NURSES IN WAR-TIME

Manawatu Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 1667, 27 January 1917, Page 4

NURSES IN WAR-TIME

A tribute to the. “band of devoted ladies who have given up their lives to the can 1 of the wounded’’ was paid by Viscount French in opening the Imperial Nurses’ Club in London. *‘Jn all my experience of warfare in Egype, South Africa, and Europe,” ho said, “the military nursing- sister and her glorious self-sacriticing work has ever impressed upon my mind the best form of high-souled Christian courage and devotion to duty. In those early days in Egypt, when the Soudan was a seething mass of fanatic Dervi.-hes, to fall into whose hands meant death and torture even to a man, these noble women used to accompany our forces under burning suns up to the very border line of imminent danger, and were only prevented by the most peremptory orders from running terrible risks of death and capture. In South Africa and during the presenl war in France no one can measure the value of their devojed work. Since I left France and look up (he chief command at Home, I have visited almost all the hospilals in London, and many others in all parts of the Cniled Kingdom. Conducted as these hospitals are with no effort spared to ensure bright and cheerful surroundings, and with every

endeavour made to secure the utmost measure of comfort for the wounded and maimed soldiers, there must yet always be within them an atmosphere of depression and sadness inseparable from the contemplation of strong, vigorous frames maimed and injured for life, ami young lives permanently blighted by the loss of sight or limbs. Vet it is in these sad surroundings and in this depressing atmosphere that, week in and week out for more than two long years, these noble-minded women have spent nearly every moment of their lives. Surely no effort can he too great for us to make to give them what peace, rest, and recreation is possible for lives so spent.’’