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The University of Southampton
Health Sciences

Special exhibition to celebrate nursing across the region

Published: 1 August 2013

The University of Southampton is calling on nurses across the south to loan their nursing badges to an exhibition commemorating the 30th anniversary since the Bachelor of Nursing undergraduate degree was first offered.

To mark the historical occasion the University will hold a unique display that will include nursing badges, memorabilia and photographs celebrating military and civilian nursing in the area.

The collection will be put on display in the Health Sciences building on the Highfield Campus in Southampton.

Small pin badges were given to nurses to mark their official qualification from nursing school. Many nursing training colleges were attached to hospitals in the area, with each school represented by a different badge.

Badges are already being donated and in particular organisers are looking to trace owners of badges from the Southampton Children's Hospital which closed in 1974, the Winchester Royal Hampshire County Hospital and the Lord Mayor Treloar Hospital in Alton.

The exhibition will also showcase nursing uniform over the decades and include a WWI uniform from the Netley Royal Victoria Military Hospital, a 1960s Great Ormond Street uniform, the only remaining original 1888 uniform from St Mary's Hospital in London and a replica uniform that Florence Nightingale wore at the Scutari base in Turkey in 1853.

The University of Southampton has been training nurses for over 30 years this September. Starting from a small school, it has now become one of the largest Health Sciences faculties in the UK and one of the top three providers in the UK.

Professor Alan Glasper, who was the first professor of nursing at the University, and the first practising children's nurse to be awarded a professorial position, comments: "This is a remarkable celebration of nursing which captures the legacy of nurses at work in the region. Many of the smaller hospitals across Hampshire and the Isle of Wight have now closed but they would have trained hundreds of nurses when they were open. These badges will be at the backs of draws and probably been forgotten about, so we are asking all nurses to root them out and loan them to us for this unique exhibition."

With help from Southampton City Council archives and The Daily Echo archives, the photographic display will showcase all the hospitals in Hampshire and

the Isle of Wight, even those which no longer exist, such as the Western Hospital - a fever hospital, the Free Eye Hospital of Southampton founded in 1889 and White Croft Hospital on the Isle of Wight which is now a luxury development.

The launch of the exhibition will take place on Wednesday, 25th September.

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