Dulcie Mary PillersMMAA (17 August 1891 – 2 December 1961) was an English medical illustrator and a founding member of the Medical Artists' Association of Great Britain (MAA). The daughter of a Bristol solicitor, she completed her art training at Kensington Government School of Art, Berkeley Square, Clifton, Bristol, graduating in September 1911 with an Art Class Teachers' Certificate.
In the 1920s, she was a member of the Bristol Venture Club, one of the first women's classification clubs. She was also a good amateur golfer and a member of the Bristol and Clifton golf club. In later life, she lived with her mother and sister, Irene Dorothy, a former inspector for the Board of Trade. She died at a nursing home in Stoke Bishop, Bristol, close to Sneyd Park. In 1989, her artwork, including ink drawings and colour illustrations of orthopaedic surgery, was exhibited at the British Orthopaedic Association conference. In 2013, her niece donated her artwork to the Royal College of Surgeons of England.
Early life
Dulcie Mary was born on 17August 1891,[1] at Glen Gariff, Chesterfield Road, StAndrew's, Bristol,[2] the second daughter of Ernest James Pillers and Elizabeth Scott, née Webb.[3][a] Elizabeth Scott was the daughter of Robert Barrett Webb,[3] a former partner in Laverton & Co, furnishers and upholsterers,[5] at Corn Street and Mary le Port Street in Bristol.[6][b] Ernest James was a Bristol solicitor and the son of a hop merchant. They had married on 4September 1889 at St Werburgh's Church, Bristol.[3][c]
Pillers' father had a troubled career as a solicitor in Bristol. In 1898, he was charged with forging shares in the Fishponds and Bedminster Brick and Tile Company and obtaining transfer deeds by false pretences,[14] though the case was settled the following year.[15] In 1905, his firm at StStephen's Chambers, Baldwin Street, Bristol, was embezzled by a shorthand clerk.[16] Subsequently, on 15March 1905, a creditor petitioned for bankruptcy, and he was made bankrupt on 19May 1905.[17] He had been suffering from a long and painful illness,[18] and for this reason, his public examination on 2June 1905 was postponed.[19] He died only a few days later on 4 June 1905(1905-06-04) (aged 41),[20] at 16Withleigh Road, Knowle, Bristol.[18] His funeral was held at Arnos Vale Cemetery in the afternoon of the 7June 1905.[20]
Pillers' father, Ernest James
After her father's death, the family moved from Withleigh Road to live with Pillers' maternal grandparents, the Webbs, at 20Belgrave Road, Tyndalls Park.[4]: 456–457 In 1906, Pillers began corresponding with the "Children's Corner" section in the Bristol Times and Mirror,[21] that was edited by Florence Beatrice Hawkins, néeBird.[22][d] She entered the puzzle and painting competitions in that section, coming second in March 1907 for her "charming watercolour seascape, with softly coloured cliffs and brown rocks; also another clever painting of three kittens, and a third of a bunch of violets."[24]
The former Kensington Government School of Art building at 31 Berkeley Square, Clifton, Bristol
Pillers was educated at Kensington Government School of Art, known occasionally as "Kensington House School of Art",[38] 31Berkeley Square, Clifton, Bristol.[39][g] The school was founded in 1890 by John Fisher,[41] with the objective of providing a grounding in drawing, sculpture, and design, for professional artists, designers, craftsmen, and art teachers. The school offered courses in artistic anatomy, architecture, decorative design, modelling, figure composition, and painting. There was also an annual exhibition of students' work.[42] William Stuart Vernon Stock, an anaesthetist at the 2nd Southern General Hospital in 1908,[43] was honorary lecturer in anatomy at the school.[42][h]
Pillers took courses in:
1908 (1908): Drawing an ornament from a photograph; drawing in light and shade of an ornament from a cast; memory drawing of a plant form.[38]
1911 (1911): Shaded drawing from a group of models; geometrical problems worked in ink.[46]
