Cicely Joan Whittington CBE (21 January 1907 – 23 March 1980)''England & Wales, Civil Registration Death Index, 1916-2007'' was an English Red Cross aid worker.

Work during WWII

Whittington joined the Red Cross in 1928. At the start of World War II, aged 32, she became a voluntary nursing assistant and was sent to

Cairo, Egypt Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the largest urban agglomeration in Africa, the Arab world and the Middle East: The Greater Cairo metro ...

. During the war, she also worked in Tripoli, Libya, Italy, and Greece.

Post-war achievements

After the war, Whittington began to work on expanding the Red Cross' overseas operations, setting up new branches and continuing her work in Kenya, Uganda, Borneo,

Fiji Fiji ( , ,; fj, Viti, ; Fiji Hindi: फ़िजी, ''Fijī''), officially the Republic of Fiji, is an island country in Melanesia, part of Oceania in the South Pacific Ocean. It lies about north-northeast of New Zealand. Fiji consists ...

, the

Caribbean The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean Se ...

, and the United States. She eventually rose to become the Red Cross' Director of Overseas Branches. Whittington was also a magistrate and Chairman of the Bench in

Oxfordshire Oxfordshire is a ceremonial and non-metropolitan county in the north west of South East England. It is a mainly rural county, with its largest settlement being the city of Oxford. The county is a centre of research and development, primarily ...

, and was active in the

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movement. Whittington was successively made a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE; 1945),

Officer of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

(OBE; 1955) and Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE; 1963). She also held the Red Cross' Badge of Honour Class 1, its highest award. After her retirement, Whittington appeared as a castaway on the BBC Radio programme '' Desert Island Discs'' on 31 October 1970. Whittington died in

Henley, Oxfordshire Henley-on-Thames ( ) is a town and civil parish on the River Thames in Oxfordshire, England, northeast of Reading, west of Maidenhead, southeast of Oxford and west of London (by road), near the tripoint of Oxfordshire, Berkshire and ...

, aged 73. The

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she used in World War II is on display at the

Imperial War Museum Imperial War Museums (IWM) is a British national museum organisation with branches at five locations in England, three of which are in London. Founded as the Imperial War Museum in 1917, the museum was intended to record the civil and military ...

in London.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Whittington, Joan 1907 births 1980 deaths Red Cross personnel English nurses Commanders of the Order of the British Empire People from Godstone