WOMAN AND THE WAR.
SHE HAS WON "HER PLACE IN THE SUN"--RICH AND POOR IN THE MUNITIONS
FACTORIES--NURSE AND AMBULANCE DRIVER--KHAKI AND TROUSERS--ORGANIZER AND
FARMER--HEROES IN THE STRESS OF CIRCUMSTANCES--DOING MEN'S WORK FOR
MEN--EVEN A "BOBBIE."
If it were ever really necessary for woman to "win a place in the sun"
she has done so by her activities with relation to the war. We have
regarded woman with a high degree of sentimentality, and to her pleas
for recognition in world affairs have shrugged our shoulders and
intimated that she was fit to bear children, nurse the sick, do
household chores and cook, cook, cook; but physically, mentally and by
training she was unfit to perform the greater world duties.
But the world war has proved that all the tasks which men claimed women
were unfitted to perform can as well be done by what we have been
pleased to term the "weaker sex."
The war has proved a truism that old saying, "The hand that rocks the
cradle rules the world," and also that the burden of war falls upon
women. It is they who give up their sons to their country and send their
husbands and boys to the front to serve as fodder for the cannon.
In England the work of women in the war secured for them a degree of
recognition in Parliament which all of their agitation and militant
tactics failed to produce.
National extremity was woman's opportunity; frank invitation to new
lines of work was followed by hearty appreciation on the part of the
men; and a proposition to extend suffrage to 6,000,000 English women was
based avowedly upon the general gratitude felt for their loyal and
effective service in the war. And it is war service, for modern warfare
has greatly enlarged the content of that term. In the modern conception
those who make munitions or in other ways release others for the front
are doing war service as truly as those who bear arms.
Instead of yielding to fame a few isolated Mollie Pitchers, the war
brought a largely neglected half of the nation's military strength into
practical service. Indeed, though woman dreads war more than man does,
if it comes to actual defense of land and home and young, we find, with
Kipling, that "the female of the species is more deadly than the male."
THE WORK OF WOMEN.
The work of the women in the munitions factories in England has
deservedly attracted large attention, and, doubtless, British historians
will for centuries tell how, when England found herself utterly at a
loss before her enemies because of a lack of effective ammunition, the
women responded "as one man" to meet the need and save the Union Jack
from being forced to the shore. It was a repetition, multiplied 10,000
times, of the Presbyterian parson at Springfield, N.J., supplying
Washington's army with Watts hymn books when it was retreating to serve
as paper wadding for the rifles.
The innovation of the task, the large scale on which it was carried out
and the striking success of it make it a major event of the war, even to
be compared with the battle of the Marne. And shall not American
historians ascribe to the scores of young girls who lost their lives in
an explosion at Eddystone, Pa., making munitions, the honor of being the
first martyrs of the German-American War?
It was not alone the working girls of England who tired their arms and
calloused their hands on the heavy shells. When the work was at its full
capacity, a proposition was sent to the women of leisure to undergo
three weeks of training in a munitions factory and then take up the work
at the week-ends to relieve the regular workers, the women shell
machinists, whose strength and skill could best be maintained by saving
them from Saturday and Sunday overtime.
There was a strange incongruity in paying them less than the men for the
same work. They worked in eight-hour shifts and were required to stand,
except during a single half-hour interval. The prospectus of instruction
suggested short skirts, thick gloves and boots with low heels, adding
that evening dress would not be necessary.
Hotel accommodations were attempted for these "lady" workers, but this
proved inadequate, and part of them went to the lodgings with the
regular workers. Short skirts were only the first step that promptly led
to overalls, and when these English ladies, whom the girls called
"Miaows," got well grimed with dust and grease, utterly tired out with
handling 12-pound shells and hungry enough to prefer coarse food, they
understood the workgirls as never before, and the men, too, and they had
a new birth of patriotism. One lady said she found great relief and
enthusiasm by thinking of the shells as so many dead Boches or live
Tommies.
VARIED OCCUPATIONS OF WOMEN.
Making ammunition and hospital supplies, handling luggage and trunks in
baggage rooms, driving motors, conducting trolley cars, carpentry work
on wooden houses for the front, are but a few of the occupations in
which European women engaged in war service. They have served as lift
attendants, ticket sellers, post office sorters, mail carriers,
gardeners, dairy lassies, grocery clerks, drivers of delivery wagons and
vans, commissionaires. More than a million were added to the industrial
workers in England during the first two years of war.
