Recovery: Women's Overseas Service in WW1 by Kay Morris Matthews was published in association with the Tairāwhiti Museum exhibition held in 2017.

Explore interactive timelines and maps tracing the contributions of nurses from Gisborne and the East Cape – developed by The Gisborne Herald

Listen to the experiences of Tairawhiti nurses (in their own words, read by NAMOT nurses)

Ethel Taylor

Jane Sutherland Cormack

Download the Recovery exhibition object labels

Photographs from the exhibition opening March 2017

Exhibition stories from The Gisborne Herald

Recovery: Women’s Overseas Service in WW1

Exhibition/whakaaturanga

Dates: 24/03/17 - 16/07/17
Opening: 24/03/17 12:00 am

Making visible the work that New Zealand women undertook overseas during World War One (WW1) is what this exhibition is about. I wanted to recover a range of New Zealand women’s work outside of New Zealand during WW1 as well as the research I undertook to recover their stories. The women featured have connections to the East Coast. Between 1915 and 1919 they served with the armed services or as volunteers with 12 different service organisations within war zones in Turkey, Egypt, France, Serbia, Greece, Italy, Palestine, East Africa as well as in England. Many were highly decorated. All who served had their lives changed forever. That so many women and men from the East Coast served overseas in WW1 is remarkable for the relatively small population at the time.

Because only a sample of the women could be included in the Exhibition I have written a 172 page illustrated book providing further detail plus annotated profiles of other women from the East Coast who served overseas in WW1. This exhibition is the result of collaboration between the Tairāwhiti Museum, the Eastern Institute of Technology (EIT), The Gisborne Herald and the Nurses and Midwives of Tairāwhiti (NAMOT).

Professor Kay Morris Matthews, EIT (Exhibition Curator/Researcher)

Purchase the book