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Thomas Bonnar Garvie

Civilian Surgeon – Anglo Boer War
Captain, South African Medical Corps (S.A.M.C.) – WWI

- Queens South Africa Medal with clasps Cape Colony, Orange Free State and Transvaal to T.B. GARVIE, M.B. Surgeon
- Kings South Africa Medal with clasps South Africa 1901 & 1902 to Civ. Surg. T.B. GARVIE
- British War Medal to CAPT. T.B. GARVIE

Thomas Garvie was born in Glasgow, Lanarkshire on 25 April 1875 the son of John Garvie, a Master Draper (Employing 5 Men 6 Women, 1 Girl & 1 Boy), and his wife Margaret Bonnar Garvie. According to the 1881 Scotland census, a 6 year old Garvie was a school boy at home in 134 Buccluech Street, Glasgow with his parents and siblings Sarah Jane (15); Helen Fowler (14); Maggie (10); John Thompson (7); Elizabeth (4) and William Broomberry (2).

Ten years later, at the time of the 1891 Scotland census, the family had moved to 42 Hill Street in the Blythswood district of Glasgow. Mr Garvie was now a Manufacturer’s Agent by occupation. Thomas, now 15, was at home with his entire family. He initially attended Garnet Hill Public School in Glasgow and must have been a precocious child as, according to the 1892 List of Students enrolled for Medical Studies, he had just completed his preliminary studies at Glasgow Senior Loc. in June 1891 and was registered to commence his medical studies on October 20th of that year.

Garvie’s medical studies were never going to be without incident and, in what could have been a joke at his expense, which went horribly wrong; or, as something possibly more sinister which spoke to his relationships with his fellow students, he was embroiled in a controversy which grabbed the headlines in the local newspapers of the time for a few weeks, before they moved on, as is the way of all newspapers, to report on other matters.

In cases such as this, to get as close as possible to the true version of events, it is best to provide as many press accounts as possible.
An early account appeared in the Daily record of Friday, 2nd September 1898 under the heading, “Royal Infirmary Squabble – Dr. Garvie’s Resignation Accepted. It read thus: -

‘The managers of the Royal Infirmary at a meeting yesterday had under consideration the events which had arisen with the ducking of Dr. Garvie. It will be remembered that Mr. Garvie who is a young Doctor, was an assistant in two important wards which are always well filled.

He also did duty in two other wards which are sub-divided into male and female sections which are not so fully occupied. He protested that this ward should not be made a “hen coop” for cases said to be crowded out of other wards. His protests were in vain however, and he eventually refused to receive a certain patient. This was resented by other members of the medical staff.

Their resentment came to a head on the evening of the 12th of August, when they met Mr Garvie and compelled him to go through a mock trial, the charge being that he had disturbed the peace of the Infirmary. The result of the “trial” was that he was found guilty of the charge preferred against him, and sentenced to be invested with what one Doctor called “The Order of the Bath.” Some of his clothes were torn off him, and he was plunged into a bath full of water. Mr Garvie complained afterwards to the managers of the Infirmary, and also to the police authorities and it is understood the matter will be gone into at the Rollex Police Court next week.

The managers yesterday, after some discussion, decided to accept the resignation tendered by Dr Garvie, who had previously been suspended. They had also a letter before them from other resident doctors apologising to both the directors and Dr Garvie for their conduct.

The apology was accepted. A letter was submitted also from Mr Black, who had been acting as superintendent of the Infirmary at the time but who had likewise been suspended. In it he made an explanation of the circumstances which had arisen – which was similar to the statement made by the ‘residents’ – giving a totally different version of the affair from that given by Dr Garvie. Mr Black stated that he had attended at the request of the doctors for the purpose of informing them whether it was true he had given orders as to Dr Garvie taking certain cases into his wards, which the latter had declined to obey. He stated that he had taken no part in the immersion in the bath; in fact, he had been present only at the meeting – called the “mock trial” – for about a quarter of an hour. Under these circumstances the directors thought it best to recall Mr Black’s suspension, but cautioned him to be more discreet in future in connecting himself with proceedings where his conduct was liable to be misunderstood.’


The Royal Infirmary, Galsgow

In a similarly detailed account, under the banner “A Doctor’s Bath – Charge against his fellow Doctors” the Elgin Courant and Courier of Friday, 9 September 1898 reported as follows: -

‘The recent assault upon a Doctor, till lately resident in Glasgow Royal Infirmary, by a dozen of his colleagues there, came before Bailie Cleland at Glasgow Street, Rollox Police Court. As soon as the doors of the court were opened the court room was crowded by ladies and gentlemen chiefly connected with or interested in the medical profession.

