Description:Ravenhill House had been briefly unoccupied when, in March 1915, the War Office intimated that Lady Zouche had offered the house as a V.A.D (Voluntary Aid Detached) Hospital to be operated by the Red Cross for military convalescents. Lady Zouche put the house in thorough repair and donated £50 towards the expenses. Mrs Lambert was the local Commandant (14th Staffs V.A.D.) assisted by Sisters Hatton & Beddoe. The hospital was to accommodate twenty patients. The first nurses were engaged in August 1915. A few men were engaged as night orderlies. Most staff were released by January 1919. During August 1917 the hospital was closed for four weeks after an out break of measles. The opportunity was taken to increase the number of beds from twenty-seven to thirty-three. The troops are wearing their "hospital blues" which identified them as convalescing soldiers.
Before the military hospital at Brindley Heath was completed in 1916, any injured or convalescing soldiers would have been treated at the nearest General Infirmaries, Sister Dora's Convalescent Home at Milford or Ravenhill House, Rugeley.