Florence Simpson
Dame Florence Edith Victoria Simpson, (née Way, formerly Leach; 9 October 1874 – 5 September 1956) was the senior female British Army officer during World War I and Controller in Chief, later President, Queen Mary's Army Auxiliary Corps (formerly the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps). Personal life. Florence Edith Victoria Way was born on 9 October 1874, the daughter of Colonel Wilfred FitzAlan Way and his wife, Henrietta Mary (née Ross). She married firstly on 3 December 1895, Captain (later Brigadier-General) Henry Edmund Burleigh Leach. They divorced in 1920. She married secondly, Ernest Percy Simpson, a widower  with two daughters in 1922. There were no children from either marriage. Her second husband died in 1925. In retirement, Leach lived with her stepdaughters for many years in South Africa. She died at a clinic in Arlesheim, Switzerland on 5 September 1956, aged 81. Career. Her career began in 1915 when she volunteered as a cook in the Women's Legion, an organisation founded by Lady Londonderry to provide "a capable and efficient body of women whose services could be offered to the state to take the place of men needed in the firing line or in other capacities