Context:

James Barry (born Margaret Anne Bulkley, or Bulkeley;\7])#citenote-9)[\8])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-:0-10) c. 1789[\a])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-birthdate-6) – 25 July 1865) was a military surgeon in the British Army. Originally from the city of Cork) in Ireland, Barry obtained a medical degree from the University of Edinburgh Medical School, then served first in Cape Town, South Africa, and subsequently in many parts of the British Empire. Before retirement, Barry had risen to the rank of Inspector General (equivalent to Brigadier)) in charge of military hospitals, the second-highest medical office in the British Army. He[\c])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-11) improved conditions not only for wounded soldiers, but also for the native inhabitants. Barry performed the first recorded caesarean section by a European in Africa in which both the mother and child survived the surgery.[\9])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#cite_note-New_Scientist-12)

Barry, who lived his entire adult life as a man, was named Margaret Anne at birth and was known as female in childhood.\10])#citenote-BBCNews-13) Barry lived as a man in both public and private life, at least in part, in order to be accepted as a university student, and to pursue a career as a surgeon. His anatomy became known to the public and to military colleagues only after his death.[\9])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#cite_note-New_Scientist-12)

Wherever Barry served across the British Empire, improvements were made to sanitary conditions and the conditions and diet of both the common soldier and other under-represented groups. He was outraged by unnecessary suffering, and took a heavy-handed and sometimes tactless approach to demanding improvements for the poor and underprivileged which often incited anger from officials and military officers; on several occasions he was both arrested and demoted for the extremity of this behaviour. He held strict views about nutrition, being completely vegetarian and teetotal, and, while keeping most personal relationships distant, was very fond of pets, particularly a beloved poodle named Psyche.\45])#citenote-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield2016pp._251,_252_citing_Bradford,_Edward,'The_Reputed_Female_Army_Surgeon',_The_Medical_Times_and_Gazette_vol._II_for_1865,_p._293.-49)

Death

Despite protesting against the decision, Barry was forcefully retired by the army on 19 July 1859 because of ill health and old age, and was succeeded as inspector general of hospitals by David Dumbreck.\52])#citenote-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield2016364–365-56)[\53])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-57) After a quiet retirement in London, Barry died from dysentery on 25 July 1865.[\54])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield2016371–374-58) The identity of the woman who discovered the truth of his physical sex is disputed, but she was probably a charwoman who also laid out the dead.[\55])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield2016390–391-59) The charwoman, after failing to elicit payment for her services, sought redress in another way; she visited Barry's physician, Major D. R. McKinnon, who had issued the death certificate upon which Barry was identified as male. The woman claimed that his body had been biologically female and had marks suggesting he had at one point borne a child.[\56])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield2016378–379-60) However, no professional examination was carried out which could have confirmed these points beyond doubt.[\57])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-:2-61)[\58])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-62) When McKinnon refused to pay her, she took the story to the press, and the situation became public. It was discussed in an exchange of letters between George Graham of the General Register Office, and McKinnon.[\59])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#cite_note-FOOTNOTEKubbaYoung2001354–355-63)

After the matter was made public, some people claimed to have known of it all along,\61])#citenote-65) although many who had known him expressed surprise[\62])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-66)[\63])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-67)[\64])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-68) or even disbelief.[\57])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-:2-61)[\65])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-69) The British Army, seeking to suppress the story, sealed Barry's service records for the next 100 years.[\9])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-New_Scientist-12)\)dubious – discuss#Dubious)\) The historian Isobel Rae gained access to the army records in the 1950s, and concluded that the painter James Barry was indeed Barry's uncle.[\66])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-sm20081230-70) Barry was buried in Kensal Green Cemetery, with a Portland stone headstone inscribed Dr James Barry Inspector General of Hospitals.[\67])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-71) It was claimed by several sources that "John", the manservant who always attended Barry, returned to Jamaica, but his actual fate is unknown.[\68])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#cite_note-72)

Gender and personal life

In a letter chiding John Bulkley, Barry's older brother, for abandoning legal studies for the military, 19-year-old Barry wrote: "Was I not a girl I would be a Soldier!"\69])#cite_note-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield201650-73)

Rachel Holmes notes in her biography of Barry that Mary Anne Bulkley, in all her complaints to her brother about her child's precarious future, never once raised the question of marriage – even though a good match was then quite vital for a woman's financial security. Holmes suggests this could mean Mrs Bulkley was aware of "some defect in her daughter that made marriage an impossibility".\70])#cite_note-74)

Barry's interest in medicine was probably encouraged by the liberal-minded friends of the late James Barry RA, and just before travelling to Edinburgh to enroll as a medical student in 1809, he assumed a male identity.\71])#citenote-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield201651,_59-75) His short stature, slight build, unbroken voice, delicate features and smooth skin led others to suspect that he was not a man but a pre-pubescent boy.[\72])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield201675,_76-76) This identity was maintained through surgical training and recruitment into the British Army which, at officer rank level, did not then require a medical examination.[\73])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#cite_note-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield2016101-77)

Despite efforts to appear masculine, witness reports comment on Barry's effeminacy\76])#citenote-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield2016125-80) and on a somewhat contradictory reputation – he had a reputation for being tactless, impatient, argumentative and opinionated,[\45])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield2016pp._251,_252_citing_Bradford,_Edward,'TheReputed_Female_Army_Surgeon',_The_Medical_Times_and_Gazette_vol._II_for_1865,_p._293.-49) but was also considered to have had a good bedside manner and famous professional skill.[\4])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-ondb-4) His temper and bravado led to a famous pistol duel with Captain Josias Cloete of the 21st Light Dragoons. Barry's aim was better, the bullet striking Cloete's shako military cap and removing its peak, which dissipated its force.[\77])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#cite_note-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield2016155–159-81)

Intersex controversy

Kubba and Young picked up on Major McKinnon's statement that he did not know whether Barry was "male, female, or hermaphrodite" and suggested that it might be more appropriate to say that Barry was "hermaphrodite" [or intersex] rather than "female", and "may have had ambiguous genitalia". These suppositions are based on the premise that "Concealment of one's sex for ... 40 years in the British Army, is simply unbelievable".\82])#citenote-FOOTNOTEKubbaYoung2001355-87) However, du Preez and Dronfield show how Barry might have been able to conceal this secret from all but a few people, and those who did know did not reveal it while he was alive.[\83])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-FOOTNOTEdu_PreezDronfield2016-88) N. Turner has commented on Kubba and Young's conclusion that the belief in an intersex condition was based on "vanishingly slim evidence".[\84])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-turner-89) Holmes also raises the possibility of Barry being intersex, but acknowledges the impossibility of knowing, expressing surprise that this is a problem for so many people. The suggestion that he may have been intersex has been criticised for both biological and social reasons.[\85])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#citenote-FOOTNOTEHolmes2003-90) In a review of Holmes's biography, Loudon firmly rejects the implication that Barry might have been intersex.[\81])](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Barry(surgeon)#cite_note-FOOTNOTELoudon2002-86)

Regarding the intersex theory, one biographer wrote, "Dr. Barry couldn't have been a woman, for women and medicine were contradictory terms ... it was still too much to imagine that any female could perform as brilliantly as Dr. Barry had done."\86])#cite_note-FOOTNOTEHacker2001-91)

submitted by /u/PresterJohnson
[link] [comments]