Angels of Mercy E-Book

Eileen Crofton

• Herausgeber: Birlinn
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 578

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Beschreibung

They may have been angels of mercy. But they were also angels with attitude – real women, with real guts. This is the little-known story of the gritty and free-spirited women who, in 1914, put aside their fight for the vote to set up a hospital in an abandoned French abbey to treat the appalling injuries sustained on the Western Front. Uniquely in that theatre, the hospital was staffed entirely by women – doctors, surgeons, nurses, bateriologists, radiographers, orderlies and ambulance drivers. In the face of opposition from the military and medical establishments, and in the teeth of many hardships, they succeeded in establishing one of the most effective and longest-serving frontline military hospitals of the First World War.

Leseprobe

ANGELS OF MERCY

After qualifying as a doctor in 1943, Eileen Crofton served for the remainder of the Second World War as a captain in the Royal Army Medical Corps. In 1945 she married John Crofton, who, as professor of respiratory diseases at Edinburgh University, went on to pioneer the successful multi-drug treatment for tuberculosis. After raising a family, Eileen Crofton returned full-time to her career, and in 1973 became the first medical director of Action on Smoking and Health in Scotland. Appointed to the WHO’s expert committee on smoking, she worked throughout the world to raise awareness of the harm caused by smoking and campaigned for increased tobacco regulation. Lady Crofton was awarded the MBE in 1984 for services to public health. She died in 2010.

This eBook edition published in 2013 by Birlinn Limited West Newington House Newington Road Edinburgh EH9 1QSwww.birlinn.co.uk

Copyright © The Estate of Eileen Crofton 2013 Foreword copyright © Tam Dalyell 2013

Originally published in 1997 by Tuckwell Press asThe Women of Royaumont: A Scottish Women’s Hospital on the Western Front

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form without the express written permission of the publisher.

ISBN: 978-1-84341-063-8 eBook ISBN: 978-0-85790-616-8

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data

Foreword

by Tam Dalyell

Back in the 1990s, the late Dr Eileen Crofton rescued an inspiring episode in the history of Scotland, and in the history of the women’s movement, from oblivion. Without her efforts, the story of the heroic women who set up a military hospital in the old abbey of Royaumont in northern France during the darkest days of the First World War would have vanished for ever.

I should explain why Birlinn have invited me to pen a foreword. It has nothing to do with politics, or my being ‘Father’ of the House of Commons (2001–2005). It has everything to do with my mother’s distant cousin and great friend, Dr Elsie Dalyell, one of the intrepid doctors who – along with nurses, orderlies and others – worked day and night in the abbey hospital. Her story, like the stories of so many of the women at Royaumont – is a remarkable one. Elsie came from a family that had left Scotland for Australia, as my mother put it with a chuckle, ‘shortly after Botany Bay’. She grew up a tom-boy in Sydney, and went on to study medicine, graduating in 1909 with first-class honours. On the outbreak of war in 1914 she volunteered her services to the War Office, but her offer was declined. Instead, she joined the Serbian Relief Fund that went to Skopje in 1915 to help deal with a typhus epidemic. After Skopje was overrun by the Bulgarians, she joined (in 1916) the Scottish Women’s Hospital at Royaumont, and her time there is well documented in Eileen Crofton’s book. After the war, she travelled to poverty-stricken Vienna, where she established herself as an authority on rickets, which she showed was due to poor diet – an important leap forward in public health.

Eileen Crofton was also keenly interested in public health. She went up to Oxford in 1938 to study medicine, and after qualifying became a wartime captain in the Royal Army Medical Corps. It was while serving that she met her future husband, John Crofton, at that time a lieutenant-colonel in the RAMC. They married in 1945.

In 1952 they moved to Edinburgh, where John Crofton took up the post of professor of tuberculosis and lung disease, in which role he and his team were the first to develop a successful multi-drug treatment for tuberculosis. Eileen, meanwhile, had her hands full raising five children, but in the 1960s returned, part-time, to medicine, publishing a number of papers on the epidemiology of various respiratory diseases, including a study of the social effects of chronic bronchitis.

In 1973 she really found her metier, when she was appointed first medical director of Action on Smoking and Health in Scotland, in which role she proved her skills as a tireless campaigner and thorn in the flesh of the big tobacco companies. In recognition of her services to public health, Eileen was awarded an MBE on her ‘retirement’ in 1984. Of course she did not retire. Instead, she became convener of the nascent ASH women’s committee, which became active in addressing smoking issues specifically among women, an area of health campaigning that had previously been largely ignored. She also became increasingly interested in women’s issues more generally, and it was this interest that led her to research the stories of the pioneering women who ran the Scottish Women’s Hospital at Royaumont. Her book was first published in 1997, but has been out of print for some years, and I am delighted that Birlinn have now brought out a new paperback edition. At the time of her death in 2010, at the age of 91, Eileen was still at work on another book, recording the experiences of the first generations of women medical students in Britain, in the later 19th century. Sadly, this work remains unfinished.

Preface to the Second Edition

Angels of Mercy is a revised edition of my mother’s book The Women of Royaumont: A Scottish Women’s Hospital on the Western Front, first published in 1997. When my mother was writing the book, a small handful of the women involved in the hospital at Royaumont during the First World War were still alive, and she told me how privileged she felt to be able to interview and correspond with some of those survivors. There is now no one left alive who served during that war; that generation is past. My mother too – who served as a captain in the Royal Army Medical Corps during the Second World War – has also now passed on. She died at the age of 91 on 8 October 2010, her mind still lively and her spirit vibrant to the end. Her generation in its turn is daily diminishing.

The year after my mother’s death, Birlinn asked me, as her literary executor, whether they might bring out a revised paperback edition of The Women of Royaumont. We agreed that we needed a new title, one that would better communicate to a wider audience what the book is about. We also agreed that the book should be somewhat shorter, and more focused on the main story. To this end I have undertaken a certain amount of editing and rewriting, and have cut out quite a substantial amount of material that was somewhat tangential to the core narrative, and perhaps of more interest to historians and other researchers than to the general reader. In this task I was assisted by my sister Patricia Raemaekers, who made numerous useful suggestions, making my task much easier than it might otherwise have been.

For this second edition, I have preserved unaltered the original Dedication, Preface and Acknowledgements that my mother included in the book when it was first published.

