Читать книгу Our Bit: Memories of War Service by a Canadian Nursing-Sister - Mabel B. Clint - Страница 15

Table of Contents

At last we were really on the way, envied of all left behind. At Southampton we were taken for a motor drive of several hours, through beautiful Hampshire, studded with military camps, no payment being accepted, because we were Canadians, and on the 7th November, boarded the hospital ship Carisbrooke Castle, which had just discharged 600 wounded. There was no sleep for anyone that night, as the boat coaled by the wharf, supplies were being taken on, chains rattling, orders relayed, and thud of heavy boxes overhead. It was a grimy group that met at breakfast. The hospital wards were already prepared for the next convoy, six medical officers and twelve Sisters being the complement for sometimes eight hundred wounded, ably assisted by trained orderlies. Every department was comfortable, clean and well-equipped. Steaming down Southampton Water we got a first glimpse of the human and material war resources that were daily being rushed to the invaded countries. It was foggy at first, and our progress was slow, many ships going both ways appearing out of the mist close beside us, while whistles blew and bells clamoured. Many troopships crowded with reinforcements singing “Tipperary” had the right of way, and we met a great fleet of empty ones returning to port. The defences of Portsmouth, or such as we could see of them, were a formidable array, and many destroyers clustered round the Channel entrance. It seemed like a page of past history to see guns mounted at strategic points high up on the cliffs, and clusters of white tents at frequent intervals. All during a calm Sunday afternoon, warm and sunny as June, we were steaming past Beachy Head and the white coast to Folkestone, where we turned south. As night fell weird arcs of light swept across the sky from the searchlights at Dover and Cap Gris-Nez, and occasionally blazed and died on one of the destroyer patrol, or a trawler “fishing” for enemy mines. It was very suggestive of danger and destruction so few miles east along the French shore. Over that marvellously guarded lane of the Straits, kept inviolate for four years, we reached beleaguered France, but as the Boulogne Harbour boom was closed for the night, had to spend another twelve hours at anchor.

While we awaited orders to disembark in the morning, wounded began to arrive on the dock, in long lines of ambulances, and we had our first actual contact with war-wreckage, straight from the front. The walking cases were provided for on deck, and an endless row of stretchers came up the gangway. The staff were speed and gentleness incarnate, and not a word or groan came from the victims, who had of course already received first aid during the night. A crane lifted a dozen at once on a baggage platform, and Sisters set about changing blood-soaked dressings, while orderlies entered particulars from the tags attached to each uniform. In a corner, covered with the Union Jack, a rough box indicated one who needed no attention. Only a few days before perhaps he had crossed the Channel absolutely “fit”. Two other hospital ships arrived, and we were told about 2000 would be embarked before evening.

Australian and Canadian ambulances were to be seen running up and down the steep Grande Rue, so like Quebec; a naval armoured train, camouflaged in colours of brown and green foliage, moved out from the siding, each car bearing the name of a naval hero, and all along the quays, mingled with the French fishing-boats, were loaded lorries, guns, huge piles of war stores, staff cars, cavalry horses, French gendarmes, Red Cross workers, and Allied soldiers in hundreds, each going about some duty, preoccupied and serious; quite a different undertone from England, where as yet war had not become the only normal life. Though the British army used all harbours of the French northern coast at intervals, Boulogne was to be the head and centre... the clearing-house... of effort for four and a half years, and become, apart from civilians, a British town.

Our impatience to be at work still more increased by these sights, and the grim atmosphere of a life and death struggle, anticipation of which had hung over French heads for 4 years, we still had three weeks of inaction before our Colonel found a suitable building for the first Canadian hospital in France. In the meantime most of us were quartered in a quaint, three-hundred year old Inn within the walls of the fortress, under the shadow of the Cathedral and Godefroi de Bouillon’s tower.  That bitter first winter it rained or snowed every day, I think, and at night at the Bourgogne we dressed up in wrappers, rugs, stockings and sweaters, before creeping into the damp, icy beds. What air entered was impregnated with a mouldy odour of age and sunlessness. A British cemetery had been opened at the top of the hill, and as we sat at breakfast, soldiers’ funerals passed up the narrow street every few minutes, so that the burial service might be read simultaneously at a fixed hour. Great trenches were dug, and three tiers of real coffins placed in them, but only partially covered with earth till quite filled, so that the area looked like a plague-stricken field. But every burial was conducted reverently, and flowers already bloomed on three-months’ old sod. The adjacent inhabitants constantly brought garden blossoms to decorate the graves of “les soldats anglais”... a kindly action kept up for years, till the British cemeteries were laid out in their present beautiful form by the War Graves’ Commission. Already some English nurses lay there, first women victims of devotion to duty. We represented the Canadian profession by attending the burial of one from St. Thomas’ Hospital, and placing a wreath on the grave. In the next row, two Church of England chaplains, a Roman Catholic Priest, and a Presbyterian Minister were reciting the final offices over thirty bodies. The “Last Post” wailed and faltered, and a small detachment of men with reversed arms formed a guard of honour. It was a sad and gloomy spot.

