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Tel. 0117 973 8168
2 Westbury Park
Bristol BS6 7JB
EnglandSecretary, Korea Desk
American Friends Service Committee
Philadelphia21 June 2001
Dear Friend,
Re. Friends Service Unit Korea 1953 - 1957
My wife, Jean, and I worked for the Friends Service Unit in Kunsan from March 24, 1954 until July 24, 1956, and were employed by the Friends Service Council in London from January 1, 1954 until September 30, 1956.
Jean was asked to organise and run a Nurse Aide Training School in the Kunsan Provincial Hospital sponsored by the United Nations Reconstruction Agency (UNKRA). She ran this successfully with the help of a refugee Korean schoolteacher from North Korea employed by AFSC, Augustine J.R. Kang, (Dan to us). After we left Korea Dan started Credit Unions to help farmers in Cholla Pukto, the region around Kunsan, who were troubled by spiralling debt. He was thrown into prison as a suspected communist, but later released. He went on to establish Credit Unions all over South Korea, and later still around the world. He finished up working for the World Association of Credit Unions at their Headquarters in Madison Wisconsin, where he now lives in retirement.
Some of the Student Nurses trained by Jean and Dan in Kunsan have kept in touch with Jean, most notably Miss Choi Pil Yae who devoted herself to the plight of Korean orphans and worked for their adoption, and Miss Cho Shin Ja who worked for the Red Cross and settled in Germany. Cho Shin Ja pioneered the development of intensive care nursing for the neuro-surgery department at the University of Bocchum in West Germany. She retired in 1999 at the age of 60.
After her retirement Cho Shin Ja was keen to improve her knowledge of English and attend International Conferences on Nursing. I used my influence as Quaker Chaplain to Bristol University to get Cho Shin Ja on an English course at Trinity College, Bristol, and she stayed with us throughout the course. When she returned to Germany she' was given the highest public award that Germany can bestow for services to the Nation by the President of the German Republic in the Town Hall at Bocchum. In thanking the President of Germany and the German people she maintained that she owed everything to the Friends Service Unit in Kunsan and to the teaching of high standards of nursing care in the Kunsan Provincial Hospital.
She appeared on German television, and during her stay in Bristol she was interviewed by the BBC and representatives of the local press. Her comments on the Friends Service Unit were relayed to the Korean Embassy in London. As a result we had two visits from the Medical Attache to the Korean Embassy, a phone call from the Korean Consul in London, and received a box of Ginseng from the Korean Ambassador. Acting on instructions from the Embassy Dr. Hann invited us to return to Korea and take part in a Government sponsored conference on Health Care in the New Millennium. and I was asked to present a paper on the provision of health care to rural communities based on our experiences in Kunsan. We made our excuses and turned down this invitation.
In 1965 - 1966 when 1 was Clerk of the Redland Friends Meeting I was asked to help a young Korean couple living in Bristol. Andrew and Angela Chung had both graduated in English from Universities in Seoul, and Andrew had been given a scholarship by the British Council to study for an M.A. in English Literature at Bristol University. His scholarship money only provided for one person, but feeling lonely and missing his wife he used some of this money to bring his wife to Bristol. They lived in poor accommodation. Angela's first pregnancy ended in a miscarriage, and her second pregnancy resulted in a premature baby. They were destitute.
Jean was nursing our new born son at that time so there was an instant rapport between our two families. We collected their things, and Andrew, Angela and Eugene came to live with' us. We shared our house with them for over one year. Jean helped Angela with her baby, and I tried to help Andrew with his thesis on the_ 'Life Force in the novels of D.H. Lawrence'. When he got his M.A. Andrew worked as a night porter in the Grand Hotel to raise the money for his return fare to Korea, and friends paid the return fare for Angela and Eugene.
Angela's use and understanding of English was very good, and she told us that her father had worked at the Korean Embassy in Washington and that she had been to school there, After returning to Korea Angela worked as Librarian to the British Embassy in Seoul and was a broadcaster for Womans Hour on Korean radio. Andrew was appointed Lecturer in English at the National University.
Last August Angela (Professor Okyoung Choe) came to see us in Bristol. She is Professor of English, and Dean of the College of West European & American Studies, at Hankuk University in Seoul. She retires in two years time. Her husband Andrew (Professor Chung Chung-Wha), formerly Professor of English at the National University, moved to a better paid job as Professor of English at a private University in Seoul. He retires this summer. Angela asked us to return to Korea this October and said that Andrew wanted to show us the changes that have taken place since we left Kunsan in 1956. Angela wrote to us last Christmas and repeated her invitation. A few weeks ago they made a joint phone call from Seoul and after some hesitation we agreed to return to Korea October 17 - November 4 and stay with them in Seoul.