Ian Crofton

October 2012

Contents

Foreword

Preface to the Second Edition

List of Illustrations

Dedication of the First Edition

Preface to the First Edition

Acknowledgements

Map of the Western Front 1915

1 The Story Begins

2 The Hospital That Went to France

3 The First Year

4 1916: The Year of Testing

5 The Patients

6 1917: Strange Interlude

7 1918: Their Finest Hour

8 Aftermath: From Armistice to Closure

Appendix I The Hospital: An Assessment

Appendix II The Women

Notes and References

Bibliography

Index

List of Illustrations

1. The Abbey of Royaumont.

2. Miss Francis Ivens, médecin-chef of Hôpital Auxiliaire 301.

3. The Scottish contingent leaving Waverley Station, Edinburgh, on 2 December 1914.

4. Les doctoresses in the abbey cloisters, 1915.

5. The hard-working ambulances were well cared for, but do not give the impression of great comfort.

6. Chauffeur Banks stands proudly in front of her ambulance.

7. An operation in the theatre on the first floor.

8. The job of the Vêtements Department at the top of the building was to sort through the filthy, tattered and bloodstained clothing of the injured.

9. Miss Ivens on a ward round.

10. Nurses dressing the wounds of French soldiers in the Blanche de Castille Ward on the first floor.

11. Another view of Blanche de Castille Ward.

12. Patients were nursed in the cloisters in the summer months.

13. Another view of the cloisters.

14. The kitchen.

15. A decoration ceremony taking place in the cloisters.

16. Sister Williams with one of her Senegalese patients.

17. Miss Ivens looks on as a poilu receives a decoration.

18. The arrival of the post at Villers-Cotterêts.

19. Orderly Proctor.

20. Miss Ivens, wearing her decorations, stands outside one of the wards at Villers-Cotterêts.

21. Miss Edith Stoney in her x-ray department in the Scottish Women’s Hospital in Serbia.

22. Doctors awarded the Croix de Guerre, December 1918.

23. General Descoings and Professor Weinberg of the Pasteur Institute.

24. Dr Leila Henry, the youngest doctor, and Dr Elizabeth Courtauld, the oldest, on the terrace.

25. Dr Elsie Jean Dalyell, the bacteriologist.

26. Sawing wood for fuel at Villers-Cotterêts.

27. Staff enjoying a picnic in the grounds of Royaumont.

28. Two blessés (‘wounded’) in drag, performing a skit.

29. Staff with blessés.

30. A wheelbarrow race at Royaumont.

31. Soldiers about to leave Royaumont.

32. Departing from Royaumont.

33. The abbey at Christmas 1917.

34. Dr Courtauld as an old lady.

35. Miss Ivens in her office.

Dedication of the First Edition, 1997

To Miss Helen Lowe MBE, who has done so much, and still battles to keep alive the memory of Dr Elsie Inglis. Without Elsie Inglis there would have been no Women of Royaumont and no story to tell.

Also to John who has shared 50 years with me,

Preface to the First Edition

This book arose quite by chance – a perfect example of serendipity.

A last-minute decision to attend a conference of the European Medical Association on Smoking and Health in 1990 led me to a totally unexpected sequel: some years of growing discovery and excitement, numerous interesting contacts and some valued friendships as the story gradually unravelled.

The conference was held in the beautiful Cistercian Abbey of Royaumont about 30 miles north of Paris, now a delightful cultural centre and an important tourist attraction. Arriving in thick mist on a dark November day, its beauty was not immediately apparent, but on succeeding days a conducted tour in better weather revealed the glorious architecture of the 13th-century building in its lovely setting among trees still resplendent in their autumn colours, and the surrounding canals and waterways in the grounds. We were told the story of the abbey – and, as an aside to me, and because I came from Scotland – our guide pointed out the plaque in a dark corner that commemorated the fact that the abbey had been a military hospital during the First World War, and was a ‘Scottish Women’s Hospital’. This, however, was not considered sufficiently important to be conveyed to the rest of the international group.

I was so intrigued by this that on my return home I began to make enquiries and to read the early accounts, published in 1917 and 1919,1 from which I learned the names of a few of the women who served there, and some basic facts – although seen through slightly suspect rose-coloured spectacles.

As a medical woman – and proud of what medical women have contributed to medicine – my first intention was to concentrate on this particular aspect of the story of the hospital. I had not gone far, however, when I discovered that the part played by women doctors – of crucial importance as it was – was only a part of the story. I became more and more involved with all the women who were engaged at Royaumont in a unique and extraordinarily successful enterprise. I decided then that it was the story of this community as it evolved over the years of war that was the story I wanted to tell. It also became clear to me that the story had been forgotten. In the abbey itself, only the bare fact of its existence seems to be known. To most people in this country, if they have heard of the Scottish Women’s Hospitals at all, they recall the tremendous retreat from Serbia over the mountains in 1915, the gallantry of Dr Elsie Inglis, and her tragic death on landing in England in 1917 after the retreat of her hospital from Russia. This story has now been told,2 but the story of Royaumont is a fascinating one on its own and deserves a fuller study. I have tried to do justice to it. The main part of the book focuses on the events in the hospital throughout the war, as well as the difficulties faced by the pioneers in setting up their hospital and the problems arising from an ever-increasing volume of patients as the war dragged on and the French medical service struggled to cope. The book then concludes with an account of the personalities and careers of some of the women involved, both medical and non-medical. As is often the case in wartime conditions, there were periods of intense pressure and periods of comparative quiet and inactivity. These two aspects of life called for adaptability and qualities of character in those who participated.

One of the outstanding features of this story is the gradual emergence of a strong and unique sense of community, which lasted not only throughout the period of active service, but which persisted for many years afterwards through the Royaumont and Villers-Cotterêts Association and through many lifelong friendships. It must be almost unique that a wartime association should persist as theirs did, with regular newsletters and meetings, until as recently as 1973.

The strong sense of community – not always to be seen in an all-woman setting – was remarkable. It must have owed much to the quality of their ‘Chief’, Miss Ivens. It must also owe something to the fact they knew, and were proud, that they were doing a worthwhile job, one that was recognized and highly valued by the French authorities and in all the villages around who benefited from the presence of ‘Les Dames Anglaises’. To be a ‘Royaumontite’, to be the recipient of the medal of the Scottish Women’s Hospitals, and, for some of them also, medals from the French government, was a distinction and source of pride in their later lives.

