Nevertheless, Barry was considered an excellent doctor with a sympathetic beside manner regardless of background and an enduring focus on improving sanitation.
Scandal
In 1865, returning to Britain with a bad case of dysentery, Barry died.
Barry's maid laid them out for the funeral, and held on to her sensational discovery until afterwards: Barry was a woman.
Speculation and scandal began to spread. Some army personnel claimed they’d known all along, while others put forward theories that Barry was a hermaphrodite or a male who had never developed past puberty. The army shut down all access to his papers for a good hundred years, and the case wasn’t opened again until the 1950s, by historian Isobel Rae. This uncovered Barry's army career, but details about their family life were revealed by some clever digging by retired Cape Town doctor Michael du Preez.
Du Preez traced Barry’s family history by examining Barry's companion when they began their studies in Edinburgh, their ‘aunt’ Mary Ann Bulkley, finding that she was the sister of Irish artist and professor James Barry.
Who was James Barry?
James Barry started out life as Margaret Ann Bulkley in an impoverished family in Ireland. Barry's family had revolutionary connections through their uncle, painter and professor James Barry, and also to General Francisco De Miranda, a Venezualian radical.
When Barry's uncle died, a plan was hatched that they would study medicine in Edinburgh disguised as a man, then, once General Francisco De Miranda had liberated and taken charge of Venezuala, practice medicine in Venezuala as a woman.
Barry and their mother, Mary Ann Bulkley, travelled by boat from London to Leith, carrying a letter of recommendation from their friend Lord Buchan. This connection possibly facilitated Barry's career through medical school and the army. Margaret was already inhabiting the new disguise. When they matriculated their apparent youth only added to the perception of precocious intelligence.
General de Miranda’s attempt to liberate Latin America failed, and Barry's dream of going to Venezeula was dashed. After graduating from the University of Edinburgh, they joined the army, a dangerous and seemingly odd decision, but one which they got away with till the very end.
How did Barry get away with it?
The question of how Barry managed as a woman in an army environment can partly be explained by the support of Lord Buchan, but a great deal has also to do with attitudes at the time.
It seems a mixture of professional respect and blind denial protected Barry's reputation in light of the scandal, and there is still much we don't know, such as if they had a child, and at what age. To give Barry the full respect they are due, and to refer to them by the correct gender, it would be useful to know if they considered themselves to be a man, or if they identified as a woman all along over decades of pretending.
Was Barry's identity ever discovered? Who did Barry confide in? We can only speculate to fill in the gaps in Barry's story.