BOPDHB History Whakatāne Hospital History Book | Page 36

Dr James Christopher
Wadmore, Medical
Superintendent, 1920-1923

Dr James Christopher Wadmore circa 1920
Photo: Whakatāne & District Historical Society Archive

Dr JC Wadmore was born in 1878 and sailed from Plymouth, England as the ship’s surgeon on the
Turakina, arriving in Wellington on 12 February 190647. He took his discharge from the ship and
found his way to Whakatāne where he established a private medical practice. In his early years he
travelled widely throughout Te Urewera. These early experiences led him to actively participate in
the activities of the Bay of Plenty Māori Historical & Research Society which he formed in 1933 and
chaired until 1939 when it went into recess following the outbreak of World War II. This early Society
was the forerunner of the present Whakatāne & District Historical Society. In January 1909 his services
were ‘secured’ by the Whakatāne Medical Club and for the next eleven years he operated out of his
own surgery and, from 1913, the Māori Mission Hospital. His name appears on a regular basis in the
minutes of the Bay of Plenty Health and Charitable Aid Board.
In November 192048 he was appointed joint Medical Superintendent together with Drs Cronin and
Appleby at the Mission Hospital and in March 1921 he took up the Medical Superintendent (solo)
position on a full-time basis on a salary of £100 per annum. At the same time Drs Cronin and Appleby
took up Honorary Surgeon positions at the Hospital.
In September 1923, Dr Cronin was appointed to the position of Medical Superintendent at the newly
opened Whakatāne District Hospital and in May 1925, Dr Wadmore was appointed Anaesthetist and
Honorary Physician at the same hospital. He continued to work as the Anaesthetist and Assistant
Medical Officer with authority to assume the duties of the Medical Superintendent in his absence and
was Assistant Surgeon until at least April 1936 when the Board Minutes mention his ‘recent accident’.
He died, after years of unstinting service to the community, on 29 November 1938 at the age of 60.

Alison B. Heath, The Opouriao-Taneatua Settlement of 1896, (Whakatāne, Whakatāne &
District Historical Society, 1989), pg 85
48
Bay of Plenty Hospital and Charitable Aid Board Minutes, Volume 2 [17.09.1917 – 25.03.1938],
26 November 1920, (Auckland, Archives New Zealand, Reference ADHL A1669 22975 7)
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