The Belgium Doctors' and Pharmacists' Relief Fund
On 4 August 1914,
German armies invaded neutral Belgium. Within a month German forces had overrun
the small country, and a four-year occupation ensued. The United Kingdom, the
guarantor of Belgium’s neutrality under the Treaty of London 1839, declared war
on Germany on the same day. In Ireland, the plight of ‘Catholic Belgium’ was a
key factor in the initial support shown by the Catholic hierarchy for the
British war effort, and sympathy for the Belgian people was widespread.
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Andrew J Horne, medical doctor and son of Andrew
J Horne Snr (a President of RCPI), who fought in the
British Army during the First World War (Image
from Andrew J Horne photograph album)
|
In the Royal College
of Physicians of Ireland and the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, a letter
from a Belgian medic called Professor Jacobs helped to transform sympathy for
the plight of Belgium into concrete action to help Belgian medics.
Professor Jacobs’
appeal is referenced in a letter in a file in the archive of the College of
Physicians Letter. This letter, written by TPC Kirkpatrick, Registrar of RCPI,
and CM Benson, Secretary to Council of RCSI, stated that Professor Jacobs of
Brussels had written to the Presidents of the Colleges ‘telling of the ruin which the war has brought on the medical men and
pharmacists of Belgium, and asking for the assistance of their colleagues in
the Profession in Ireland’.
In response to this
appeal, it was decided to hold a meeting of representatives of two Colleges in November 1914. The meeting resulted
in the establishment of the Belgium Doctors’ and Pharmacists’ Relief Fund. A
committee with responsibility for collecting subscriptions for the assistance
of Belgian medics was appointed, and it was decided that the collecting point
would be the Royal College of Physicians. The success of the appeal is
evidenced by the hundreds of completed subscription forms and related letters
sent to the College by individual Irish medics.
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| Subscription form for the Belgian Medical Relief Fund (RCPI/3/10) |
The subscriptions appeal was followed by proposals
to facilitate Belgian medical students in their training. An entry in the
Journal of the Royal College of Physicians of Ireland, dated 1 Jan 1915, shows
that the College recommended a recognition of the curriculum of four Belgian
Universities ‘in the case of such Belgian
medical students in exile from their native land as are desirous to obtain the
qualifications to practise of the Royal Colleges under the Conjoint Scheme [for
examinations in the Royal College of Physicians and Royal College of Surgeons]. It was also recommended that Belgian
students unable to pay fees should be admitted free to the Conjoint Examinations.
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| Extract from the College Journal regarding the training of Belgian medics (RCPI/2/1/1/27) |
Fergus Brady,
Project Archivist
Belgium
Doctors’ and Pharmacists’ Relief Fund (RCPI/3/10)