My Good Lady

'My Good Lady' is the fifth novel from Gary Mill, an Amazon Kindle chart-topping writer. It is the dramatised account of a true story.It is 1914. The staid, morally righteous and male-dominated Victorian era has given way to a potentially more liberal Edwardian period. However, women remain second-class citizens and still do not have the vote. Britain's menfolk have gone to war but the female population must remain behind and keep the home fires burning. After all, the fairer sex don't fight; that is not their role in life. But one iron-willed female doctor from Edinburgh has a very different idea; an idea borne out of political struggle and a steely determination to succeed. Her name is Dr Elsie Maud Inglis.A founder member of the Suffragist movement in Scotland, Elsie stirs her fellow activists into action. Ensuring financial independence through an extensive and successful fund-raising campaign she establishes an exclusively female medical relief organisation: The Scottish Women's Hospitals for Foreign Service. Elsie's 'girls' are an ill-assorted bunch from a variety of backgrounds but they share one thing in common - an independence of mind which refuses to be cowed by accepted social convention and the repressive political status quo. Yes, Elsie's volunteers will wear uniforms and go to war. But they are an army of a different kind; an army of medical pioneers engaged in a perilous battle to do their duty and win their freedom.Elsie and her team of female doctors, nurses, orderlies and drivers soon travel to war-torn Serbia, Russia and Romania and find themselves in a hellish crucible of war. Forced to fight against the extreme weather, diabolical living conditions, horrific injuries, virulent disease, constant bombardments and deep-seated personal conflicts they start to wilt under the relentless pressure. Despite everything, the SWH women find the courage they thought they didn't have; the will to go on they suspected they did not possess; and the hope for peace they believed could never be achieved again. At the beginning of the 'great adventure' Elsie tells her girls "if you do your utmost then you will be victorious". In the face of overwhelming odds and perpetual conflict, each woman finds her own way to battle through and achieve a personal victory - a victory of which their inspirational leader would be proud, but one which would exact a great personal cost.The stirring tale of Elsie and the SWH is fascinating, exciting, inspirational and profoundly moving. It is the story of courageous women exposing themselves to the greatest of dangers so that lives could be saved and men could be healed. It is a story of selfless sacrifice which should never be forgotten.