Andrew is a senior figure in Korean education and has Government connections. He is a principal advisor on the placement of Korean students in British Universities through an educational foundation sponsored and paid for by Korean industry. Despite our request for a peaceful and quiet return to see the changes that have taken place in Seoul and Kunsan I have been asked to give a lecture in the Medical School at the National University, give an illustrated talk to the Anglo-Korean Society in Seoul on the work of the Friends Service Unit, meet the Governor of Cholla Pukto, and attend a civic reception in Kunsan. Korean officials have asked for my CV and for a summary of Friends work in Kunsan.
Miss Cho Shin Ja phones Jean regularly from Germany. When she learnt of our return visit to Korea she booked her own flight home and is determined to be with Jean in Kunsan. The Kunsan Provincial Hospital where we worked has been pulled down and a new up-to-date hospital containing a department for brain surgery has been built on the site. It is part of a medical college attached to the University of Iri. Dr. Hann from the Korean Embassy in London tells me that the medical school in Kunsan teaches traditional Korean Medicine. Cho Shin Ja tells us that her uncle is a Governor of the University of Iri, so we may get a chance to see inside this new hospital.
I had always wanted to return to Kunsan to renew my friendship with Dr. Shin In Churl, the senior surgeon at the Provincial Hospital. After leaving Kunsan we wrote to each other at least once a year. I was able to help his youngest son, Sang-Whan, when he came to this country to study for a higher degree in Dental Surgery at Guys Hospital in London. Sang-Whan is now the Professor of Prosthodontics at the National University in Seoul. Two years ago Sang-Whan told me that his father had had a stroke and could no longer speak or write in English. Since then he has had further strokes and suffers from dementia. It may not be possible to see him.
My work in Kunsan was made possible by the help of a Korean interpreter, Mr Oh Dong Whan, employed by the American Friends Service Committee. Just before we left Kunsan Mr Oh was appointed English teacher at the Kunsan Commercial High School. Cho Shin Ja has managed to make contact with Mr Oh and I am hoping that we will meet again in Kunsan.
I am not sure at this stage what will happen when we return to Korea. At the moment I feel a bit shocked and unsettled at having accepted this invitation. I felt I wanted to write to you to let you know about our invitation, and to send you a copy of my summary of the work of the Friends Service Unit in Kunsan. I do hope this is a fair and reasonable summary, and I apologise for any serious omission or misrepresentation. I cannot thank AFSC enough for the help and support we received, and for the trust you placed in us.
Yours sincerely,
(Dr.) John Cornes
FRIENDS SERVICE UNIT, KOREA.
The Friends Service Unit in Korea was provided by the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) through the American Friends Service Committee in Philadelphia and the Friends Service Council in London. Friends have a long history of humanitarian relief work in times of war.
Between December 1950 and January 1951 six million people in South Korea were on the roads as refugees, i.e. one in three of the population. 300 War Orphanages contained 30,000 children. Between 20,000 and 40,000 children had no shelter. Mass starvation was prevented by relief supplies of food from UNCACK (United Nations Civil Assistance Command in Korea), and the spread of diseases was limited and prevented by mass immunisation against Typhus, Typhoid, Paratyphoid, and Small Pox. 66 million innoculations were given by staff attached to UNCACK. However there were a lot of people suffering from Tuberculosis, with over one million people affected, 300,000 with open tuberculosis, and 72,000 dying from this disease each year.
In December 1951 Friends were asked to provide humanitarian relief work and assistance in South Korea, but the United Nations decided all relief should come from the Military. As the situation in South Korea deteriorated the United Nations changed its policy, and in October 1952 they invited civilian organisations to help with their relief efforts.
In November 1952 Professor Jonathan Rhodes from AFSC Philadelphia and Lewis Waddilove from FSC London visited South Korea to see how Friends could help the relief effort. Government Officials took them to most parts of South Korea, and Cholla Pukto and Kunsan were identified as areas where Friends help would be welcome. UNKRA in Tokyo were planning Kunsan as their main port for relief supplies into Korea.
On 16 July 1953 Frank and Patricia Hunt arrived in Korea to start the Friends Service Unit. They were welcomed by Dr. Lee, the Governor of Cholla Pukto, and by the Mayor of Kunsan. The Mayor of Kunsan offered the use of a Korean house, 55 Tae Song Dong, opposite the fruit and vegetable market, as a centre for Friends work in Kunsan. The Kunsan Provincial Hospital offered two basement warehouses for medical and relief supplies, and a store room to sort out supplies of relief clothing and bedding for the refugees.
