Agnes Warner and the Nursing Sisters of the Great War (7 page)

Some ailments, despite their prevalence among the soldiers, are mentioned only rarely in contemporary accounts. One was nerve strain (alternately, “nerve paralysis” or “shell shock”), a condition that included disorientation, localized paralysis, mutism, or muscle tics brought on by psychological reactions to horrific experiences at the front. Early in the war medical personnel tended to consider it temporary insanity or emotional collapse — something that would melt away in a restorative setting such as Divonne-les-Bains. But the rising number of disabling cases represented a serious threat to manpower and prompted military authorities to become
serious about getting victims back in fighting condition as soon as possible. The typical prescription — segregation and therapy at the hands of an exacting medical team — was not calibrated to be sympathetic, but to “re-educate the will” through exposure to demanding situations, discipline, and sometimes electric shock applied to uncooperative parts of the body. Whether the shocks were intended to be strictly therapeutic, partly motivational, or largely punitive is not clear, and may have depended on the administrator. It is evident from Warner's letters that the hospital in Divonne-les-Bains offered electrical treatment. Though she only identifies its recipients as “paralyzed,” rather than “nerve paralyzed” or “insane,” the fact that so many of them reportedly regained their mobility under treatment suggests they may have suffered from shell shock.

The other hushed condition was venereal disease, sufferers of which typically were removed to separate hospitals or treated by male orderlies rather than by female nurses.

As 1915 gave way to a new year of fighting, the bombardments grew so severe that the numbers and condition of the wounded pouring into Mrs. Turner's ambulance at times overwhelmed the staff. The wards were so full that when a wounded General Lerous arrived, nurses struggled to find the mandatory space to segregate him from the rank-and-file wounded, and furthermore to accommodate his wife and the Belgian royalty who came to visit him. (Royal visits to hospitals were relatively common events during the war; besides cheering the soldiers, they served to buoy the spirits of the staff and boost their visibility with war authorities and sponsors — Warner's hospital was no exception.)

Unfortunately for Warner, the frantic pace that spring meant she had to postpone the rest trip to Divonne she had planned for March. When she finally was able to leave the roar of the front in May, her first sleep was as long as it was restful. But just like the soldiers she used to receive at the Divonne hospital, the next night she found it too quiet to sleep.

Presumably, as a requisite to service in the F.F.N.C., Warner was proficient in French, thanks in part to her Victorian education and the time she spent in Montreal. Proficiency would have been critical for managing good relationships with doctors, orderlies, and patients alike, and Sister Warner seems to have been singularly successful (or fortunate) in forging harmony with all three. Her letters are free of the exasperation shown in other nurses' accounts toward the untrained help, possibly because her orderlies (and also the “nurses,” or “
infirmiers
” as she tended to refer to them, notwithstanding that they were amateur) were motivated French citizens rather than the P.O.W.s or “inept soldier” orderlies of British and Canadian military hospitals, who required close, prodding supervision. It is also likely that she commanded respect through her leadership abilities and attracted local affection with her relief work beyond the hospital. The humility in her letters certainly suggests that, after taking charge as matron in 1916, Warner led her colleagues by earnest example. In contrast with the matrons of larger military hospitals whose chief duties were oversight
and discipline, she obviously participated fully as a ward nurse alongside her close-knit staff. It is noteworthy that, in so many of her sentences composed in Belgium, the subject is “we.”

Faced with mind-numbing toil and pain, nurses did whatever they could to lighten things up for themselves and the men. They planned and hosted entertainments, usually located on site so patients could participate. They lavishly summoned Christmas in the wards with festoons, songs, and treats — clearly a lot of work but unquestionably worth the trouble. No one viewed decorations as frivolous in a wartime hospital; rather, colourful ribbons, flowers, and blankets were an integral part of the restorative therapy nurses designed for patients — part of that tidy, heavenly atmosphere soldiers ascribed to the nurses' sovereignty in the wards. Even a poorly heated barrack ward was nothing less than a palace next to the shivering, swarming miseries of grey trench life.

In truth, nurses embroidered their world as much for their own sake as for their patients'. An endless visual diet of grey walls, white sheets, brown mud, and red wounds had the effect of super-sensitizing the retina to colour and beauty, causing nurses to linger in doorways, enchanted by sunrises over the Belgian countryside, and to hover over flower arrangements picked by recovering patients eager to show their gratitude. We know that Warner had a zeal for plants from an early age, and it finds expression in her
My Beloved Poilus
letters. But in those surroundings, it becomes more spiritual than academic — like many nurses who sprinkle their accounts with glimpses of beauty, she interprets that beauty as Hope.

Personal joy might have been rare in the frenzied nights and days, but it would not have taken much to liberate a laugh from a human spirit craving mirth. A kitten's brazen antics, a friendly message dropped by an air force pilot, or a patient's quip could easily coax a smile from a nurse, and everyone was eager to earn one. If we are to believe the claim of Warner and other nurses that their soldier-patients were nothing if not perfect gentlemen — or, rather, “boys” — then it seems to have been relatively uncomplicated for nurses to maintain an easy, familial rapport. As long as men viewed nurses as religious or domestic “Sisters” and nurses considered themselves stand-in mothers to grateful children, all could
enjoy a respectfully affectionate relationship in which nurses showed warmth without compromising professionalism. More likely, there were occasional lapses of patience or decorum on the part of both parties in an atmosphere of disgust, desire, madness, pain, and long-term deprivation. But reports of unseemly behaviour rarely made it across the Atlantic. On the contrary, nurses praised the manners and restraint of the soldiers and even indulged in national comparisons of their pluck:

At one hospital where nearly all the patients were French, several Canadians were brought in, among them a brawny chap named McDonald. The Poilus were very curious to see how this Canadian would behave, and as he had a bad dressing to be done Miss Warner was anxious that he should be as brave as the French. However, she saw his face getting red, and she said to him, ‘Well, if it will make you feel better, say it.' And the Canadian opened his mouth and ejaculated, ‘Boys!' The Colonel of his regiment, who came to the hospital later, told Sister Warner that McDonald could do better than that, as he was a foreman of the railway construction line and had quite a command of the language.

Another good reason to behave oneself in front of the nurse was the discretion she wielded. A good word from her to the medical officer might prolong a soldier's convalescence period and keep him off the “fit for duty” list awhile longer — possibly even send him home.

What Sister Warner's eager New Brunswick readership got in
My Beloved Poilus
was a series of snapshots — both visual and narrative — of her adopted world. Amid the unrelenting rhythms of work and care, she highlights her own experience of uncertainty, discomfort, joy, and revulsion. We get to know how strongly she feels about senseless devastation and how
heavily she relies on support from home. We see how keeping busy sustains her mentally and how the
poilus
' gratitude restores her emotionally. In the letters are glimpses of her inner struggle to sort out her feelings on the war's lethal perplexities — wondering how to reconcile her fear and her pride when nephew Bayard signs up as a soldier or rethinking her position on nursing the enemy when German soldiers first arrive in her hospital in May 1916. And despite a momentary vow to give up nursing altogether after the war, we see her taking every opportunity to augment her professional knowledge of surgical advancements and methods of hospital administration by touring other facilities. Through the letters, we move ever closer to the front lines with a dedicated woman who takes one difficult day at a time.

As she was writing the last letter that would be bound into
My
Beloved Poilus
, neither Warner nor her readers could have contemplated that her ordeal at the front was scarcely more than half over.

Agnes Warner.
My Beloved Poilus

Solidago flexicaulis
, collected by Agnes L. Warner.
NBM VP-02816