The hospital was what they made it. Its success – and it was a success – was theirs and belonged to them all. They were dependent on their own resources and could not summon outside help in times of crisis. The success of the hospital depended on all the different departments. Efficiency in the kitchen and the clerical department was no less important than in the departments concerned with the direct care of the patients. There was mutual respect, which existed despite occasional misunderstandings, some of which are recorded in the story. That there should also be some misunderstandings with the committee at home is not surprising, but it was a tribute to the members of the committee who visited from time to time that a fuller appreciation of the difficulties faced by the unit working in what was in fact a totally unsuitable building led in most cases to their resolution.

The history of these women illustrates the changing role of women in the early part of the 20th century and, in particular, the impact of the war. For many, probably all of them, their experiences at Royaumont formed a watershed in their personal lives. For some it opened new windows of opportunity; for others their return to civilian life brought less change than they might have expected and perhaps hoped for.

Acknowledgements

I am sometimes overwhelmed by the number of people who have helped me in the writing of this book. I am grateful to all of them and only hope that I have not betrayed their trust in me.

I owe a big debt of gratitude to Miss Helen Lowe who generously placed at my disposal her register of the Royaumont staff, her collection of newsletters of the Royaumont and Villers-Cotterêts Association, and other material and whose unfailing interest has greatly encouraged me.

Dr Leah Leneman shared with me much material arising from her own researches on the Scottish Women’s Hospitals that was relevant to Royaumont. Although we shared information, I am conscious that the debt was very much on my side.

I would also like to thank Dr Harold Swan, honorary archivist of the University of Sheffield, for his continuing interest and listening ear, and Professor Alexander Fenton, director of the European Ethnological Research Centre, for reading my text, encouraging me, and making many useful suggestions.

I acknowledge with gratitude the enormous help of my publisher, John Tuckwell, who has shown unending patience in guiding a tyro through the mysteries of publishing. Any deficiencies that remain are mine, certainly not his.

Finally I am grateful to Professor Ruth Bowden for much useful advice.

Among the individuals I acknowledge the help of: Mrs Audrey Acland, daughter of Orderly Starr; M. l’Abbé Bigo, Presbytère de Viarmes; Mrs Mona Calder, daughter of Orderly Watt; Dr Hilda Cantrell and Dr James Carmichael for memories of Miss Ivens and Miss Nicholson; Mr Samuel Courtauld, great-nephew of Dr Courtauld; Dr Betty Cowan, for information on Dr Guest at Christian Medical College, Ludhiana; Mrs M. Crowther, daughter of Dr Hamilton; Mr Tam Dalyell, Mr Wm Dalyell and Dr Martin Davey for information on Dr Elsie Dalyell; Mme Marie-Christine Daudy, daughter of M. Henry Goüin, and granddaughter of M. Edouard Goüin for a tour of the abbey and making it possible to examine the visitors’ book; Sir Alastair Denny, for information on Orderly Denny; Mr Harold Francis FRCS and the late Professor Sir Norman Jeffcoate for information on Miss Ivens; Mrs Morag Fairlie, niece of Chauffeur Smeal; Mr William Garrett, son of Dr Lillie; Mr James Gray and Mrs Gray, formerly Cook Simpson; Dr Jean Guy for information on Edith Stoney; Miss Rachel Hedderwick, daughter of Cook Littlejohn; Mrs M. Kappagoda, for information on Dr Hendrick; Miss Heather Mackay, niece of Auxiliary Nurse Chapman; the late Dr Grace Macrae, formerly Orderly Summerhayes; Mrs Amy Maddox and Mrs Sue Morris, nieces of the three Inglis sisters; Mlle Maloum-Gerzo, of the Abbey of Royaumont; Mrs Anne Murdoch, daughter of Dr Henry; Mrs Margaret Nisbet, daughter of Orderly Manson; Mrs Margaret Oddy, daughter of Sister Dunderdale; Mr David Proctor, nephew of Orderly Proctor; Miss Mary Pym for information on Miss Ivens; Dr Elizabeth Rees, for information on Miss Ivens and Miss Nicholson; Ms Margaret Randall, niece of Orderly Davidson; Mr G.D. Richardson for information on the Dalyell family; Mrs Catriona Reynolds, niece of Orderly Neilson-Gray; Dr Ann Shepherd, niece of Dr MacDougall; Mrs Ailsa Tanner, granddaughter of Mrs Robertson; Dr J.F. Tessier for advice on French writing on the First World War; Dr Christopher Silver, for a photograph of Miss Ivens; Dr I. Simmonds, son of Chauffeur Banks; and Miss M.P. Simms, niece of Orderly Simms.

I acknowledge also the help of many institutions, libraries and museums: Mr Adrian Allen, assistant archivist, University of Liverpool; Mr Michael Barfoot, Edinburgh Medical Archives Centre, University of Edinburgh; Mme Therèse Blondet-Busch, Musée d’Histoire Contemporaine, Photothèque de l’Hôtel National des Invalides, Paris; Mr Peter Carnell, library archivist, University of Sheffield; Mr D.M. Cook, librarian, Liverpool Medical Institute; Mr David Dougan, librarian, Fawcett Library, London Guildhall University; Miss Joan Ferguson, former librarian and Mr Ian Mills, librarian, and his staff, Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh; Miss A. Fletcher, medical librarian, Royal Free Hospital School of Medicine; Dr Leslie Hall and Miss S.M. Dixon, Contemporary Medical Archives Centre and Mr William Schupbach of the Iconographic Collection, Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine; Mr Graham Hopper, Dumbarton District Library; Dr Elizabeth van Houts, archivist, Newnham College, Cambridge; Mr Peter Liddle, keeper of the Liddle Collection of First World War Archive Material, Leeds University; Mr Colin McLaren, head of special collections, university archivist, Aberdeen University; Mme Annick Perrot, conservateur du Musée Pasteur, Paris; Mrs Kate Perry, archivist, Girton College, Cambridge; Mr Simon Roberts, Department of Documents and Mrs Hilary Roberts, Department of Photographs, Imperial War Museum; Ms Margaret Robins, archivist, Women’s College Hospital, Toronto; Mr M.A.M. Smallman, sub-librarian, Queen’s University, Belfast; Mr K.E. Smith, archivist, University of Sydney; Mr Robert Smith, keeper of muniments, University of St Andrews; Mr Alastair Tough, archivist, Greater Glasgow Health Board, University of Glasgow; Dr Ian White, honorary archivist, St John’s Hospital for Diseases of the Skin, St Thomas’s Hospital, London; Miss Hazel Wright and her staff, Department of Rare Books and Manuscripts, Mitchell Library, Glasgow; and to the staff at the National Library of Scotland, the Edinburgh Central Library and the French Institute, Edinburgh.

