Girls' book of the Red cross

Front matter

GIRLS BOOK

OF THE

RED CR05S

CHAPTER I ' PACE The Meaning of the Cross of Red . . . 1-30

The Battle of Solferino i, Jean Henri Dunant 2, The Geneva Convention 5, Need for the Red Cross 6, Florence Nightingale 10, Dorothea Lynde Dix 16, Clara Barton 20, Structure of the Red Cross 26.

CHAPTER H The Red Cross in Time of Peace .... 31-76

Fires 33, Floods 40, Tornadoes 49, Accidents on the Water 53, Pestilence 55, Famine 56, First War Work 60, Relief Work Abroad 63, " First Aid " 65, Work Among Miners 67, Among Railroad Workers 68, Among Lumber- Jacks 69, Among Police and Firemen 70, Among Electrical Workers 71, Among Seamen 71, Among Life-Savers 72, Health Work 72, Tuberculosis 74.

CHAPTER HI The Call to Greater Service 77-146

Hospital Supplies 79, The Red Cross in Foreign Lands 83, Increase in Membership and Funds 85, Appointment of a War Council 87, The First Red Cross Drive 89, New Administrative Methods 92, Spirit of Helpfulness Awakened 95, The Woman's Bureau 99, Red Cross Statistics 104, Grandmother's Medal 106, Comfort Kits 108, The Junior Red Cross io8. Social Service of the Junior Auxiliary 117, Civilian Relief Abroad 121, War Relief in Belgium 130, The American Red Cross in Italy 132, Relief Work in Russia 135, Work in England 137, In Switzerland 139, Work in Serbia and other Balkan Countries 142, The American Red Cross in Palestine 145.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER IV The Red Cross at Home 147-197

Information Department 149, Home Service Section 149, Eleanor and Eugene 155, Sue and Sam 155, Adele 157, Mildred 159, Girl Brides 160, Helen and Paul 161, Louise 164, Rosie and Dave 166, Boy Scouts 171, Girl Scouts and Camp Fire Girls 173, Camp Service 174, Communication Service 178, Sanitary Service 179, Canteen Service 179, The War Brides 186, Home Service After the Armistice 187, Nursing Service 195.

CHAPTER V Behind the Firing Line 198-259

The Ambulance Man 198, The Ambulance Woman 201, The Ambulance Service 205, Hospital Units 210, The Hospital Orderly 213, The Stretcher-Bearer 214, Red Cross Dogs 217, Hospital Trains 224, Hospital Ships 225, Rest and Refreshment Canteens in France 228, Rolling Canteens and Street Kitchens 245, Red Cross Soap 247, Care of Refugees 248, Mechanical Transport Corps 256.

CHAPTER VI

" The Greatest Mother in the World " . 260-339

The Care Committee 267, Voluntary Aid Detachments 267, The American Nurse 269, Miss Jane A. Delano 275, Nurses' Work and Risk 282, Bureau of Communication 289, Reconstruction of the Injured 296, Mothering of Soldiers on Leave 297, Mothering War Orphans 304, A Faithful Friend 315, Care of Rapatries 315, Festival Occasions 323, A Tribute to Women 337, Miss Boardman's Forecast 337.

CHAPTER VII The Future of the Red Cross .... 340-375

Modern Health Crusade 353, American Women's Hospitals Organization 355, Medical-Social Service Workers 357, A Program of Preparedness 358, First Aid Work and the Junior Red Cross 359, Red Cross Animals 369, The Great Work Ahead 373.

Janet has a curious ivory ornament on her bookcase. It is a ball, about the size of a hen's egg, cleverly carved and containing within its perforated shell several other balls of decreasing sizes, each carved sphere perfect in itself and revolving freely by itself, yet each securely held inside the larger surrounding balls.

Perhaps you have one of these curious ivory ornaments in your home, or perhaps you have seen one in some art museum, and if so you doubtless have wondered, as Janet does repeatedly, how those clever Chinese carvers fashion such marvels.

Janet's bedroom has a broad, deep bay window from which a great stretch of sky can be seen. Janet never tires of studying the stars, and almost every clear night she searches out her favorite constellations. But the steady Pole Star is always in the same place.

Perhaps you too can name the constellations and find the Pole Star, and perhaps you sometimes wonder, as Janet does, why the heavenly bodies always look just so and how it is they all keep together in just such arrangement and never lose their place in the sky or their relation to the Pole Star.

Janet joined an organization not long ago, and it reminds her of the ivory balls, each revolving independently, yet all hound in one; and the more she learns of the working-plan of the organization, the more she is reminded of the constellations and the Pole Star. Her branch of the Red Cross, she says, might he likened to one tiny star in a great constellation, the division to which her chapter helongs, to the constellation, and the Central Committee in Washington, to the steady Pole Star.