The charge against the accused was as follows: That Malcolm Watson, John Bain, Andrew Colville Wilson, James R. Rindell, Alexander Bankier Sloan; George Coats, Griffith Llewelyn Jones, Alexander Henry Edwards, William Kew Russell and James Law Brownriggs, all of the Royal Infirmary, Castle Street, Glasgow; Robert Stewart and John Glen Parker, late of Hartwood Asylum did, on August 6 in the said Royal Infirmary, and in a room there occupied by the said Alexander Henry Edwards, and in a bath-room adjoining the said room, assault Thomas Bonnar Garvie, of the said Royal Infirmary, and did seize violent hold of him, throw him down on the bed in the said room, forcibly pull off his coat, vest, trousers, braces, necktie and watchguard, carry him through the said room into the said bath-room and did there plunge him into a bath full of lukewarm water, all to the injury of his person, whereby they were liable to a penalty not exceeding £5 or 30 days’
imprisonment, and to find caution for good behaviour, or other 30 days’ imprisonment.

The reading of the charge caused laughter among the accused, who all pleaded guilty. Their legal representative, Mr Todd: it was an extraordinary case, he said, and he thought some explanation was necessary to show the position of the twelve gentlemen who appeared at the bar of the Police-Court, charged with the assault upon one man, and that man a colleague of their own in such an institution as the Royal Infirmary.

His Honour saw before him then, in fact, the whole resident staff of the institution, charged with an assault on one of their number. It was preposterous for the complainant to appear before the court and expect the Judge to believe that they would have been guilty of assault without some serious cause. The nature of the case had become a matter of public notoriety. The cause of the whole trouble was that his clients considered the complainant had been guilty of a serious breach of duty. The assault was simply the climax of a series of attempts on the part of Dr Garvie to shirk duty, and the matter had been dealt with by the managers of the Infirmary who, after full consideration, accepted an apology from his clients and also accepted the resignation of Dr Garvie.

The Magistrate: What did they do to him?

Mr Todd: They gave him a bath. (Laughter.) It was not even a cold bath or a hot bath; it was lukewarm, and they took off his clothes as gently as they could, and used no violence whatever except what was necessary to get him in. They offered Dr Garvie an apology and were ready to make good any damage that was done to his clothing. It would have been far better if Dr Garvie had accepted that apology – better for his own interests and dignity – and better for the Infirmary.

Bailie Cleland said that whatever reason the accused had for the action they took, they certainly could not be allowed to take the law into their own hands. Taking into consideration the statement which had been made on their behalf, however, he would impose a fine of 1 guinea on each of the accused.’

The Lisburn Standard of September 17, 1898 reported the matter from a slightly different angle:

‘Dr Garvie, the doctor who was assaulted, states that shortly after his appointment in April to the Infirmary he found the less desirable cases in the “surgically dirty” class being put into his wards. To this he objected, with the result that he was instructed to appear before a court of his fellow medical men to answer the charge of disturbing the institution.

At 5 minutes past eleven on Friday, 5th August, Dr Garvie met the 12 residents in the room of one of their number, who did the honours of host, wearing a police uniform and baton. After a brief trial the doctor was found guilty of refusing to take two cases into his ward; and on declining to promise amendment in the future, he was sentenced to undergo a cold bath.

“Before I had time to fully realise the meaning of this threat,” the doctor states, “they had laid violent hands on me.” They carried him to bed, divested him of his outer garments, and gave him the “Order of the Bath.” “Being clad only in shirt, semmet and collar, I was carried into the bathroom and put into the bath, which was full of warm water, and held in it, while some tried to keep my head under water. In their efforts to do so, they blackened my right eye.”

The doctor’s account goes on to explain that he was then given his trousers and drawers, and a dressing gown, and he left the bathroom carrying his wet clothes in his hands. Two nurses, he adds, were witnesses to his exit and evidently enjoyed his discomfiture. Dr Garvie, next morning, demanded an apology. None was forthcoming. Hence the police-court case and the guinea fines.’

While this tragicomedy was playing out, Garvie’s family had left the Hill Street residence they had occupied and had relocated to Newlandsfield House in East Pollokshields where they lived from 1897.

But what of Garvie, recently qualified as a M.B. ChB, he had already resigned from his first “situation” – that of the Royal Infirmary – under less than desirable circumstances. That he was unliked by his colleagues and management alike was obvious from his treatment at their hands. What was he to do? The answer came in the form of the Anglo Boer War where, in a faraway land, he could put his newly acquired skills to use without having to look his former colleagues in the eye.

