As thousands of wounded returned from the Front, extra hospitals opened across Cornwall and many young women volunteered for basic medical training to help nurse the injured and maimed. Between 1914-1918 an estimated 90,000 women signed up nationwide, many hundreds in Cornwall.
Several large houses across the county were turned into nursing homes. One which became a convalescent home for officers was Scorrier House, near Redruth.
Lucy Opie who lived at Penrose, Clinton Road, Redruth had married into the well-known Redruth photography firm Opie Ltd. (Henry Opie was a photographer who opened a photographic studio in 1889 at Bond Street, Redruth. Originally called Opie, Henry & Sons, the firm became Opie Ltd in 1914 with other premises opening in Penryn Street, Redruth; Truro, Falmouth And Helston.
She became matron of the hospital overseeing care and a group of local young women who helped out there. They went on outings, danced and sang. The key thing: to lift spirits and think about anything other than the war. One – L. Opie (perhaps Lucy Opie, the hospital matron, but more likely a younger woman) – kept an autograph book with photos, signatures and poems from the officers recovering there.
Here are a selection of images from that book (held at Kresen Kernow, Redruth, Cornwall).