From her window Janet looks hy day into the green depths of a swaying hemlock tree. How the branches sway when even the gentlest breeze blows! And when the wind is high, the limbs bend and bow, but never break. While through all kinds of weather, stands stif and straight and unbending the stout, thick trunk of the tree!

And sometimes as Janet gazes into the green depths of the swaying branches, she is again reminded of her Red Cross Auxiliary. For she says the trunk of the tree is like the Central Committee in Washington; the strong limbs are like the great divisions; the long boughs spreading in all directions may be likened to the chapters; the swaying branches extending away out over the lawn and the clif are the busy Red Cross branches; and the twigs are the auxiliaries! Janet laughs when she gets as far as this! and rejoices to think that even the Junior Auxiliary to which she belongs is, like the tiniest twig of the big hemlock, really a part of the great whole and firmly attached to the stout tree trunk in Washington.

CHAPTER I

The Meaning of the Cross of Red

"Oh, no, no, no. Monsieur, we could not do that!" "We should be afraid!" "We should not know what to do — " "Nor how — " "Oh, no, no, no. Monsieur!"

So babbled a group of sobbing peasant women gathered about a young man of gentle but determined manner, pleasant and kindly yet firm and commanding. Terrified by the sounds of battle, grieving over the sad tidings from the field beyond, these women were overwhelmed with despair and dismay.

A young girl pressed forward. "But was it not Monsieur himself who brought home to us in his own carriage our Louis? And have we not seen him day after day going back and forth to the battlefield? Can we not do our share?"

The battle of Solferino was ended. The blue skies of sunny Italy smiled down on one of the bloodiest battlefields the world's history had ever then known. Italy had won her independence, Victor Emmanuel had gained his kingship, but thousands of Italy's fair young sons lay wounded and dying, and still other thousands of France and Austria lay dead or disabled. It was in June, 1859, and the French had once more helped the Italians to throw off the yoke of Austria, even as they had before in 1796 on the very same field of Solferino.^ To commemorate this second battle there stands upon its field the picturesque Tower of Martino, commanding a splendid view and containing a military museum ; but the most worthy and effective memorial is the world-wide organization of the Red Cross which resulted from the effect of the sight of this battlefield on a tender-hearted and high-spirited young Swiss.

JEAN HENRI DUNANT

There was living in Geneva at that time an author and philanthropist, by name Jean Henri Dunant, who devoted his time and his fortune to various kinds of charitable work in his native city. While visiting Solferino, he was im-

iSolferino: From the first battle, a certain shade of blue was designated by the name "solferino" and was popular for many years, though now forgotten, unlike its companion "magenta," which gained its name from a battle fought three weeks earlier in the same campaign.

pressed with the lack of aid for those who had fallen in battle. There were not enough doctors to care for such vast numbers, and the wounded lay where they fell, without attention or proper surgical care, or painfully crawled to shelter, while the dead on all sides remained unburied. He wrote: "The battlefield is everywhere covered with bodies of men and horses; the highways, the ditches, the ravines, thickets, and meadows are sown with dead bodies, and the environs of Solferino are literally heaped with them."

Dunant volunteered his services and did what he could in the work of relief. He secured authority to use the churches and other public buildings of a near-by town as emergency hospitals; he organized the peasant women (whose fears and reluctance he overcame) to act as nurses; he enlisted the aid of the young girls, whose kindliness and attention "raised a little the courage and the morale of the sick," and of boys, who brought water to stay the thirst or moisten the bandages of the wounded; he provided all sorts of supplies at his own expense, bandages, medicine, food, and even delicacies in the way of fruit and other dainty things to tempt the appetite of the convalescing heroes. Nor did he forget "smokes" for the invalids. Dressed always in immaculate white, he went about among the cots, cheering and comforting the wounded men, ministering to their needs, and writing letters to their homes. The men adored him and spoke of him lovingly as ''The Gentleman in White."

The memory of this frightful experience followed him to his home. He could not rest for thinking of the needless suffering of men wounded on the battlefield. At length there came to him the idea of founding in every country societies of mercy and help for soldiers in war. Recollections of the Crimean War and the wonderful work of Florence Nightingale, which had awakened a responsive chord of sympathy in Dunant's heart and brain, inspired him with the thought of an international organization, all nations working together for relief in time of war and furthermore cherishing a purpose to prepare in time of peace for the activities needed in war.

