August 23, 2003
Beatrice M. Allen, a former World War II combat nurse who later worked at St. Joseph's Nursing Home in Catonsville, died of complications from a stroke Monday at her Ellicott City home. She was 92.
She was born Beatrice Moulton in Portland, Maine, the daughter of a Canadian Pacific railroad locomotive engineer.
She was raised in Winnipeg, Canada, and was a 1934 graduate of the nursing program at Winnipeg Hospital.
She enlisted in the Army Nursing Corps three days after the bombing of Pearl Harbor and served as a nurse in England and in combat assignments in North Africa, Italy, France, Japan and later Korea. She was discharged as a captain in 1949.
While serving in Korea, she met and married her husband of 53 years, Ollie James Allen, a career military officer, who survives her.
After leaving the Army, Mrs. Allen worked as a labor and delivery nurse at Kimbrough Army Community Hospital at Fort Meade. She later was a staff nurse at the old Veterans Administration Hospital on Loch Raven Boulevard in Northeast Baltimore and Patuxent Institute.
She spent the last seven years of her career as a charge nurse at St. Joseph's Nursing Home. She retired in 1970.
Mrs. Allen was a charter member of the Women in Military Service for America Memorial Foundation at Arlington National Cemetery.
She was a longtime communicant at St. John Episcopal Church in Ellicott City, where she was a member of the Altar Guild and helped establish a bereavement support group.
She enjoyed gardening, knitting and embroidery. She also was an avid bridge player.
A memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. Monday at her church, 9120 Frederick Road.
In addition to her husband, Mrs. Allen is survived by two sons, Rex O. Allen of Ellicott City and Kelly M. Allen of Westminster; and seven grandchildren. Another daughter, Elizabeth Allen, died in 1950.
