Catholic Medical Quarterly Volume 72(2) May 2022
The Archive of the Catholic Medical Quarterly.
The first publication of the Guild of St Luke Cosmas and Damien was in 1914. A single volume of the Gazette was published and we think there was a second issue of the Gazette in 1921, which has been lost. But in January 1923 quarterly publication of the Catholic Medical Guardian started January 1923 when Catholic Medical Guardian restarted. The Catholic Medical Guardian was to continue in print right through till 1941. Its editor did not want to stop and thought the war ought not to get in the way. But, in the end, the last issue of the Catholic Medical Guardian was in October 1941. The Catholic Medical Quarterly reappeared in 1947 and has been continuously in print since then. We are now on Volume 72. The resource is a rich and humbling example of real excellence. Humbling especially for your current editors perhaps. There is much to read and we are summarising it and cataloguing it now. We hope to publish extracts from it in future issues. The CMA and CMG and CMQ archive is now in Ushaw and will soon be accessible there for those who want to see it and study it etc.
Here, largely for fun, is how, in the end the Catholic Medical Guardian met its Waterloo.
From the Catholic Medical Gazette (1941) Volume 18 No 4, October.
By the Editor.
NOT LONG ago a Coastal Command pilot, returning from an uneventful reconnaissance, sighted one of our submarines peacefully patrolling on the surface of the ocean. It was a lovely morning, the sun glinted cheerfully on the sea, life was good, the air invigorating, so the pilot was naturally impelled to perform an exuberant dive on the submarine. The submarine commander had seen things like that before and was taking no risks. He crash-dived. As the foam rose round his conning-tower, the succinctly expressed view of the pilot came down in unmistakably clear Morse- 'T-W-E-R-P.' The submarine decrashed (we hope this is the correct word) itself and, through the spray, asked¬ 'W-H-A-T- T-H-E-? 'T-W-E-R-P' interrupted the aircraft efficiently. 'W-H-Y?' The conversation then became very general.
This story is, in some sort, an allegory.
The Council of the Guild has decided that cir-cumstances are such that the CATHOLIC MEDICAL GUARDIAN must cease publication until a later date. This number is therefore the last for a period unknown. We are very sorry that this should be necessary, but these are hard times and there must be very good reasons for the Council's decision. Therefore, until the day comes when the CATHOLIC MEDICAL GUARDIAN can once more appear on the surface, we say goodbye and thank you to all of those who have helped us, our readers, our authors, our printers, the editors of other journals who have sent us their publications in the twenty years' life of our journal and, not least, those who have generously responded to our appeals in the last numbers.
Editorial note: Happily The Catholic Medical Guardian did indeed return as the CMQ in October 1947 under the same Editor.