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Harriet Newton Phillips (1819-1901) is known as the first trained nurse in America. Harriet worked as a nurse during and after the Civil War, she served through community nursing and missionary work. Harriet was born on December 29, 1819, and died on August 29, 1901. There is little known about Harriet’s early life, in 1863 she joined the Western Sanitary Commission in St. Louis, Missouri where she joined the army as a nurse and was discharged in March of 1864. After being discharged she began taking night classes through the Female Medical College of the Women’s Hospital in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. These classes were inspired by the Society of Friends, Florence Nightingale, and Elizabeth Blackwell were meant to educate women about personal health and for the medical and nursing professions. Phillips was taught by Ann Preston and Emeline Cleveland during these classes. After a brief leave from the hospital, she returned as the head nurse and assisted in training the nurses and was later named the matron of the Women’s Hospital. She then left the hospital once again to provide mission work for Native Americans in Wisconsin. Phillips moved to San Francisco, California to work with the Chinese population, before returning to the Women’s Hospital in 1878. There she worked in postgraduate training for five years. For the later part of her life, she moved to Gladwyne, Pennsylvania with her niece Mary Egbert. Harriet Newton Phillips died at the age of 81 in Gladwyne. The title “first trained nurse in America” can be misconstrued for belonging to Linda Richards since she and Harriet were some of the first women to receive their nursing certificates and pursue postgraduate training. Due to the confusion between whether Harriet Newton Phillips or Linda Richards was the first trained nurse in America, there are no documented historical representations that acknowledge her of this title.

Family
Harriet Newton Phillips was born on December 29, 1819, in Pennsylvania. The identity of both of Harriet’s parents is unknown, but it is believed that they were also both born in Pennsylvania. Harriet also had at least one sister named Mary and a niece named Mary Egbert. There is very little information known about Harriet’s life until 1862.

Career
From October 1862 to November 1863, she worked at the General Hospital, Jefferson Barracks near St. Louis, Missouri, as a nurse. From there she reported as a nurse to the army at the Benton Barracks General Hospital in St. Louis. There is documentation of her being at the General Hospital 19 in Nashville, Tennessee, in February 1864. In March of 1864, she was released from the army and returned to Philadelphia, PA. There she took night classes from the Female Medical College of the Women’s Hospital educating Phillips on women’s health along with medicine and nursing health professions. She then moved to Wisconsin to do missionary work amongst the Ojibwe and Sioux tribes. From there she was employed at a San Francisco Presbyterian mission working with the Chinese, before returning to the Women’s Hospital to receive advanced training.

Women in nursing
Until the Civil War, very few women practiced medicine publicly, they often simply tended to sick or injured family members in their homes. Women were believed to not be able to handle the hardiness of the work and were unwilling to follow military etiquette. Due to the vast amount of sick and wounded soldiers in need of care due to the fighting, Dorothea Dix was appointed Superintendent of the Nurses for the Union Army. Her job was to help recruit and set the standard qualifications for women to become nurses in the Army. This led Marie Zakrewska, in 1862, to create a medical school for women in Boston, Massachusetts. This school was affiliated with her Hospital for Women and Children and in 1872 she began the first associated nursing school at the hospital.

Legacy
Even with the confusion between which woman was truly the first trained nurse in America does not take away from the acts of Harriet Newton Phillips. She was a nurse who worked to help the sick and wounded during the Civil War. She was one of the first women to receive a nursing certificate and pursue post-graduate work in America. She provided missionary work to two different minorities, the Native American tribes of Ojibwe and Sioux in Wisconsin and the Chinese in San Francisco. After, she returned to her home state and continued training and educating herself in advanced medical training.