America coming later into the war, its women naturally followed the lead
of the English and French along many lines tried and proved to be worth
while, but our matrons and maids, famed for their independence and
initiative, developed also new lines of patriotic effort. As soon as it
was evident that German ambitions included designs upon America, the
strong feminine instinct for preservation began to assert itself.
Pacifism had no special appeal to the gentler sex at such a time. She
got behind the recruiting as if it were her own job, and much of the
success of it was due to her efforts.
The Woman's Section of the Navy League may well be described by quoting
from its own statement of motive and purpose. "Every mother with sons,
every wife with husband, every sister with a brother, feels her heart
stand still with the horror of what war may bring to her."
WOMAN'S MANY SERVICES.
These women spread information to arouse interest in the condition of
the United States naval forces, aided recruiting for the Naval Reserve,
assisted in procuring enrollments for the Naval Coast Reserve, and
drawing on their resources provided many needed articles of clothing,
equipment and comfort not furnished by the Government. A knitting
committee makes sleeveless jackets, helmets, wristlets and mufflers.
Comfort kits, games, blankets, underwear, rubber hats, coats and boots
are made or bought by the Comfort and Supplies Committee.
The two poles of patriotic service are the production of food and
fighting at the front; a world of activity bulges between them. European
women are accustomed to farm labor. Millions of peasant women, serfs,
all but in name, under the late Russian regime; Balkan women, German and
French wives and girls, and, to some extent, the mothers and daughters
of the English poor, would have understood Markham's poem better if he
had called it, "The Woman With the Hoe."
In the war food crisis the women of America matched the women of the
enemy and vied with those of their own allies in persuading mother earth
to yield her bounty. In heavy shoes, trousers of jean, rolled-up sleeves
and a straw hat, the girls of America here and there turned to the land
and took hold of the tasks of the farm.
So far we have mentioned only the work at home that women took up for
the war, but this is only a part; the other pole finds them near. The
invaluable service of Red Cross nurses, their zeal and sacrifice and
sometimes martyrdom, from Elizabeth Fry and Florence Nightingale to
Edith Cavell, have been women's glory for more than half a century. This
war multiplied the need many times and veritable regiments of them
responded. Their emblem became the symbol universal of mercy, charity
and good will.
In addition to the 50 trained nurses for a base hospital, there are 25
hospital aids, who serve without pay. America has 8000 registered Red
Cross nurses and scores of thousands are in training for aids.
The effective and helpful work of women in all lines of endeavor, aside
from home and family life, has never before been shown so impressively
as now. Their energy, willingness, faithfulness and capability in every
activity are unsurpassed.
WOMAN BENT ON DOING HER UTMOST.
But woman shares the lot of mankind on earth, and in the issues of life
and death, land and home, she fears to do less than her most, and we
would fear to have her do less.
The woman for ages has been the war nurse, but the American woman has
gone a step further and qualified as the war physician. When the war
clouds first hovered over America more than 200 women physicians
formally offered their services to the Government. At the graduation
exercises of a women's medical college, when America first entered the
war, a prominent official made the statement that 3,000 women physicians
could find unlimited work of mercy behind the first line of firing in
Europe.
The surgeon general of the United States army did not await an actual
call to arms to notify a physician that the proffer of the services of
women physicians would be accepted when the need came.
"When I spoke to the women," said this physician, "I asked them this
question:
"'Can I tell the Government that it may count upon each and all of you
for any work within your power?'
"Their answer was unanimous. It was 'Yes.'"
There is a law prohibiting women from going aboard battleships when they
are under way, but such an obstacle has not stood in the way of woman's
desire to help where she can when her country calls, and so Miss Loretta
Walsh became a member of the United States navy--the first woman
enlisted in that branch of the service, with the exception of the
nurses' corps. Her title was chief yeoman.
Women announced their readiness to assist in another way--in
economizing--one organization having adopted the following resolutions:
RESOLUTION ON ECONOMICS.
"Resolved, That all patriotic women be urged to use their influence on
fashions in dress to keep them as economical as possible, and to
register their disapproval of such styles as the melon and peg-top
skirt, or any other styles that imply extravagant changes in the
wardrobe, to the end that the time and money thus saved from clothes may
be devoted to the needs of the nation."
