Housewife : Sister L A Hooke, Queen Alexandra's Imperial Military Nursing Service Reserve Accession Number: REL/15724

Description

Coarse weave, thick brown linen housewife with edges bound in light brown cotton twill tape. One end is rounded and forms the upper flap when the housewife is folded in three and secure with the same cotton tape. The rounded end is lined with grey wool flannel, intended to hold pins and needles. Two lengths of wider light brown cotton twill tape, divided into sections, are sewn down the centre of the inside and across the square end of the housewife. They hold in place a folded length of 188mm wide glazed white linen tape, a paper of steel pins, a large skein of white linen thread and a flat brown silk covered pin cushion.

Contextual Description

Louisa Augusta Hooke was born in 1873 near Patrick's Plains, in the Hunter Valley of New South Wales (now Singleton) and later trained as a nurse. She had retired from nursing and was holidaying in England with her mother when the First World War broke out. She escorted her mother back to Australia as far as Colombo in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), and then returned to England to enlisted with Queen Alexandra's Imperial Military Nursing Service (Reserve). She served in Malta in 1915, nursing wounded and sick soldiers from the Gallipoli campaign. She in nursed in England and Egypt before returning to Australia in 1921. Hooke did not nurse again. She died in 1938.