I have not written since that day in Liverpool, and now we have been ten
days in London. If only I had the ability to write what we have seen and
what we have felt. The contrasts have been so great some of us have
almost lost our mental equilibrium. We are fêted and cheered and taken
from one entertainment to another and made much of by people of every
class; and then between such social affairs we visit hospitals, military
hospitals, because it is necessary for us to see how such hospitals are
run. First we see 1700 men, young men with faces or arms or legs blown
off, and then we go to a tea at a fancy club; next we see 500 blinded
men fighting their way back into normal life by learning various
occupations, then we are taken in a body to the silliest musical comedy
that was ever staged. Again we see thousands of crippled soldiers
brought out to see the King give decorations to 350 heroes and heroines,
soldiers and nurses, or “the next of kin” all in black, and we nearly
choke when a blinded officer is led up to the King by his orderly who
directs his every move, and lame men go hobbling up to receive their
medals, and we watch the King use his left hand to shake hands with one
man, because the man’s right arm is gone, and then we go to St. Paul’s
and see the Stars and Stripes carried up to the altar with the 64
British flags to be blessed at an “Empire day” service, while thousands
and thousands of people sing “O God, our help in ages past.”
Do you wonder that our emotions are wearing us to a frazzle? It is not
only feminine emotions that are affected, because there are those of our
directors who said they could not go to St. Dunstan’s (the hospital
school for blind soldiers) because they would not be able to sleep for
nights afterwards. It is a mistake not to see such a wonderful place,
however. There never was a more cheerful, hopeful place in the world.
Sir Arthur Pearson, the blind man who runs the place and is its
inspiration, is doing the kind of reconstructing of lives that probably
has no parallel in the world. He is having the men taught not just the
trades and occupations that blind men are taught in other places, but
all sorts of things. We saw men learning anatomy, who after a year’s
most strenuous training will be certificated masseurs. They take the
regular examinations that the sighted people take and get excellent
marks, and always get positions. There were men learning cobbling and
carpentry, and chicken-farming and shorthand and typewriting and
matmaking and weaving and basketry. The whole place was full of
whistling, singing men who were going about their business as though
they were like everybody else in the world instead of in total darkness
forever. There were 500 of these men.
People tell me that English men and women have passed the emotional
stage and have now settled down to work without the waste of riotous
emotions and bursting feelings. It must be so or they would be dead, and
they could not be doing the wonderful “war work” that each one of them
is engaged in. From the highest to the lowest each woman has her work,
her nursing, her preparing vegetables in hospitals (as Mrs. Waldorf
Astor’s sister was doing), her making of supplies, her managing a
hospital in a private house, her organizing “hostels” for nurses,
raising funds, everything that one can conceive of as a job for women is
being done, as never before. Of course the street-sweeping by women is a
kind of war work, and the bus conductoring, and delivering mail and
telegrams, and driving cars and ambulances. The streets are full of
women in uniforms of all sorts, all smart and business-like. Women in
England are coming into their own. What is to happen after the war when
the men come back can well fill the minds of those who are given to
prophesy changes, for a change is taking place here that can never be
undone. In addition to women taking a new place in the working world,
class distinctions are being broken down in a way that is making itself
felt to those who a few years ago could never have dreamt that such a
change was possible. A few days ago Miss Dunlop and I were lunching with
a Lady H. on Carlton House Terrace, overlooking St. James Park. In front
of her house is the famous Crimean monument, flanked on one side by the
beautiful statue of Florence Nightingale and on the other side by a
statue of the father of the husband of our hostess. In the course of the
talk at the luncheon, which was most informal and frugal, the
conversation turned to the most-talked-of subject at meals nowadays, her
“work,” and Mrs. A., who has a thousand-bed hospital on her grounds at
C. and who spends almost her entire time in the wards, not nursing but
talking and cheering the men up, said the men don’t know it, but they
are giving us far more than we are giving them, and Lady H. replied:
“Our whole outlook is changing. Take, for instance, us here to-day. A
short while ago you (meaning Miss D. and me) and we (meaning Mrs. A.,
Sir Harry L., the other guest, an elderly man who had recently lost his
only son, and herself) would have had nothing in common, and now we have
everything in the world.” This was said most simply and sincerely and
was what she really felt.
