Читать книгу Our Bit: Memories of War Service by a Canadian Nursing-Sister - Mabel B. Clint - Страница 12

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The Sisters disembarked on the 16th., and were taken to the railway station for London, Lord Kitchener having asked the Governors of St. Thomas Hospital to receive us temporarily. It was an exquisite evening, and the majority of the nurses who had never yet visited that lovely land hung out of the coach windows with exclamations of interest and delight. The ladies of Plymouth presented us with a Union Jack, which flew from our particular window on the way up; also a gift of 100 pounds of Devonshire cream. All along the route the “special” attracted much attention and applause. Scouts and cadets were in force at every station, but could not conceal their disappointment that only women were on board. The alert healthy, polite boys pleased us all. Many of them, “in the early morning of their days”, were able to offer their lives before the war ended, in succession to those of 1914, who had already cut their last school term for the King’s service.

“I say, it’s awfully good of you people to come such a long way to help us”, said some of the adult spectators. We assured them that thinking Canadians recognized the complete justice of the cause, and that, should Britain suffer defeat, the Empire, greatest force in the world for good, would break up; so that we were fighting for our own freedom as well. Our slow, northern intelligence had grasped the essential points of the situation, some three and a half years before it dawned upon our more mercurial neighbours in the United States. All along the railway the peaceful green fields were invaded by war posters, and uniforms were everywhere. Encampments and troop-trains were frequently passed, and piles of stores were accumulating near London.

At midnight we ran into Waterloo, and were met by char-a-bancs for ourselves and luggage, and deposited at St. Thomas’ Hospital. At once a triumph of organization, typically English in its quiet method, was demonstrated by our hostesses. One of the matrons sat in the hall with her aides, and handed each of us a card with the number of our rooms. Supper was provided, and our trunks all came up within an hour. I don’t know how much notice the War Office had given the Staff, but we found that 100 rooms, absolutely free of every personal belonging of their rightful occupants, had been prepared for us. It was in fact a vacant hotel at our disposal for several weeks; and this at a time when convoys of wounded were arriving at the hospital daily, and arrangements had to be adjusted to meet emergencies. Our Matron had her own office, the Florence Nightingale Dining-room was exclusively reserved for us, and nurses attended to our wants. Several Sisters also were detailed to give us information, issue invitations for sight-seeing, provide guides, and in every way assist us. Without fuss, all showed us our desire to serve was appreciated, and on their side some idea enlarged of the unity of the profession, which the distinguished Founder of their training-school had brought into being. Months of extra duty lay behind these Sisters, many of the staff had gone to France, nearly all had already lost friends or relatives, and the housing of 104 persons must have entailed much time and physical and mental labour. Our grateful acknowledgments to them once more.

Invitations poured in upon us; visits to hospitals, Windsor Castle, Harrow School, private receptions, war lectures, etc., and theatre tickets were sent several times a week. Princess Alice, now Countess of Athlone, received us at the Middlesex Hospital, and many Women’s Organizations entertained parties. I was impressed by the air of comfort and cheer in the military wards of ancient St. Bartholomew’s. Armchairs before the great open fire, red blankets, tables and flowers relieved the monotony of the rows of beds, and were a contrast to the cold and severe lines of most hospital wards in Canada and the United States. Some of us went in the mornings to work at Red Cross supplies under the auspices of the League of Empire and Victoria League, and thus met some of the outstanding women leaders. The Rector of the mediaeval church of St. Bartholomew (1123) invited us to a special service, and the Navy League reserved fifty seats on the platform for a great demonstration in the London Opera House, Oct. 21st. The National Anthems of the Allies were sung in succession with highest enthusiasm; Lady Tree recited Kipling’s prophetic lines “The Hun is at the gate”, amid a tense silence, and that old patriot, Lord Charles Beresford delivered a stern, resolute address, punctuated with cheers at every other clause. Every reference to the Dominions also came in for rounds of applause. This Trafalgar Day the Nelson Column was festooned with laurel, and its base covered with hundreds of wreaths, naval, military, and from the Empire in all quarters of the seven seas. “England expects that every man TO-DAY will do his duty”, ran the century-old motto.

We had arrived in the Empire’s capital city at a moment when the first stunned realization that England was at war had subsided. The Retreat from Mons, and the obliteration of the heirs of many families, with carnage undreamed of among the rank and file, had left an ineffaceable, grim mask upon the people. But there had not yet developed that stoic attitude, that acceptance of war as the chief business of the nation that one saw in 1918. They had not as yet settled into the steel mould, each man and woman a unit in a vast, coordinated machine, to wrest victory from a barbarous foe. Very rarely was mourning worn, and those who had received a fatal War Office telegram one morning, carried on as usual at their Red Cross depot the next day. The part women would play in every field of action except the trenches had not been visualized even by themselves. But on August 5th, as the “Terriers” responded to the call to the Colours, the women of the British Isles closed their ranks, the Victorian grande-dame, the stay-at-home housewife, and the suffragette, young, old, rich, poor, class forgotten, had but one enquiry: “Have you a job for me?” It mattered not what; and they continued to the end, the same cheerful, dogged, persistent, plucky, and resourceful “servers” as their husbands and brothers. Privation, grief, anxiety, overwork, air-raids, only riveted their determination. Comment is unnecessary on what they accomplished. It has been acknowledged by King and Parliament, and carried women by one consent to the equality they had claimed for years. Proof of their capacity and widespread service may be seen to some extent in the Imperial War Museum, and for future ages there is portrayed in the Royal Exchange a fresco dedicated to them. Earl Haig once had read to the troops the account of the courage and coolness of women in a bombed munition factory.

