While Canadian soldiers were fighting in the trenches of France during the First World War, there were others Canadians who were also serving but too often their service is forgotten about.
Over the course of the war, more than 2,800 nurses served in the Canadian Army Medical Corps.
They saved lives.
Put their lives on the line and had no small impact on the war itself.
The story of the Canadian Nurses, as we know them, begins in 1904 when the Canadian Militia established the Canadian Army Medical Corps. Within that organization, was a nursing service. Only women could serve as nurses, and they were given the special rank of “nursing sister”, which was equivalent to lieutenant at first, with the rank of captain and major above.
The creation of this force of nurses made Canada the first country to commission women as officers.
Nurses did exist in the battlefield for Canada before the 20th century. During the North-West Resistance of 1885, Canadian nurses performed military duties for wounded soldiers. Seven nurses served under Reverend Mother Hanna Grier Coome in present-day Saskatchewan, but their time in the conflict was relatively short, lasting only four weeks.
When the nursing service was established, only two women, Georgina Pope and Margaret Macdonald were part of the service.
Macdonald, who was born in Bailey Brook, Nova Scotia, had graduated as a nurse from Charity Hospital Training School in 1895. She served as a nurse during the construction of the Panama Canal, helping workers with their medical needs. In 1896, she contracted malaria and had to move from Panama as a result.
Two years later, she served in the Spanish-American War, helping sick and wounded American soldiers. When the South African War broke out, she went there to serve and earned a military commission. She then returned to Canada and was appointed as the head nurse of the Canadian Army Medical Corps. In that position, she was in charge of the admission process and worked to build the reputation of the corps. She required all women who wanted to serve to have proper and professional training as nurses.
As for Georgina Pope, she was born in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island and attended the Columbia Hospital for Women in Washington, D.C. where she trained as a nurse. After graduation, she opened a school for nurses. During the South African War, she also served and was in command of a group of nurses who went overseas. She spent a year in South Africa, primarily serving in British hospitals in Cape Town. For her service, she received a medal from the Duke of York, who later became King George V. In 1902, she became the first Canadian to be awarded the Royal Red Cross.
Over the next decade, the nursing service slowly grew to include five regular army nurses and a reserve of civilian nurses. There were also 57 in reserve.
When the First World War began, the size of the nursing service was about to increase greatly.
While men were joining up to fight, women also wanted to do their part and that is where the nursing service came in for many.
To join the nursing service, women had to have British citizenship, and have graduated from a three-year nursing program. They needed to be physically fit, aged 21 to 38, and have what was described as high moral character and dignified deportment. Non-white women were not considered for service with the nursing sisters.
On average, nursing sisters were about 30 years old, but were as young as 19 and as old as 56. Most were born in Canada, and their parents had come from the British Isles. While they were required to be single, divorced or widowed to join up, some women married in secret and did not resign when they were married.
Typically, nurses were placed initially in Canada, before they were sent overseas. The first stop was always England and from there Canadian nurses were stationed in France, Belgium, Russia and the Mediterranean.
In all, 2,845 Canadian nursing sisters served during the war.
Georgina Pope oversaw training nurses in Halifax before she was sent overseas in 1917 when she was 55-years-old.
After some time in England, she was sent to the No. 2 Canadian Stationary Hospital in France. She was close enough to the front to have to be wary of artillery hitting the hospital. The constant noise of bombardments left her with PTSD.
In her memoir Our Bit, nurse Mabel Clint wrote that she could still remember the sound of the guns in the distance. After one gas attack, she wrote that a soldier arrived whose face looked the colour of mahogany. She was able to save his life by keeping him on pure oxygen for two weeks.
Typically, nurses were not near the front trenches but were close enough to the front so that truck convoys and hospital trains could bring wounded soldiers quickly. The nurses were often the first to treat the wounded, giving them pain medication, cleaning wounds and providing comfort as they were taken to clean beds.
The Blairmore Enterprise wrote about the work of nurses during the war in 1915,
“While the man in khaki is bearing the brunt of the battle in the firing line, the Red Cross nurse is performing as important and in many cases, as dangerous a work not very far away from where the shells are bursting and the big guns send forth their messengers of death.”
The caring for soldiers was not just about fixing wounds. The nurses bandaged and rebandaged injuries and ensure that the soldiers were free of infections. To the soldiers they treated, they were known as “bluebirds” for the blue uniforms they often wore.
The nurses also served in the Casualty Clearing Stations. These stations were very close to the front lines, and rats and fleas were constant problems.
There were several nurses who had an impact during the war with their bravery and service.
One nurse who served near the front lines was Edith Monture. She was Canadian but served with the US Army Nurse Corps.
Charlotte Edith Anderson was born on the Six Nations Reserve. The youngest of eight children, she graduated high school and looked towards having a nursing career. Unfortunately, she was refused entry to Canadian nursing schools due to her race.
