Part 14

Here’s the copy of a telegram I got Major M. to send last week. “Director General of Voluntary Offerings, Scotland House, London: Number Twelve General Hospital urgently needs three thousand each, two, three, and four inch roller bandages, thousand each abdominal, chest, shoulder, hip, elbow, head triangular and T bandages. Two hundred each, elbow, arm, and leg splints, two hundred sand-bags, three dozen pairs crutches, five hundred limb pillows, thousand pneumonia jackets, five hundred arm slings, five cases each absorbent wool (in America, ‘cotton’) and absorbent gauze, also unlimited gauze dressings.” The next day we got the message: “Bulk of all articles named being shipped immediately.” Pretty good business? We have received notice of twenty bales sent from London already.

Paris, April 12, 1918.

If I don’t hurry and write I shall not be able to remember a single one of the really memorable things that have happened to me since I last wrote. I am getting new impressions so fast I can hardly straighten out one from another. I last wrote April 6 just after I got my orders to move. On Sunday the 7th the British orders came, and I decided that I would be ready to leave Wednesday the 10th.--Just then Philip was announced and I went down to see him. He had just arrived in Paris. It was a curious coincidence his being ordered here, too, just as I was.

Sunday evening we had one of the finest sings up in our mess that ever anybody had. Every Major, including the two English ones, was there, and all the young officers too, and the mess was full, and there was much amusement, as they all tried to ask for their favorite tunes at the same time. We used the new Y. M. C. A. service hymn-books that Aunt M. sent and they proved most acceptable, and everybody seemed to find his or her favorite hymn in it. I played my violin and a fine player played the piano, and I can tell you we made the welkin ring. It was a bit hard for me, especially when some idiot asked for “God be with you till we meet again.” But nobody could know how badly I was feeling.

Monday was very busy all day. That evening was our usual little family dance, which I attended. The next day I finished turning things over to Miss Taylor, went up to Sick Sisters’ Hospital to say good-by to the nurses up there, and the afternoon, packed. The D. D. M. S. came to say good-by and the Acting Principal Matron, which was nice of such busy people at such a busy time. The nurses were full of mysteries all those last days and that afternoon I found in my room a wonderful fitted dressing-bag, the kind my soul has always longed for. It is like a small suitcase, is black, and has a cloth cover and is a perfect beauty. That was from my whole family. Then the original 64 gave me a lovely little gold mesh-purse to go on my watch chain with my other dangles. That too was another thing I had been hoping to have some time.

I forgot to say that on Saturday evening I had talked to the 64 and told them about my going. They were all splendid about it and are glad that I am going to have this position which they think needs me. They told me individually and collectively how badly they felt about my going, but they all think it is the right thing and there has not been one murmur or horrid feeling about it. They are giving me to the bigger cause freely and gladly, though with truly sincere sorrow, I know. So that has made things easy for me, in a way.

That last evening they all had a big reception for Miss Taylor, Miss Claiborne, the new assistant, and me. The officers sent wonderful bunches of roses to all three of us. The party was a wonder. After everybody was there, three Majors came for us three over in my sitting-room and escorted us over to the mess, where we were lined up, and everybody came up and shook hands and said nice things. After some general talk we all sang songs out of the back of Aunt M.’s books, “Old Oaken Bucket,” “Swanee River,” “Auld Lang Syne,” “Juanita,” and the like; then Miss Taylor and I ran away and it was all over. My four dear Majors gave me the most beautiful charm to wear on my watch chain. It is a round, flat unpolished crystal, about as big as a quarter, with a red cross in the center, made of large garnets. It is a perfect beauty. Major Clopton got it at Tiffany’s in Paris for me, and the four of them all signed the dearest note that went with it. They have been such wonderful friends to me and I am so horribly lonesome without them. No woman leaving a job ever had such things said to her as I have had, this past week.

But, oh, I need to remember them now, for if ever there was a desolate soul, it is I. My predecessor left before I arrived. Her assistant has been sick and away from the office ever since I have been here, and I have been simply floundering. Miss Morgan is a great help, but, I wish it was a month from now and I knew something of my job, which is huge. One can only sit tight and not let oneself be discouraged. It’s got to come out right. Our job is, I am sure, to do our job and wait patiently.

Lovingly,

Jule.

Paris, May 17, ’18.

Now to go back a bit. Last Sunday I was down in Rouen! By Friday the 19th I was so homesick and lonesome for all my children and the hospital that when some of the officers blew into my office and said they were going back Saturday evening at five, after their meetings were over, I decided I would go with them. It was very easy to arrange, and oh, I was so glad I went. Our train was late and we did not reach the camp until about nine-thirty, but I got a welcome all right! It did me more good than anything else possibly could have done, and I came back renewed in courage and strength in a most remarkable way, and perfectly sure if so many dear people loved me so much and had such confidence in me, maybe I could manage this awful job after all. Sunday morning I played with Ruth and talked with lots of other people. That noon we had Maj. Murphy up to dinner with us. Before that I went to the office and talked “shop” with the “Little Matron,” as my children, who are now her children, lovingly call her. I stayed with her in my old rooms that night and we talked long into the night, much to the easing of my heart and mind. She has a bed in the sitting-room, used as a couch, which she says is ready for me any time I want to use it. Later I met lots of people, officers and nurses, for tea in the mess. Then M. T. (Miss Taylor, the little matron) and I had early supper together in her sitting-room. Then Maj. Murphy said that he had been planning to go up to Paris the next day, and he would go a day ahead, so he came along with me. We left at seven and arrived at ten. Phil met me and we came home to this nice apartment into which Phil had moved all his and my things that day. I am going again to Rouen just as soon as I possibly can, because I need so much to see them all. They don’t need me, for everything is going wonderfully smoothly, but I need to see them. We don’t talk about their shop, for naturally I am not doing a single thing about their local business, but M. T. talks over my shop with me and helps me lots. That is certainly the most wonderful group of men and women it has ever been my privilege to work with. The more I see and hear of other groups, the more I realize how exceptional ours is. And oh, how good they have been to me. Most of them, I feel, will be my friends forever, and a few of them will be some of the most precious possessions that a person could ever have. Sundays are my own, and so I want to go down there often. The anniversary of our leaving [May 17th] will be my next visit, I hope.

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FOOTNOTES:

[1] Miss Stimson was then superintendent of nurses and head of the training school for nurses at Barnes Hospital, Washington University, St. Louis.

[2] Her younger brother, a doctor.

[3] Miss Stimson had organized her nurses, for convenience of direction, into squads of eight for the journey, each with its leader.

[4] Director of the Unit.

[5] Hospital down on the opposite side of the race course. It was a promenade.