The War Office was the most poignant corner in the country, and a long queue of women seemed to stand there day and night, where the “Missing” list was checked. The streets were crowded, but not so choked as in 1918, when uniforms from every part of the Empire could be seen in the Strand. Everywhere flamed Recruiting Posters: “Your King and Country ....”, and on every street groups of young men in mufti, who had just been passed “fit”, marched away to some training-centre. The street lights were dimmed at night, but not as they soon would be. Closing of Galleries and Museums containing national treasures unfortunately denied to the “Colonials” possibly their only chance of seeing these relics, but their military duties left them little time for the “sights”. Some priceless articles had been walled up in a lately-completed Tube, but the tombs in the Abbey were not yet sandbagged. The churches were crowded, and more often than not a memorial service for some well-known hero was going on. The buses still had men conductors, and women in breeches had not yet come to town, but for the first time in history, London was in uniform, and its parks armed camps. Waterloo, Victoria and Charing Cross were the chief points of pathetic interest each day, on the arrival of the hospital trains. Relatives, comrades and throngs of sympathetic onlookers always lined the driveway of the ambulances, sometimes throwing flowers, or calling a cheery greeting; or, regimentally, “Well done the Middlesex!”... “Good old Inniskillings!” To this day there seems something missing about the front yard of Charing Cross. The War Office censorship had met with a great deal of criticism, and news was just beginning to be issued more freely, as a few correspondents were allowed in France. The situation was amusingly satirized in a clever skit entitled “Malice-in-Kultur-land”, thus:

“A town in Europe,

(Blank) o’clock,

November (dash)

A fearful shock

Of arms occurred at (blank) to-day,

And I’m at liberty to say

That the result was (blank-dash-blank),

For which we have the (Blanks) to thank.

The whole (dash) Corps of (censored) Huns

Supported by (omitted) guns,

Advanced at daybreak, and were faced

By (here a passage is erased),

Who held a very strong position

Resting upon (a long omission).

The (blanks) were able to advance

And occupy (a town in France),

But presently the (blank) Division

Attacked the trenches of (excision)

. . . . . .

(A paragraph omitted here)

As a result of which it’s clear

That further efforts will (the rest

Of the report has been suppressed).

(Horace Wyatt)

Belgian Refugees swarmed in the city, and were being domiciled in very comfortable quarters in the country. Detailed accounts of the atrocities of the German army (which we are now asked by certain voices not to believe!) were fresh and recent, and had filled the civilized world with horror, but people still thought of slaughter, bombs and rules of war as a long way off, (as distance is counted in Europe) and had not the faintest idea of the extent of “frightfulness” that was yet to come. Woman spoke to woman of deeds thought to belong to the dark ages, and it was then that women orators appeared in Trafalgar Square urging all young men to enlist, or forever surrender their national title to chivalry and humanity. Besides the refugees, it must be remembered that 5000 Belgian soldiers also were transported to Voluntary British Hospitals in the first months of the war. One of the most pacific Editors in London wrote: “I am accustomed to war, and the horrors of war, but this week I have learned fresh depths of woe. At first English people refused to believe stories of German atrocities. When I returned from the front in Belgium, and told my friends of the sights I had witnessed at places like Termonde, many of them either treated me with good-humoured incredulity, or told me I ought to be ashamed of myself for stirring up hatred against the enemy. WHO TALKS IN THIS WAY TO-DAY? Germany has made herself the pariah nation of the world”.

An American in London commenting on the difference in the crowds as to the prevalence of khaki, the wounded, the great lorries rumbling through the streets with war material, the nightly entraining of troops at the stations, remarked: “But you will search in vain for any sign of agitation or distress. The same traffic, the same streams of calm, self-possessed people going about new duties, and an entire absence of demonstration over either victory or retreat. Your fleet has gained a signal success in the Pacific, your army has driven back the German attempt to seize the Channel ports, and there have been no public rejoicings whatever. An amazing people! I suppose the reason is that the English have set their jaws tight, and are going to leave the shouting till it’s all over.” London papers printed long lists of the gifts and contributions of the Dominions and India to the common good with most appreciative comment.

We ourselves, or rather our uniforms, attracted considerable notice even in these thronged thoroughfares. Our brass buttons, and particularly the lieutenant’s stars on our shoulder-straps, made us conspicuous. A photograph taken at St. Thomas’ Hospital was posted in the window of a great Oxford Street shop, and hundreds paused for a look. We were often stopped and asked who and what we were. But in spite of all these intense sensations and scenes our chief idea on returning to the “Home” was to rush to the notice-board, and see if orders for a move to duty had arrived. We felt we should not be “waiting round” when so much was to be done, and two weeks had already elapsed. However finally, No. 2 Stationary Hospital (12 officers and 70 other ranks), was slated for France, and the Commanding Officer insisted that nurses should accompany the Unit, much to our joy. Then arose the burning question: “What names would be on the list?” The corridors hummed with debate. Would the remainder be distributed to English hospitals? Would some of us get overseas at all? At last the Order! Fifty of the hundred to France, including twenty to English Emergency stations in Boulogne, and the remaining fifty to the Canadian camps on Salisbury Plain. With alacrity which needed no spur we made ready for our respective destinations, happy to think that we were at length to be of use, and have our own part to play.