Russell Watson

Male

Birth date: 14.11.1881 y.

Cabin: Medical Officers-12

Biography:

On the 25th of April, 1915, 3100 New Zealanders began their ruthless attempted invasion of Gallipoli in Eastern Thrace beginning at their landing at Gaba Tepe, with the New Zealand Expeditionary Force leading the charge. By December of 1915, the New Zealander forces were evacuated after failed offensives in the summer that only left disaster after disaster. The sheer amount of causalities and injuries brought in New Zealand's best and brightest medical professionals into the war, thus came Captain Russell Watson.

Russell Watson graduated from the University of New Zealand's university college in Wellington after long and arduous studies in medicine, which afterwards, he was put immediately to the test, as not long into his career, the newly founded Royal New Zealand Army Medical Corps (RNZAMC) had recruited Watson into their ranks, embodying the traits that the corps held dear with relative ease, Always Alert. Always Calm. For a while, this was easy, war in regards to New Zealand was a bygone era, barring the occasional issue with some Māori group out in the hinterland. He didn't anticipate himself to be thrusted into war as it was.

Then Gallipoli came. Initially stationed at a hospital designated for the NZEF in Suez, Egypt, Watson was commended for his quick work, despite how it was clear that the events of Gallipoli's landing ruptured his composure, and with the August Offensive, his composure would only be ruptured further. Sari Bair, Chunuk Bair, and Hill 60 saw many men in dire need of assistance, and as such, he was stationed aboard His Majesty's New Zealand's Hospital Ship Number 2, the former SS Marama, bringing countless numbers of injured men back home, and while he could treat them fine with no concern, the staggering amount of men lost only resonated worse within Watson.

This trend continued until December of 1915, with the most horrific thing he had seen, a disastrous evacuation from Anzac Cove, a day that stuck with him immensely. While aboard the Marama he did what he could, however when he returned to that hospital in Suez in December after he left in August, colleagues could only regard how much he had changed in demeanor. Much as if what was his typical stupor, positive at that, now had been dulled, a cynic taken from what the war had brought upon him, much how many others had faced. After his time in Suez, he was transferred from the work of just his countrymen in the RNZAMC to the full RAMC, now serving those of the Empire all-around.

June of 1916 marked his full transfer in service from Suez to a more active position in the war, aboard His Majesty's Hospital Ship Britannic, apart of something bigger than what he once did. Time at sea on Marama brought him time to have distractions from the war, and while the time at sea was less from Britannic, at least he could have something to bring him back down to sanity and away from his work. Those measly distractions, comedic at that in such a serious world, a stark contrast, and yet a relief inexplicable, perhaps the only things that still help him externally exude the traits of aware and calm as instilled before.

Yet the memories of Gallipoli never truly left Russell. Even in his attempts to bring himself sanity, a reminder of him being alive, and thanks to his work, his countrymen also being alive, the memories of those lost and those wounded drove him to a more stoic disposition with his line of work inside of himself. Keeping appearances for the other men was hard. In many ways, he merely wished to return to the Marama, back home, away from the more active grievances, or even to the hospital in Suez. With an ensuing crisis in Greece, everything can only get more intense. At least hopefully his work will not fail him and keep him... stable.

So long as that remains, then Russell Watson can still keep what he knows. Aware. Calm. Ready to serve.

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