Agnes Warner and the Nursing Sisters of the Great War Read Online Free Page B

F.F.N.C.’s mandate came to embrace whole villages, not just fighting men. F.F.N.C. work was as varied as it was relentless. In the absence of civilian doctors, F.F.N.C. nurses cared for local civilians, and fed and clothed refugees, often on their own time:
    We had a sad experience two nights about ten days ago when we were asked to meet two trainloads of refugees from the invaded districts . . . These poor, miserable people, so cold, hungry and travel-worn . . . all huddled up together in carriages without either light or warmth. . . . The snow lay thickly on the platform and it was bitterly cold. Being a very wretched night the Red Cross ladies were conspicuous by their absence, and we F.F.N.C. Sisters had the work to ourselves. This consisted in going from carriage to carriage with warm milk for the babies and small children, and plates of soup for the adults, with large chunks of war-bread. . . . Poor things! . . . Our work being finished, we went off to our various abodes to snatch a few hours’ sleepbefore getting-up time. On getting into my comfortable bed I thought of those tired homeless people spending such dreary hours on the hard train seats, after their trying dreadful experiences. The following night we were again told to meet a train of refugees.
    On Christmas Day 1915, a contingent of ten Canadian nurses supervised by Miss Helen McMurrich, former instructor at Montreal General Hospital, sailed from Saint John, bound for the F.F.N.C. For their passage and equipment, they relied on the generosity of the Canadian public to the amount of $400 per nurse. During their stopover in England, they were invited into London’s drawing rooms and theatres to catch an “idea of the greatness of London,” all the while fortifying themselves with inspiration for their upcoming sacrifice. It was a breathless whirlwind of entertainments, sightseeing, and receptions that would stand in sharp contrast to next month’s accommodations. By March, McMurrich and at least one other Canadian F.F.N.C. nurse were set up at Ambulance Mobile No. 1, a new surgical unit in the village of Rousbrugge, Belgium, and a gift of wealthy New Yorker Mary Borden Turner, herself a war nurse and author. Sister Agnes Warner had already been at this hospital for almost four months, looking forward eagerly to the extra pairs of Canadian hands that were rumoured to be on their way. She would soon praise them for being “a joy to work with, for they have had splendid training and are the kind that will go till they drop.”

    Trained nurses were not the only ones intrigued by the prospect of high adventure and the pleasures of travel abroad. Thousands of other young, talented Canadian women longed to make a tangible contribution and see the world beyond their provincial neighbourhoods, but was there a role for them? Many could not produce a graduate certificate from an accredited nursing school, but had taken a St. John Ambulance course on basic nursing and were more than eager to learn on the job. In the face ofthe tens of thousands of young men who needed care, could not dogmatic insistence on formal training be set aside and non-nurses be allowed to serve for the duration? In Canada, the answer was a resounding “no”: under no circumstances would the C.A.M.C. recruit untrained women for overseas nursing.
    In taking this stance, Canadian authorities wanted to avoid the powder keg situation that had evolved in Britain with the pre-war formation of Voluntary Aid Detachments (V.A.D.s) — local groups of volunteer women recruited by the Red Cross and trained in brief courses by the St. John Ambulance to be called upon in an emergency. The more than 23,000 women who had joined Britain’s V.A.D.s were a godsend in the crisis, but they also represented a threat to the status of trained nurses and a potential step back for the profession as a whole. If any woman could nurse, then training and certification would