OBITUARY MISS E. J. WATT

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31627, 13 March 1968, Page 2

OBITUARY MISS E. J. WATT

Miss Eliza Jane Watt, who was matron of the Ashburton Hospital from 1924 to 1940, the founder and first president of the Ashburton branch of the New Zealand Registered Nurses’ Association, and a founder of the Ashburton Country Women’s Institute, has died in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. She was aged 82. Advice of Miss Watts’ death was received by the Ashburton Hospital Board at its monthly meeting on Monday. Members stood in silence as a mark of respect, and spoke in tribute to her services to Ashburton and to the nursing profession. They said Miss Watts’s name had been a household word in the Ashburton district, and she had a high reputation for training nurses at the hospital Miss Watts was last in Ashburton in 1959 when nurses subscribed to a fund to pay her return air fare from Aberdeenshire to attend a nurses’ reunion held in conjunction with the eightieth anniversary of the hospital The twenty-first anniversary of the Registered Nurses’ branch was held in conjunction with the hospital celebrations, and she attended these, too. Miss Watt had a distinguished nursing career both in Scotland and New Zealand and was awarded the Royal Red Cross Medal for bravery in the first gas attack by Germans in France during the First World War, and the Mons Star for service at the Battle of Mons. Later in the war she was awarded a Bar to the Royal Red Cross Medal. Miss Watt was born in Aberdeenshire in 1885. She did her nursing training at the Royal Infirmary, Aberdeen, and at Rotunda Hospital, Dublin. She then served for four years in the Queen Alexandra Imperial Military Nursing Service in the first World War and was made an Associate, Royal Red Cross. In 1922 she came to New Zealand to take charge of the McHardy Maternity Home, Napier, and was appointed matron of Ashburton Hospital in 1924. During her 16 years as matron she taught hundreds of nurses. Miss Watt was a member of the Ashburton and Tinwald Presbyterian Churches

After her retirement as matron Miss Watt volunteered for service with the Royal New Zealand Air Force and, with the rank of Squadron Leader, she assisted in organising the nursing service, hav-

ing headquarters at Ohakea and Levin. When the Second World War ended Miss Watt returned to Aberdeenshire in 1945 to live in retirement On her visit to Ashburton in 1959 Miss Watt brought her medals and awards with her, and presented them to Miss Helen Crooks, whose mother, Mrs T. L. Crooks, was a nurse at the hospital during Miss Watt's term as matron.