How often have we heard: "When war comes, when our homes are threatened,
when peril stalks abroad in the land, who shoulders the musket and goes
out to fight? The man! The man!"
But woman, knowing better than man the impulses of her own heart, only
awaited the opportunity to show what she could do, though, much more
than man, she loves peace, detests strife. But she did not await an
actual call to arms to show the patriotic spirit with which her soul was
fired. Whatever her Government was willing she should do, to that was
she prepared to give her best efforts.
Lady Frances Balfour, president of the London Society of National Union
of Women Suffragists and president of the Travelers' Aid Society, worked
as hard to win the war as any Tommy in the trenches.
A daughter of the eighth Duke of Argyll and the widow of a soldier, she
played an important part in Scotch and English public life for many
years, and has done much to advance the cause of British women.
An authentic view of the situation as it developed with reference to the
reception of women into the everyday work and what American women might
do is contained in the following interview with Lady Balfour:
WOMAN AS WAGE EARNER.
"We are doing everything," she said. "We are filling nearly every post.
If the House of Lords had not vetoed the bill we would be solicitors,
but that must wait for a time. British women are now meeting with
success because for the first time they are receiving a proper wage and
are able to live in a way to do their best work. The old sweat shop wage
has gone, and I hope never to return. Women will never return to the
conditions which existed before the war.
"American women start with a great advantage. They have already the
entree in the business world and fill many clerical places, whereas our
women and girls had to break down the barriers of conservatism existing
in a great number of banks. There was the same objection to women
workers among the farmers of the South of England, though in Scotland
the woman has always done her part on the farm.
[Illustration: GENERAL PETAIN. GENERAL MANGIN. GENERAL D'ESPEREY.
Three French Generals who fought their way to fame. In many a battle
they saved the day, and through their heroic deeds France was saved from
the Hun.]
[Illustration: ENGLISH BOMBING PLANE ON THE AISNE FRONT.
Preparing the departure for a bombing expedition. The bombs and their
holders can be seen in the foreground.]
[Illustration: UNITED STATES COLORED LABOR TROOPS BOARDING A TRANSPORT.
An American Negro battallion entering a pier ready to board a transport.
These husky doughboys perform their tasks with a vim and a will.]
[Illustration: FIRST LOOK AT FRANCE FROM A TRANSPORT.
United States soldiers seeing France as the transport arrives in sight
of land. This vessel was formerly a Hamburg-America (German) liner.]
[Illustration: BRITISH TANKS ADVANCING ACROSS THE HINDENBURG LINE.
This battery of tanks shows the new superstructure on their fronts,
which is used to carpet the slippery mud which the caterpillar wheels do
not grip.]
[Illustration: MAMMOTH BRITISH GUN "KILL JOY."
Used by the British forces in Flanders. No gun of more power was used by
any belligerent. It is greater than the "Busy Berthas" of the Germans.]
[Illustration: A RAPID FIRING GUN ON A FRENCH AEROPLANE.
This remarkable picture from a close-up photograph shows the little
Nieuport "scout" plane. The electric gun is worked from the pilot seat
by a wire. It produced great havoc among German birdmen.]
[Illustration: THE GUN WITH THE PUNCH. A FRENCH 320 M.M.
Photographed While in Action--Loading.
One of the largest and most effective guns used in the war. An idea of
its immense size is gained in comparison with the men. It is moved about
on a specially constructed railway.]
[Illustration: THE RETURN OF THE HOLY SCROLL IN JERUSALEM.
General E.H.H. Allenby, Commander-in-Chief of the British Army in the
Holy Land, is seen seated at the left. The ceremony was very
impressive.]
[Illustration: THE GUN WITH THE PUNCH.
Huge American railway artillery of 16-inch calibre for the U.S. Army.
This big gun can be put into position in 15 minutes and will fire all
around the horizon. The ammunition car for shell and powder is
attached.]
[Illustration: A MONSTER BRITISH HOWITZER NICKNAMED "GRANNY."
One of the guns which blasted the way along the Menin Road in the big
offensive. "Shells hastily delivered and with a punch," that's all
Granny had to say. Any German trooper will vouch for its accuracy.]
[Illustration: THE HANDLEY PAGE SUPER AERIAL BOMBING DREADNAUGHT.
Designed by Mr. Handley Page, a British manufacturer. It was claimed
that this giant plane could cross the ocean under its own power.
