Una Mae Arnold

Una Mae Arnold was born in 1897 in Weakley County, Tennessee. She was orphaned at an early age and graduated from the Kentucky Female Orphan School in Louisville on 27 May 1916.[1] She served as a nurse during World War I.

Arnold was one of 18 women to graduate from Nursing School at Baptist Memorial Hospital in Memphis Tennessee on 12 June 1921.[2]  She worked at the Veteran’s Hospital in Memphis and later transferred to the Veteran’s Hospital at Ft. Bayard, New Mexico.  She was the first war nurse to be adopted by the American Legion Auxiliary of Davenport, Iowa.  Upon learning that she was hospitalized after suffering from “a complete break down” and not expected to recover, the group had sent “little luxuries which helped make her last days more pleasant.”[3]

Arnold died on 13 February 1930 at the hospital at Ft. Bayard. The clinical director of the hospital, Dr. S.J. Mann, wrote to family that she “passed away quietly and peacefully,” and that she “had many sincere friends here and there was a large number present at the funeral.”