Isobel Dodds, René Shadbolt, and Millicent Sharples, who were sent to Spain during the Spanish Civil War.
The Spanish Aid Medical Committee recruited these three nurses as the only organized contingent from New Zealand. They arrived in Spain on July 15th, 1937, and first worked in a large makeshift hospital in Huete (central Spain) run by the International Brigade.
Shadbolt (33yrs) was the head sister of Auckland Hospital's casualty ward, and she was appointed to lead the group. Dodds (22yrs) was a staff nurse from Wellington Hospital, and Sharples (46yrs) worked at a private hospital in Levin.
During the war, these three nurses were an important promotional tool for the SMAC, who used their photos on posters, and printed their letters home in newspapers and in SMAC's own newsletter.
Shadbolt and Dodds returned to New Zealand in January 1939, and continued to work for the SMAC. They did a 6-week speaking tour to raise awareness and money for the many Republican refugees in France.