AUSTRALIAN INFANTRY MARCHING UNDER INSPECTION.
The Anzacs, famous for their brave and daring accomplishments, and among
the best of fighters.]
[Illustration: WELCOME HOME, ALL HAIL TO THE CONQUERING HEROES.
When New York's Negro Soldiers marched amid the cheering crowd, Harlem
was mad with joy over the return of its own.]
[Illustration: SOME OF THE WOUNDED IN THE NEW YORK PARADE.
The 369th Colored Regiment was cited as a whole for bravery in
action--at Champagne, Chateau Thierry, Mihiel Salient or in the Argonne,
wherever there was hard fighting to be done.]
[Illustration: MANUAL OF ARMS OF THE UNITED STATES.
Showing the different positions in the drill.]
[Illustration: GROUP OF RUSSIAN SAILORS. They are the first to come to
New York since the United States entered the war.]
[Illustration: SERBIAN CORPS ORGANIZED IN THE UNITED STATES.
Hundreds of Serbians organized an army and went to France and joined the
offensive. The photo shows the men leaving San Francisco, where they
were mobilized. The United States paid for the transportation of the
men.]
"Girls are beginning on the farm at 18 shillings ($4.50) a week; before
the war men farm hands worked for 11 shillings ($2.75). Our women are
milking cows, running steam plows, digging in the fields and giving
complete satisfaction. I dare not venture to predict what will happen in
the future, but we can face it with confidence, I am certain. Now we are
inspired with the spirit of patriotism; we feel we owe our best to our
country; we are ready to suffer hardship just as our brave men are doing
in the trenches.
BRITISH WOMEN'S PATRIOTISM.
"The patriotism of British women had stood a hard test; I hope American
women have an easier trial. Lloyd George says he hopes America will
profit by the mistakes of Britain. For more than a year the government
of this country snubbed and discouraged our women. The government does
not pay women at the same rate as men; it does not give them the same
war bonus. There came a time when the government realized the war could
not be won without the women. Then it issued frantic calls for help, and
the women responded nobly, just as they would have done months before. I
hope your American Government will recognize the value of woman's help
from the very start.
"Unfortunately I must judge your women largely by those who come over
here for the season in peace days. As I remember they spent a great deal
of time and money at the hairdressers, manicures, dressmaking
establishments and hotels. But I am certain the great majority of
Americans care more for their homes and country and less for display. I
feel that they should concentrate on the production of food. We need all
we can get and then we shall not have as much as we require. Money, food
and ships are the things most needed.
"Your women have been wonderfully generous in giving us money,
supporting hospitals and sending us supplies. We can use some of your
nurses and women doctors. We have a hospital here in London holding
nearly 1000 soldiers and it is run entirely by women. Our Scottish
women's hospitals have done grand work in the various theaters of war.
Not only the nurses, but the doctors and ambulance drivers are women. We
have supplied about 72,000 women for this work alone."
"How have women regarded the discipline of army life?" was asked.
"Wonderfully!" said Lady Frances. "It has been good for them. Just see
our women 'bus conductors. They work hard, handle all kinds of people,
but I never heard them say they are unable to meet the emergencies which
arise. And for the most part they are women who come from very humble
surroundings. You hear that women have broken down in health under their
work, but it seems to me I have read frequently about American business
men suffering from nervous breakdowns and overwork."
SUCCESS BUILT ON RUINS OF FAILURE.
No great victories, either in war or in the ordinary relations of life,
are attained without initial blunders. Many a splendid success is built
upon the ruins of failure, and this is a fact that the women of Europe
learned after the first hysteria occasioned by the marching soldiers,
the beat of drums and all the excitement incident to real warfare.
American women, when they joined hands with the Allies against
Prussianism and all that it meant, builded splendid records of their
usefulness upon the mistakes that these women made.
In the summer of 1914 every girl and woman clamored to be a nurse. Women
with a great deal of money and no experience opened "hospitals" that
were about as fit for the reception and treatment of wounded men as a
henroost is capable of housing an eagle. They all wanted to be in the
"Red Cross" or "V.A.D." (Voluntary Aid Department) and wear caps and
bandage wounds.
