An Order of St John group of five awarded to Lady Superintendent B. Bourke, Children's Home...

An Order of St John group of five awarded to Lady Superintendent B. Bourke, Children’s Home Division and 1st (Stoke Newington) Nursing Division, St John Ambulance Brigade, who was one of the first eight women to be awarded the Service Medal of the Order The Order of St John of Jerusalem, Serving Sister’s shoulder badge, silver and enamel, on lady’s bow riband, white enamel repair to two arms; Jubilee 1897, St. John Ambulance Brigade (Lady Treasr. Miss. B. Bourke.); Coronation 1902, St. John Ambulance Brigade, bronze (B. Bourke. Lady Supt.); Coronation 1911, St. John Ambulance Brigade (Lady Supt. B. Bourke.); Service Medal of the Order of St John, with three Additional Award Bars (Lady Supt. Blye. Bourke. 1906.) mounted for display, minor contact marks, generally very fine and better (5) £240-£280 --- Blye Bourke was born in Islington around 1850 and is recorded as an unmarried draper’s assistant living in Hastings in 1881. Returning to Hackney to live with her widowed father, she devoted her life to the work of the St John Ambulance Brigade in London and became Honorary Serving Sister of the Order of St John of Jerusalem on 24 June 1893. As one of the first eight women to be awarded the Service Medal of the Order of St John of Jerusalem, Bourke later served from 20 October 1914 at the Roseneath Voluntary Hospital, Winchmore Hill, in the rank of Commandant. Released from nursing duties upon the cessation of hostilities, she returned home to ‘Chateaudun’, 166 Osbaldson Road, N.16, and was soon mentioned in the Bayswater Chronicle on 29 September 1923 for her continued work with St John Ambulance and her appointment as Lady of Grace. She died in 1931, one of the great Lady ‘stalwarts’ of the Brigade.