Ida Thekla Bowser, Fellow of the Institute of Journalists (1874 – 1919) – British writer and journalist

Ida Thekla Bowser was born in London in 1874. Her parents were John Carrick Bowser and his wife, Elizabeth, nee Mannell, of London. Thekla’s elder sister Elsie was Matron of a Nursing Home in Putney, London, UK.

Thekla became a writer and journalist, writing under the name of Thekla Bowser. She worked for “The Queen” magazine and had articles published in national newspapers.  Thekla became a member of The Order of St. John of Jerusalem in England in around 1903. When war broke out, she served as an Honorary  nurse initially in England and then, after volunteering for overseas service, served in France as Commandant of a First Aid Post at a railway station.

Thjekla became ill and returned to Britain where she underwent an operation.  She died on 11th January 1919 and was buried in Hastings Cemetery, Sussex, UK - Grave Reference: Screen Wall. E. M. B1.

Thekla’s book “Britain’s Civilian Volunteers: Authorised story of British Voluntary Aid Detachment Work in the Great War” (Moffat, Yard & Co., New York,, 1917) is available to read as a down-load on Archive: https://archive.org/details/01110420R.nlm.nih.gov/page/n7

“Hastings and St Leonards Observer” 18 January 1919

Photograph - photographer unknown - from Agnes Conway's collection for the nation of the Women of the First World War in the Imperial War Museum, London