She graduated from the school in September 1911, aged 20, with an Art Class Teachers' Certificate.[46] At the end of July 1914, the school closed and moved to new premises at Broad Weir, Bristol,[47] to form the Municipal School of Industrial Art.[48] In December 1921, John Fisher retired through ill health,[49] and a year later, the school was closed permanently because of dwindling pupil numbers and escalating costs.[50]
Career
A railway porter, admitted to Southmead Hospital on 15March 1920, with inoperable cancer of the lower jaw. The image on the left shows the patient prior to treatment with Pituitrin. Described by Robert Henry Norgate.[51]
Method of inlay grafting for a gap fracture of the tibia. An aluminium template is nailed to the periosteum to guide the saw. Described by HeyGroves.[52]
Examples of medical illustrations by Pillers
See § Publications for details of Pillers' medical illustrations
By 1918, Pillers was employed as a secretary and medical illustrator to Ernest William HeyGroves,[53] a well-known orthopaedic surgeon.[4]: 457 [i] He was commissioned captain in the Royal Army Medical Corps in World War I,[55]: 138 serving for a year at the surgical division of a general hospital in Alexandria, Egypt.[56]: 93 In 1917, Sir Robert Jones, Inspector of Military Orthopaedics,[55]: 138 recommended that he take charge of the military orthopaedic centre at Beaufort War Hospital in Stapleton, Bristol.[57][j] The war was one of the most destructive conflicts in human history, leaving over 750thousand British troops dead with 1.6million injured, the majority with orthopaedic injuries.[58]: 12 At least half the patients arriving at Beaufort had compound fractures caused by shrapnel and gunshot wounds.[57] HeyGroves experimented with grafts and pins to stabilise the fractures and used medical illustrators to record the operations. At the time, photography was unable show enough detail of the interior of the body to be of use to surgeons.[4]: 459 Conversely, photography was used extensively for medical records, slides, and book illustration.[59]: 56
HeyGroves wrote several standard textbooks on surgery for students and nurses, but before 1915, they contained few illustrations.[4]: 457 [k] His 1915 book, Gunshot Injuries of Bones, was illustrated by Lucy Marion Joll, known as Marion Joll, the younger sister of Cecil Augustus Joll,[60] who had proofread the book.[61]: Preface [l] From January 1916, Cecil Gwendolen StLeger Russell worked with HeyGroves at Beaufort and Southmead Hospital as a "surgical draughtswoman",[67] illustrating his 1918 paper on the treatment of gunshot injuries to bone.[68][m] Pillers, with Russell, illustrated HeyGroves's first post-armistice paper, "The Crucial Ligaments of the Knee‑joint", published in the January 1919 edition of the British Journal of Surgery.[69] In December 1918, Russell married Niel Charles Trew, an American physician, born in Toronto,[70] who had worked at Beaufort during the war.[71][n] In March 1919, the Trews left Bristol for New York, and in consequence, Pillers became the sole medical illustrator to HeyGroves.[70]
After the war, Pillers completed numerous pen and watercolour illustrations of bone-grafting operations.[4]: 458 In 1920, with Alexander Kirkpatrick Maxwell, she illustrated Arthur Rendle Short's book on physiology.[72] She contributed to a number of papers on rheumatic and coronary artery diseases by Carey Coombs,[73] including the 1926 Long Fox Memorial Lecture.[74][o] In 1933, HeyGroves retired from the consulting staff of Bristol General Hospital and the University of Bristol medical school.[76]: 166 In the same year, Percy Phillips was appointed medical superintendent of Southmead Hospital,[77] with Pillers also working there.[78] She continued to contribute to her colleague's medical papers, including sketches of bone cross-sections, that exhibited the typical features of renal rickets.[79]
I have to express my grateful thanks to Miss Pillers for the care and skill she has bestowed upon the preparation of the illustrations, which form, I think, its most valuable feature.
