Margaret Payson
Margaret Payson was one of a group of four Victoria Order of Nurses who travelled to the Yukon with the Yukon Field Force in the spring of 1898. On her arrival in Dawson, she was assigned to the Grand Forks Hospital on Bonanza Creek. She travelled from Dawson on 21 September during the first fall of snow and walked twelve miles through slush and mud accompanied by Reverend Dickey.1) Robert Dickey was a presbyterian minister from Skagway, Alaska. He had appealed to Lady Ishbel Aberdeen, wife of Canada’s Governor General at the time, and she helped to develop the Victorian Order of Nurses in Canada and sent trained nurses to the Klondike.2)
The Grand Forks hospital had few conveniences and Margaret slept in a corner of the ward with only a curtain for privacy. There was no bed, so she slept in a sleeping bag on the floor. Margaret resigned after six weeks, took a position in the Dawson post office, and later married a wealthy miner.3)