Why "The Queen's"?

The Queen’s Hospital was named after Queen Mary, consort of King George V.

Both the King and Queen were active in supporting the armed  forces during the First World War. The King visited the Western Front several times from 1914. The Queen accompanied her husband, the first time being in 1917. She took a particular interest in the wounded, touring casualty clearing stations, hospitals and nurse’s hostels.

It is no surprise then, that she became a sponsor of Harold Gillies project to build a new hospital managing facial injuries at Sidcup, gathering together expertise in the “Strange New Art” of Plastic Surgery.

Queen Mary gave her name to the hospital, helping those fundrasiing for it to be built. She supported it by visiting, sometimes bringing her children and buying some of the jewelry or toys that the convalescent servicemen had made as an early form of Occupational therapy.

Following the war, The Queen's closed to facial injury patients in 1925. It was formally re-opened, again by Queen Mary, in 1930 as a General Hospital, and to be known as “Queen Mary’s Hospital, Sidcup”.

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