THE TYPHOID WARDS
When I first came to Hospital I had been put as V.A.D. in Ward I, on the
surgical side, and at ten o'clock had heard "shop" (which by the way was
strictly debarred, but nevertheless formed the one and only topic of
conversation), from nurses and sisters in the Typhoid Wards, but had
never actually been there myself. As previously explained the three
Typhoid Wards--rooms leading one out of the other on the ground
floor--were in a separate building joined only by some outhouses to the
main portion, thus forming three sides of the paved yard.
The east end of the Cathedral with its beautiful windows completed the
square, and in the evenings it was very restful to hear the muffled
sounds of the old organ floating up through the darkness.
Sister Wicks asked me one day to go through these wards with her. It
must be remembered that at this early period there were no regular
typhoid hospitals; and in fact ours was the only hospital in the place
that would take them in, the others having refused. Our beds were
therefore always full, and the typhoid staff was looked on as the
hardest worked in the Hospital, and always tried to make us feel that
they were the only ones who did any real work!
It was difficult to imagine these hollow-cheeked men with glittering
eyes and claw-like hands were the men who had stemmed the German rush at
Liége. Some were delirious, others merely plucking at the sheets with
their wasted fingers, and everywhere the sisters and nurses were
hurrying to and fro to alleviate their sufferings as much as possible. I
shall always see the man in bed sixteen to this day. He was extremely
fair, with blue eyes and a light beard. I started when I first saw him,
he looked so like some of the pictures of Christ one sees; and there was
an unearthly light in his eyes. He was delirious and seemed very ill.
The sister told me he had come down with a splendid fighting record, and
was one of the worst cases of pneumonic typhoid in the ward. My heart
ached for him, and instinctively I shivered, for somehow he did not seem
to belong to this world any longer. We passed on to Ward III, where I
was presented to "Le Petit Sergent," a little bit of a man, so cheery
and bright, who had made a marvellous recovery, but was not yet well
enough to be moved. Everywhere was that peculiar smell which seems
inseparable from typhoid wards in spite, or perhaps because of, the many
disinfectants. We left by the door at the end of Salle III and once in
the sunlight again, I heaved a sigh of relief; for frankly I thought the
three typhoid Salles the most depressing places on earth. They were
dark, haunting, and altogether horrible. "Well," said Sergeant Wicks
cheerfully, "what do you think of the typhoid Wards? Splendid aren't
they? You should have seen them at first." As I made no reply, she
rattled gaily on, "Well, I hope you will find the work interesting when
you come to us as a pro. to-morrow." I gasped. "Am I to leave the
_blessés_, then?" was all I could feebly ask--"Why, yes, didn't they
tell you?"--and she was off before I could say anything more.
* * * * *
When one goes to work in France one can't pick and choose, and the next
morning saw me in the typhoid wards which soon I learnt to love, and
which I found so interesting that I hardly left them from that time
onwards, except for "trench duty."
I was in Salle I at first--the less serious cases--and life seemed one
eternal rush of getting "feeds" for the different patients, "doing
mouths," and making "Bengers." All the boiling and heating was done in
one big stove in Salle II. Each time I passed No. 16 I tried not to look
at him, but I always ended in doing so, and each time he seemed to be
thinner and more ethereal looking. He literally went to skin and bone.
He must have been such a splendid man, I longed for him to get better,
but one morning when I passed, the bed was empty and a nurse was
disinfecting the iron bedstead. For one moment I thought he had been
moved. "Where--What?" I asked, disjointedly of the nurse. "Died in the
night," she said briefly. "Don't look like that," and she went on with
her work. No. 16 had somehow got on my mind, I suppose because it was
the first bad typhoid case I had seen, and from the first I had taken
such an interest in him. One gets accustomed to these things in time,
but I never forgot that first shock. In the afternoons the men's
temperatures rose alarmingly, and most of the time was spent in
"blanket-bathing" which is about the most back-aching pastime there is;
but how the patients loved to feel the cool sponges passing over their
feverish limbs. They were so grateful and, though often too ill to
speak, would smile their thanks, and one felt it was worth all the
backaches in the world.