Then there were the amateur nurses who didn't know much about nursing,
"but would love to try." The daughter of a duke tried to go through a
probationary course at St. Bartholomew's Hospital because she thought
the uniform "perfectly sweet." But of course this element of
"fluffiness" exists on the outside of any great movement. It has to be
blown away so that the hard surface of genuine and practical endeavor
can be seen and felt. And that is what happened to England. The "fluff"
disappeared and women knew where they were, and men realized that women
possess a force, a firm and splendid resolve, that gives them the right
to step beside men in the march toward victory.
Another craze that amounted to a vice was the furious and ill-considered
efforts of totally unskilled women to make shirts and hospital garments
for soldiers. If some of the results had not been pathetic one could
almost be overcome with the comicality of the whole business. Soldiers'
shirts were turned out by a circle of busily sewing ladies that would
not fit a dwarf, while probably the next batch of garments dispatched
with patriotic fervor to a regimental depot might have been designed for
a race of giants.
NATIONAL SERVICE FOR WOMEN.
National service for women as well as for men proved a very substantial
portion of Great Britain's strength, but before national service had
been generally thought of an organization called the Women's Service
Bureau had been formed by a group of influential and intelligent women
who were imbued with the idea that only by careful and systematized
registration and selection could the matter of feminine war work be
successfully arranged.
Lady Frances Balfour was the first president of the Women's Service
Bureau, which with the London Society for Suffrage established 62
branches in the city of London and its suburbs.
What the women at the head of this society realized was the necessity
for giving the right women the most suitable employment and also to give
every applicant for work helpful and practical advice. The need for
women's labor in the many trades and professions hitherto closed to
them, and for their increased co-operation in those in which they
already took part, has been forced home even to unwilling minds.
Here and there on the battlefields of Europe--in Bulgaria, Servia,
Roumania, France, Belgium and Russia--have been noted occasionally the
presence of a woman warrior, a modern Joan of Arc. It was not expected,
however, that in America woman would do more than perform the service
work which fell to the lot of the Red Cross nurses and the women
practicing conservation and effecting organization in England.
But the women of America were not satisfied with "petticoat
preparedness." They rushed to the khaki suits and to the colors with
unexpected enthusiasm. One khaki-clad woman walked from San Francisco to
New York, making recruiting speeches on the way.
The infantry, the cavalry, the navy, the marines could all point to
their girls in khaki.
ALL KINDS OF WOMEN ENLISTED.
As the women enlisted for all kinds of service, so it may be said all
kinds of women enlisted--that is, women of all ranks of life--some from
society, some from the mills, others from the offices, the shops, the
stage, the restaurants and the colleges.
Many years ago the country rang with the name of Tippecanoe, and one of
the men who bore arms on the western frontier was William Henry
Harrison. The years went by and Benjamin Harrison came to the White
House as President.
The Harrison blood showed in the preparedness work, and Old Tippecanoe's
great granddaughter helped to make the women of the country fit for the
burden of war.
There isn't anything on earth that shows so strongly in the blood as the
soldier element, and Elizabeth Harrison, whose great ancestor faced the
perils of the frontier warfare, was a leader by force of her inherited
ability as a leader. She was elected drill sergeant for the college
girls of the New York University.
When the war clouds came she was following inherited bent. All of the
Harrison men had been among the country's greatest lawyers and Miss
Harrison was studying for the bar.
But just as the warwhoop of the West called Tippecanoe from his books
and briefs to bullets and battles, so the daughter of the former
President dropped Blackstone and Kent to take up the Drill Regulations
and the elementary text books of the army.
She knew that the way to make women fit for their part of war service
was to make them strong and healthy and to give them an idea of the
things that men-at-arms have to do.
NOTED WOMEN IN THE WORK.
So Miss Harrison was one of the first workers in the movement to teach
women the elements of war. Many women of importance in the social and
financial world took up the task with a will, and there was a girl for
every signal flag, a maid for every wireless station, and an angel for
every hospital ward in the making as the men pursued the task of
providing guns and the men behind the guns.
Miss Harrison and the girls she drilled at the University wore
regulation field service uniform, khaki breeches, coat, heavy shoes and
puttees, and a large hat of military cut.
The American Woman's League for Self-Defence and Preparedness was the
first woman's military organization in America, according to its
president, Mrs. Ida Powell Priest, who is descended from an old Long
Island family, Thomas Powell being one of her ancestors.
The first cavalry troop, of which Ethel M. Scheiss was first senior
captain, drilled regularly. Their first appearance mounted caused a mild
sensation on Broadway. They were most impressively stern soldierettes as
they trotted and galloped their horses.
