Profile

BROWN, Marion Sinclair
(Service number 22/104)

Aliases
First Rank Nurse Last Rank Staff Nurse

Birth

Date 6 October 1880 Place of Birth Scotland

Enlistment Information

Date 6 June 1915 Age 35
Address at Enlistment Waimatuku, Southland
Occupation Matron, Private Hospital
Previous Military Experience
Marital Status Single
Next of Kin Mrs J.S Brown (mother), Waimatuku, Southland
Religion Presbyterian
Medical Information

Military Service

Served with NZ Armed Forces Served in Army
Military District

Embarkation Information

Body on Embarkation Hospital Ship No.1 Maheno
Unit, Squadron, or Ship NZ Army Nursing Service Corps
Date 10 July 1915
Transport Maheno
Embarked From Destination Suez, Egypt
Other Units Served With No.1 Stationary Hospital, Port Said
Last Unit Served With NZ Army Nursing Service

Military Awards

Campaigns
Service Medals
Military Awards 1914-1915 Star, British War Medal (1914-1920), Victory Medal

Award Circumstances and Date

No information

Prisoner of War Information

Date of Capture
Where Captured and by Whom
Actions Prior to Capture
PoW Serial Number
PoW Camps
Days Interned
Liberation Date

Discharge

Date Reason

Hospitals, Wounds, Diseases and Illnesses

Post-war Occupations

Death

Date 23 October 1915 Age
Place of Death HT Marquette, Aegean Sea
Cause Drowned
Notices
Memorial or Cemetery
Memorial Reference
New Zealand Memorials On Memorial wall, Timaru

Biographical Notes

Marion Brown was the daughter of Mrs. J. S. Brown, of Waiuatuku, Southland. She trained for nursing at Riverton and had worked at Waimate for approxmately 12 months prior to her enlistment.

Marion was one of the New Zealand nurses who died when the Marquette was torpedoed and sank in October 1915. The Marquette was a British Merchant ship of 7,057 tons. It sank when a torpedo launched from a submarine hit it 36 miles south of Salonika Bay. Twenty nine crew and 182 troops were lost. Ten of those who died were New Zealand nurses who had been working at No.1 New Zealand Stationary Hospital in Port Said in October 1915 when they were ordered to prepare to go to Lemnos. The hospital was to be set up there to care for casualties being brought back from the Dardanelles. The Transport Ship Marquette took on board officers and men of the New Zealand Medical Corps, 36 New Zealand Army Nursing Staff, 610 officers and men of 29th Divisional Ammunition Column, 541 mules and some ammunition in mid October sailed for Salonika. The French torpedo destroyer Tirailleur joined the convoy on 22 October which gave credence to the idea that there was a real danger of being attacked by German submarines in the Mediterranean. The torpedo destroyer left the convoy that night and at 9.15 am on 23 October the Marquette was hit by a torpedo on the starboard side and began to list. Within about 15 minutes she sank. Nurses lost their lives in the evacuation as lifeboats tipped over as they were lowered into the sea, some boats falling on others, with some being left on the ship and going down with her. Nurse Brown is said to have held hands with nurse Isabel Clark as they went into the sea.

Sources

Auckland War Memorial Museum Cenotaph Databse (Oct 2013); SC GenWeb Project (http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~nzlscant/marquette.htm)

External Links

Related Documents

No documents available.

Researched and Written by

Carol Bell, SC branch NZSG & Timaru Herald; David Batchelor, South Canterbruy Museum

Currently Assigned to

Not assigned.

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 Logo. Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License unless otherwise stated.

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