prejudice of the fanners was overcome, the demand for workers was
greater than the camp could supply. Practically the same processes were
carried through as at Vassar, and the verdict of the farmer on his new
helpers was that "while less strong than men, they more than made up for
this by superior conscientiousness and quickness." Proof of the
genuineness of his estimate was shown in his willingness to pay the
management of the camp the regulation two dollars for an eight hour
working day. And it indicated entire satisfaction with the experiment,
rather than abstract faith in woman, that each farmer anxiously urged
the captain of the group at the end of his first trial to "please bring
the same young ladies tomorrow." He was sure no others so good existed.
The unit plan seems a heaven-born solution of many of the knotty
problems of the farm. In the first place, the farmer gets cheerful and
handy helpers, and his over-worked wife does not find her domestic cares
added to in the hot summer season. The new hands house and feed
themselves. From the point of view of the worker, the advantage is that
her food at the camp is prepared by trained hands and the proverbial
farm isolation gives way to congenial companionship.
These separate experiments growing out of the need of food production
and the shortage of labor have brought new blood to the farm, have
turned the college girl on vacation and, what is more important, being a
solution of an industrial problem, the unemployed in seasonal trades,
into recruits for an agricultural army. And by concentrating workers in
well-run camps there has been attracted to the land a higher order
of helper.
One obstacle in the way of the immediate success of putting such women
on the land is a wholly mistaken idea in the minds of many persons of
influence in agricultural matters that the new labor can be diverted to
domestic work in the farm house. This view is urged in the following
letter to me from the head of one of our best agricultural colleges:
"The farm labor shortage is much more acute than is generally understood
and I have much confidence in the possibility of a great amount of
useful work in food production being done by women who are physically
strong enough and who can secure sufficient preliminary training to do
this with some degree of efficiency. Probably the larger measure of
service could be done by relieving women now on the farms of this State
from the double burden of indoor work and the attempt to assist in farm
operations and chores. If farm women would get satisfactory domestic
assistance within the house they could add much to the success of field
husbandry. Women who know farm conditions and who could largely take the
place of men in the management of outdoor affairs can accomplish much
more than will ever be possible by drafting city-bred women directly
into garden or other forms of field work."
The opinions expressed in this letter are as generally held as they are
mistaken. In the first place, the theory that the country-bred woman in
America is stronger and healthier than the city-bred has long since been
exploded. The assumption cannot stand up under the facts. Statistics
show that the death rate in the United States is lower in city than in
farm communities, and if any added proof were needed to indicate that
the stamina of city populations overbalances the country it was
furnished by the draft records. Any group of college and Manhattan Trade
School girls could be pitted against a group of women from the farms and
win the laurels in staying powers. Nor must it be overlooked that we are
not dealing here with uncertainties; the mettle of the girls has
been proved.
In any case the fact must be faced that these agricultural units will
not do domestic work. Nine-tenths of the farm houses in America are
without modern conveniences. The well-appointed barn may have running
water, but the house has not. To undertake work as a domestic helper on
the average farm is to step back into quite primitive conditions. The
farmer's wife can attract no one from city life, where so much
cooperation is enjoyed, to her extreme individualistic surroundings.
A second obstacle to the employment of this new labor-force is due to
the government's failure to see the possibility of saving most valuable
labor-power and achieving an economic gain by dovetailing the idle
months of young women in industrial life into the rush time of
agriculture.
One department suggests excusing farm labor from the draft, as if we had
already fulfilled our obligation in man-power to the battlefront of our
Allies. The United States Senate discusses bringing in coolie and
contract labor, as if we had not demonstrated our unfitness to deal with
less advanced peoples, and as if a republic could live comfortably with
a class of disfranchised workers. The Labor Department declares it will
mobilize for the farm an army of a million boys, as if the wise saw,
"boys will be boys," did not apply with peculiar sharpness of flavor to
the American vintage, God bless them, and as if it were not our plain
duty at this world crisis to spur up rather than check civilizing
agencies and keep our boys in school for the full term.
