Louisa McLaughlin

Louisa Elisabeth McLaughlin (1836–1921) was one of the first British women to serve as a nurse for the Red Cross. Louisa, who often spelled her name MacLaughlin and was familiarly called Louise, is pictured wearing medals awarded by both the French and Germans for running ambulances (as field hospitals were then called) during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870. She also wears the Gold Cross of the Order of the Takova marking her work in the Serbo-Turkish war, the prelude to the Russo-Turkish War (1877–78). Her partner Emma Maria Pearson (1828–93) was awarded the same medals. Background and training Louisa was daughter of Rev. Hubert McLaughlin (1805–1882), and the Frederica Crofton (1816–1881). Hubert McLaughlin was Rector of Burford, Shropshire, a Rural Dean, and a Prebendary in Hereford Cathedral. He began his clerical career as domestic chaplain to Edward Crofton, 2nd Baron Crofton (1806–89), Representative Peer for Ireland and Lord-in-Waiting to Queen Victoria. In 1835, Hubert married Frederica, who was Lord Crofton's youngest sister. Louisa, their first child, was born in Nice, where her father had become the minister of the Church of England chapel. At that time Nice was a part of the Italian Kingdom of Sardinia. Louisa was the eldest of three sisters, one of whom, Sophia, served as a nurse with the Universities' Mission to Central Africa for five years, until she took charge of wards at the Civil Hospital in Kandy, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) in 1893.