Virtual
War Memorial
Australia

Daughter of Elijah IMISON and Elizabeth Jane nee MEDDLETON
Of Hall Street, Mount Morgan, Qld.

Married Captain Charles Horace WOOLSEY of Shepherd's Bush, London 03 July 1920 at St. Thomas' Church, Shepherds Bush, London by Vicar Rev. R E Young
Resided 45 Outram Road, Alexandra Park, London, England

In September 1933 the General Nursing Council of England and Wales admitted Alice Ethel Woolsey as a Registered Nurse. This allowed her to enlist in World War Two in 1940 and serve with Queen Alexandra’s Imperial Nursing Service where she was posted to France. Following the fall of France in 1940 she was evacuated from Dunkirk earning her a Royal Red Cross Medal. From 1940-1945 she served in Egypt, Lebanon, Italy and Belgium and was released from Service in August 1948 being granted honorary rank of Sister by the War Office.
Alice returned to Australia in 1972 and died ten years later at age 88 years on 08 April 1982. Her ashes were interred in the War Service Memorial at the Albany Creek Crematorium, Brisbane Queensland.

Born in Laidley, Queensland in 1893 Alice completed her nurse training in January 1917 at the Rockhampton General Hospital. She enlisted as a Staff Nurse in the Australian Army Nursing Service (A.A.N.S.) in August 1917 and almost immediately embarked for India. She served in India and Pakistan until the end of the war, returning to Australia in October 1919.
After being discharged from the A.A.N.S. as 'medically unfit' in February 1920 she went to England where she married Captain Charles Woolsey in London on 3 July 1920. In September 1933 she was admitted to the General Nursing Council of England and Wales, so was able to work as a nurse in England.
With the outbreak of WWII she once again answered the call and in 1940 enlisted in the Queen Alexandra's Imperial Military Nursing Service. Her first posting to France at the beginning of March 1940 was cut short by the fall of France and her evacuation from Dunkirk. She received a Royal Red Cross Medal for her work evacuating wounded soldiers.
After France and until the end of the war she served in Egypt, Lebanon, Italy and Belgium. She was released from service in August 1948, after years of dedicated work.
Alice returned to Australia in 1972 and died in 1982 at the age of 88. You can read some of the letters Alice wrote to her family during WWII in the Anzac Square Memorial Galleries.