Refusing to be in the least crushed by government neglect, far-seeing
women determined to organize widely and carefully their solution of the
farm-labor problem. To this end the Women's National Farm and Garden
Association, the Garden Clubs of America, the Young Women's Christian
Association, the Woman's Suffrage Party, the New York Women's University
Club, and the Committee of the Women's Agricultural Camp, met with
representatives of the Grange, of the Cornell Agricultural College, and
of the Farmingdale State School of Agriculture, and formed an advisory
council, the object of which is to "stimulate the formation of a Land
Army of Women to take the places on the farms of the men who are being
drafted for active service." This is to be on a nationwide scale.
The Council has put lecturers in the Granges to bring to the farmer by
the spoken word and lantern slides the value of the labor of women, and
is appealing to colleges, seasonal trades and village communities to
form units for the Land Army. It is asking the coöperation of the labor
bureaus to act as media through which units may be placed where labor is
most needed.
This mobilization of woman-power is not yet large or striking. The
effort is entirely civil. But all the more is it praiseworthy. It shows
on the part of women, clear-eyed recognition of facts as they exist and
vision as to the future.
The mobilization of this fresh labor-power should of course be taken in
hand by the government. Not only that, it should be led by women as in
Great Britain and Germany. But the spirit in America today is the same
as in England the first year of the war,--a disposition to exclude women
from full service.
But facts remain facts in spite of prejudice, and the Woman's Land Army,
with faith and enthusiasm in lieu of a national treasury, are
endeavoring to bring woman-power and the untilled fields together. The
proved achievement of the individual worker will win the employer, the
unit plan with its solution of housing conditions and dreary isolation
will overcome not only the opposition of the farmer's wife, but that of
the intelligent worker. When the seed time of the movement has been
lived through by anxious and inspired women, the government may step in
to reap the harvest of a nation's gratitude.
The mobilization of woman-power on the farm is the need of the hour, and
the wise and devoted women who are trying to answer the need, deserve an
all-hail from the people of the United States and her Allies.
XII
WOMAN'S PART IN SAVING CIVILIZATION
Men have played--all honor to them--the major part in the actual
conflict of the war. Women will mobilize for the major part of binding
up the wounds and conserving civilization.
The spirit of the world might almost be supposed to have been looking
forward to this day and clearly seeing its needs, so well are women
being prepared to receive and carry steadily the burden which will be
laid on their shoulders. For three-quarters of a century schools and
colleges have given to women what they had to confer in the way of
discipline. Gainful pursuits were opened up to them, adding training in
ordered occupation and self-support. Lastly has come the Great War, with
its drill in sacrifice and economy, its larger opportunities to function
and achieve, its ideals of democracy which have directly and quickly led
to the political enfranchisement of women in countries widely separated.
Fate has prepared women to share fully in the saving of civilization.
Whether victory be ours in the immediate future, or whether the dangers
rising so clearly on the horizon develop into fresh alignments leading
to years of war, civilization stands in jeopardy. Political ideals and
ultimate social aims may remain intact, but the immediate, practical
maintenance of those standards of life which are necessary to ensure
strong and fruitful reactions are in danger of being swept away.
We have been destroying the life, the wealth and beauty of the world.
The nobility of our aim in the war must not blind us to the awfulness
and the magnitude of the destruction. In the fighting forces there are
at least thirty-eight million men involved in international or civil
conflict. Over four million men have fallen, and three million have been
maimed for life. Disease has taken its toll of fighting strength and
economic power. In addition to all this human depletion, we have the
loss of life and the destruction of health and initiative in harried
peoples madly flying across their borders from invading armies.
Starvation has swept across wide areas, and steady underfeeding rules in
every country in Europe and in the cities of America, letting loose
malnutrition, that hidden enemy whose ambushes are more serious than the
attacks of an open foe. The world is sick.
And the world is poor. The nations have spent over a hundred billions on
the war, and that is but part of the wealth which has gone down in the
catastrophe. Thousands of square miles are plowed so deep with shot and
shell and trench that the fertile soil lies buried beneath unyielding
clay. Orchards and forests are gone. Villages are wiped out, cities are
but skeletons of themselves. In the face of all the need of
reconstruction we must admit, however much we would wish to cover the
fact,--the world is poor.