All the hotels on the quays were turned into British Hospitals, and the staffs cheerfully carried on with limited equipment, temporarily assisted by twenty of our Canadians. The Great Casino accommodated 1300 cases, cots side by side on the main floor, and galleries, and even the staircase landings. Can the reader imagine 500 men lying in the one great open hall at one time on mattresses on the floor, and on stretchers, as well as the full complement of beds? Anaesthetics were given, and minor operations performed on the beds. There was neither time nor place for anything else, when, after the first battle at Ypres, 20,000 wounded were received in Boulogne in one week! Wonderful work was accomplished there, but still provision was inadequate for needs. The grey and red of Queen Alexandra’s Imperial Military Nursing Service Sisters was to the fore on train, ambulance, and many “converted” buildings, the “Regulars” having red shoulder capes, and the “Reserve” Sisters a red border only. The Sisters of the Dominion Services, except Canada, adopted the latter dress. Canadian Army Medical Corps Sisters were conceded the rank of Lieutenant, (Matrons, Captain.) The blue uniform, with brass buttons and leather belt, worn by the Canadian Nursing Service, was designed in 1900 for the South African War detachment, though the colour was at first khaki. We were shown some of the new treatments for wounds developed by England’s foremost surgeons, who from the first did their full part in the fray. An Australian hospital had just been stationed on the cliff at Wimereux, and before they had unpacked, a convoy of wounded descended upon them. We visited it in the midst of heroic efforts to cope with the situation, and retired till a more convenient day. Liaison between the War Office and the various Overseas’ Hospital Nursing Staffs was carried on under the British Matron-in-Chief in France, Miss McCarthy, with headquarters in Boulogne, whence she made tours of inspection. She proved an ‘understanding’, a popular and capable “Chief”, and is now known as Dame Maud, O.B.E., an old Saxon title revived.

The great assemblage of allied troops from a score of countries which made Boulogne such an extraordinary microcosm in 1918, had not yet concentrated, but one of the most interesting sights were the Indian regiments, especially the Lancers. They rode magnificently along the straight tree-bordered “Rues Nationales”, each man in symmetry and martial pose a statue. Pathetic were the tents amid the wet and dirty snowpatches on the heights, the little brazier fires, over which the Hindoos tried in vain to warm stiff fingers. These suffered much for the British Raj, understanding little of the quarrel, but loyal to the command of the King-Emperor. One of the most human aspects of the thousand ramifications of British responsibilities was the careful attention given the religious customs of the various races in food and other details, and the special cemeteries, where these dark subjects of the Empire lie, attest equality of service and honour.

It was a tribute to the character of the British armies that the English churches in France were always full, and a large number were frequently present at Holy Communion. The death of Lord Roberts cast a shadow over the British Community, and his funeral cortége along the quay one dark evening drew forth from the French army and civilians a sincere tribute of respect. His beloved Indians had his last thought, and it seemed fitting that he who had done his utmost to warn the “Kingdom of the Blind” of the coming cataclysm, should not have had to bear the long strain of the consequences of unpreparedness. Will it be so again? It seems so, in spite of all past experience, and the knowledge that the Kaiser would not have broken the peace if England in 1914 had had a million trained men to throw into the scale—that million sacrificed later on the altar of a peace policy not founded on actualities.