There were 200,000 refugees in Cholla Pukto, and 33,000 of these refugees were in Kunsan. There were 14 Refugee Camps in Kunsan. 11 recognised by the City Government, housing 5,000 people, were provided with some food. 20,000 other refugees lived in colonies or individually, and did not receive any food. They were mainly North Koreans, mostly Widows and Children. Hainong Camp contained 1,500 Refugees. Jo Chong Camp contained 986 Refugees. In one building 450 people lived in a space 50 feet x 40 feet. Yong Sin, a Japanese house behind City Hall, contained 177 refugees. The Refugee Colonies consisted of houses of mud bricks and straw thatch, and the largest contained over 2,000 people. Many of these people, men and women, worked in the port carrying loads off the ships, and picked up the sweepings of grain from the quays to carry home to eat. There were four other colonies housing 8,000 people in all.
The Hunts visited ten Orphanages. Most of them received grain, clothing, powdered milk, and some fuel. The children looked healthy and well cared for, and most of them attended school. But in the refugee camps and colonies there were many war widows and lots of children, and no school for them to go to.
The Kunsan Provincial Hospital had a partly built Wing left incomplete after the Japanese withdrawal from Korea. The back of the Hospital had been partly destroyed and damaged by American bombing. Unoccupied rooms were filled with sick Refugees, many suffering from severe malnutrition. A lot of the Hospital equipment had been removed by the retreating North Koreans, and a lot was damaged. There was no heating, and no running water. A water tap outside the hospital worked intermittently. Electricity supplies were frequently cut off. Drugs and X-Ray Film were severely limited, and often unavailable. Nearly all the hospital care was provided on an out-patient basis. Beds were only available for paying patients, and in-patient care was provided by the patient's family.
Relief Supplies of Penicillin, Streptomycin, Multivitamins, Drums of Powdered Milk, Soya Bean Flour, Clothing, and Bedding shipped out by The American Friends Service Committee arrived in Kunsan on October 22nd, 1953. On October 26 a small team of doctors, nurses, and a physiotherapist from the United States, Ireland, Sweden, Scotland and England started to work with and help the Korean doctors and nurses working in the Provincial Hospital. At the same time a team of social welfare workers from the United States and Norway working with officials from the City Hall and representatives from the refugee camps, orphanages, and local institutions began to assess welfare needs and work out the best way to provide help.
With the onset of winter the first priority was to provide warm clothing and bedding, and these were sorted out into suitable bundles by Korean volunteers and distributed strictly according to need as assessed by local officials and our welfare workers. On November 6 we opened our first milk station in the Kuam refugee camp and served hot milk to 180 children. With the help of Korean women volunteers we quickly opened three more serving 1,500 children. Eventually we were providing hot milk and multivitamins to children up to the age of 14 and to pregnant women, a total of 6,800 people every day.
The priority in the Kunsan Provincial Hospital was to treat the sick refugees and their families who had settled into the rooms at the back of the hospital, resettle them in an empty warehouse with washing facilities, and clean up the hospital. Most of the sickness was related to malnutrition and lack of care. After a few weeks of feeding, multivitamins, and careful nursing most of the sick people were able to leave hospital and the few remaining patients with serious illnesses were cared for in a cleaned up medical ward with a nurses duty unit set up and run by the Friends medical team.
During the cold winter months of January and February 1954 the welfare team and the medical team drew up plans to help with the rehabilitation of the refugees and the restoration of medical services at the Kunsan Provincial Hospital. Supplies were requested from America, and essential medical equipment and up-to-date textbooks of medicine and surgery were purchased in Japan.
A building project was started on land provided by the City Hall using building materials supplied by KCAC, the Province of Cholla Pukto, and some provided by the Friends Service Unit. The refugees built their own houses with the materials provided, and the work was supervised by trained Korean builders paid for by the Friends Service Unit. Provision was made for 150 houses.
Schools were started in the refugee camps and the Friends Service Unit supplied educational materials and the money to pay the Korean teachers. Adult Literacy Classes were started for War Widows who could not read or write. A temporary neighbourhood centre was opened for girls and boys, with a small library and art materials provided by the Friends and sports equipment provided by the American Marines. Volley ball and baseball were played. The girls made coloured paperchains, handkerchiefs and school bags, and the boys made pencil cases.