[Illustration: A useful blending of Allied women. Miss Kathleen Burke
(Scotch) exhibiting the X-ray ambulance equipped by Mrs. Ayrlon
(English) and Madame Curie (French).]
And still, as in no other war, the will to guard human welfare has
remained dominant. The country rose to a woman in most spirited fashion
to combat the plan to lower the standards of labor conditions in the
supposed interest of war needs. With but few exceptions the States have
strengthened their labor laws. In its summary the American Association
for Labor Legislation says:
"Eleven States strengthened their child labor laws, by raising age
limits, extending restrictions to new employments, or shortening hours.
Texas passed a new general statute setting a fifteen-year minimum age
for factories and Vermont provided for regulations in conformity with
those of the Federal Child Labor Act. Kansas and New Hampshire
legislated on factory safeguards, Texas on fire escapes, New Jersey on
scaffolds, Montana on electrical apparatus, Delaware on sanitary
equipment, and West Virginia on mines. New Jersey forbade the
manufacture of articles of food or children's wear in tenements.
"Workmen's compensation laws were enacted in Delaware, Idaho, New
Mexico, South Dakota, and Utah, making forty States and Territories
which now have such laws, in addition to the Federal Government's
compensation law, for its own half-million civilian employees. In more
than twenty additional States existing acts were amended, the changes
being marked by a tendency to extend the scope, shorten the working
period, and increase provision for medical care."
The Great War, far from checking the movement for social welfare, has
quickened the public sense of responsibility. That fact opens the widest
field to women for work in which they are best prepared by nature
and training.
Many keen thinkers are concerned over the question of population. One of
our most distinguished professors has thrown out a hint of a possibility
that considering the greater proportion of women to men some form of
plurality of wives may become necessary. The disturbed balance of the
sexes is a thing that will right itself in one generation. Need of
population will be best answered by efforts to salvage the race. The
United States loses each year five hundred thousand babies under twelve
months of age from preventable causes. An effort to save them would seem
more reasonable than a demand for more children to neglect. Life will be
so full of drive and interest, that the woman who has given no hostages
to fortune will find ample scope for her powers outside of motherhood.
The "old maid" of tomorrow will have a mission more honored and
important than was hers in the past.
But whatever the conclusions as to the wisest method of building up
population, there is no doubt that government and individuals will make
strict valuation of the essentials and non-essentials in national life.
In our poverty we will test all things in the light of their benefit to
the race and hold fast that which is good.
The opinions of women will weigh in this national accounting. There will
be no money to squander, and women to a unit will stand behind those men
who think a recreation field is of more value than a race track. It will
be the woman's view, there being but one choice, that it is better to
encourage fleetness and skill in boys and girls than in horses. If we
have just so much money to spend and the question arises as to whether
there shall be corner saloons or municipal kitchens, public sentiment,
made in good measure by women, will eschew the saloon.
The things that lend themselves to the husbanding of the race will draw
as a magnet those who have borne the race. The tired world will need for
its rejuvenation a broadened and deepened medical science. Women are too
wise to permit sanitation and research to fall to a low level. On the
contrary, they will wish them to be more thorough. There will be economy
along the less essential lines to meet the cost.
The flagging spirit needs the inspiration of art and music. To secure
them in the future, state and municipal effort will be demanded. Women
are born economizers. They have been trained to pinch each penny. With
their advent into political life, roads and public buildings will cost
less. Through careful saving, funds will be made available for the
things of the spirit.
One of the men conductors on the New York street railways somewhat
reproachfully remarked to me, "No one ever came to look at the
recreation room and restaurant at the car barns until women were taken
on. Men don't seem to count." Is the reproach deserved? Have women been
narrow in sympathy? Perhaps we have assumed that men can look out for
themselves. They could, but in private life they never do. Women have to
do the mothering. A trade-unionist is ready enough to regulate wages and
hours, but he gives not a thought to surroundings in factory
and workshop.
An act of protection generally starts with solicitude about a woman or
child. Factory legislation took root in their needs. There was no mercy
for the man worker. His only chance of getting better conditions was
when women entered his occupation, and the regulation meant for her
benefit indirectly served his interest.
