(1795-1865)
An inspector general in the British Army Medical Corps. James Miranda Barry, a woman who posed as a man, was born in London around 1795. She earned a doctorate in medicine from the University of Edinburgh in 1812. Although disguised as a man, she was the first woman to graduate from a medical school in the United Kingdom. Barry passed the Army Medical Board examination and became a hospital assistant with the British army. She was posted to the Cape of Good Hope as assistant surgeon in 1816, to Mauritius in 1828, and to Jamaica in 1831.
In 1835, Barry was assigned to St. Helena as principal medical officer. There she became involved in dispute with the island’s administrators and was arrested and sent back to England. After being demoted to staff surgeon, she was sent back to the West Indies. There she successfully devoted herself to the improvement of the conditions of the soldiers and was promoted to principal medical officer. In 1845, she returned to England after a bout with yellow fever. During that illness, a colleague discovered her true sex, but he was sworn to secrecy and maintained his silence. In 1846, Barry was sent to Malta as the principal medical officer. She served there and at Corfu until 1857.
Barry was a contentious character confident in her own expertise gained through long experience. Although personally generous with her time and resources, she was intolerant of colleagues whose expertise and diagnoses fell short of her standards. At Malta as elsewhere, she demanded better sanitary conditions and food for the men in the ranks, whose health was her concern. As a result of her efforts during a cholera epidemic in 1850, she was promoted to deputy inspector general of hospitals and posted to Corfu. There she supervised the care of sick and wounded soldiers from the Crimean campaign. In 1857, she was promoted to inspector general of hospitals and posted to Canada. On December 7, 1858, she was promoted to inspector general, a rank equivalent to that of major general. In 1859, after a bout of influenza, she was declared unfit for service and returned to England. She died in London on July 26, 1865. She had ordered that she be buried without an autopsy, but during the preparation of her body for burial, her sex was finally discovered.
