| Marjory Cockburn |
 Marjory Cockburn was born in 1927, the third of five children of a hospital administrator in Rugby. Wanting to work with people
when she left school, Marjory Cockburn’s career has included a variety of nurse training: orthopaedic nursing at Nuffield
Orthopaedic Centre, Oxford; general nursing at King’s College Hospital, London; midwifery at Nuffield Maternity Centre, Oxford;
and finally health visiting in Oxford. However, after several years working in this country, Marjory Cockburn felt drawn to
the mission field, and was sent to Nigeria by the Church Missionary Society in 1961, where she spent the next twelve years.
She had first encountered talk of hospice through Tom West who attended the same mission college. Later, whilst pondering
her future abroad after several bouts of illness, Marjory Cockburn read an article by Eileen Mann on St Luke’s Hospice, Sheffield,
in the Journal of the Orthopaedic Centre in Oxford. Marjory Cockburn felt ‘hospice’ would be preferable to working in the
NHS, and contacted Eileen Mann. Marjory Cockburn began as Administrative Sister at St Luke’s in 1974, rising to Assistant
Matron, and Matron after the departure of Eileen Mann in 1976. The interview discusses the development of day care, home care
and the training of district nurses, the selection and support of nursing staff and staff ratios, the changing length of stay
of patients, and finally her trip to the USA, and spiritual aspects of care.
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| Interview conducted by David Clark, 17 January 1997 |
| Interview Duration: 2 hours, 3 minutes |
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