"Men suffer more than women in certain dangerous trades, but I did not
suppose you were generous enough to care anything about them," came in
answer to an inquiry at a labor conference at the end of a most
admirable paper on women in dangerous trades, given by one of the
doctors in the New York City Department of Health. He was speaking to an
audience of working women. I doubt if his hearers had given a thought to
men workers.
Perhaps this is natural, since there has been going on at the same time
with the development of factory legislation in America a strong
propaganda directed especially at political freedom for women. We have
been laying stress on the wrongs of woman and demanding very
persistently and convincingly her rights. The industrial needs and
rights of the man have been overlooked.
With increasing numbers of women entering the industrial world, with
ever widening extension of the vote to women, and the consequent
quickening of public responsibility, together with the recent experience
of Europe demonstrating the importance of care for all workers, both men
and women, there is ground for hope that even the United States, where
protective legislation is so retarded in development, will enter upon
wide and fundamental plans for conservation of all our human resources.
Protection of the worker, housing conditions, the feeding of factory
employees and school children, play grounds and recreation centers, will
challenge the world for first consideration. These are the social
processes which command most surely the hearts and minds of women. The
churning which the war has given humanity has roused in women a
realization that upon them rests at least half the burden of saving
civilization from wreck. Here is the world, with such and such needs
for food, clothing, shelter, with such and such needs for sanitation,
hospitals, and above all, for education, for science, for the arts, if
it is not to fall back into the conditions of the Middle Ages. How can
women aid in making secure the national position? Certainly not by
idleness, inefficiency, an easy policy of laissez faire. They must
labor, economize, and pool their brains.
Women can save civilization only by the broadest coöperative action, by
daring to think, by daring to be themselves. The world is entering an
heroic age calling for heroic women.
APPENDIX
DOCUMENTS USED IN WOMEN'S WAR-WORK IN
ENGLAND AND FRANCE
WAAC
WOMEN'S ARMY
AUXILIARY
CORPS
CONFIDENTIAL. Reference No: J.W. 21 [o.]
Joint Woman's V.A.D. Department.
DEVONSHIRE HOUSE. PICCADILLY, LONDON. W.I.
_Return to Secretary,
V.A.D Department.
Devonshire House,
Piccadilly, S.W.I._
Territorial Force Associations,
British Red Cross Society.
Order of St. John of Jerusalem.
Telegrams [unreadable]
Telephone Mayfair 4707
_B.R.C.S. or Order of St. John ..._
Sir,
Will you kindly fill up the following form of Medical Certificate,
returning it to the address given above.
Your communication will be received as strictly confidential.
It is urgently requested that Members'
names and detachment numbers should
be filled in legibly.
Yours faithfully,
MARGARET HEMPHILL
MEDICAL CERTIFICATE
1. Name
2. County No. of Detachment
3. How long have you been acquainted with her?
4. Have you attended her professionally?
5. For what complaint?
6. Is she intelligent and of active habits?
7. General health?
8. Has she flat feet, hammer-toe, or any other defect?
9. Is her vision good in each eye?
10. Is her hearing perfect?
11. Has she sound teeth, and if not, have they been properly
attended to by a Dentist lately?
12. Has she shown any tendency to Rheumatism, Anaemia,
Tuberculosis, or other illness?
13. When?
14. What?
15. Has she ever had influenza?
16. Does she suffer from headaches?
17. Any form of fits?
18. Heart disease or varicose veins?
19. Is she subject to any functional disturbance?
* * * * *
I have on the day of 191 seen and
examined and
hereby certify that she is apparently in good health, that she
is not labouring under any deformity, and is, in my opinion,
both physically and mentally competent to undertake duty in
a Military Hospital, and is [*]A. Fit for General Service.
B. Fit for Home Service only.
C. Unfit.
_Date (Signed)
Address_
[Footnote *: Kindly delete categories which do not apply.]
* * * * *
Reference No.: J.W. 19c.
JOINT WOMEN'S V.A.D. DEPARTMENT.
Territorial Forces Association. British Red Cross Society. Order of St.
