Hilda Lloyd

Hilda Lloyd
Dame Hilda Lloyd (1891–1982), DBE, President of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (1951) by Anthony Devas
Born11 August 1891 Edit this on Wikidata
Died18 July 1982 Edit this on Wikidata
EducationKing Edward VI High School for Girls, University of Birmingham Edit this on Wikidata
OccupationsSurgeon, obstetrician Edit this on Wikidata
Employer
Spouse(s)Bertram Arthur Lloyd, Baron Theodore Rose Edit this on Wikidata
Awards
  • Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire Edit this on Wikidata

Dame Hilda Nora Lloyd, DBE (née Shufflebotham; 11 Aug 1891–18 July 1982) was a British physician and surgeon. She was the first woman professor at the University of Birmingham, and the first to be elected as president of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.

Early life

Lloyd was born on 11 August 1891 in Balsall Heath, Birmingham, to master grocer John Shufflebotham and Emma Amelia Jenkins. The younger of two daughters, she attended King Edward VI High School, Edgbaston, before entering Birmingham University (Interc BSc Pure Science, 1914, MBChB Medicine, 1916).

Career

After house officer posts in London, she returned to Birmingham University as a resident in obstetrics and gynaecology, and passed her FRCS in 1920. She was particularly concerned with the problems of urban poor women, such as STDs and illegal abortions. The "flying squads" she pioneered helped to save the lives of mothers and babies who would otherwise have died. She became a lecturer at Birmingham in 1934, and was the first female professor there, from 1944. She became chair of Obstetrics and Gynaecology in 1946. She was, in 1949, the first woman to be elected president of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists and in 1950, she became the first woman on the General Medical Council.

Personal life

In 1930, she married Bertram Arthur Lloyd, a pathologist who became a professor of forensic medicine at Birmingham University two years later; they had no children. Lloyd died in 1948 after she had nursed him through a lengthy period of ill health.

She married in 1949 Baron Theodore Rose (1892–1978), her former classmate and a widower.

She died on 18 July 1982 in Clent, Worcestershire, after having a stroke.

Recognition and legacy

Lloyd was appointed a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in the 1951 Birthday Honours and made an Honorary LLD by the University of Birmingham in 1958.

A 1951 bust of Lloyd by Jacob Epstein is in the collection of the University of Birmingham. The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists has a 1951 portrait in oil by Anthony Devas, in which Lloyd is wearing the college's presidential robes. She is commemorated by a blue plaque at Birmingham Women's Hospital. The Dame Hilda Lloyd Network, a research network for women's health based in the West Midlands, is named in her honour.

Notes

  1. ↑ Charlotte Anderson was the first woman professor of paediatrics in the United Kingdom. She was appointed Leonard Parsons Professor of Paediatrics at the University of Birmingham Medical School in 1968. Some sources erroneously refer to her as the first woman professor at Birmingham.
  2. ↑ Christine Murrell was actually elected to the GMC in September 1933, but never took the seat due to her death the following month.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Rose, Dame Hilda Nora (1891 - 1982)". Plarr's Lives of the Fellows. Royal College of Surgeons of England. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
  2. ↑ "University of Birmingham". Bhamalumni.org. 21 February 1940. Archived from the original on 6 October 2014. Retrieved 30 December 2016.
  3. ↑ Journal of Perioperative Practice, 1 June 2009, "Dame Hilda Lloyd: first president of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists"
  4. ↑ "Dr Cavenagh gets university chair". Birmingham Post. 10 June 1972.
  5. 1 2 3 "University of Birmingham : Blue Plaque Guide" (PDF). Birmingham.ac.uk. Retrieved 30 December 2016.
  6. ↑ "Our History". General Medical Council. Retrieved 12 April 2020.
  7. ↑ "Murrell, Christine Mary". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/54293. (Subscription, Wikipedia Library access or UK public library membership required.)
  8. ↑ "Dame Hilda Lloyd: First president of the Royal College of Obstetricia…".{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
  9. ↑ "Dame Hilda Nora Lloyd (née Shufflebotham, later Rose) - National Portrait Gallery". National Portrait Gallery. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
  10. ↑ "Rose, Baron Theodore (1892 - 1978)". Plarr's Lives of the Fellows. Royal College of Surgeons of England. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
  11. ↑ "Lloyd [née Shufflebotham], Dame Hilda Nora". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-61394. (Subscription, Wikipedia Library access or UK public library membership required.)
  12. ↑ "No. 39243". The London Gazette (Supplement). 1 June 1951. p. 3070.
  13. ↑ "Dame Hilda Lloyd (1891–1982)". Art UK. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
  14. ↑ "Dame Hilda Lloyd (1891–1982), DBE, President of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (1949–1952) Anthony Devas (1911–1958)". Art UK. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
  15. ↑ "Hilda Lloyd blue plaque". Open Plaques. Retrieved 27 September 2026.
  16. ↑ "Dame Hilda Lloyd Network". Dame Hilda Lloyd Network. Retrieved 27 September 2026.