James Barry

Place: Cork

Born: 1799

Death: 1865

Biography:

Dr. James Miranda Steuart Barry was a military surgeon in the British Army, born in Ireland. Barry obtained a medical degree from the University of Edinburgh Medical School, then served first in Cape Town, South Africa and subsequently in many parts of the British Empire. Before retirement, Barry had risen to the rank of Inspector General (equivalent to Brigadier General) in charge of military hospitals, the second highest medical office in the British Army. Barry not only improved conditions for wounded soldiers, but also the conditions of the native inhabitants, and performed the first caesarean section in Africa by an Irish surgeon in which both the mother and child survived the operation.
Although Barry's entire adult life was lived as a man, Barry was born Margaret Ann Bulkley and was known as female in childhood. Barry lived as a man in both public and private life, at least in part in order to be accepted as a university student and pursue a career as a surgeon, Barry’s birth sex only becoming known to the public and to military colleagues after death.
Other than some personal correspondence, there are few sources of information about the non-military parts of Barry's life. The scant available evidence provides a skeleton onto which a great deal of myth and speculation has been added by various commentators. In his detailed research into Barry's early life, Michael Du Preez states that Barry was born in Cork in 1789, a birth date based on Mrs Bulkley's description of her child being fifteen years old in a letter dated 14 January 1805. Various other sources give birth dates of 1792, 1795, and 1799, but these incorrect dates are almost certainly the result of Barry later lying about age on official documents to aid passing as a man.
Barry was the second child born to Jeremiah and Mary-Ann Bulkley, and was given the name Margaret Anne. Mary-Ann Bulkley was the sister of James Barry, a celebrated Irish artist and professor of painting at London's Royal Academy. Jeremiah Bulkley ran the weigh house on Merchant's Quay, Cork. However, anti-Catholic sentiment led to his dismissal from this post. This and subsequent financial mismanagement left Mary-Ann and Barry without the support of either Jeremiah Bulkley (whose debts led to him spending time in the Marshalsea prison in Dublin) or later the Bulkleys' married son John. A third child appeared in the Bulkley family and was named Juliana. Although presented as being Barry's sister, it is likely that she was Barry's daughter as a result of childhood sexual assault, as the charwoman who discovered Barry's sex when laying out the body stated that pregnancy stretch marks were present.
The teenage Barry was educated with the prospect of becoming a tutor, but given a lack of evidence of any work history, the Bulkleys appear to have struggled to find Barry any suitable tutoring positions. A conspiracy appears to have developed between Barry, Mary-Ann Bulkley and some of the late James Barry's influential, liberal-minded friends (General Francisco de Miranda, Dr Edward Fryer, who had become Barry's personal tutor, and Daniel Reardon, the family's solicitor) to enable the teenage Barry to enter medical school. The University of Edinburgh was chosen and Mary-Ann and Barry boarded a Leith smack on 30 November 1809. And so, Margaret Anne Bulkley became James Barry, nephew of the late James Barry RA the Irish romantic painter and remained known thus for the next 56 years. In a letter to Daniel Readon, sent on 14 December, Barry asked for any letters addressed to Margaret Bulkley to be forwarded to Mary-Ann Bulkley (whom Barry now refers to as "my aunt"), and mentions that '...it was very usefull for Mrs. Bulkley (my aunt) to have a Gentleman to take care of her on Board Ship and to have one in a strange country...'. Although the letter was signed "James Barry", the solicitor indiscreetly wrote on the back of the envelope 'Miss Bulkley, 14 December'; this crucial piece of evidence was the one which enabled researchers to finally confirm that Margaret Bulkley and James Barry were one and the same.
Arriving in Edinburgh in November 1809, Barry began studies at the Medical School as a 'literary and medical student'. Barry's short stature, unbroken voice, delicate features and smooth skin led many to suspect that Barry was a young boy not past puberty, and the University Senate initially attempted to block Barry's application for the final examinations due to this apparent youth. However, the Earl of Buchan, a friend of Dr Fryer and Barry's late namesake, persuaded the Senate to relent and Barry qualified Medicinae Doctor (MD) in 1812. [a] Barry then moved back to London, signing up for the Autumn Course 1812/1813 as a pupil of the United Hospitals of Guy's and St Thomas', whose teachers included Henry Cline and celebrated surgeon Astley Cooper. On 2 July 1813, Barry successfully passed the examination of the Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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