CHAPTER ONE

The Story Begins

This story concerns an abbey, a hospital, some women and the war.

It all took place in the Abbey of Royaumont, one of the most beautiful of all the lovely Cistercian abbeys of France. Set in gently rolling wooded country some 30 miles to the north of Paris, it is still in a relatively unspoilt area. The continual expansion of Paris has not yet engulfed it, though the nearby villages are gradually losing their local character. The roads are now of a quality that would have aroused the envy of those women ambulance drivers who, dodging potholes, tried to protect their wounded passengers from the jolts and bumps of the 12-mile journey on atrocious roads from the railhead at Creil.

The train service nowadays is perhaps not very much better than the one they knew. But for those travelling to and from Paris in the First World War it must have been a very much more beautiful journey than it is now, especially in spring when the orchards were in flower.

The journey from England now is, however, very different. A rapid and comfortable flight to Charles de Gaulle airport bears no comparison with the crowded cross-Channel steamers with the ever-present danger of U-boat attack, and the slow, and often devious, journeys by train to Paris and on to Viarmes.

Today from the air you can look down on a crossroads, where you can see, clearly visible, the Royaumont Monument, marking the limit of the German offensive in 1914 and commemorating those who died in the hospital. And if you are quick enough you might also catch a glimpse of the Abbey of Royaumont itself, among its trees and its landmark spire.

The forests where the women loved to wander and picnic are still there, but the trenches they sometimes explored are gone. There are possibly fewer of the wild flowers that so delighted them. Did they, perhaps, gather too many of the lilies-of-the-valley? We know that the poilusa were allowed to do so, and that they delighted in offering great bunches to the sisters and orderlies. The beauty of the unspoilt countryside in those days made an unforgettable impression. In spring and summer they remembered:

The fields blue with cornflowers and scarlet with poppies – the woods carpeted with cowslips, lilies of the valley, dwarf daffodils, and all made gayer and more exciting by gorgeous butterflies, dragon flies and moths.1

And in November:

I have no words to tell of the beauty of that autumn forest [the forest of Beaumont]. The hush of St Luke’s peace was over all the forest, that dream beauty which comes with a still November, a kind of hushed period of farewell when the tattered banners of scarlet and gold hang on the edge of the winds. A perfect sunset lit the forest aisles with subtle light . . . and the misty blue distances between the tree vistas had the spell of moonlight on them. The names too of these forest alleys were a perpetual delight to me – imagine such a light shining along the ‘Route de la Pierre Turquoise’. In these woods Blanche de Castille used to ride on her white palfrey. When we emerged from the wood a new beauty awaited us, a great copper moon rising on the loops of the Oise – Seen through the straight poplars it was like a Japanese painting . . . That ride home through the little village of Beaumont and by the Oise in the last lingering purple twilight and glorious moonlight was unforgettable.2

The trees in front of the abbey – in their spring or autumn foliage, shrouded in snow, or sparkling with frost – are the same ones that grew there all those years ago; and the canals and waterways around the abbey, where convalescent poilus so hopefully went fishing, are there still.

The buildings themselves struck every newcomer then – as they still do today – with their beauty. The cloister court is unchanged, though the rose garden has disappeared. In imagination the visitor can picture the cloister court filled with beds, and patients lying there enjoying the healing power of the sunshine and the lovely surroundings and the nights of peace and quiet. ‘On moonlit evenings,’ Antonio de Navarro tells us in his 1917 account of the hospital, ‘the scene was one of indescribable beauty. The old grey masonry, assuming then a ghostly pallor, shone like marble in the dark, shimmering sky.’3 The terrace above the cloisters, where they used to sit and rest and chat, has now been removed – it had been a 19th-century addition. Behind the present buildings there is a field where a crater remains from a shell that landed in 1918.

The interior of the buildings is now much changed. The entrance hall, so large and impressive in the hospital era, has been divided, but happily concessions to modern ideas of comfort have not gone so far as to install a lift. The visitor must still climb 71 steps to the second floor, and is thankful not to be burdened with a heavy patient on a stretcher. Nor, with modern heating and plumbing, must fuel and water still be carried up all those stairs.

The hospital wards are recognizable from their beautiful vaulting and ornamental pillars. How impossible it must have been to black out those tall Gothic windows when the Zeppelins and Gothas were overhead.

The present well-heated bedrooms with their ensuite bathrooms are a far cry from the primitive conditions of wartime, and would have seemed an unbelievable luxury to the women who strove to keep themselves warm and clean in those early days. Perhaps also they might have envied the sanitary arrangements enjoyed by the monks of the 13th century, who were provided, in what is now known as the Maison des Latrines, with no fewer than 60 seats placed back to back and draining into a canal. A generous allowance, it would seem, for 180 monks. How useful these would have been for the patients in the wartime hospital, where the sanitary arrangements were pretty primitive and the graceful lectern in the refectory was used as a convenient depository for bedpans.4

All those coal-burning stoves seen in the archive photographs, with the flues finding their way out through the old stone walls, are gone without a trace. Gone also is the monstrous stove in the kitchen on which Michelet, the renowned chef, used to dance, and gone also is the sink. Instead there are priceless mediaeval tapestries, and a superb 15th-century statue of the Virgin and Child.

Standing in the great refectory, or perhaps enjoying one of the concerts that frequently take place there, the visitor requires a keen imagination to picture it when it was a ward of wounded – often desperately wounded – men: beds on each side and a row down the middle – 100 in all; brilliant scarlet bed covers against the soft grey of the Gothic pillars; and a giant Canadian flag reminding us that this was ‘Canada Ward’. It must have looked even more colourful at Christmas time when it was decorated with great branches and bunches of mistletoe, and how beautiful it must have been when the old Curé celebrated Mass in the candlelight.