Everywhere the girl in America strove with helpful earnestness to do
"her bit." Every strata of society called out its members in a wonderful
plan of feminine preparedness. Besides the thousands of women members of
the Red Cross some of the most prominent organizations officered and
planned by women include The National League for Women's Service, which
has branches in every large city in the United States. They enrolled
women as motor car drivers, telegraphers, wireless operators,
agriculturists and skilled mechanics.
Miss Anne Morgan, as head of this organization, devoted an enormous
amount of energy to the success of the work.
OTHER SOCIETIES ORGANIZED.
Other societies organized were the National Special Aid Society, Service
of Any Kind, Militia of Mercy, which sends and provides bandages and
other necessities and comforts for the soldiers; Girl Scouts of America,
first aid, signalling and drills; Daughters of the American Revolution;
the Suffrage Party and the Anti-Suffrage Society; the International
Child Welfare League and the Girls' National Honor Guard. The Federation
of Women's Clubs all over the United States also organized for any
patriotic service that women could perform.
A practical way of doing something to help France and Servia was offered
early in the war by the splendid initiative of Dr. Elsie Inglis and the
Scottish Federation of Women's Suffrage Societies, who organized
hospitals for the wounded, the staffs of which were all women, and
called on other societies for their support.
The London society responded first by subscriptions from individual
members, then by giving beds, then (in February, 1915) by offering
itself as London agent for the hospitals and undertaking all the
practical work, in the sending out of personnel and equipment, which had
to be transacted in London.
It is only by carefully systematized organization that great work of
this kind can be carried on. The slapdash, haphazard of hysterical
excitement can have no legitimate place in a movement that provides
stepping stones toward the salvation of the civilized world.
One of the things which will live long in the history of womankind was
the wonderful work done by the magnificently courageous units of Lady
Paget's nursing force, which went out to Servia, when that country was
laid waste not only by the German beasts, but also by disease.
It was not the fault of those brave women and men that things happened
at Uskub and in other Servian towns that do not bear repeating.
It was just the lack of thorough preparedness for a war which was much
worse than humanity had thought possible that deepened the tragedy of
their situation. In Servia, in fact, the career of the hospitals was
quite checkered and the service rendered proportionately more vital.
LONDON-WALES UNIT.
At the time of the Austro-German invasion in the autumn of 1915, the
London-Wales Unit was at Valjevo, one of the five Scottish women's
hospitals working in the country. It was under the command of Dr. Alice
Hutchinson and was very highly organized. Doctor Inglis had herself gone
on to Servia to take general charge of the hospitals there in the spring
of 1915. From the time that a typhus epidemic was overcome by women
doctors early in the year to the time of the invasion all seemed to be
going well. Then came three weeks of great pressure of work and of rapid
moves from place to place as the enemy advanced into the country.
Finally, it became a necessity for the personnel of the different units
either to retreat with the Servian army over the mountains into
Montenegro or to fall in the hands of the enemy.
The story of the retreat is now very generally known. The journey was
one long series of forced marches. Mountains 7000 feet high had to be
traversed in blinding snow, almost the whole journey had to be made on
foot and it was six weeks before the little band reached the coast.
Doctor Inglis meanwhile, with her group of nurses and orderlies, and
Doctor Hutchinson, with the London-Wales Unit, had gallantly stayed
behind and continued to attend to their Servian wounded and to organize
help for them till the work was forcibly stopped by the advancing
Austrian army.
UNIT TAKEN PRISONERS.
After being ordered out of Valjevo, Doctor Hutchinson made several
attempts to organize hospitals in the line of retreat. She was at
Vrnyachka Banja when the Austrians entered the town on November 10,
1915. She and her unit were taken prisoners and interned, first near the
Servian frontier and then in Hungary for three weary months. The
cheerful courage with which the members of the unit bore hardship and
uncertainty and hope deferred has been related by Doctor Hutchinson in a
memorable narrative. Their conditions would have been still more
intolerable and their release would have been still longer delayed if
Doctor Hutchinson herself had not known a great deal more about the
Geneva Convention than the Austrian authorities had ever dreamed. She
was thus able to assert herself on behalf of those under her in a way
which taught her captors something new about British women. At the
beginning of February the unit was at last allowed to cross the frontier
into Switzerland. It reached England on February 12. It was only the
perfection of its organization that carried this brave body of women
through amazing hardships.