HeyGroves died on 22October 1944,[80] and in recognition of Pillers' "long and devoted service", he left her his casebooks and copyright in Synopsis of Surgery.[53] In 1945, the book was updated and edited by Sir Cecil Wakeley, with Pillers contributing new illustrations, and republished as the twelfth edition.[81] On 2April 1949, she attended the founding meeting of the Medical Artists' Association of Great Britain at Nunnery Close, Upper Wolvercote, Oxford, the then home of Audrey Arnott and Margaret McLarty. Also present, amongst others, were Zita Blackburn and Dorothy Davison, elected honorary secretary and treasurer respectively, and David Tompsett, assistant prosector at the Royal College of Surgeons of England, who was elected chairman. At the following meeting in July 1950, it was agreed that those who had attended the first meeting would become founding members of the association.[59]: 59
Personal life
In the 1920s, Pillers was a member of the Bristol Venture Club, one of the first women's classification clubs,[82]: 34 and was registered in the club's records as an "anatomical artist".[83][p] She was an active participant in the club's membership committee and charitable activities.[84][85] However, in 1930, the club merged with the Soroptimist volunteer movement,[82]: 61 and she allowed her membership to lapse.[83] In the 1930s, she lived at 24Goldney Road in Clifton,[86] and along with HeyGroves,[54] was a member of the Bristol and Clifton golf club.[87] She won a number of club medals at monthly competitions,[87] off an improving handicap of 25.[88][q]
Pillers' home at Goldney Road was damaged during the Bristol Blitz,[91] and by July 1941, she had moved to Kimbolton House, 2Mount Beacon in Lansdown, Bath,[92] close to the then Lansdown Grove Hospital, and now known as Haygarth Court.[93][r] In 1943, she returned to Clifton to live with her sister at Eaton Villa in Clifton Down.[36][97] She never married; nineper cent of all British men under the age of forty-five died during World War I. While many women remained unmarried due to the lack of available men, some women in this period remained single by choice or by financial necessity. Furthermore, vocational careers, such as medicine, were opening up to women, but only if they remained unmarried.[98]
Death and legacy
Dulcie Mary Pillers Place forms part of a housing estate in Lockleaze, Bristol
Pillers' mother died on 9 April 1960(1960-04-09) (aged 96) at Downleaze Nursing Home,[99] 9Downleaze, Stoke Bishop, Bristol, close to Sneyd Park.[100] Pillers died after a long illness at the same nursing home on 2 December 1961(1961-12-02) (aged 70).[101] Her funeral was held at Canford Cemetery, Westbury-on-Trym, and her remains were later cremated.[102] Her estate was administered by her niece,[103] Elizabeth Mary Marrian (known as "Biddy"), néeKingsley Pillers,[104] the only child of Pillers' brother, Robert Kingsley.[105] Marrian was a qualified doctor, a former research fellow at the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center,[106] and until her retirement, director of medical studies at Girton College, Cambridge.[105][s]
In 1989, Pillers' artwork, including ink drawings and colour illustrations of orthopaedic surgery, was exhibited at the British Orthopaedic Association conference.[4]: 462 In 2013, Marrian donated around twenty-five illustrations by Pillers to the archives of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. In February 2015, Gordon Bannister, professor of orthopaedic surgery at the University of Bristol, presented a further seventy-five illustrations to the same archives.[107][t] In the same year, her life and career was chronicled by Samuel Alberti, then director of museums and archives at the Royal College of Surgeons of England (which includes the Hunterian Museum).[109] On 11March 2015, he presented this research to the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh, as part of a series of seminars organised by the Edinburgh History of Medicine Group.[110] In May 2015, he made a related presentation of her work to the Hunterian Society, at the Medical Society of London, entitled Watercolour, Woodcut and Wax: Medical Illustrations since Hunter.[111]
The majority of the cruciate ligament illustrations were drawn by Pillers. It was HeyGroves's first post-armistice paper: It is now considered to be one of the classic works of orthopaedic literature.[112]
Figure 12 illustrates a method of inlay grafting for a gap fracture of the tibia. An aluminium template is nailed to the periosteum to guide the saw. Figure 14 shows a moulded splint that fixes the arm to the body before and after bone-grafting of the humerus.
See illustrations on pages 664, 670, 672, 683, 694, and 705. See page 666 for a diagram of a step-cut operation on an ununited humerus by Cecil Gwendolen Trew.
Illustrations of various methods of treating bone cavities due to discharging sinuses. The principal method is that in which the cavity is filled with a pedunculated muscle flap.[113]
See illustrations on pages 314, 353, and 360. Includes the essay on bone grafting by HeyGroves that won the Jacksonian prize of the Royal College of Surgeons of England.
Ernest William Hey Groves, John Matthew Fortescue‑Brickdale, and John Alexander Nixon
Book
Amongst other drawings, page 283 illustrates a typical humerus extension splint, and the wrong and the right way of bandaging a fractured elbow. The medical section was revised by John Alexander Nixon, professor of medicine at the University of Bristol until his retirement in 1935.[114][115]
Davis, Oliver Charles Minty; Phillips, Percy (January 1937). Knight, Edward (ed.). "Some Observations on Physical Stigmata". The Clinical Journal. 66. London: H. K. Lewis & Co. Ltd.: 29–32. ISSN0366-6743. OCLC10995429.