I can’t tell you the number of people who have given us this same
impression, and I can’t begin to tell you how they all have tried to
express to us what they think about our coming over to help them. Many
individuals have talked to us separately with tears in their eyes and
the warmest handshakes, and we have had speeches made to us in theaters
by actresses and managers, who have led the whole audience in cheers. We
have been stopped constantly on the streets by people who have asked us
if we were not some of the “American Sisters” and wasn’t there some way
in which they could express to us their appreciation of what we had come
to do. Could they not take us to their homes and give us tea, and could
they not come to our hotel and take us out in groups to sightsee, and
could they not send us tickets to this or that, and could they not make
special arrangements to have Towers of London, and the Zoölogical
Gardens and Lambeth Palaces and Houses of Parliament and such little
things opened for us at unusual hours? We have been literally swamped
with kindnesses. One officer has made himself almost a nuisance by
giving us theater tickets for every single night and has been so
insistent that every single nurse should go out to see something every
night that we have come to dread his daily telephone calls or visits.
Mrs. Page had a reception for us and Mrs. Whitelaw Reid, and the
Archbishop of Canterbury asked us to tea, and we spent a wonderful
afternoon at Cliveden, and Sir Thomas Lipton sent us all chocolates and
invited some of us to motor out to his place. The Royal Overseas
Officers Club gave a reception for us, the American Woman’s Club opened
its doors to us. We have been sent choir seats at St. Paul’s for special
services and special tickets to the Royal Investiture, and there have
been a number of other things which lords and ladies of high degree have
asked us to in greater or lesser groups.
To-morrow there is luncheon for me at Lady P.’s (a St. Louis woman whose
sister I know), then a motor ride to somewhere on the Thames to see a
hospital where the nursing is done by New Zealand women. In the evening
there is dinner for Miss D. and me with Mrs. F., the editor of the
_British Journal of Nursing_, and after that I hope to get out to
Elizabeth M.’s to spend the night, as I am afraid that will be my last
chance to see her, as we are due to leave Saturday the 9th. I spent a
most beautiful Sunday with her last Sunday, going to church with her in
the morning and just sitting and talking with her most of the afternoon.
She has two splendid boys, Jim just four and John about 18 months. Jim,
Sr., is doing three men’s work, it would seem, on the go from early
morning till 10 or 11 at night. E. seems very well. She is this year
most sensibly putting all her time into taking care of her men folks
large and small. I had a little call this afternoon on Lady H.-H., and
found her most lovely to look at and charming. We had such a nice talk
and wasted no time on preliminaries. I am going to a special service
with her in the morning at Westminster Abbey in St. Faith’s Chapel. My
nurses are all pawing the ground, they are so eager to get to work.
Lovingly,
Julia.
HANG
_Extract from letter from Lady H.-H. to Mrs.
L. in New York_:--
“Thank you for sending me a letter by your most interesting and
delightful niece. I wish I might have seen more of her and her wonderful
contingent of nurses. I went to the Waldorf Hotel to talk to them all at
8:30 on Friday night. I can’t tell you what I said, but they seemed
satisfied and I felt that it drew me nearer to you and your wonderful
nation, and I wish it were possible to come to you and help you bear the
heavy cross and suspense and anxiety. I know every step of the way and
what it means, the long, weary march on the road of sorrow. But now God
has let me see the glory and the triumph of it all, and I am no longer
afraid.”
France, Monday, June 11, 1917.
Dearest Daddy and Mother
and all of you:--
We have at last arrived! I wish I could tell you where, but I can’t.
This much I believe I can say, that it is on the outskirts of a large
city, a beautiful old city. Our particular hospital is on a race course,
which looks now like a vast circus establishment or a county fair, for
it is covered with rows and rows of canvas tents, each of which holds
about 14 beds. All around the edge are lovely thick trees, sycamores and
locust they seem to be, under which are small conical tents, small
single-room shacks of canvas and paper, and long, single-story “huts,”
as they are called. These huts are made of thin wood and roofed with
tarred paper and are divided into single cubicles, the whole hut
accommodating about 16 or 18 people. This part that I am describing is
the nurses’ corner of the paddock. It is really very beautiful, for the
grass and hedges and trees are so green, and along the walks are little
flower-beds, and pansies and geraniums and roses are all in bloom. If
one looked only at this corner of the huge place, one might imagine
oneself in some summer camp at home. But just a few hundred yards away
are those scores of tents full of wounded, and every night more are
brought in and others are sent away. This of course is the most
beautiful time of year. The trees are full of birds, who chirp and sing
all day long. And every few minutes along the road on the other side of
our hedge troops go marching by. Some have bands and some whistle their
marching tunes, but all march on and on. There are any number of
hospital establishments like this all around here, and also thousands of
troops of all sorts are in camp near. We got just a little glimpse of
the situation as we were driven out here in huge motor ambulances from
the station.