Abroad women chauffeurs became almost as common in the war as men; the
public in Paris and London refused to regard the appearance of a woman
on the streets in cap, "knickers" and puttees or heavy boots as unusual,
and in need they in many instances not only drove "taxi," but guided
ambulances in the hospital service.
The Red Cross in America, in the matter of preparedness, organized a
class for women chauffeurs. One of these, started in Philadelphia, had
among its instructors Mrs. Thomas Langdon Elwyn and Miss Letitia McKim,
both of whom drove ambulances for the Allies in England.
The National League for Woman Service, working in conjunction with the
Council of National Defense, canvassed the country through its Bureau of
Registration and Information to provide statistics for mobilizing the
entire woman-force of the Nation; all of which was done with the
approval of the Secretary of Labor.
Perhaps the outstanding incident of industrial employment among women
was that of several women in France as locomotive engineers. It is true
that they operated only the shunting engines about the yards at the
military camps, but it was noted in dispatches in every quarter of the
globe that Mesdames Louis Debris and Marie Viard, whose husbands were
killed in the war, were piloting the engines which their husbands had
formerly driven.
WOMAN'S INGENUITY.
And woman has proved her ingenuity. In the damp trenches of the
battlefields abroad the men need protection from the dampness and cold,
which ordinary clothing will not provide. It was found that the
leather-lined huntsmen's coats, and the sort of garments worn by the
chauffeur, the aviator and the mountaineer served the men in the
trenches well, and particularly along the Russian frontier and in the
cold mountainous regions.
But the price of leather soared, with the demand for millions of pairs
of shoes, saddles, harness, headgear, and whatnot, and leather-lined
coats were at a premium. The women were not to be denied, and through
the Suffrage organizations which turned in to prepare America for the
struggle and to render assistance to the Allies, the unique plan was
adopted of making linings for the airmen and soldier's coats of old kid
gloves.
One group of women in a single section of Philadelphia gathered a
thousand pairs of old gloves in a canvass. The seams were ripped and the
gloves cut down one side and laid open. The fingers of one glove so
treated were dovetailed between the fingers of another glove so cut, and
stitched together. Thus one glove was sewed to another until a section
of leather was formed sufficient to make a lining for a coat. And many
such were devised and incorporated in the garments sent to the front by
the various agencies dominated by the women of the land.
WOMEN AS POLICEMEN.
While women to a limited degree were rendering service as "policemen" in
certain sections of the United States and on Continental Europe the war
was responsible for the development of an organized force in London,
which will probably remain a permanent organization to the end of time.
Miss Darner Dawson is chief of the London woman "bobbies," and M.S.
Allen is chief superintendent.
The force was organized in 1914, shortly after the outbreak of the war
and has relieved the men of a large amount of responsibility. The force
is uniformed, the women wearing military costumes with visored caps.
They operate under the supervision, or with the authority of Sir Edward
Henry, Chief Commissioner of the Metropolitan police, and serve for duty
at the munition plants where women workers are employed, besides doing
regular patrol duty and welfare work.
The service in London is in the nature of a training for special service
and the women after sufficient experience are sent to suburbs and small
towns to do police duty. They are highly spoken of and declared to be
very efficient, rendering service in the barrooms and looking after
women in a manner that the regular "bobbies" cannot approximate.
It was declared in England, by way of closing the comment on this phase
of the war that no one thing so stimulated the enlistments for service
as the execution of Miss Edith Cavell, the English nurse who was shot as
a spy by Germany. That her name will go down in history as a martyr to
the cause of liberty and humanity goes without saying.
Miss Cavell had been a nurse in Brussels, and after the occupation of
the Belgian capital by the Germans, she remained where she used her
private hospital for the nursing of wounded soldiers; not excluding the
Germans. It had been intimated that she had better cross the border, but
she insisted on remaining at her post. Ultimately she was accused of
being one of the instigators of a plot to smuggle English, French and
Belgian soldiers across the lines, and of serving the enemies of
Germany.
To the German mind she was more than a spy; Her conduct was
reprehensible, because in the capacity of nurse she had won a degree of
confidence. She was therefore held as a spy and traitor. And though
Brand Whitlock, America's Minister to Belgium, and other diplomats
sought to save her, she was shot by the ruthless Germans.