— (January 1922) [First published 1916]. On Modern Methods of Treating Fractures (2nd ed.). New York: William Wood and Company. pp. 1–435. hdl:2027/mdp.39015076989451. OCLC9780894.
— (March 1945) [First published 1908]. Wakeley, Cecil Pembrey Grey (ed.). Synopsis of Surgery (12th ed.). Bristol: John Wright and Sons. pp. 1–632. OCLC11979926. Retrieved 4 February 2021. Note, the title link does open the illustrated 12th edition, and not the 6th edition (1922) that is stated in the archive.org record i.e. the archive.org record is incorrect.
Hey Groves, Fortescue‑Brickdale, and Nixon
Hey Groves, Ernest William; Fortescue‑Brickdale, John Matthew; Nixon, John Alexander (November 1930). Milford, Humphrey Sumner (ed.). Textbook for Nurses: Anatomy, Physiology, Surgery and Medicine. Oxford Medical Publications (4th ed.). London: Oxford University Press. OCLC26775942.
^Some sources name Pillers as "Dulcibel", as noted in the 1911 Census.[4]: 456–457 However, all other records, such as birth, newspaper reports, academic papers, death, and probate, name her "Dulcie".
^In July 1903, Webb patented a rotating bookcase where the top and base remain stationary.[7]
^Elizabeth Scott Webb's brother, Herbert Barrett Webb,[3] married Annie Hester Wise in 1895.[8] Annie Hester was the elder sister of Beatrice Ethel Wise,[9] the founder of the first Girl Scoutpatrol at Brislington.[10][11] Pillers attended Wise's funeral at Brislington Congregational Church, now the Brislington United Reformed Church,[12] on 23June 1944.[13]
^Hawkins was known as "Uncle Jack" and was the first female journalist to have been appointed an MBE.[23]
^7 Unity Street was then the main building of the Merchant Venturers' technical college.[28]
^William Morgan was professor of automobile engineering at the University of Bristol and a former research engineer at Daimler Motor Car Company. His research assistant, Edmund Baddeley Wood, was educated at Eton and the University of Cambridge, and was a researcher at the University of Birmingham and an engineer at Daimler.[28] Robert Kingsley Pillers studied under Morgan in 1910 and spoke at Morgan's retirement presentation in June 1936.[29]
^As at 2024, 31Berkeley Square is still used as an arts and media space.[40]
^Jones and HeyGroves were good friends, with a shared interest in bone surgery, and Jones visited him many times in Bristol.[56]: 93
^HeyGroves edited the British Journal of Surgery for twenty-seven years.[54] For this work the Royal College of Surgeons awarded HeyGroves a Hunterian Professorship in 1914 and the Jacksonian Prize in 1916.[54] His early work anticipated much that followed in the field of orthopaedic surgery.[56]: 93
^Marion Joll had been a student at the Kensington Government School of Art at the same time as Pillers,[46] but left Bristol in 1916, to establish a photography business with Kathleen Chivers,[62] known as "Chip",[63] in Bath, Somerset.[64] Their photographic studio was known as Chivers & Joll and had premises at 1 Seymour Street, near Bath Green Park railway station,[65] and later, at 33 Milsom Street, Bath.[66]
^In general, classification followed the Rotary International principle that member classes were determined by the services they provided to society and not by the position they held.[82]: 24 Example membership classifications were "school mistress", "florist", and "chemist".[83]
^Pillers' colleague, Norman Lloyd Price (she had illustrated his 1937 paper Renal Rickets), the deputy medical registrar at Southmead Hospital, was also a member of the club.[89] He was a skilled player with a handicap of 18, sometimes called a "bogey golfer", meaning he averaged a bogey, or one shot above par, per hole.[90]
^Kimbolton House was owned at the time by Francis Camm Bennett,[94][95] a medical electrician and a founder of the Russell Institute of Medical Electricity at 23Marlborough Buildings, Bath.[96]
^On 4June 2024, two watercolours from Pillers' later work were sold at an auction in Exmouth, Devon. Dated 1951, they illustrated abdominal operations on two infants.[108]
^
Brooke, Gerry (14 June 2010). "Guiding light for girls". Evening Post. Bristol. p. 1. OCLC31282566. ProQuest375511264. As a major exhibition opens at the Bristol Record Office, Gerry Brooke looks back on the history of the local Girl Guide movement as it celebrates its centenary year 'The Girl Guides helped out wherever they were needed'.
