A Nurse's Life in War and PeaceLaurence, E. C. (Eleanor Constance)
History
A Nurse's Life in War and Peace
Laurence, E. C. (Eleanor Constance)
Military nursing; Nursing -- Great Britain; South African War, 1899-1902 -- Medical care
I shall be so glad when the men can get time to cut the long grass round
the camp, as there are a good many snakes about (two have been killed
quite near my room). We all wear canvas gaiters, as a sort of
protection; but there are other weird creatures about, and one night a
wire came from the next station to say that a leopard, or some such
creature, had carried off a Kaffir baby, and we were to look out for the
beast; so the men were much excited, but they have not seen anything of
him.
Last Sunday was Easter Sunday, and the men had a much needed day of
rest, but the sisters and officers went on most of the day unpacking and
sorting the things most urgently needed. We knocked off in the evening,
and went to service at the Pinetown church.
The next day (April 16th) we had started work as usual, when the
Sergeant-major's whistle summoned all hands: a wire had come to say that
a troop train had been thrown off the line about three miles from here.
The Major went off with the medical officers and orderlies, with
stretchers. I provided them with brandy, water, a mug, a corkscrew, &c.,
and then hunted up some lint and bandages, and a few splints, and sent
them after them.
Two or three orderlies who were sick in camp came down to see what the
alarm meant, and wanted to go to help, but they did not look fit for a
three miles' run in the burning sun, so I told them to collect all the
natives who were left behind, and we made a hasty clearance of the
building that was to be an officers' ward (temporarily used as a
store-room). We set several boys to work to scrub the floor and clean
the windows, while the orderlies fitted some beds together, and the
sisters collected the bedding and made them up, and I got the most
necessary ward fittings out of the store, so that when the stretcher
party arrived we had quite a workable little surgical ward ready for
them.
Two poor fellows had been killed, and fifteen mules were either dead or
had to be shot; three men of the Army Service Corps were injured, one
with a badly broken leg, and the others with concussion, &c., and two
black mule-drivers had each a dreadfully smashed up arm. The Major had a
tent pitched for these natives, not far from the ward. It is a wonder
they were not killed, as they were in the same truck with the poor
mules.
One sister and some orderlies were told off to look after these, our
first, patients; and then we returned to our building occupations.
I did not put a night sister on for these few cases, but I take a prowl
round some time during the night (the fleas always wake me up at least
once, otherwise I am so tired I don't think I could wake myself), just
to see that the orderlies are awake, and managing all right, and the
medical officers go round the last thing before turning in, and we are
all about by 6 A.M.
One of the injured A.S.C. men had been ill before he arrived here, and
it looks as though he is in for typhoid.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account