It was such a virulent type of typhoid. Although we had been inoculated,
we were obliged to gargle several times during the day, and even then we
always had more or less of a "typy" throat.
Our gallant sergeant, sister Wicks, who had organised and run the whole
of the three Salles since November '14, suddenly developed para-typhoid,
and with great difficulty was persuaded to go to bed. Fortunately she
did not have it badly, and in her convalescent stage I was sent to look
after her up at the "shop window." I was anxious to get her something
really appetising for lunch, and presently heard one of the famous fish
wives calling out in the street. I ran out and bargained with her, for
of course she would have been vastly disappointed if I had given her the
original price she asked. At last I returned triumphant with two nice
looking little "Merlans," too small to cut their heads off, I decided. I
had never coped with fish before, so after holding them for some time
under the tap till they seemed clean enough, put them on to fry in
butter. I duly took them in on a tray to Wicks, and I'm sure they looked
very tasty. "Have you cleaned them?" she asked suspiciously. "Yes, of
course I have," I replied. She examined them. "May I ask what you
_did_?" she said. "I held them under the tap," I told her, "there didn't
seem anything more to be done," I added lamely.
How she laughed--I thought she was never going to stop--and I stood
there patiently waiting to hear the joke. She explained at length and
said, "No, take them away; you've made me feel ever so much better, but
I'll have eggs instead, thank you." I went off grumbling, "How on earth
was I to know anyway they kept their tummies behind their ears!"
That fish story went all over the hospital.
Nursing in the typhoids was relieved by turns up to the trenches behind
Dixmude, which we looked forward to tremendously, but as they were
practically--with slight variations in the matter of shelling and
bombardments--a repetition of my first experience, there is no object in
recounting them here.
The typhoid doctor--"Scrubby," by name; so called because of the
inability of his chin to make up its mind if it would have a beard or
not--was very amusing, without of course meaning to be. He liked to
write the reports of the patients in the Sister's book himself, and was
very proud of his English, and this is what occasionally appeared:
Patient No. 12. "If the man sleep, let him sleep."
Patient No. 13. "To have red win (wine) in the spoonful."
Patient No. 14. "If the man have a temper (i.e. temperature) reduce him
with the sponges." And he was once heard to remark with reference to a
flat tyre: "That tube is contrary to the swelling state!"
So far, I have made no mention of the men orderlies, who I must say were
absolute bricks. There was Pierre, an alert little Bruxellois, who was
in a bank before the war and kept his widowed mother. He was in constant
fear as to her safety, for she had been left in their little house and
had no time to escape. He was well-educated and most interesting, and
oh, so gentle with the men. Then there was Louis, Ziské, and Charlké, a
big hefty Walloon who had been the butcher on a White Star liner before
the war, all excellent workers.
About this time I went on night duty and liked it very much. One was
much freer for one thing, and the sisters immediately became more human
(especially when they relied on the pros. to cook the midnight supper!),
and further there were no remarks or reflections about the defects of
the "untrained unit" who "imagined they knew everything after four
months of war." (With reference to cooking, I might here mention that
since the fish episode Mrs. Betton and I were on more than speaking
terms!)[3]
There were several very bad cases in Salle II. One especially Sister
feared would not pull through. I prayed he might live, but it was not to
be. She was right--one night about 2 a.m. he became rapidly worse and
perforation set in. The dreadful part was that he was so horribly
conscious all the time. "Miske," he asked, "think you that I shall see
my wife and five children again?" Before I could reply, he continued,
"They were there _là bas_ in the little house so happy when I left them
in 1914--My God," and he became agitated. "If it were not permitted that
I return? Do you think I am going to die, Miske?" "You must try and keep
the patient from getting excited," said the calm voice of the Sister,
who did not speak French. He died about an hour later. It was terrible.
"Why must they go through so much suffering?" I wondered miserably. If
they _are_ to die, why can't it happen at once?"
This was the first typhoid death I had actually witnessed. In the
morning the sinister coffin cart flapped into the yard and bore him off
to his last resting place. What, I wondered, happened to his wife and
five children?
When I became more experienced I could tell if patients were going to
recover or not; and how often in the latter case I prayed that it might
be over quickly; but no, the fell disease had to take its course; and
even the sisters said they had never seen such awful cases.