WEBB, MARTHA BEATRICE

1903 - 1924 (mainly 1903 - 1909, additional notes 1924)

Admin history: Martha Beatrice Webb (1863-1951) was born on 20 October 1863 in Furness Vale, Cheshire. She was educated at a private school in Stockport until the age of 16. After a four-year period of ill health, she entered Newnham College, Cambridge, where she took the natural science tripos. She began the study of medicine relatively late in life, having worked for ten years as a teacher at Edgbaston High School. In 1902, at the age of 38, she attended the Birmingham Medical School, as one of the first female students. Part of her education included clinical training at the General Hospital and Queens Hospital. Both in the classroom and in the wards she experienced discrimination due to her sex from her male colleagues, teachers, and some patients. She graduated MB ChB at Edinburgh in 1907, proceeding MD in 1909. Webb practiced medicine in Birmingham, where she held the post of lecturer in personal hygiene at Birmingham University, and later became the medical officer for the Department of Education. She created the Women's University Club, a social gathering for professional women, and the Women's Medical Society. During the First World War, 1914-18, Webb studied the conditions affecting the health of working girls for the Ministry of Munitions. She published two books on the subject, entitled 'Health of Working Girls' and 'On Keeping Well'. During Webb's life there were great advances in women's higher education and their establishment as professionals. Webb was a pioneer in social medicine, and played her part in making this progress possible. From 1923-25 she was a member of the council of the British Medical Women's Federation. She also became president of the Birmingham Association of Medical Women, vice-president of the Birmingham Medical Institute, and a founder member of the Birmingham Soroptimists. She actively supported the British Medical Association's (BMA) campaign for equal pay and conditions for men and women. Webb retired from medical practice and teaching in 1932. She lived to see Cambridge University admit women to full membership in the late 1940s. She died in Birmingham on 14 February 1951. Sources: 'Obituary - Dr Martha Beatrice Webb' - 'British Medical Journal', vol. I, 17 March 1951, pp.590-91 [BMJ, 1951, pp.590-91] 'The Medical Student Days of an Edwardian Lady', Katharine Appleton Downes, 'Journal of the American Medical Association', 1 March 1995, vol. 273, no. 9, pp.748-49 [JAMA, 1995, pp.748-49] 'To Live History: the Letters of Martha Beatrice Webb, an Edwardian Medical Student', Katharine Appleton Downes (Harvard University BA thesis, 1989)‎