Lena Angevine Warner

Lena Angevine Warner (1869-1948) was an American nurse and activist. She is sometimes referred to as the "Tennessee's pioneer nurse".

Warner founded the Tennessee Nurses Association and the Tennessee Health Association and was the first superintendent of nurses at City of Memphis Hospital.

She volunteered her services as a nurse in Cuba during the Spanish-American War where she was named Chief Executive Nurse. This made her the only female officer in the United States Army at the time.

Warner was a member of the research team that determined the role of mosquitos in the spread of Yellow Fever.

Early life and education
Warner was born in Grenada, Mississippi. Her immediate family died during the Yellow Fever epidemics of 1877 and 1878 after which she was raised by her grandmother.

Warner attended St. Mary’s Episcopal School in Memphis, Tennessee and was among the first students accepted at the Memphis Training School for Nurses (1887).

Career and research
When the Spanish-American War began in 1898, President McKinley called for volunteer nurses to help support efforts in Cuba due to numerous viruses such as cholera, malaria, smallpox, yellow fever, and bubonic plague all spreading across the country. Warner volunteered and was named Chief Executive Nurse of the island, resulting in her being the only female officer in the United States Army at the time.

Following the Spanish-American War, Warner was invited back to Cuba to support the yellow fever experiments alongside Dr. Walter Reed and other distinguished medical staff. The team determined that Yellow Fever was carried by the Aedes Aegypti mosquito.

After returning to Memphis, Tennessee, she founded the Tennessee Nurses Association and the Tennessee Health Association, organized Red Cross chapters, and served as the state chairperson for the Red Cross Nursing Department from 1910 to 1932.

In 1916, Warner moved to Knoxville to fight epidemics of influenza and cholera until her retirement in 1946 at 79.

Death
Warner is buried at Elmwood Cemetery in Memphis.