^
Morgan, William; Wood, Edmund Baddeley (22 October 1910). Staner, Herbert Walter (ed.). "The Limit Carburetter". Autocar. Vol. 25, no. 783. London: Iliffe and Sons. p. 553. ISSN0005-092X. OCLC2445167.
^ ab
Fisher, John (September 1903). "Committee of Management. Object of the School". Prospectus for the Kensington Government School of Art at Berkeley Square, Clifton, Bristol. Bristol: Bristol Education Committee. pp. 1–2.; "Local News. Kensington School of Art, Berkeley Square". Bristol Times and Mirror. 17 September 1903. p. 5. OCLC2252826. Retrieved 4 February 2021 – via British Newspaper Archive.
^
Clarke, Suzanne (2006). "1923–1938"(PDF). History of the Clifton Arts Club 1906–2006 (Booklet) (2nd ed.). Clifton: Clifton Arts. p. 11. Archived(PDF) from the original on 19 May 2021. Retrieved 21 September 2021. Centenary of the club
^ abc"Cecil G. Trew (1897–1958)". bobforrestweb.co.uk. Prestwich: Bob Forrest. 18 August 2013. Archived from the original on 22 February 2021. Retrieved 22 February 2021.
^ abc
Badger, Jane (2021). "Cecil G Trew". www.janebadgerbooks-oldsite.co.uk. Kettering: Jane Badger Books. Archived from the original on 23 February 2021. Retrieved 23 February 2021.
^ abc
Bristol Venture Club. "Lists of members 1931 to 1969" (February 1931). Soroptimist International of Bristol (Soroptimists), Series: Membership other, ID: 31642/14/a, p. 4. Bristol: Bristol Archives. Retrieved 30 May 2021.
^
Samuel, E. W. "Attendance committee minutes" (1 October 1928). Soroptimist International of Bristol (Soroptimists), Series: Membership committee, ID: 31642/3/a. Bristol: Bristol Archives. Retrieved 30 May 2021.
^
Button, Eustace Harry. "Rebuild 24 and 26 Goldney Road, Clifton" (14 May 1947). Building plans and indices of the City Planning Officer, Series: Volume of building plans deposited, ID: Building plan/Volume 200/10p. Bristol: Bristol Archives. Retrieved 24 May 2021.
^
Marrian and David Johnstone & Co (2 June 1961). First Codicil to the Last Will and Testament of Dulcie Mary Pillers (Codicil). Alfred Ernest Harding, Kenneth Ivor Trotman, and Elizabeth Mary Marrian. Bristol: Probate Service. p. 2. D104.
^
Foulds, Gordon Sutcliffe (September 1921). de Tarnowsky, George (ed.). "Surgery of the Bones, Joints, Muscles, Tendons, etc". International Abstract of Surgery. July to December 1921. 33. Clinical Congress of Surgeons of North America. Chicago: The Surgical Publishing Company: 213–214. OCLC50367380. Retrieved 27 April 2021.
Archer, Patricia Margaret Alice (1998). "Membership of the MAA"(PDF). A history of the Medical Artists' Association of Great Britain 1949‑1997 (DPhil). London: University College London. pp. 165–202. OCLC45043825. Thesis number DX 207840. Archived(PDF) from the original on 11 April 2021. Retrieved 11 April 2021.
Trew, Cecil Gwendolen (1947). What Are You Doing Here? Being the adventures of a surgical artist with the British Liberation Army (BLA). Edinburgh: International Publishing Company. OCLC9907114. b18048134 Wellcome Collection. Mrs. C. G. Ehrenborg.
Doctors and surgeons at the Beaufort War Hospital in 1918, in the collections of the Glenside Museum. Pillers (front, second right), is photographed with HeyGroves (front, centre), and Cecil Gwendolen StLeger Russell (front, second left). Russell's first husband, Niel Charles Trew, is also pictured (back, first left).
Watercolour, Woodcut and Wax, medical illustration around 1900, as part of the Edinburgh History of Medicine Group seminar series. Presented by Samuel Alberti, to the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh, 9 Queen Street, Edinburgh, on 11 March 2015. Pillers' work is discussed in the video of the presentation at 32 minutes 34 seconds.
Official website of the Medical Artists' Association of Great Britain.
