Women in War Part 2: Dr. Deborah Glaister Hannay
Posted Nov 8, 2015 06:29:06 AM.
Last Updated Nov 9, 2015 01:10:15 PM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
570’s Joe Pavia has produced a 5 part series on the stories of the local women who served. In this segment he tells the story of Dr.Deborah Glaister Hannay of Wellesley.
“Dr. Deborah Glaister Hannay was pleased to finally be heading over after joining the Canadian Women’s Army Corp in 1942.
She had been ready to go since the war started but says there were restrictions on women. Only those who were specialized anaesthetics, psychiatry and pathology.
But the Canadian war effort changed and she claims the military finally accepted women who had enlisted out of desperation.
“Scraping the bottom of the barrel, and women were the bottom of the barrel.”
Dr. Debbie, as she was affectionately known, was the first female doctor to practice in Wellesley Township. She would eventually become a Captain with the Canadian Women’s Army Corp and landing in the south of England in May of 1944. That’s when she first heard about D-Day.
“They sent us word very shortly after we got there to try to get rid of as many of our patients, to evacuate many of our patients farther north to England or back to Canada to make room for D-Day casualties.”
She explains everyone knew D-Day was coming. But not exactly when. And then she heard the bombers.
Just a few days before D-Day the heavy bombers were going over so hard. They were all stationed way up north and they would be pretty high by the time they came over us.
In the next segment of women in war, Catherine Wilkes Thomson of Cambridge.”
