THE Rotunda Hospital is paying tribute this month to the role its staff and prominent medical women played during the Easter Rising with an exhibition that opens next Monday (March 7).
‘Birth of a Nation’ will showcase the lives of five extraordinary medical women for the first time through a series of previously unseen mages, diaries and specially commissioned video footage.
The women – Bridget Lyons Thornton, Kathleen Lynn, Dorothy Stopford Price, Mary O’Shea and The Hon Albinia Brodrick – all went on to become important figures in Ireland’s medical history.
Dr Kathleen Lynn was a member of the Irish Citizen Army who described herself to an arresting officer as ‘a red cross doctor and a belligerent’ while Midwife Mary O’Shea, witnessed the surrender of the leaders of the Rising as they were held on the grounds of the Rotunda.
The exhibition has been carefully collated by a multi-disciplinary group of doctors, departmental staff and Head Librarian of the Rotunda, Anne O’Byrne, along with Curatorial Advisor, Sinead McCoole.
A series of lunchtime talks will take place, from 1.15pm-1.45pm in The Pillar Room of the Rotunda throughout March with special guest lecturers providing insight into life at the Rotunda and its medical practice throughout 1916.
The first of these takes place on Friday, March 11, when Joe Duignan will discuss ‘Medicine in 1916’.
The exhibition runs until March 31, Monday to Friday, 10am to 4pm and Saturday to Sunday, 10am-5pm. Admission is free.