Roy Pesterfield

Roy joined the Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC) in September 1959 when aged 15 years old and started his full military service and nurse training in 1962 at Cambridge Military Hospital in Aldershot. Although the Queen Alexandra’s Royal Army Nursing Corps (QARANC) was flourishing, all male nurses had to serve as part of the RAMC as the QARANC was a female only corps since its establishment in 1902 until 1992 when male nurses were transferred across.

Roy qualified as an Army Trained Nurse in 1965 which was followed by registration with the General Nursing Council as a State Registered Nurse in 1966, just 15 years after male nurses were allowed to join the professional register.

After qualifying, Roy was posted to the British Military Hospital in Rinteln, West Germany where he worked for 6 years providing healthcare for both the troops and their families.  Here Roy met his wife, Lynda who was working as a QARANC, needed a leg wound suturing!  In 1972 Roy was posted back to the UK to run various services at the Royal Herbert Hospital, Canterbury, Beaconsfield, Northern Ireland and then the newly built Queen Elizabeth Military Hospital which replaced the aging Royal Herbert.

1980 saw a posting to the Sennybridge in Wales, used to train troops for operations such as the Falklands War where the hostile weather would be similar to those in the South Atlantic, so Roy dealt with conditions such as trench foot!  After 2 years in Wales, Roy returned to the Cambridge Military Hospital until he retired from the Army with 25 years service to army nursing.

Life after the Army saw Roy take up a nursing role in Maidstone where he found his love for Elderly Medicine and took up roles managing residential homes until they were closed by the council.  Roy completed his career as the manager of a private nursing home until ill health cut his nursing career short.