One member of that wartime community tells us what it was like to be a part of this great endeavour:

I dreamed dreams of a grey, dusty austere Royaumont, where eager grey, blue and white figures hurried about, intent and tight-lipped, or enthusiastic and laughing; rows of red-blanketed beds in the quiet nights and the soft pad of feet and the long shadows moving on the high stone walls; of a purpose and unity of mind; of life and of death and of memories too deep for words . . . something of which nobody left in the whole building knows.5

On their tour of the abbey the observant visitor might notice a rather worn and inconspicuous plaque, which translates as follows:

Here from 1915 to 1919 Miss Frances Ivens CBE MS Lond was Head Physician of the Scottish Women’s Hospital established in the Abbey of Royaumont by the good grace of its owner, M. Edouard Goüin, and the generosity of British and Allied donors.

Ten thousand eight hundred and sixty-one wounded French soldiers received from an exclusively feminine staff the benefits of a devotion without limits.

What was this hospital? And who were these women?

Before we answer those questions, let us first unravel a little of the broader history of the abbey,6 which was founded by Louis IX of France (later known as Saint Louis) in 1229. His father, Louis VIII, had had the ambition to endow a monastery. When he died, his 12-year-old son lost no time in carrying out his wishes, with the help of his redoubtable mother, Blanche de Castille.

The little boy took his duties seriously. The abbey was to be under the Cistercians, a relatively new order that called for greater simplicity than that practised by the longer-established Cluniac foundations. However, as this was to be a royal foundation, simplicity was somewhat modified. It was to be known as Royaumont, or Mons Regalis (‘royal mount’, although there is little evidence of a mount). It was well-endowed – in fact its subsequent history showed that it was too well-endowed.

According to tradition, the boy-king would ride over to the abbey from his nearby castle at Asnières, mingle with the lay brothers engaged in the construction work, and encourage them to greater efforts by pushing a stone-laden wheelbarrow himself. He would rebuke those who made too much noise, or rested from their labours, telling them ‘Monks keep silence, and so should you. Monks don’t rest, and neither should you.’

With or without this encouragement, the abbey church was ready for dedication on Sunday 19 October 1235 (an event which the hospital staff commemorated in 1915, almost 700 years later). The church was dedicated to the Holy Cross, Our Lady and All the Saints, and King Louis donated a piece of the True Cross, a fragment of the Crown of Thorns, some relics of St Thomas of Canterbury, and some relics of St Agnes.

Many stories are told of Louis’ piety. He took part in the Cistercian custom of washing the feet of the poor (just as in a later chapter Orderly Starr records how she washed the feet of the wounded poilus). Louis, in an excess of zeal, wanted to go further to demonstrate his humility by washing the feet of the monks. He was restrained, however, by the abbot, who suggested some people might speak ill of it – in other words he might be accused of showing off.

Louis used to visit the infirmary, and with his own hands prepare food and place it carefully in the mouth of a leper, removing any grains of salt that might cause pain – just as, centuries later, Orderly Starr would feed her patient with the wounded mouth so patiently and so carefully. Like the orderlies 700 years later, St Louis swept the floors, and at mealtimes carried his plates to the hatch into the kitchen – the very same hatch through which meals passed when the monks’ refectory was used as the staff dining area. Sometimes Louis would read to the monks from the pulpit where, on Christmas Eve 1917, Orderly Don (a trained opera singer) sang to delight her listeners.

King Louis died at Tunis on the Second Crusade, but his endowments to the abbey were continued and even increased. Consequently, the initial period of devotion and austerity gave way to an era of laxity and indulgence.

In 1516 King Francis I gained the right to appoint ‘commendators’. These appointments, being highly profitable, were much sought after, and were a useful source of royal income. Religious duties were not required, and commendators could be responsible for the worldly affairs of a number of abbeys. One such commendator was Cardinal Mazarin, who added Royaumont to his list. For reasons best known to himself he handed Royaumont over to the ten-year-old Prince of Lorraine, in whose family it remained, becoming a beautifully furnished maison de plaisance (‘pleasure palace’). A later abbot was not content with the abbey as it stood and built a palace (later known as the ‘chateau’) alongside. However, he was not to enjoy this. The French Revolution broke out, and the abbot fled to Austria, where he was reported to have died in misery.

In 1790, when there were only ten monks remaining, the National Assembly decreed the destruction of the abbey church. This was duly carried out in 1792 – but the northeast tower was too strong for them and still stands today as the flèche (‘spire’), the emblem of Royaumont.

The abbey was sold, its contents scattered and a cotton mill installed, and in the 19th century pavilions in the grounds became popular holiday resorts for fashionable Parisians. In 1864 the abbey was sold again, to the Oblate Fathers, and then in 1869 to the Sisters of the Holy Family. It was a religious building once more. Much preparatory work was done after the damage caused by the industrial installations, but the return to a religious use was not to last. In 1905 a law was passed against religious orders and the sisters had to leave for Belgium. The property was bought by Monsieur Jules Goüin (who already owned the nearby chateau). It lay empty until the advent of the First World War, when Goüin’s son Edouard offered it to the French Red Cross. This in turn led to its occupation by the Scottish Women’s Hospital for four and a half years.

The Scottish Women’s Hospitals of the First World War were the inspiration of one remarkable woman. On the outbreak of war Dr Elsie Inglis conceived the idea of setting up hospitals that would be run exclusively by women, as a means of supporting the war effort. She carried through her project until her own tragic death in 1917, but she had laid such firm foundations that Scottish Women’s Hospitals continued in active service up to and beyond the end of the war.

It was a magnificent achievement, especially in the face of society’s attitudes towards women – particularly medical women – in the early years of the 20th century.

The 19th century had seen many struggles by women to raise their standards of education, to widen the their opportunities in employment, and to correct at least some of the injustices they suffered regarding property and other rights. By the end of the century women had gained access to universities. After a long and sometimes bitter struggle, they were able to qualify in medicine and, by having their names on the Medical Register, could be legally entitled to practise medicine. When Elizabeth Garrett Anderson gained admission to the Medical Register in 1865, she was only the second woman to do so. The medical profession were perturbed: they closed ranks and denied women access for the next 12 years. But others – among them Elsie Inglis – were pressing hard on the closed door.