Sewing machines were brought in for War Widows, and they opened sewing shops in the town, altering and mending clothes, and made surgical towels, face masks and gowns for the operating theatre in the Provincial Hospital. We also helped War Widows open a shop for Dry Cleaning, and another for making and selling bean curd. Widows were provided with goats, bees, bee hives, and seeds for planting.
In cooperation with UNKRA Friends opened and ran a training school for Nurse Aides at the Provincial Hospital. There were two courses lasting 9 months each. 30 students entered the first course, and 20 entered the second course. 18 of these trainees worked for the hospital after completing their training. This Training School was run by Jean Cornes with the help of a Korean Schoolmaster from North Korea, Augustine J.R.Kang.
Friends restored and re-equipped the Pathology Laboratory in the Provincial Hospital. In cooperation with UNKRA Dr. Ingle Wright ran a training school for student laboratory technicians and provided a full range of laboratory tests for the hospital, including a blood transfusion service.
Dr. Andrew Wiley assisted by Nurse Trudi Wiley and Nurse Rakel Ask ran a T.B. OutPatient Clinic, and an In-Patient service for 50 patients with open tuberculosis. After Dr. Gordon Bancroft arrived in July 1956 family contacts were X-Rayed, and B.C.G. vaccinations were given.
Dr. A. F. MacDonald assisted by Nurse Irene Howard and Nurse Eve Gold ran a medical Out-Patient clinic, and a medical ward for In-Patients. Supplies of drugs, antibiotics, and multivitamins continued to arrive from AFSC in America, and were made available to the hospital pharmacy.
With the help of a Korean craftsman employed by the Friends Service Unit David Ward opened a Physiotherapy Department in the hospital and they made and fitted artificial limbs. There were a large number of people who had lost their arms and legs during and after the war, and it was difficult to meet their needs.
Friends provided an autoclave, sterilisers, surgical instruments, emergency lighting, a closed circuit anaesthetic machine, surgical clothing, towels, gloves, dressings, bandages, plaster of Paris, suture materials. and anaesthetic supplies for the hospital operating theatre. Dr. John Cornes and Nurse Ray Cordner ran a surgical in-patient ward, providing pre- and post-operative care. Dr. John Cornes provided an anaesthetic service for the Korean Surgeons and Gynaecologist, and trained Korean Graduate Nurses in General Anaesthesia.
Friends provided four training posts for young Korean doctors in the Provincial Hospital and set up a medical library for the Doctors and Nurses, with books and journals sent from America, and some bought from Japan. The American Friends Service Committee arranged three visits from senior American Specialists. Post-Graduate classes and surgical demonstrations were provided for Doctors in Kunsan and Kaejong.
Friends started an out-patient service in the hospital for sick children from the orphanages. To care for the really sick children we had to set up our own in-patient unit in the hospital, and employed a House-Mother to look after them. Some of the sick infants were black children who had been abandoned. When they got better our Welfare Staff arranged their adoption by Black families in America, and all were resettled.
Nurse Ann Sealey helped and encouraged the opening of a midwifery service in the Provincial Hospital, and with Dr. Jean Sullivan started ante-natal and post-natal clinics at two centres in the town, Shin Poon Dong and City Hall.
These brief statements conceal the difficulties faced by the Korean Provincial Administration in Chonju, and the Kunsan Officials in City Hall, namely lack of money to pay salaries, and the continuing shortages of grain, fuel, building materials, and medical supplies. In-patient services at the Kunsan Provincial Hospital could only be adequately maintained by the Friends Service Unit paying half of the salaries of the Korean staff, paying for food and fuel during the times of shortage, and by a continuous supply of drugs, dressings, and antibiotics supplied by the American Friends Service Committee through their offices in Philadelphia and Pasadena.
The Friends Service Unit, started in Kunsan by Frank and Pat Hunt, was led and managed by Geof Hemmingway from late 1953 until Autumn 1956, and then by Robert Gray until December 1957, when the work ended. Robert Gray left Kunsan on January 12, 1958.
DR. JOHN SELWYN CORNES
Born: 19 September, 1926, Chester, England.
School Education: Quarry Bank Grammar School, Liverpool, 1933 - 1944
University Education:
King's College, London University, 1944 -1948
Westminster Hospital Medical School, London University, 1948 - 1951 Royal Postgraduate Medical School, London University, 1956 - 1957
Qualifications:
B.Sc. Special Honours, First Class, (in Physiology), 1948, London University. A.K.C. London, with Credit, 1948. (College Diploma in Theology.)
M.B.: B.S., 1951. (in Medicine & Surgery.) London University.
