Charlotte Bristowe Brown's diary provides a rare firsthand perspective on the challenges facing women who traveled with the British forces, providing medical services to the military, in the Great War for Empire (1754–1763).

When the widowed Charlotte Brown was appointed Matron of the General Hospital for the Braddock expedition to America in 1754, she was already an experienced campaigner. Leaving her children in England in November, Brown and her brother, who was an apothecary with the expedition, sailed with other hospital staff and officers on the London, part of the fleet bringing the 44th and 48th regiments to Virginia as part of General Braddock's command. The four-month voyage taxed the tempers of all on board.

The group disembarked in Bellhaven (Alexandria), Virginia, in late March 1755. Braddock and the main force left Bellhaven on April 22 in order to dislodge the French...