Opinions have so differed about the attitude of the French people as a whole to the British that I have often been questioned in regard to personal experience. We had little to do with them officially, but the Sisters were invariably the objects of respectful and friendly comradeship from men and women. The women were marvellous. They took the place of the men in every phase of life immediately, and their stoicism under all conditions of hardship was beyond praise. “C’est la guerre”, “Pour la Patrie”, were no empty phrases on their lips, and they had no compensations but their national spirit. Their men were only paid a few sous for their service, there were no family allowances or Red Cross benefits, and they seldom were notified of their dead till weeks after a battle, and then without details. I never saw any excitement in France. I never saw any depression at the worst of times. They seemed to have taken on the phlegmatic character with which the English are credited. But also they never smiled, and “Les Boches” were to them the summing up of all that was monstrous and brutal. But they treated the prisoners without mawkish sentimentality, and without vindictiveness. I often marvelled at it. More than one French woman commented with amazement upon the, to them, extraordinary fact that except for the first seven Divisions, all the British soldiers were Territorials or volunteers. “But, Mademoiselle, is it possible that this English army is composed of recruits? Is it then that these young men who give themselves to die are all of the best?... But... after the war... what have you?” Of course they were absolutely logical. Those Canadians who criticize the French should imagine the Germans occupying our southern border, should remember the invasion of 1870, and the cost, and should also give thought to what a boundless, cynical and unprincipled ambition did to France and Belgium, apart from the toll taken of 2,000,000 lives. Let them ask themselves how they would feel and act!! And whether those who blamed the French for not being prepared in 1914, are logical in also blaming a firm resolve to be ready so that it shall not happen a third time to their children.

At long last the Le Touquet Golf Hotel, set amid woods on the edge of the sand-dunes, twenty-five miles from Boulogne, had been selected, and the Sisters joined Officers and men on the 26th, having a villa a few hundred yards off for our quarters. Then ensued a hectic week of scrubbing everything in sight, except the floors (left to orderlies) unpacking, readjusting furniture, bed-making, and generally turning a sports’ hotel (fortunately central-heated) into a semi-modern hospital, setting up an operating theatre, and arranging a schedule of duties. Army medical stores were new and fairly sufficient, and nearly every sister had a source of supply to draw on for extra comforts for the men, besides the bales from the Canadian Red Cross, to which we owed such a debt of gratitude. The wonderful British Red Cross Society also provided many extra sheets and pillows, and fifteen motor ambulances to run from the station three miles away.

The number of beds was 420, and as a special distinction the wards were named after Canadian provinces, “Quebec”, “Ontario” and “Nova-Scotia” occupying the ground floor. Hardly was the last bed made when at midnight on the 3rd December, two hundred patients were sent us. Every member of the staff was on his or her mettle, for we felt Canadian efficiency might be judged by this sample of organization and training. Everyone remained up most of the night, hot drinks were in readiness, beds warmed, clean clothing beside each locker, and gallons of hot water on hand. Carried up flights of stairs by our willing orderlies, or stumbling in, uniforms and boots caked with Flanders’ mud, too exhausted to speak, four wards were soon occupied, clothing stripped or cut off, and the men given a bath of some sort. The Medical Officers made rounds, examined injuries, fresh dressings were applied, and within two hours we had the satisfaction of seeing the Convoy, warm, clean, and dead to the world in deepest sleep.

It is a source of gratification that we had the honour of nursing some of the “Old Contemptibles”, men of that deathless band which held the enemy hordes at bay beyond a thin khaki line. Our charts bore the names of nearly all the famous regiments of the British army—the remnants of the first Expeditionary Force, and they had made that splendid stand at Ypres in October which had covered them with glory, when it was known. Little wonder that we were glad and proud to serve them.

The old British “Tommy” was well-disciplined, not loquacious, simple, uncomplaining, humourous and shrewd. They were the most grateful patients, and many wrote us later that they would never forget the kindness of the Canadians, the different “atmosphere” from any hospital they had known, the eagerness and good nature of our orderlies. The latter were chiefly ambulance corps men, untrained in ward duties, but most attentive to the wounded. The greatest suffering was caused by trench foot. Those affected could not bear the bed-coverings, and with difficulty repressed moans when a hasty footstep jarred the floor near them.

Very shortly, H.R.H. the Prince of Wales paid us an informal visit, tramping six miles through the Paris Plage woods. There was a moment’s excitement as we saw him running up the steps, and then, accompanied by the Colonel, he looked in at each ward, men standing or lying “at attention”, all eyes on the slim, youthful figure in service kit, with the wistful glance he seems never to have lost. On leaving he said he would tell his father how well the Canadian hospital was carrying on, and we felt loyally elated.

Within a week many of our first arrivals had been evacuated to England, or minor casualties to Convalescent Camps, and a new lot took their places. Later in the campaign, the in and ex-flow was so rapid after a battle, that it was impossible to remember names, and each man was called by the number of his bed. There might be six “No. 20s” in six days. The clerical labour of the office staff and of Sisters in charge of wards in these circumstances was heavy. And who will ever forget the anomalous “Diet-sheets” designed for peace establishment, but, as far as I had to do with them, a waste of time and paper under war conditions on foreign soil. Among the first Territorials to distinguish themselves, the Liverpool Scottish, were also despatched to No. 2 Canadian Stationary, and we had a chance to compare them with the “Regulars”, and to appreciate the same characteristics, differently expressed. A few London “Terriers” from nearby camps also were admitted, just arrived from garrison duty in Malta, where in August they had replaced Regulars. Very few realize the huge and complex net-work of plans and movements of the British forces, especially when they fought on fifteen fronts towards the end.