Monture went to the United States to train as a nurse with the New Rochelle Nursing School. She graduated at the top of her class. She remained in the United States and worked as nurse at a private school until 1917 when she joined the Army Nurse Corps.
Before she left, she apparently received ceremonial clothing from her reserve in case she died overseas. Her community believed that she would not return due to so many dying in the war.
Monture was stationed right at the front lines, working as a nurse at Base Hospital 23 in Vittel, France. She worked 14 hour days in work that was emotionally and physically draining. During this time, she became close with Earl King, a wounded soldier.
He had been shot in the neck and was expected to live. He adopted Monture as a big sister in France and the two often talked while he recovered. Sadly, one morning, he started to hemorrhage and died four hours later. His death left Monture heartbroken.
She wrote to King’s mother to tell him he was not alone when he died. Often, Monture walked the battlefield looking for wounded. She said: “We would walk right over where there had been fighting. It was an awful sight.” Her wartime experience had a deep impact on her.
Since she served in the military, Monture became the first Status Indigenous woman to vote in a Canadian federal election under the Military Service Act of 1917. Other Indigenous women would not receive the vote until 1960. After the war, Monture returned to Canada. She died in 1996 at the age of 106.
Emma Black was born in 1884 in Fort Williams, Ontario. She completed her nursing training in 1912 and began to work as a nurse in Victoria. For four years, she served in France and remained overseas until 1919 when she returned home.
Bessie Watson was born in England but found her way to Victoria where she worked as a nurse. She served in France from 1915 until she was married in 1916. At that point, she resigned her commission and returned to Canada. During her short time in the war, she was awarded two Royal Red Crosses, as well as the British War and Victory medals.
Annie Dover was born in England but came to Canada as a young woman. She spent four years serving in hospitals in France and England. During her service, she dealt with several infections before she returned home in 1919.
Penelope Mellen spent two years serving at the Canadian General Hospital and the 3 Casualty Clearing Station in England and France. She resigned her commission in June 1917 and married one year later.
Working as a nurse was not free of danger. Over the course of the war, 58 nursing sisters died. Of those 21 were killed because they were killed during a combat situation. One of the worst days for the nursing sisters happened on May 31, 1918 when the No. 1 Canadian General Hospital and the No. 3 Canadian Stationary Hospital were bombed in France. Six nurses were killed.
The Kingston Whig-Standard wrote,
“The hospital caught fire after a large section of the building had been demolished by bombs. A few women nurses were among the slain and their bodies, together with those of a considerable number of the personnel and patients, were buried in the ruins.”
On June 27, 1918, the hospital ship HMHS Llandovery Castle was sailing from Halifax to Liverpool. One of five Canadian hospital ships in the war, several Canadian nurses were onboard. The ship was equipped with 662 beds and had a medical staff of 102. Along the way, 200 km from Ireland, the ship was torpedoed by U-86. In later testimony, the captain of the U-Boat said he believed it was a war ship transporting troops and ammunition.
The ship sank in only 10 minutes. While there were no patients on board, of the 258 crew and passengers who were, only 24 survived. Among the dead were 14 nursing sisters. The death of the nurses became a rallying cry in Canada, with many illustrations urging people to avenge the nursing sisters who died.
Bonar Law, who sat in the British Parliament but was born in Canada, said,
“Llandovery Castle was an unspeakable outrage. Nothing could be gained by talking about his last example of frightfulness. The wild beast is at large. There is no use arguing or reasoning about it. The only thing to do is to destroy it. That’s the duty and up to all the Allies to set their teeth until that end is achieved.”
Sadly this was not the only case of a Canadian nursing sister dying at sea. On Oct. 10, 1918, RMS Leinster was sunk only four nautical miles from the coast of Ireland by U-123. The number of dead is believed to be over 500, including one Canadian nursing sister named Henreitta Mellett. She had served with the Red Cross in France, Egypt and England during the war.
The rest of the nursing sisters died from illness and disease.
Many nurses were highly decorated for their service during the war. A total of nine Military Medals, 317 Royal Red Cross Awards, one Royal Victorian Order and 169 Mentioned in Despatches. More than 50 matrons received foreign decorations and two matrons were awarded the Order of the British Empire.
The Canadian nurses continued to work even after the war ended. Wounded soldiers still needed care before they went back home. The Spanish Flu also resulted in nurses continuing to care for soldiers. Two nurses would die from the flu while helping others.
When the Canadian Expeditionary Force demobilized, the nursing service saw a slow decrease in the number of nurses. Many got married after the war, and by 1920 there were only 12 military nurses. That year, the nursing service was recognized and become part of the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps.
In 1926, a memorial to the nursing sisters was erected in Ottawa in the Hall of Honour of Canada’s Parliament building with funds raised by the Canadian nurses. It cost them $32,000 to create the memorial that honoured the women who served, and those who died. The memorial is a 5.3 metre by 2.8 metre sculpture that was carved from a solid six-tonne piece of Italian marble by George William Hill.
