The Nurse's Clock

Many years ago, in the 1930s, a young woman left her (Victorian) country home and set out for Melbourne to become a nurse.

Her family was very proud of their daughter and sister and presented her with  a leather-encased travel clock to have with her in her new place of residence.

They had her initials embossed on the clock’s leather casing:  “I.L.B.” for Iva Lillico Blackwell.

Journeying to Melbourne, (seemingly so far away in those days) she left behind a fiancé, who promised to stay true and with whom she corresponded by letter as they planned for their wedding day.

Sadly, the young nurse contracted a virulent disease from the big city hospital where she was working. At first the doctors thought she would recover, but Iva ‘took a turn for the worse’, succumbed to the dreadful illness and died, leaving her family and fiancé bereft.

Her little clock has been in my possession for many years and now I have made the difficult decision to sell it.

How could I?  

Perhaps I’ll think it through again, first.