The Royal British Nurses' Association was founded in December 1887 by Ethel Bedford-Fenwick, with leading matrons from voluntary, local authority and military hospitals including; Isla Stewart of St Bartholomew's Hospital, Godiva Thorold of the Middlesex Hospital, Miss Hogg of Haslar Hospital and Anne Gibson of Brownlow Hill Infirmary, Liverpool [1][2] The early objectives were : to obtain a charter to enable the association to examine and register nurses, conferring degrees; to devise schemes for annuity pensions and sick funds for nurses; the formation and management of convalescent and holiday homes for nurses as well as alms houses for retired nurses; and the organisation of conferences on questions relating to the profession of nursing.
In a speech Princess Christian made in 1893, she made clear that the association was working towards "improving the education and status of those devoted and self-sacrificing women whose whole lives have been devoted to tending the sick, the suffering, and the dying".
[3] The charter altered the constitution, and Mrs Bedford-Fenwick lost her permanent position.
One condition of the royal charter was the placing of representatives of medical associations on the Executive Board and especially a large number of general practitioners on the committee entrusted with the registration of nurses.
The association helped to set up the Central Committee for the State Registration of Nurses in 1908.