Sidcup's Australian Section
An Australian section was formed at Sidcup, shortly following that from New Zealand
The Queen’s Hospital, Sidcup’s medical staff were organised on national lines, with contingents from Great Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. This was due to the participation of many “Dominion” nations (todays Commonwealth) in the conflict.
A small unit dedicated to Australian soldiers had been established at the 3rd Australian Auxiliary Hospital in Dartford. Gillies was keen that all the allied units in some way treating facial injuries, should be concentrated at the Queens Hospital. He conceived that in this way, and with suitable allied medical and technical staffing, knowledge and skills in the management of facial injuries and plastic surgery in general would be acquired and develop much faster. Indeed compared to continental units which did not communicate, even within their own countries, he was proved correct. When concentration was agreed upon the Australian unit moved to Sidcup.
Its head was Colonel Henry Simpson Newland. Born, a third generation Australian in Adelaide in 1893, he graduated in medicine at the
university there in 1896. Coming to Britain the next year, he requalified and rapidly gained his Fellowship of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1899. As a general surgeon he had worked in Egypt, at Gallipoli and in France. He was one of the first Australian surgeons to volunteer his services in 1914.
Newland outranked all those commanding the other Dominion (today’s Commonwealth) sections. Including Harold Gillies. It has been suggested that senior army surgeons deliberately posted Newland, because they still had doubts as to whether Gillies was the right person, and senior enough, to head up the hospital. This may have been because Pickerill, who commanded the New Zealand section, had been reluctant to go to Sidcup. However, Newland was a pragmatist and realized the Gillies had far more experience of facial work than he did, so recommended that he remain in charge.
The Australian team included (Alfred) Fey McLure a general surgeon and Dr William Francis Digges La Touche, a physician, who was the section’s anaesthetist, Ken Russell a dentist whose contribution to advances in that specialty were substantial. Their resident artist, was Daryl Lindsay, who produced many watercolours as well as line drawings of the procedures undertaken by his team.