Paris Plage at this time had Voluntary Hospitals, like the Duchess of Westminster’s, and Etaples was one huge camp of men in reserve. Our war news was very scanty all winter. English papers with meagre despatches came late, and Rumour from those who—somehow—had motored to the front, or who had heard through some “Hush, Hush” source, was always contradictory. The wounded seldom knew more than the incidents in their immediate vicinity. Their pronunciation of French place-names (like the classic “Wipers”) moreover, though always a joy, did not help in locating them on the map very often.

A Roman Catholic chaplain was attached to the Unit, but for months none of any other denomination. The omission was kindly filled by the busy Padre from the English hospitals in the area, who used to hold a service in the wards on Sunday afternoons, which the patients seemed to enjoy. This gentleman also walked several miles every other Sunday to celebrate Holy Communion at 7 A.M., and in fact voluntarily took over the care of the hospital wards till a Canadian was sent. The little Church of England near Paris Plage was always crowded from the surrounding British colonies, and it was a pleasure wherever we went in France to find one functioning, not only in its usual way, but undertaking unexpected tasks of every sort, and contributing much to the welfare of the soldiers in hospitals, their relatives, and the spirit of the back-areas, while proclaiming unshaken faith in a God of Justice and Righteousness.

On April 22nd, orders were given to pitch marquees on the ground in front of the hospital, as a severe battle was raging, and casualties heavy. By the next morning our capacity had been raised to 615, and the main building transferred as many of its occupants as possible to the canvas lines, to make room for the expected rush. It came on the 26th, with the arrival of three hundred and twenty-seven Canadians, who had won their spurs just two months after landing in France. The war was certainly brought close that night. Everyone was called on duty, and as each ambulance rolled up friends were recognized, officers, sisters, and orderlies crowded to the stretchers, anxious questions poured forth, shock and relief alternated, as one and another replied, and well-known names were uttered; “B—— ’s gone... G. D. dead... Captain P. fell the first hour... Didn’t see your brother at the last... Fatally wounded...” We all fell silent. We could sense what the casualty list would convey to Canada, but the men themselves, forty-eight hours after the hell of the gas attack at Ypres, were still dazed. It was some days later that they and we heard what honour our brothers-in-arms had won for their country. Telegrams from His Majesty the King, and from Sir John French... “They saved the day”... showed that the soldiers of the Dominion had proved worthy of the tradition of their ancestors. We were intensely proud amid the general sadness that they had stood the test, even when the tragic “Missing” lists were published.

Our tent lines were hastily evacuated next day to hospitals farther south, so that we might be prepared for the next Red Cross trains, and by 4 A.M. on the 28th, the beds were filled again by men direct from the trenches. After removal of filthy uniforms, to wash and feed the patients, and do dressings occupied all day, and a number of operations had to be performed. A central dressing tent was arranged, and 207 were attended to in that alone. Among the convoy were Londoners of the Queen Victoria Rifles, Artists’ Rifles, young business men, law students and others, some of the finest types we saw in the war, of good family and fortune, who had been among the first to be called up. On the same evening another train-load was signalled, and we closed the day with a total of 560. This strained our resources in every way to the utmost, and the constant orders to send on “walking-cases” down the line and “stretchers” to England, at a few minutes’ notice, caused great uncertainty and confusion, impromptu meals and remaking of beds, etc., several times a day, more fatiguing than the actual unremitting surgical toil of the week. By March 1st, 1100 had passed through the Clearing Station, as we had temporarily become, and only 100 remained. The emergency had passed, and the staff could now breathe and take stock, and replace supplies all but vanished.

I remember that on May 7th, a Canadian from London visited us, and remarked that there was a rumour before she left town of the sinking of the Lusitania. “Oh, Rumour!” we exclaimed, “we know all about rumours. But this surely can’t be true, because of the effect on America.” But before twenty-four hours had elapsed the news was confirmed, to the horror of the civilized world. It was one of those psychological ‘blunders’ that the Germans consistently committed all through the war.

NOTE: The original staff of No. 2 Canadian Stationary Hospital, including the first fifty Sisters in France had the honour of being awarded the “1914 Star.”