In Edinburgh Sophia Jex-Blake, having won her own personal battle for registration in 1877, was struggling with the Edinburgh medical establishment to get instruction, practical experience and access to examinations for women students. Elsie Inglis was one of her students. At an early age Elsie showed the stuff of which she was made when she, with others of her fellow-students, rebelled against Jex-Blake’s autocratic ways and, with outside help, set up a rival – and successful – Medical College for Women in Edinburgh. She herself qualified in 1892, and set up practice. She went on to carry out pioneering social and medical work with poor women in the slums of Edinburgh.

Elsie Inglis soon became involved in the campaign for votes for women, and in due course became the honorary secretary of the Scottish Federation of Women’s Suffrage Societies. The Scottish Federation was allied to the National Union of Women’s Suffrage Societies (NUWSS), whose president was Mrs Millicent Fawcett, a younger sister of the pioneer Dr Elizabeth Garrett Anderson. The policy of both these organizations was to pursue their aims through peaceful and constitutional means. These were the ‘suffragists’. For some women these methods were too slow. Mrs Emmeline Pankhurst and her daughters founded the Women’s Social and Political Union (WSPU), which adopted militant tactics and whose members became known as ‘suffragettes’. These women became increasingly active in the years before the war, and gained considerable notoriety. They actively sought imprisonment and caused the government of the day more than a little embarrassment through their policy of going on hunger strike when they were imprisoned.

In the mood of patriotic fervour that accompanied the outbreak of war, most suffragists and suffragettes resolved to lay aside their campaigns for the vote, and devote themselves to the war effort. To Dr Elsie Inglis the war provided a golden opportunity to demonstrate what medical women could achieve, particularly in a very different field from the traditional one of caring for women and children. Dr Anderson – now aged 80 – had no doubts either. ‘My dears,’ she told the volunteers, ‘if you are successful over this work, you will have carried women’s profession forward by a hundred years.’7

Elsie Inglis was an achiever. She had determination, and she knew how to be ruthless when she thought it necessary. She had a remarkable gift of persuading others to do what she wanted; she could gain support from influential people; and she could attract devoted followers. In addition she never spared herself.

Even before the war she was involved in the training of young women for Voluntary Aid Detachments, but on the outbreak of war she envisaged something much more ambitious. On 12 August 1914, at a meeting of the Scottish Federation of Women’s Suffrage Societies in Edinburgh, Dr Inglis proposed ‘that the Federation should give organized help to Red Cross work’. Miss Mair, the president, then proposed that the empty St George’s School in Melville Street (the school for girls which she had helped to found, and which had moved to new premises) should be applied for and equipped as a hospital. One can almost feel Dr Inglis’s mind leaping ahead as she then proposed ‘that Melville Street should be equipped as a hospital staffed entirely by women – and if not required at home should be sent abroad’.8

Finding that the school building in Edinburgh was not available, Dr Inglis then proposed, with the backing of the committee, to offer the proposed unit of 100 beds to the War Office or to the Red Cross. Both offers were summarily turned down (‘Go home and sit still’ was the oft-quoted phrase). There was no interest in a hospital staffed by women.

Undaunted, on 15 October Dr Inglis wrote to the French ambassador in London:

I am directed by the Executive of the Scottish Federation of Women’s Suffrage Societies to ask Your Excellency’s consideration of our scheme for organizing medical aid for the help of our Allies in the field.

The Federation proposes to send out hospital units, officered by women doctors, and staffed by fully trained nurses and properly qualified dressers. The Units will be sent out fully equipped to nurse 100 beds. Should Your Excellency’s Government desire such aid as we are proud to offer, it will be very willingly placed at the service of the French Red Cross. Our Units will be prepared to move from place to place as the exigencies of war may require, and to utilize such buildings as may be placed at our disposal.9

A similar letter went to the Serbian authorities. Both countries recognized that their own medical services were very inadequate, and both countries accepted the offer. The Serbian story is a fascinating one, but is not the subject of the present book.10 Dr Inglis now had the enthusiastic support of the NUWSS, and they agreed on an appeal for ‘Scottish Women’s Hospitals for Foreign Service’. Meetings were arranged, including a very large one in London on 20 October, where Dr Inglis outlined her plans to a big audience.

Back in Scotland a specially convened ‘Scottish Women’s Hospitals Committee’ was organized to receive donations and offers from volunteers. Sub-committees were set up to deal with hospitals, personnel, equipment, uniforms and cars. Premises were obtained in St Andrew’s Square, Edinburgh, gifted by the Prudential Insurance Society.

Excitement was mounting, and money was flowing in; by 30 October Common Cause (the journal of the NUWSS) announced: ‘Dr Inglis has got her first £1000! One hospital is secure and will go to Serbia.’ There were plenty of volunteers – ‘surgeons, nurses, medical students and members of Voluntary Aid Detachments . . . but many more are needed’.

The press work in the NUWSS offices in London was coordinated and masterminded by V.C.C. (Vera) Collum, who was to play a major role in the subsequent history of Royaumont.

By 6 November £2800 had been collected; they now hoped to fund three hospital units, at an estimated cost of £1000 (later raised to £1500) to equip each 100-bed unit. By 13 November two units were ready.

By 20 November Common Cause reported that Madame de la Panouse, president of the French Red Cross, was actively seeking a building that would accommodate the unit of these ‘Dames très sérieuses’, and by 27 November the decision had been taken that it should go to the Abbey of Royaumont. By the end of November the link between the abbey and the Scottish Women’s Hospital was firmly in place, a link that was to last longer than anyone conceived at the time.

From the military point of view, the fighting in northern France between August 1914 and the arrival of the hospital in January 1915 represented one of the most dramatic periods of the war. It was in essence a war of movement, not to be repeated until the German onslaughts of 1918 and their subsequent repulse.

The so-called ‘Battle of the Frontiers’ began on 14 August. The Germans advanced rapidly, taking Amiens, Soissons, Laon and Reims; British and French forces were in retreat and Paris itself was threatened. What had seemed to be an inexorable onslaught was eventually halted at the River Marne, where the German advance was checked, signalling the end of the war of movement and initiating the horrors of trench warfare. In the first five months of the war the French lost 300,000 men killed, including 5000 officers; 600,000 men were captured, wounded or missing.