Dunant wrote a book describing the horrors of Solferino and suggesting how lives might have been saved and suffering lessened if nurses and sufficient numbers of doctors had been at hand. He went before the Society of Public Utility in Geneva and delivered lectures advocating plans for relief in war times. He visited many European countries and interested influential persons in his plans. So persistent and persuasive was M. Dunant that a great meeting was held in February, 1863, and the whole matter was laid before the Society. Committees were appointed to examine into methods and to anticipate obstacles. In the following October, representatives from many other countries were invited to attend a conference which lasted four days, adjourning until the calling together of the Geneva Convention in 1864, which resulted in the establishment of a permanent committee for international work.^ Ten different governments agreed to cooperate, and in this way the Red Cross was officially established, August 22, 1864.

THE GENEVA CONVENTION

Under the terms of this Convention, each nation pledged itself to work with other nations in caring for the sick and wounded of all countries alike and never to fire on a doctor, nurse, or ambulance that bore the sign of the

1 Geneva is the largest and wealthiest city of Switzerland. It lies on both sides of the Rhone, at the foot of Lake Leman and in the shadow of Mont Blanc. The city has a remarkable history and has held a prominent place on the map since the first century B. c. The Huguenots originated in Geneva, and it was for a long time the home of Calvin and the center of Protestant education. Many congresses have been held there, including the famous Peace Congress of 1867, and of the Alabama Commission in 1871-72. At the conclusion of the World War in 1919, Geneva once again comes into prominence as headquarters for the new League of Nations and for the League of the Red Cross.

Red Cross. There were many other provisions, but those two were the most important. The Convention adopted the emblem of the Swiss banner with the colors reversed, as a tribute to the nation which called them together. Thus, the Swiss national banner is a white cross on a red field, and the banner of our organization, the Red Cross, is a red cross on a white field. The two words "Humanity" and "Neutrality" were used as watchwords of the Red Cross; to care for those who need it, regardless of race or creed, is the aim of the Red Cross.^

NEED FOR THE RED CROSS

Much of our ancient history is a record of wars. Long accounts are given of military preparations, of equipments of shields, helmets, bows, and slings; but no mention is made of any relief of or provision for the sick or disabled; never is there any mention of nurses ministering to the warriors.

The history of Egypt shows that the State employed physicians, paying them from the

1 The old prejudice against the cross, born of the days of the Crusades, made Turkey unwilling to accept this emblem as the insignia both of its army medical service and its volunteer relief society. With the other signatory powers of the Treaty of Geneva, Turkey adopted as her symbol the Red Crescent, at the same time promising to respect the protection of the Red Cross. The Red Crescent Society was organized in 1877.

public treasury, and the Egyptian soldiers were cared for free of charge. Homer and Plato were so impressed with the science and skill of Egyptians that they declared the Egyptians were all doctors.

When surgeons were employed on the battlefield in the earliest times, it seems probable that they were selected from the warriors. Homer wrote of "the wise physician skilled our wounds to heal, who is more than armies to the public weal." In the "Retreat of the Ten Thousand," written after the Battle of Cunaxa, about 400 B. C, Xenophon says he appointed eight doctors because there were so many wounded. The statement implies that the doctors were selected from the soldiers. When Alexander the Great went on his march of conquest, he was accompanied by the most distinguished physicians of the day; one of these extracted an arrow from the king's shoulder and cured him of the dangerous fever which followed, and another cut the barbed head of a javelin from the conqueror's breast.

The idea of humane treatment of wounded soldiers was known even in the sixth century B. c. We read that Cyrus the Great ordered his surgeons to attend his wounded prisoners. Alexander Severus (third century A. D.) visited the sick in their tents. No mention is made of hospitals, but it grew to be the custom among the Roman generals to have the wounded distributed among the houses of the patricians. Tacitus tells us that during the reign of Tiberius (at the beginning of the present era) by the falling of an amphitheater fifty thousand spectators were killed or injured, and that they were taken to the houses of the citizens "according to the customs of the ancients, who maintained those wounded in war by their contributions and care." In an essay on the construction of camps, a writer of the second century B. C, who lived under the Emperors Trajan and Hadrian, assigns a place to the hospital or "valetudinarium."

It is less than three centuries since official sanitary service, the foundation of the present military medical service, begins to be recorded. Except for the deeds of the Hospitaller Knights during the wars of the Crusades, no mention is made of humanitarian service during the Middle Ages.^ Those knights of old, on whose breasts gleamed the Cross, really practiced the motto of the Red Cross, "Humanity" and "Neutrality," for although they were fighting for the Holy Land, they ministered to the sick and wounded Moslems as well as to the Christians. In the course of their wanderings,

1 Address by Clara Barton.

lart jirti i wherever they were established they set up hospitals and ministered to all needing care. It has been said of them, *'Not their riches nor their power nor their military prowess have given them their distinctive place in history, but their deeds of mercy to the sick and wounded." There was also a woman's branch of the Hospitallers stationed in Jerusalem, with Agnes, a noble Roman matron, at the head.

