New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-07-22
Women Occupy
Many Positions
In British Army
Supplant Troops as Typistss
Clerks and Motor
Transport Drivers
Thousands Are Nurses
Total at Work Numbers More
than Half of First Army
Sent to France D.,
BY F. A. WRAY

BY F. A. WRAY
London. July Women are serving
in the army in many more ways than
were ever looked for in time OF peace
The old army asked them for nurses.
They have given nurses 10 new army
ten times larger, and they have given
as well doctors, dispensers, storekeepsl
ers, orderlies, cooks, horse trainers and
motor drivers. ..
This did not all come at once, but
after women in large numbers had ;
come forward 70 fiji the civil places Of
men, and still more and more men .
were needed for combatant service. the
army itself began gradually to relieve
soldiers of certain of their non-comS"
blatant duties and replace them by
women. But before this was attempted .
women had already done n great work.
with the army in that duty which was
already theirs.
When war broke out there were 290"
nurses in the Imperial Military Nursing
Service and 173 in reserve. Besides
these, 800 were called up at once from
civilian hospitals for duty with the ex-
peditionary force. Small as this mum.
Der now seems, il was sufficient TO staff
the twelve hospital units which went
overseas with that first army, and also
the permanent military hospitals in
Great Britain.
Second Line Nurses Get No Pay 49,,
Behind this regular nursing service
was the Territorial Service, the second
hospital line. All its nurses were Ia 2
civilian work and drawing no army pay
but were pledged, at the outbreak OF
the war, TO come 10 the call OF tina
state.
Their duty was to staff the extra hosr
pitfalls In Great Britain, which would at
once be taken over by the government.
OF nurses so pledged there were nearly
5000. Besides these fully trained
nurses there had already been formed
before the war the voluntary aid de-.
tachments. which were 20 work with
The second hospital line In the event Of
war In Great Britain, and on ambu-
lance trains, in clearing hospitals and
rest camps; and for this work no pay
was then offered land many are still
working without pay, but only board"
lodging and travelling expenses.
Such were the preparations for war
already made in time OF peace, and
they were complete and ample for the
old army. But the nursing service.
like the army itself, had suddenly 10
grow beyond all that had ever been ex-
pected Of il. With this difference, that
while the FIRST Of the new armies we're
set TO train themselves in six months,
and in that time had become soldiers.
no nurse was accepted unless she had
had three years OF service IN large
hospital.
Even with this standard set tho
needs of the great armies have been
met. and now after two and a half years
of war. that service Of 300 with IT'S l7G
in reserve. and the 500 civilian nursec
attached 10 IL. has grown 70 close on
coo and is steadily growing. Al tho
same time the territorial nurses have
increased 10 close on 5000. and they,
too, enlisted originally for service
only in the hospitals of Great Britain,
are to be found at all the fronts. 10.
All Are Trained Nurses
These women. nearly thirteen thou
sand in number, are all fully trained
nurses, but besides them II has been
found advisable 70 recruit a certain
number Of partly trained and unframed
women who work under the nurses as
'probationers. These number nearly
5000.
These twenty-one thousand women
are in the Army Nursing Services, but
there are abroad, besides. those trained
nurses, some in British hospitals, some
in the hospitals Of the other Allies,
who work under the Red Cross and the
O. ii
two bodies have under tbs cir joint con-
troll all those nurses who are not un-
der the War Office, and they like the
army insist, in their choice, on full
three years training and take only
those who arc III for the work.
For, in the first enthusiasm OF the
war. unauthorized units had gone
abroad often hastily equipped and
with stats half trained. Such untried
workers broke under the strain.
1t was found the more necessary 20
have vigorous tests, as the Red Cross
was choosing women not only for hos :
pitals az home. II was asked very
early in the war TO find them for tina
most arduous and difficult work over.
seas. for Serbia, devastated with ty-
phus. and for the army in Gallipoli.
For such work only the best would
serve. '1i
Already by the end OF the first six
months Of the war the Red Cross and.
the Order of St. John had nearly four
hundred nurses in hospitals abroad,
and nearly a thousand in hospitals at
home. and that is 10 say nothing OF
the. three thousand other women who,
had offered themselves, and because OF
insufficient training could not be used.
They engage their nurses for six
months, and in two and half years,
have sent 10 hospitals in Great Britain
and overseas more than 5000
Face Perils o. the Sea ,n,
These nurses Of the Imperial Nursing
Services. the Territorial Nursing Ser
vice and the Red Cross are serving all,
over the world, in Great Britain
France, Malta, Salonica, Egypt and Mes
opotamia, and in those hospital ships
which 90 continually through the new
perils Of the seas. There are British Red
Cross nurses in Holland, meeting the
British wounded coming home from
Germany; there are Red Cross nurses
in Russia and Rumania and al the rest
stations all along the Italian front. -.
The voluntary aid detschments have,
grown in these two and a half years
not by thousands, but by tens OF thou.
sands, and they, too, are working over
seas. Many have come from the domin-
ions at their own expense, and tnstsr
are thousands more waiting 70 come
when they shall be needed. In the,
first twenty-five months ten thousand