispensary. She also lectured to midwives in the district and examined for the Royal College of Nursing.[9]
In her professional role as a doctor, Ramsay was actively involved in medico-political work. In 1916 she was appointed to the Plymouth Panel Committee as their representative to attend the yearly National Health Insurance Act Conference and thereafter was invited by the B.M.A. to become a member of the National Health Insurance Act’s Committee. She served on the Plymouth Panel Committee as Hon. Treasurer and was Chairman for two years. She later held the post of Hon. Secretary to the Local Medical Committee until 1948.[10]
In 1917 the Medical Women’s Federation was formed with the object of looking after the particular interests of medical women, especially of securing equal pay and opportunities for work. Soon afterwards a South Western Association was formed and Ramsay was appointed a representative to the Council. She subsequently became Vice President, Hon. Secretary, and, in 1933, President of the Medical Women’s Federation. She was also involved with the Medical Women’s International Federation, attending international conferences.[11]
Ramsay became the first woman president of the Plymouth Medical Society in 1930. She was a member of the Local Executive Committee set up under the National Health Service Act and was later elected Chairman.[12]
In 1930 Ramsay became the first President of the Plymouth Venture Club run on the same lines as the Rotarians, which subsequently became merged with the Soroptimist Clubs.[13] She championed the cause of women all her life, supporting and encouraging the next generations or women doctors as well as women in other professions. Although she retired from medical practice in 1945, Ramsay continued with her social and medico-political work. She died on 9 May 1954 at Sheffield, whilst attending a council meeting of the Medical Women’s Federation.[14]
Entry created by Ann Bond, January 2019
[1] Dr Ramsay wrote a memoir entitled A Doctor’s Zig-Zag Road which is unpublished. A copy is held by the Royal College of Physicians Archive referenced MS-RAMSM. It is dated c1952 with handwritten updates to 1954.
[2] British Medical Journal (BMJ) 22 May 1954 p1212
[3] BMJ, 22 May 1954 p1212
[4] For example Exeter and Plymouth Gazette 14 October 1909; West Briton and Cornish Advertiser 21 November 191; Western Times 8 February 1913
[5] Ramsay M.L. A Doctor’s Zig-Zag Road
[6] Plymouth and West Devon Record Office (PWDRO) 1670/20 Plymouth Medical Society papers
[7] Ramsay M.L. A Doctor’s Zig-Zag Road
[8] http://www.bermudabiographies.bm/Biographies/Biography-Gladys%20Morrell.html [Accessed 16 March 2017]
[9] Ramsay M.L. A Doctor’s Zig-Zag Road
[10] Ramsay M.L. A Doctor’s Zig-Zag Road
[11] Ramsay M.L. A Doctor’s Zig-Zag Road
[12] Ramsay M.L. A Doctor’s Zig-Zag Road
[13] Ramsay M.L. A Doctor’s Zig-Zag Road
[14] BMJ 22 May 1954 p1212