Great War Stories 1 - Harold Gillies and Henry Pickerill

‘Don’t worry Sonny, you’ll be alright and have as good as face as most of us before we’re finished with you’, Captain Gillies would say. And the poor huddle of splints and bandages that had once been a handsome guardsman would believe him and try to shake off his blank despair.

– A nurse recounts Harold Gillie's bedside manner

With our artistic efforts constantly on exhibition about the wards, not only the patients judged our results, but we too, if only out of the corners of our eyes, jealously compared our work with that of our colleagues.

– Howard Gillies

Before the Great War men with shattered face died of wounds or broken hearts. Now they go to a special hospital where marvels of surgery are performed, and step out into the world again whole and confident.

– A Kiwi nurse at Queen's Hospital in Sidcup England