Watson was born in Augusta, Georgia, United States, on July 3, 1917, one of five children of Frederick D. and Helen Gilbert Turner.

[1] Watson returned to Hartford to teach in the American Red Cross home nursing and first aid program from October 1939 to January 1941.

[3][5] Her newly minted fellow ensigns included Phyllis Mae Dailey of New York City (the first African American woman in history to receive a Navy commission, on March 8), Edith Mazie DeVoe of Washington, D.C., and Eula Loucille Stimley of Centreville, Mississippi.

Watson worked as a public health and school nursing consultant for the Connecticut State Department of Education from 1948 to 1965.

[8] On September 16, 1965,[9] she joined the faculty of the University of Connecticut School of Nursing, where she taught community and child health for eighteen years and achieved tenure at the rank of associate professor.

[1][10] Retiring on June 1, 1983,[9] she received an honorary appointment as Associate Professor Emerita courtesy of the university's board of trustees in 1984.