When the war started in September 1939 Will Nixon was thirty-five. He was exempted by the authorities from military service as his civilian work as an obstetrician and gynaecologist was too valuable. At the Soho Hospital for Women he was put in charge also of the emergency casualty unit, a part of the Emergency Medical Services (EMS) of London, to deal with those injured in air raids on the capital. This was at its maximum load in the winter of 1940/41. During the Blitz one of the worst episodes that Nixon had to cope with was the bombing of the Café de Paris in the spring of 1940. This smart nightclub was crowded with four hundred people when it was attacked. Fourteen were killed and over one hundred injured by the glass ceiling falling in. The Soho Hospital was just up the road from the club and Nixon took much of the strain of medical work. Will Nixon was able to cope with this, doing much of the work himself and allocating the rest to various grades of more junior doctors. He also took more than his share of the rota of fire watching on the hospital roof, detecting and dealing with incendiary bombs, which would often follow the dropping of high explosives. The Soho Hospital was not damaged greatly, no doubt partly thanks to the efforts of the firewatchers.