IMPORTANT WAR WORK

Southland Times, Issue 24233, 17 September 1940, Page 6

IMPORTANT WAR WORK

BRITISH RED CROSS HEAVY LOSS OF EQUIPMENT IN FRANCE The far-reaching and important work undertaken by the War Organization of the British Red Cross and Order of St. John is outlined in a letter sent to the Dominion by Field-Marshall Sir Philip Chetwode, who is chairman of the executive committee in England. “We sent out to France,” he says, “something between £30,000 and £40,000 worth of medical comforts and stores. We have a letter from the chief medical officer in France saying how much these supplies meant to him in his care of the sick and wounded during the time that'oiir Expeditionary Force was ■ overseas: We also sent but 58 vehicles, including 26 ambulances, fully equipped; we’established a convalescent home for officers and another for nurses, and equipped and staffed them. “We sent to Finland £12,000 worth of medical supplies. Two aeroplanes with stocks of chloroform, inoculation serum, and essential drugs were sent the moment Finland asked us for help. We sent more than £12,000 worth of medical stores to Norway in the same way, and in both cases difficulties of transport were very great. “We have a large department which deals entirely with the despatch of parcels of food, clothing, and necessaries to prisoners of war in enemy hands. In the last war we spent close on £4,000,000 on this work alone'.

“We have another large department which concerns itself with inquiries by people for wounded and, missing relations. This work is of such immense value that it alone would almost justify the existence of the Red Cross. At the present moment it is dealing with thousands of letters a day from people seeking information concerning relations. We also offer help to relations in visiting dangerously wounded or sick soldiers in hospital. This'was done first in France, and is now carried on in England; It' often etitails' finding temporary accommodation for people in the vicinity of hospitals.: ALL LOST IN FRANCE

“In May carrie the’ tragic collapse of Belgium, the return of the 8.E.F., and later the collapse of.. France. Everything we had' at Boulogne and all our ambulances ..fell into the hands of the enemy. We : hoped that we might have rescued the stores, at Dieppe, and our staff at great; risk to themselves, went back time after time getting the stores out and away to; the west coast, but such was the : rpsh.to save human lives, we, at the last moment, had to abandon them. j

“We have lost everything we put into France, .and all that has. to be replaced. “Then the wounded began’ to pour back to England, and in the first, days of the Dunkirk evacuation we were asked for £30,000 worth of hospital comforts which we delivered to hospitals all over England. Our trained stretcher-bearers and V-A.D.’s worked day and night to remove the sick and wounded from' the ships and take them to trains and hospitals. “We have constant demands on us to help with hospital stores and clothing sailors who have been shipwrecked and, in many cases, wounded by enemy action. All our existing county organizations are told to find at once all that is needed for that work.

“The Ministry, of. Health, in whose charge the wounded are now, has called upon us to find 10,000 beds at very short notice.. The Ministry of Healta will help with the cost of equipping these hospitals, which may amount t» as many as 200 all over the British Isles, but it will cost the British Red CrosJ and St. John Wai Organization huge sums to staff and maintain them. “Now that we are the last defence against barbarism in Europe, these isles: have become a fortress and may at any moment become a battlefield, where communication may be cut in various directions from the centre in London; We have provided for this eventuality by sending out stores to all counties and

districts and providing these counties and districts with money, telling them that we expect them to carry on the work of the Red Cross whatever happens, and we will see them through.

CIVILIAN CASUALTIES “They know well that instead of only concerning themselves with the sick and wounded of the fighting forces, they will now have to deal with the sick and wounded of the civil population.

“We have undertaken to find for the War Office and Ministry of Health anything up to 200 ambulances, and we are well on the way to doing so. A large number of these ambulances are being supplied through the generosity of the Dominions, colonies, and British communities in all parts of the world: 50 -of them have been promised by Canada and 50 by America; and we have now another offer from America of anything up to 200. We, of course, have to staff and equip them. “We, the war organization of the British Red Cross and Order of St. John, are determined—come what may —to carry out our duties to the sick and wounded, and justify the confidence which the public have so generously placed in us.”