Canada's first cross dressing doctor

James Miranda Stuart Barry. (née Bulkeley [?]) Born England 1795. Died 1865. In the day when medicine only accepted men as students one woman disguised herself as a man and entered the Edinburgh University in 1809. As a doctor in the British army she served in the far corners of the British Empire and gained a reputation as an outstanding surgeon. In 157 Dr. Barry was posted to Canada where he was well respected for his fight to provide cleaner hospital facilities and better food for the working soldiers. An odd small “man” with little or no facial hair Dr. Barry was considered an eccentric. It would not be until death, when the body was being prepared for burial that it would be discovered that the renowned doctor was indeed a woman! It must have cause a stir in the Victorian society to have had the first “woman” doctor in the British Army!