In September the Germans made a great effort to reduce Antwerp (in which they succeeded in October), and to destroy the Belgian army. The German cavalry, the Uhlans, swept across to the Belgian coast. With the Allies in full retreat, the Uhlans ranged at will over northwest France. It must have been at this time that they bivouacked in the abbey – and left behind quantities of straw and other debris for the first orderlies to clear. The German advance had in fact drawn very close to Royaumont. On 4 September 1914 they reached the crossroads only a mile from the abbey. It was here that the dearly loved Curé had stood for several days ready, if it should prove necessary, to plead with the German commanders for the safety of his village of Asnières (see Chapter Five).

By the end of 1914 stalemate had been reached; both sides were beginning to dig in, and it was not until February 1915 that fighting was renewed. By this time Royaumont was just beginning to get organized.

The story of the abbey, the hospital, the women and the war had begun.

CHAPTER TWO

The Hospital That Went to France

By the middle of November 1914 the selection of volunteers destined for Royaumont was complete. In the first instance the unit was to consist of seven doctors, ten nurses, seven orderlies, two cooks, a clerk, an administrator, two maids and four chauffeurs (two of them men, as there was initially some doubt as to whether the French authorities would permit women to drive in the war zone).

The great experiment began.

What were the motives that led these women to volunteer? Some were looking for adventure, some were swept up by patriotism, some sought to wave the banner for women’s suffrage. One of the volunteers, Dorothy Littlejohn, a highly trained cook from the Edinburgh College of Domestic Science, was not among this last group. Not only did she actively oppose women’s suffrage, she entirely disapproved of women doctors. This was strange, as her father was the great Sir Henry Littlejohn, the first medical officer of health for Edinburgh. After initial hesitation about female doctors he had become a strong supporter of Sophia Jex-Blake in her prolonged and traumatic campaign to obtain medical education for women. But his daughter clearly had very different ideas. Indeed she was furious that on arrival in London the party was ‘paraded’ before Mrs Millicent Fawcett in the offices of the NUWSS. She wanted no part of that.1

Who were these seven doctors who were about to pioneer totally new fields of activity, fields that they had probably never even imagined a few short months before?

The appointment of Miss Francis Ivensb as chief medical officer (médecin-chef) was almost certainly the most crucial one in effecting the transformation of a small medical unit into a hospital of 600 beds, later described as ‘the crack hospital of the war’. At the age of 44 she had an established position as consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist in Liverpool. She had been a brilliant student at the London School of Medicine for Women, and a gold medallist of London University. In addition she was only the third woman in the UK to obtain the degree of master of surgery. She had been keenly interested in the suffrage movement (the non-militant wing) for a number of years, and on the outbreak of war had volunteered her services to the women’s unit in Belgium under the leadership of Mrs Stobart. However, the German advance had led to the withdrawal of the unit before Miss Ivens could join it. She was then free to volunteer for the Royaumont unit.

Miss Ruth Nicholson, a graduate of Durham University, had worked in the mission field in Palestine, where she had gained wide surgical experience. She later became second-in-command at Royaumont and served continuously until the hospital closed in 1919.

Dr Agnes Savill, one of Glasgow University’s most distinguished women graduates, was a consultant in London with a high reputation in dermatology and electro-therapeutics. This involved radiological work, and it was in that capacity that her expertise was so valuable at Royaumont. Her connection with Royaumont was maintained throughout the war, though not on a continuous basis. She had played a notable role in the women’s suffrage movement, having worked alongside two distinguished male surgeons in an inquiry into the appalling treatment of women hunger-strikers in prison (see Appendix Two).

Dr Winifred Ross had been resident surgeon in Paisley Parochial Hospital after her graduation from Glasgow University. Her surgical experience included the treatment of male patients, an area which some regarded at that time as too indelicate for women.

Dr Berry (née Augusta Lewin) had been a fellow-student of Miss Ivens, and had experience in the field of public health. She served right through to the summer of 1918.

Dr Hancock had been resident medical officer at the Hospice in Edinburgh, an institution located in an appallingly poor and overcrowded area of the city. It had been founded by Dr Elsie Inglis (whom she would have known well) as a surgical and gynaecological service for women, and a centre for district midwifery.

Dr Heyworth had only recently qualified, and it was intended she would work in a junior capacity as a ‘dresser’.

Such was the initial medical team; most of them will become familiar as the story unfolds.

Although not a medical person, another key figure from the outset was Cicely Hamilton, who was clerk of the unit from December 1914 to May 1917. On the outbreak of war she had already achieved fame as an actress and playwright, and had played a prominent role in the women’s suffrage movement.

The Edinburgh contingent joined up with members coming from other parts of the country and proceeded to Folkestone accompanied by Dr Inglis herself, who had come to see them off, and who followed them a few days later. There was, on that Friday, a terrific gale blowing. The army decided that it was too rough to embark the troops, but Dr Inglis was insistent that her women would sail, come what may. She was not one with whom new recruits were prepared to argue, so on they went. Hatches were battened down and the wise ones took their seasick pills. After a ‘simply terrible crossing’ lasting three hours longer than scheduled, they landed at Boulogne and began the struggle with customs and red tape. Dorothy Littlejohn was in better shape than most, and also spoke some French, so it was left to her to negotiate with the authorities. This done, they proceeded to Paris.2

The following morning Sister Martha Aitken in Boulogne (who had no connection with the SWH) wrote an account of that fierce storm in her diary:

All night long it has blown a gale and the big windows in the casino shook very much. Every minute I expected to see them blown in. Rain, thunder and lightning accompanied the wind. The sea is lashed into a white fury and below the casino one can see the spray dashing the sea wall. The hospital ship had taken refuge in Boulogne Harbour. During a flash of lightning one can see the white cliffs of Dover. Towards morning we hear several guns being fired and two rockets sent up. I expect it is some poor ship in distress. Poor souls on a night like this.3

Cicely Hamilton, travelling a few days earlier than the main unit to take up her duties as clerk, also had a rough crossing. Looking back in 1946, she remembered

. . . the tumbling steamer as it neared the harbour, making wide circles to avoid the mines. The unfamiliar faces of Indian soldiers looking down from a familiar Boulogne quay, the slow devious journey to Paris – devious because mainline bridges had been blown. And finally Royaumont – picturesque, impressive and most abominably chilly.4

Meanwhile in Paris, Miss Ivens and a few others who had travelled with her had learned that their equipment had not arrived, and that its whereabouts were unknown. Furthermore, they heard from Monsieur Goüin, the owner of the abbey, that he had accommodated Cicely Hamilton, the clerk, and Mrs Owen, the administrator, in his own part of the abbey as a temporary measure, but that he could offer no further accommodation. He strongly urged them not to come. This was not in accordance with the ideas of Miss Ivens, who elected to proceed regardless of the warnings. She was as determined as Dr Inglis herself to get on with the tasks ahead, and it was no part of her plan to idle in Paris while work was waiting to be done. If there were no beds for her staff, she could buy mattresses, stuff them with straw, carry them by train, and lay them on the floor. So this is exactly what they did.