We have not as yet gone over the hospital proper, for our luggage has
not come and we have only our street uniforms, and the “Matron” says it
is not wise for us to go into the hospital tent until we have our wash
clothes. For the last two nights we have not had even our hand bags.
When they come, they will be welcome. The lack of tooth brushes is our
only serious lack. It is surprising how quickly one can accustom oneself
to get along without frills like wash cloths and night-dresses! And as
for new titles, I already no longer turn a hair when I am introduced as
“Matron” Stimson. My bad and disrespectful children come to me all the
time and say “Matron,” may I do this or that? That is the way the
English sisters address their Chief Nurse. As we all arrived before we
were expected my nurses have not been assigned to their regular rooms
yet. Last night they all slept in some of the large hospital tents that
were empty. My place was got ready for me and is most attractive. I have
two shutoff rooms at the end of one of the “huts.” The whole width of
the hut is 15 ft. The depth of my rooms is 11 ft. And there is a
partition about 7 ft. high which cuts off my bedroom which is 6 ft.
wide, leaving 9 ft., the width of the sitting-room. I will draw a kind
of plan on the other side for those who are interested in the details.
It is all unpainted, but, just think, there is an electric light in each
room. That is far more luxury than I ever dreamed of. The furniture is
of the simplest, but quite sufficient. I think the things that are in
here now are to be taken away when the English sisters go, and our own
equipment is to replace it. There are two casement windows in the
sitting-room, and one in the bedroom. There are plain white curtains at
them all, and there are small matting rugs on the floor. So you can see
I am going to be most comfortable. There is a mess “hut,” where all the
nurses eat, and eat very comfortably and well, we have already
discovered. All we want now is work to do, and we can see that coming,
enough to satisfy the most energetic and ambitious of our number. The
nurses are all off wandering around this morning. Some have gone to the
city and some are taking walks along the country roads. The roads are so
full of soldiers, some of whom wear turbans and carry scimitars, that
they feel a little strange and out of place, but that feeling is likely
to wear off soon. We hope that our things and our officers will arrive
soon, but there is no telling.
Now I must go back and tell you what I can of our crossing. Our last few
days in London were like the first, chock full. I was particularly busy
in helping make arrangements for sending one of our nurses home. It was
a very sad and hard thing to have happened to the poor thing, and it was
absolutely not her fault in any way but merely a technicality. When we
were getting our passports at the American Embassy in London, those born
in England had to go to the British Embassy. Mrs. S. went with the
others, and in answer to their question explained that many years ago
she had married a German, but that ten years ago she divorced him. He
married again and later died. But according to British law she is a
German subject, because she married a German. So they refused to let her
go to France and she had to be sent back to the States. Rather hard on
her? She took it splendidly and waved us off from the Waterloo Station
on Saturday in the bravest way.
Both the Philadelphia Unit and ours left together on a special train for
Southampton. It is something of a trick to get 120 women into busses and
on trains, and all their baggage too. But we have got it down to a
pretty good system. Our eight squad leaders each pass on orders to their
subleaders, then they each find the three people that belong to them and
they are entirely responsible for them, and all I have to do is to ask
the eight squad leaders if all of their groups are ready. The scheme has
worked beautifully. Yesterday at noon on the boat we had an unexpected
order to be ready to disembark at once. And the whole 64 were lined up
in squads inside of three minutes. We started out from Southampton in a
tender, but were transferred to a large hospital ship. We were
wonderfully taken care of on board of her, as we have been on all our
travels. They gave us an excellent dinner, and gave over to our use,
large wards. So each nurse had a comfortable bed for the night. It was
on the hospital ship that we got separated from our bags. They had been
brought in “lorries” from the hotel, then put in luggage vans on the
train, then transferred to the tender and then to the hold of the
hospital ship. We had not known we were going to spend the night on the
ship. You see we never know anything in advance for more than a few
minutes. It was one of the most beautiful evenings I have ever seen. We
got off in the big ship about seven, but the sunset wasn’t really over
until nearly ten. We were preceded by a destroyer and followed by one,
and flying all around were aëroplanes. Sometimes we could see as many as
ten or twelve. We were told that during the evening our destroyer in
front rammed a submarine and stove in her own bow and had to be replaced
by another, but other than that there was no excitement of any sort.