D.C.P. London, 1957. (Academic Postgraduate Diploma in Clinical Pathology.) M. D., 1961. London University.
M.R.C.Path. (in Histopathology.) Royal College of Pathologists, London.
Distinctions:
Entrance Scholarship, Westminster Medical School, 1945
Warneford Prize Winner in Theology (Gold Medal), King's College, London, 1947 Elected Fellow, Royal College of Pathologists, London, 1974
Emeritus Consultant Pathologist, United Bristol Hospitals, 1991.
Membership of Learned Societies:
Senior Member, Pathological Society of Great Britain & Ireland. Member, Association of Clinical Pathologists.
Member, British Society for Clinical Cytolgy. Member, American Society of Clinical Cytology. Member, British Medical Association.
Fellow, Royal Society of Medicine, London.
Academic Posts:
Demonstrator in Physiology, King's College London, 1948 - 1949.
Demonstrator in Pharmacology, St Bartholomews Hospital Medical School, 1949 - 1951 Demonstrator in Physiology, Chelsea College of Science, 1948 - 1951.
Junior Resident Pathologist, Royal Free School of Medicine, London, 1953. Registrar in Pathology, Royal Postgraduate Medical School, 1957 - 1958. Lecturer in Pathology, Westminster Medical School, 1959 - 1962.
Senior Lecturer in Pathology, University of Bristol, 1962 - 1968. Clinical Teacher in Pathology, University of Bristol, 1969 - 1991.
Hospital Appointments:
Training Posts in Surgery, Medicine, & Clinical Patholgy, at Teaching Hospitals in London, 1951 - 1953, and 1958 - 1962.
Consultant Pathologist, United Bristol Hospitals, 1962 - 1991.
Director of Clinical Cytology Service, United Bristol Hospitals, 1966 - 1991.
Other Appointments: (Theological)
Member of Council, Churches' Council of Healing, Lambeth Palace, London, 1959 - 1963, and Academic Chaplain to Bristol University, 1997 - 2000.
Research Interests & Publications
Gastrointestinal pathology, with reference to Ulcerative Colitis, Crohn's Disease, Lymphoid Tissue & Lymphoid Tumours in the Human Gut. Obstetric & Gynaecological Pathology, with reference to Cervical & Endometrial Cytology, In-Vitro Fertilisation, Male Infertility, and Family Planning. Papers published in various medical journals in Britain and the U.S.A., with a few contributions to Textbooks of Medicine.
Military Service.
June 1952: volunteered to work with Friends Service Unit, South Korea. December 1953 permission received from Central Medical War Recruitment Committee in London to serve as Medical Officer in Friends Service Unit, Korea, in lieu of Military Service with British Armed Forces. John worked for the Friends Service Council in London and the American Friends Service Committee in Philadelphia from January 1954 to October 1956, serving in Kunsan from 24 March 1954 until 24 July 1956. The Friends Service Unit was first attached to the U.S. Army 14th Port Battalion in Kunsan, and later to the U.S. Airforce at the K8 (Kunsan) Airbase.
MRS. JEAN MARY CORNES (Nee Grose)
Born 28 March, 1928, in London.
Education: St Martin in the Fields, High School for Girls. (Head Girl - 1945.) Westminster Hospital Nurses Training School, London, 1946 - 1950.
General Lying-In Hospital, London, 1951. St Mary's Hospital, Croydon, 1952. Chelsea Hospital for Women, 1952 - 1953.
Qualifications: S.R.N., 1949. (Nursing).
Westminster Hospital Certificate for Nursing, 1950, awarded Gold Medal as the most outstanding Practical Nurse in her Year.
S.C.M., 1952, (Midwifery).
Certificate for Gynaecological Nursing, Chelsea Hospital for Women, 1953.
Appointments: Staff Nurse Westminster Hospital, & Assistant to Sister Tutor, Nurses Training School. Staff Nurse Chelsea Hospital for Women. Research Staff Nurse Bristol Royal Infirmary - until 1989.
Overseas Service: Nurse, Friends Service Unit 1954 - 1956, attached to Kunsan Provincial Hospital. Helped with Operating Theatre Nursing, and later Teacher in Charge, Nurse Aide Training School, Kunsan Provincial Hospital.
NOTE: Jean met John at Westminster Hospital in London, when Jean was a student nurse and John was a medical student. They married in August 1952. After returning from Korea they had three children. Their daughter is a Lecturer in Spanish, their eldest son is a Consultant in Clinical Oncology, and their youngest son is a Lawyer.
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