Anita Newcomb McGee, Founder of the US Army Nurse Corps
Anita Newcomb McGee (1864 – 1940) was a physician whose work greatly influenced America’s military, and she is widely viewed as the founder of the United States Army Nurse Corps. Born in Washington, DC, to a noted astronomer, Dr. McGee got her medical degree in 1892, and became one of the few female practicing doctors in the nation’s capital.
At the start of the Spanish-American War in 1898, she trained and organized volunteer nurses. His organizational skills led to her appointment as the only woman acting Assistant Surgeon General of the US Army in 1898, in charge of nurses, for the duration of the war. That made Dr. McGee the first woman authorized to wear an Army officer’s uniform.
She wrote a manual during the conflict on nursing, that was adopted by the American military and that formed the basis for nursing practices for decades thereafter. Parts of her manual survive as standard operating procedures to this day. After the war, she lobbied for a permanent nursing corps, and wrote the section of legislation that was subsequently enacted into law to establish the Army Nurse Corps in 1901.
In 1904, Dr. McGee led a contingent of volunteer nurses to serve in Japan during the Russo-Japanese War. She established a field hospital for the Japanese Army, and trained Japanese Red Cross nurses. Given an officer’s rank by the Japanese government, she inspected field hospitals and hospital ships, and served as a medical military attache with the Japanese army in Manchuria. Returning to America after the war, Dr. McGee resumed her medical practice, wrote about her war experiences, and lectured at the University of California. She died in 1940, and was buried in Arlington National Cemetery.