The Anglo Boer War which, providentially for Garvie, announced itself on the world stage on 11 October 1899, was a fight to the finish between the two Dutch-speaking Republics of the Orange Free State and the Transvaal and the might of the British Empire. It is not known exactly when Garvie presented himself for service as a Civil Surgeon attached to the Royal Army Medical Corps and engaged at the No. 1 General Hospital in Wynberg, Cape Town as well as No. 11 General Hospital, Kimberley. There was also, possibly, some sort of military medical presence at Schmidt’s Drift, a settlement on the Vaal River, 40 miles west of Kimberley which is where one of Garvie’s medal rolls was signed.


No 11 General Hospital in the Boer War

No. 11 General Hospital was established in March 1900 with an initial 600 beds. Between the Royal Engineer officers and the De Beers Company, huts were erected, electric lights installed, and the camp was fitted up with every convenience necessary to a self-containing hospital equipped for 1000 patients. The patients were all accommodated in double canvas marquees, and the hospital divided into sections, A, B, C, D, and all the tents marked with boards and numbered consecutively. There is a road fifty yards broad bisecting the camp, and a railway siding runs through the centre of it at right angles to the road.

The hospital was well provided with both medical men and trained nurses. The principal medical officer being Lieutenant-Colonel O'Connell, and the medical officers in charge of divisions - Major H. Carr and Major S. Hickson. There was an army superintending sister, Miss Stewart, twelve junior army medical officers, thirteen civil surgeons (of whom Garvie was one), and thirty nursing sisters, twenty-three belonging to the Army Nursing Reserve and seven were engaged in the colony, besides nearly two hundred non-commissioned officers and men of the Royal Army Medical Corps or trained by the St. John Ambulance. All this personnel were accommodated in tents quite apart from the patients, except the sisters, who had special huts built for their sleeping and messing accommodation.

Garvie revelled in this environment, so much so that, after the hostilities came to an end on 3 May 1902, he elected to remain in South Africa. He had, by this time, been joined in the country by one of his sister’s – Helen Fowler Garvie came out to South Africa in January 1902 and for thirteen months was the Senior Nursing Sister in the Standerton Burger Camp Hospital. Much later, after a very successful nursing career, she went to live with her brother.

Thomas Garvie, no longer attached to the R.A.M.C., scouted around for employment. He found it as a Medical Practitioner in the small town of Moorreesburg in the Western Cape. He was also appointed as the Railway Medical Officer for the stretch between Moorreesburg and Erndekuil. His time seems to have been well spent as he is also noted as being instrumental in the coming into being of the Carnegie Library in the town – a bequest his fellow Scot made to towns worldwide. The 1910 Medical Directory has him based at the town, via Malmesbury.

1910 was an auspicious year for an entirely different reason – on 16 June of that year, in the Presbyterian Church in Wynberg, he wed 34 year old widow Christina Hendrina Pollock, born Kock. She was from the farm Biesjesfontein outside Moorreesburg whilst Garvie, now 35, was recorded as a Surgeon living in the town.

The next event of any significance was the outbreak of the Great War on 4 August 1914. Only 12 years since he was last in service. Garvie, initially, wasn’t directly involved in the war effort – in fact, according to the South African Railways and Harbours Magazine of March 1916, he was appointed Railway Medical Officer at Kroonstad in the Orange Free State, responsible for the stretch from Dover and including Milner Bridge. However, as time went on he felt the need to “do his bit” and enlisted with the South African Medical Corps.


Wynberg Military Camp

The South African Medical Record of April 1917 reported on his appointment as a Temporary Captain with the S.A.M.C. but he had been taken on strength with effect from 9 January 1917 at S.A.M.C. Headquarters in Cape Town where he moved into the married quarters in the Wynberg Camp. Appointed to the medical staff at No. 1 General Hospital, Wynberg he remained there until his appointment as Senior Medical Officer of the Dispersal Camp, transferring to the Dispersal Camp in Maitland for the purpose.

He was released from service at his own request on 19 May 1919 and, for his efforts Garvie, who had never left the country, was awarded the British War Medal.

The war over, Garvie returned to his medical role with the S.A.R. & H., transferring to Touws River in the Western Cape where he remained until making a final move to East London in 1930. Unconfirmed reports state that he was a keen Free Mason and that he took an interest in psychological research.

His wife passed away in East London 11 August 1956, leaving him a step-daughter Aletta Catherina Hutchins born Versfeld (they had no children of their own). Garvie passed away at his house Blyth Hall, Belgravia, East London on 30 April 1962 at the age of 87. He had sustained multiple injuries and had fractured his skull as a result of a fall a few days before.