Queen Mary's Army Auxiliary Corps

The WAACs marching in London at the end of World War I, 1918

File:Queen Mary's Auxilary Army Corps tug-o-war, 3 August 1918.jpg

The winning Queen Mary's Auxiliary Army Corps tug-o-war at the New Zealand Infantry and General Base Depot, Etaples, France, 3 August 1918

The UK's Women's Army Auxiliary Corps (1917–1918) was later named Queen Mary's Army Auxiliary Corps (1918–1920). It was formally instituted on 7 July, 1917 by Sir Neville Macready, the adjutant-general, who had appointed Dr Mona Chalmers Watson the first Chief Controller and senior officer. Over 57,000 women served between January 1917 and November 1918. On 31 March 1917 women in the WAAC were first sent to the battlefields in France, just 14 cooks and waitresses. Helen Gwynne-Vaughan was the Senior Officer overseas, and Florence Leach was the controller of the cooks. In 1918 women medical personnel were sent to the front in France; one such was Dr. Phoebe Chapple, who was awarded the Military Medal for her actions during an air raid on the WAAC shelter trench outside Abbeville in May 1918.

The corps was disbanded in September 1921. After a German air raid in September 1940 most of the service records did not survive. Those which did have suffered fire, water and mould damage. The National Archives in Kew, Surrey, digitised these to prevent further damage and they can be searched and viewed online. The last WAAC veteran was Ivy Lillian Campany, who died in 2008.

See also

• Women in the First World War

External links

• Women's (later Queen Mary's) Army Auxiliary Corps (1917–1920) – DocumentsOnline research guide
• DocumentsOnline searchable service record collection
• On Waactive Service by Majorie Hay, an account of the Corp. in France 1917 – 1918, The Plymouth Press, circa 1919