John of Jerusalem.
DEVONSHIRE HOUSE, PICCADILLY, LONDON. W1.
* * * * *
QUALIFICATIONS
of Members of Women's Voluntary Aid Detachments for Nursing Service or
General Service.
* * * * *
1. (a) Name in full (_Mrs. or Miss_).
(b) If Married state Maiden Name.
2. Permanent Postal Address.
Present Postal Address.
3. Telephone No.
4. Telegraphic Address.
5. Detachment County and No.
B.R.C.S.
St. John Brigade.
St. John Association.
6. Name and Address of Commandant of Detachment.
7. Rank in Detachment.
8. Time of Service in Detachment.
9. Age and Date of Birth.
10. Place and Country of Birth.
11. Nationality at Birth.
12. Present Nationality.
13. Height.
14. Weight.
15. Where Educated.
16. At what age did you leave school?
17. Whether Single, Married, or Widow.
18. If not Single, state Nationality of Husband.
19. Name and Address of Next-of-Kin or Nearest Relation
residing in the British Isles.
20. Father's Nationality at Birth.
21. Mother's Nationality at Birth.
22. Father's Profession.
23. Religion.
24. (a) If you volunteer for nursing duties state what experience
you have had in wards.
(b) Name and address of hospital.
(c) Date.
25. Certificates held.
26. (a) Nursing. (f) Motor Driver.
(b) Kitchen. (g) Laboratory Attendant.
(c) Clerical. (h) X-Ray Attendant.
(d) Storekeeping. (i) House Work.
(e) Dispenser. (j) Pantry Work.
27. State what experience and qualifications you have had
for Categories in No. 26.
28. Have you been inoculated against Enteric Fever?
If so, what date?
If not, are you willing to be?
Have you been vaccinated?
It so, what date?
If not, are you willing to be?
29. Your usual Occupation or Profession?
Your present Occupation or Profession?
30. Give the Names and Addresses of two British Householders with
permanent addresses in the British Isles who have known applicant for
two or more years, but are not related to applicant, to act as
References, having previously obtained their permission to use
their names.
(a) (Mayor, Magistrate, Justice of the Peace, Minister of Religion,
Barrister, Physician, Solicitor or Notary Public).
Acquaintance dating from year ________
(b) Lady.
Acquaintance dating from year _______
31. Name and Address of Head of College or School, recent Business
Employer, Head of Government Department, Secretary of Society or some
other person who can be referred to for a report on your
qualifications for the work selected. (The Quartermaster of your
V.A.D. could be given if you have worked in her department.)
In what capacity employed?
How long employed?
Year?
32. Are you willing to serve at home or abroad?
33. Are you willing to serve in Civil Hospitals from which
personnel have been withdrawn for War Service?
34. Are you willing to serve:--
(a) With pay,
(b) For expenses only,
on the terms of service laid down in our terms of service?
N. B.--Members who can afford to work for their expenses only are
urgently needed.
35. Date after which you will be available for duty.
36. (a) Are you pledged to serve in any other organisation?
(b) If so, what?
37. (a) Have you served with the Women's Legion or any
similar organisation?
(b) If so, what?
I hereby declare that the above statements are complete and correct to
the best of my knowledge and belief.
Date .......... Usual Signature ..........
_For Office Purposes_, please add your full Christian Names and Surname
legibly written.
I certify that the above declaration is, to the best of my knowledge and
belief, true; and that M ............ is a fit and proper person to be
employed by the Joint V.A.D. Committee.
REMARKS:--
Date .......... Signed ....................
_Commandant_.
Date .......... Countersigned ....................
_County Director_.
NOTE.--Commandants are held responsible for all statements on this form
being accurate so far as it is possible for them to find out, also for
the fact that the member who signs it is a British subject, and in every
way suitable for appointment by the Joint V.A.D. Committee.
This form must be signed by the Commandant, who should then send it to
the County Director for counter signature and forwarding to
Headquarters.
_Application No._
_For Official use only_.
CONFIDENTIAL.
WOMEN'S ARMY AUXILIARY CORPS
FORM OF APPLICATION