James Barry's birth date, parentage and childhood are not known to us. Barry was possibly born in Belfast, Ireland somewhere around 1795.
Barry enrolled as a medical student at Edinburgh University in 1810. After graduating, Barry entered the British army as a hospital assistant. In 1815 Barry was sent to Cape Town, South Africa to become physician to the governor of the colony. Dr. Barry became a very sought after physician in Cape Town; attending all the leading members of the colony. Barry was known to be a skilled doctor, a flirt with the ladies and hot tempered. The good doctor fought a duel against another officer and once stood trial for disobeying superiors. Barry proposed many reforms in Cape Town, including better sanitation and improved treatment of slaves.
Eventually Barry was sent to the British outpost of Mauritius, an island in the Indian Ocean. For the next thirty years Barry roamed the British empire attending to the sick and performing surgeries. Barry always traveled with a black male servant and a series of poodles, all of whom where named Psyche.
In 1857, Barry was sent to Canada as Inspector General. The cold northern climate did not agree with the doctor and in 1859, Barry retired and moved to London. Barry died during the summer of 1865 from dysentery. An army doctor briefly inspected the aged body and signed the death certificate. It wasn't until a woman was cleaning Barry's body that the secret was revealed.
Dr. James Barry was a WOMAN!
How in the world could a woman reach the ranks of Inspector General in the British army?! Especially at a time when women weren't allowed to even attend medical school. How could a woman serve in this capacity in the army for forty-six years without having her gender revealed?!
Looking back after her death, many of her fellow officers recalled certain eccentricities about Barry. Whenever Barry had to change, she made anyone sharing her bunk leave until she was finished. Another officer stated that it was generally assumed Barry was a hermaphrodite. Her sleeping quarters were always dark when her attending physician came to call about her health. The servant that she kept with her even claimed to not know she was a woman. Later on, after her death, a doctor and nurse that treated her for yellow fever in 1845 admitted they knew her secret but had promised not to tell anyone.
The army was not very forthcoming with an official statement about Barry. Since her parents were not known to anyone, no one knows Barry's real name. Some sources now state that the woman who brought her to Edinburgh University was her mother, Mary Ann Bulkly. Bulkly supposedly had a son and two daughters, one of whom disappeared around the time Barry enrolled in medical school. Another source states that Mary Ann Bulkly IS James Barry.
Her tombstone simply reads:
Dr. James Barry - Inspector General of Army Hospitals.
Women who Made a Difference - Malcolm Forbes
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