Dr Ross – Commemorated at Home
Attribution: unknown (Procession in High Street for Diamond Jubilee 1897)
Commemorated at home
“To the Glory of God and in undying memory of Dr. Elizabeth Ness MacBean Rose, who voluntarily gave her life during the European war to help the typhus stricken Serbian soldiers and died in the Military Hospital, Kragujevac, Serbia 14th February 1915. This tablet has been erected and hospital beds endowed in Serbia by public subscription in remembrance of the noble life and sacrifice of one whose home was for many years in Tain. Greater love hath no man than this.”
Attribution: Mrs Edith Ross of Tain
Commemorative Screen at York Minster – in memory of the 6 doctors, including Elizabeth Ross, who died in the 1914-18 war
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Tain Dr E M Ross
Elizabeth Ness MacBean Ross was born in Tain in 1878. She studied medicine at Glasgow University graduating in 1901. For several years she was the local doctor on Colonsay and Oronsay and in 1907 left to go to Iran. She worked among the Bakhtiari tribesmen in the Zagros Mountains with long periods out of contact with fellow Europeans. The photo on the right shows her in Bakhtiari dress. She described her adventures there in A Lady Doctor in Bakhtiari Land. She worked her way home from Iran as a ship's doctor, studied tropical medicine in London, went to Japan on the Glenlogan as the first female doctor on a liner and died of typhus in 1915 while working as a military doctor in Serbia. She was buried at Kragujevatz, where her dedication and courage are still greatly honoured. We are grateful to Mrs Edith Ross of Tain for permission to use the original material in this presentation