The remarkable story of the extraordinary woman who defied her times by living as a man

A Sunday Times Book of the Year

As featured on the BBC Radio 2 Book Club

Dr James Barry: Inspector General of Hospitals, army surgeon, duellist, reformer, ladykiller, eccentric. He performed the first successful Caesarean in the British Empire, outraged the military establishment and gave Florence Nightingale a dressing down at Scutari. At home he was surrounded by a menagerie of animals, including a cat, a goat, a parrot and a terrier. Long ago in Cork, Ireland, he had also been a mother.

This is the amazing tale of Margaret Anne Bulkley, the young woman who broke the rules of Georgian society to become one of the most respected surgeons of the century. In an extraordinary life, she crossed paths with the British Empire’s great and good, royalty and rebels, soldiers and slaves. A medical pioneer, she rose to a position that no woman before her had been allowed to occupy, but for all her successes, her long, audacious deception also left her isolated, even costing her the chance to be with the man she loved.

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‘A scintillating portrait of Barry’s life…that feels almost Dickensian in style.’

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‘An astounding story – of obstinacy, ambition, genius, fearlessness and pioneering feminism.’

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‘Thoroughly engaging.’

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‘Gripping, unusual, moving.’

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‘A comprehensive account.’

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'Fascinating’.

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‘Thoroughly researched, stimulating…Highly recommended’.

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‘Fascinating’

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‘An irresistible little byway in 18^th-century medical and social history’.

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‘An elegant and sensitive biography…du Preez and Dronfield have done Margaret Buckley and her alter ego proud in this absorbing book.’

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‘At each turn of this quite gripping biography I found myself gasping in disbelief…the excavations of Michael du Preez…and Jeremy Dronfield…have yielded startling new evidence about the period…Their research is authoritative and prodigious’.

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‘A cracking story’.