On 11 December Dorothy Littlejohn wrote home to her fiancé:

This Abbaye is 1½ miles from Viarmes, such a nice little country town, with quite good shops. The Abbaye itself is charming with lovely old cloisters and a real old-fashioned garden with a little fountain in the middle. The inside rather appals one at first, it’s so very large and so many odd staircases etc; in fact it is very eerie, especially as there is no light anywhere at the moment, and, as you know, a candle doesn’t give much. . . . The room I had felt very musty and in the morning my dress felt so damp I was afraid to get into it so what the uninhabited portion will be like I dread to think.5

They had set out from home under the impression that the Abbey of Royaumont was ‘a fine house with ample accommodation, good drainage and water supply, and electric lighting’.6 This description was correct in only one respect: the abbey did have ample accommodation.

Apart from the deficiencies of water, heating and lighting, the abbey was in a deplorable condition. Dirt had accumulated everywhere over the years, and the vast rooms were cluttered with masses of heavy masonry, and with straw and rubbish left behind by the Uhlans who had bivouacked there during the Battle of the Marne.

On 17 December Cicely Hamilton reported:

Those first few days at Royaumont I shall always look back on as an experience worth having. In surroundings of mediaeval grandeur – amid vaulted corridors, gothic refectories and cloisters – we proceeded to camp out with what we carried. The Abbey, in all its magnificence, was ours; but during those first few days it did not offer us very much more besides magnificence and shelter. It had not been lived in for years and its water supply had been practically cut off when the nuns left for Belgium. Hence we carried water in buckets up imposing staircases and along equally imposing corridors. Our only available stove – a mighty erection in the kitchen which had not been lit for a decade – was naturally short-tempered at first, and the supply of hot water was very limited. So, in consequence, was our first washing; at times very limited indeed. Our equipment, after the fashion of baggage in these times of war, was in no great hurry to arrive; until it arrived we did without sheets and blankets, wrapped ourselves in rugs and overcoats at night, and did not do much undressing.7

Dorothy Littlejohn, working as cook in the kitchen, also left an account of the initial privations:

I had an awful morning trying to get food ready, with a plumber every now and then putting my fire out. We have got a huge chef’s range, in fact some of the parts are so heavy it is quite difficult for women to shift them. You see, in this place, there is really nothing to work with until our things arrive from Edinburgh, so, for 25 people, we are cooking with two small pans, some rather wee bowls of the country, a kettle and that’s all. The dishes are equally scarce, so it’s a case of eternally washing up and also double meals and really by the time we have cooked and fed all that lot we are almost past food, but don’t think I am grumbling; it will be better later on. . . . This kitchen is a huge place with lovely arches and a nice door into the garden. At present we have nothing but candles, so it looks very gloomy, but they are going to put in a certain amount of electric light and also putting in a kind of hot water system which will be a comfort as at present every drop of hot water has to be specially boiled and also the kitchen is the only place you can get any at all.8

Cicely Hamilton had more to say about the difficulties:

We borrowed teacups from the village ironmonger, and passed the one knife around at meals for everyone to have a chop with it. We are as short of lamps as we are of knives – shorter; and we wandered about our majestic pile with candle-ends, stuck in bottles; little twinkling candle-ends that struggled with the shadows under the groined roofs . . . we are getting electric light in now, and already I find it in my heart to regret those bottled candles with their Rembrandtesque effects. Two of them, faintly dispersing the gloom at one end of the vaulted kitchen – while the pillars climbed to lose themselves in the blackness . . . I try to console myself for their loss by reflecting that the staring electric bulbs are more practicable for hospital purposes. But I am glad that I saw the kitchen before the bulbs were put in.

We did not easily get our staring electric bulbs; nor did we easily get our water laid on, our drains attended to, or broken windows mended. We live, you see, in the land of compulsory military service – where the plumber, the glazier, the electrician can only attend to your wants when he has not been ordered to the colours . . . Our preparations have been slow – but if they have been slow they have been sure. Drains, water, heating, lighting – everything in spite of the difficulties, is finally getting itself done. A few days ago our equipment condescended to arrive – and now we have knives all round and blankets and towels.9

Looking back in 1955 Norah Mackay (clerk from January 1915 to July 1917) remembered when ‘we scrubbed the floors by candlelight, the candle moving along as the scrubbers progressed’.10

These were the conditions with which Miss Ivens, who had the ultimate responsibility, had to cope. With her characteristic understatement she reported on 6 December to the Scottish Women’s Hospital Committee in Edinburgh that Royaumont looked lovely, but was ‘rather uncomfortable owing to lack of household implements’.11

Miss Ivens had much to do. She made a tour of inspection with Monsieur Goüin, the owner, and his architect, Monsieur Pichon (who became a very good friend to the hospital). They discussed the best way to heat such an impossibly large and draughty building, and concluded that anthracite stoves provided the best solution, combined with a hot-water system. Top priority was to be given to the operating theatre.

They also reviewed sanitary arrangements. The discovery of a bylaw whereby no sewage could be discharged into the river was a near disaster (Goüin himself was unaware of this) and threatened the very existence of the hospital. Luckily, they discovered that there were cesspits underneath the abbey, and arrangements were made to adapt the plumbing accordingly. Sanitary facilities were never more than barely adequate at Royaumont. At one point Miss Ivens was even contemplating military-style earth closets, but this desperate measure seems to have been avoided. It was all a far cry from the original 13th-century arrangements, whereby 180 monks had the choice of 60 seats.

Miss Ivens made a number of visits to see how the French ran their own hospitals, and negotiated a written contract with Monsieur Goüin by which it was agreed that they could have the use of the abbey for a year or ‘as long as the war lasts’. No one expected this would be another four and a half years.