more initiative and demonstrate their talent as in times of war. Despite much prejudice against female physicians practising in Europe, there was a substantial need for female doctors in India, as religious custom and practice deprived many women of proper medical care. Hamilton had met Colonel Joubert of the Indian Medical Service, and he introduced her to the opportunity of working abroad. Hamilton acquired her medical degree in Brussels and promptly left for Calcutta. Career Most other foreign women doctors in the country received help from government appointment or support of any missionary or philanthropic society, but Hamilton established a successful private medical practice with help only from Colonel Joubert. She held the post of medical officer at the Lady Dufferin Zenana [Women's] Hospital in Calcutta. Her career changed drastically in the spring of 1894 when she moved to Kabul, Afghanistan. Afghanistan Hamilton was invited by the Amir, Abdur Rahman, to spend six months in Kabul. He paid for all of her expenses. After she successfully treated the Amir in October 1894, Hamilton became his personal physician for three years to follow. Afghanistan was an inhospitable place for a European, especially a woman, to live. Hamilton was a prolific journalist and the author of two fiction books. She had an unpublished work titled, The power that walks in darkness, in which she expressed her serious reservations about the Amir's often muddled reforms and his 'iron rule'. Even with the Amir's protection, her work still posed a threat to her own life, and she knew that a loss of the Amir's protection could result in her execution. Her work, A Vizier's Daughter was a fictional account of her time in Afghanistan in which she challenged "Islamic Stipulations", with sarcasm and perspectives on the Amir, male and female roles in this culture of Afghanistan. In terms of her medical work, Hamilton made a significant impact on the health of the Afghan population. Not only did she establish a hospital in Kabul, but she was also responsible for introducing vaccination into the country. She expanded on techniques of treatment including maintenance of the four humors of the body based on traditional beliefs and treatments in the Qaran. Return to England By late 1896, Hamilton fled Afghanistan due to the threat and danger of her controversial writing and work. Once home in England, she redirected her attention to the predicament of homeless women's treatment,