About ten thirty I had all of my flock tucked in, with their dresses and
shoes off and life belts handy. There wasn’t an awful lot of sleeping
done because at four we entered the harbor of Havre with much blowing of
whistles, as it was raining and misty by that time. After breakfast we
hung around on the boat, watching the unloading of the luggage and the
separation of the belongings of the two Units. We also watched the
taking on board of some trainloads of wounded soldiers who were being
taken back to “Blighty.” That is what they call England. The Sisters
here say that what they want most of all is their “Blighty tickets.”
Just at 12, when we were about to go to lunch, we received word to get
off the boat at once and get into motor ambulances which would take us
to a station, where we were to take a train for about a three hours’
ride. So with a hasty farewell to our friends of No. 10 we went off in
the rain. We were pretty hungry and tired when we arrived at our city,
but before the big motor ambulances came for us we had time to go to a
pleasant little café garden and have high tea. Bread and butter, cold
meat, and tea set us up immediately and we all felt like new women when
we set off on our four-mile drive. Captain Allison and Chaplain Davis
had been ordered to accompany us in our hasty departure, so they are the
only officers of our Unit who are here with us. We have just heard that
our things are to arrive this afternoon.
We are all just hanging around, that is why I have so much time to
write. “Matron” said she would just carry on in the usual way and later
she would show me what I am to do. The first thing we have to do is to
find out how to do things in the English way, particularly the records.
Then later the English sisters are to be withdrawn, we understand. We
have not nearly enough nurses for this hospital, so some of the “V. A.
D.’s” are to be left until we receive reënforcements from America. The
“V. A. D.’s” are like our Nurse’s Aids, Voluntary Aid Detachments. They
have apparently done wonderful things during this war. They have no
regular training, but after one or two years of active service they have
many of them become very proficient. Here we find them doing all sorts
of things. Some are in the tent wards, and some are detailed for mess
duty and take entire care of the mess hut and the meals. In a New
Zealand hospital that we visited there were five of the nicest “V. A.
D.’s” doing all the cooking for 400 patients. They were women of
maturity and position at home, who had come on from New Zealand at the
request of the Matron in Chief and were serving entirely without pay and
doing wonderful work. Their hut kitchen was the best-looking kitchen we
had seen anywhere. We are told here that word has been sent back to the
States that we need more help. I should like 65 more Red Cross nurses
from St. Louis, or if I can’t have them, 65 of the Nurse’s Aids that we
trained. They would certainly find here a sufficient outlet for their
energies. They could be of the greatest help, and on the whole I do not
know but that I should rather have the Aids that I know than a lot of
trained nurses that I do not know. If Miss Bridge can get this word on
to Miss Noyes, I hope she will. Our nurses’ aids’ blue uniforms and
aprons would be excellent, but they would need some kind of a cap, I
think, and certainly a traveling or outdoor uniform.
I think our equipment is going to be fine. Rubber hats and rubber boots
may be needed later, but we can get them very easily, I think, by
sending to London, or possibly in the city here. I got a dandy rubber
hat, in London. I am not to wear my white uniforms yet a while, at the
Matron’s suggestion, so that the people here can tell me from the rest
of my group. There is now no way of distinguishing me from the rest
except my height. My assistant matron, Miss Taylor, is the smallest in
the Unit. The nurses have a good deal of fun about our appearance
together.
It has been fine to have so much time to write to-day, for when we get
started I do not think we shall have much free time. And at night I do
not know whether I can use this precious typewriter without disturbing
all the other nurses on the other side of my room wall. I think I shall
have to train them to get used to it. More marching feet tramping along,
and helmeted heads appearing over the hedge!
You all seem so far away. Not a scrap of mail since we left and no
immediate prospect of any.
I am now due to go and have tea (the third time to-day) with “Matron”
and the Senior Chaplain. So good-by for now.
* * * * *
P.S. I decided not to draw a picture this time. Our baggage came and we
are quite happy. So to-morrow we begin work. I hope you are all well and
having a good time. Good night and loads of love to you all.