Another noble woman who considered the ills of the wounded was Queen Isabella of Spain, who "during the siege of Granada had six great tents with beds set up, and called upon surgeons and physicians to attend the sick and wounded. The soldiers of Aragon and Castile gave to the establishment — perhaps the first of its kind — the name 'Queen's Hospital.' When the strict Castilian courtiers questioned the propriety of her visiting the hospital in person, she is said to have replied : 'Let me go to them, for they have no mothers here, and it will soothe them in their pain and weakness to find that they are not uncared for.' " ^

Save for a few individual instances like those cited above, the only nursing done by women in time of war was by the sisters of religious

1 Boardman, Mabel T. "Under the Red Cross Flag." J. B. Lippincott Company, 1915.

lo GIRLS' BOOK OF THE RED CROSS

bodies, when battles were fought near a convent or a town where there were sisterhoods. Not until 1 8 13 is record found of women organized for relief work ministering to friend and foe alike. In 1847 another society was formed, for the transport of soldiers seriously wounded. Then came the Crimean War and Florence Nightingale.

FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE

In the very same year of the battle of Solferino, 1859, began the Crimean War, in which England, France, Sardinia (now a part of Italy, but then a separate kingdom), and Turkey united in war upon Russia. The fleets of the allies gathered in the Black Sea, surrounded the peninsula of the Crimea, and landed their armies. For a year and a half the war lasted, and thousands of sick and wounded soldiers were dying for want of care. Great hospitals were built, after the fashion of barracks, gloomy, bare, cold, and dirty, and with men only in charge of all the departments. Men did the cooking — such as it was — men gave medicine to the patients, no one did much washing or cleaning, and no one let in fresh air for the sufferers to breathe. There were no nurses on the battlefields or in the hospitals. Wounded men were brought in just as they had fallen on the field; brought often-

MEANING OF THE CROSS OF RED ii

times on the shoulders of their more fortunate comrades — for there were no ambulances in those days. The only care they received was from the male "orderlies," who were wholly untrained for such a task. At least, this was the condition except for the French army, where Sisters of Mercy tended the wounded, sick, and dying in their hospitals.

When reports of this distressing condition reached England, there was an immediate response from Miss Florence Nightingale, a young lady who belonged to a wealthy family and who lived in a beautiful home. She was what might be called a born nurse. As a little girl she was continually doctoring everything she owned. Her dolls never knew what to expect from day to day, as they rarely were allowed to enjoy normal health. Scarlet fever, measles, mumps, whooping cough, sprained ankles or wrists, all illnesses or accidents likely to befall any child, the poor dolls suffered, and Florence dosed or bandaged the victims back to health, to have them fall ill again at once. Their only days of respite came when some of her sister's dolls broke a leg or a neck or began to leak sawdust.

All the animals on the estate came under the care of Florence's skillful hands, and kittens, dogs, birds, and horses were petted and caressed when well and doctored and comforted when 111 or in trouble. The story of her treatment and cure of a neighboring shepherd's dog has become almost a classic. One day when Florence and her friend, the vicar, were out horseback riding, they came upon an old shepherd calling his flock together. In reply to their question as to why his dog was not driving the sheep as usual, the old man told them that some boys had thrown stones at the poor dog and had broken his leg, and that there was nothing to do now but end the animal's life and put him out of misery. Florence's sympathy was aroused, and she insisted on visiting the lame dog at once. With the advice of the vicar, she bathed the sprained leg (it was not really broken) and bound a hot compress about it. Every day she visited her patient until he was able to dance about her when she came in sight, and to round up his master's flock.

As Florence grew to young ladyhood, she became a regular visitor to the sick or sorrowing in her village, unconsciously training herself for what was to be her life work. Then came the time when she began to wonder what was ahead of her, what broader field of usefulness she might enter, how she might employ her talent and desire for the widest service. She visited the hospitals of Great Britain and was dismayed at the conditions. No trained nurses to care for the sick, but only coarse, ignorant women, who were often cruel and frequently intemperate.^ Miss Nightingale made up her mind that here was where her mission lay, and she decided to become a nurse, in order to make just such places clean and wholesome for the sick. On visiting the Continent, she found a better state of things, and eventually spent a considerable time there studying and training for her chosen profession. On her return to London she took charge of Harley Street Hospital. Soon after, the Crimean War broke out. There was terrible mismanagement in the military hospitals. Supplies were lacking; two thousand wounded men at Scutari were lying for days in mud and filth, just as they had been brought in from the battlefield; sick men were packed together in hordes, sometimes on the bare floor; the place — it could hardly be called a hospital — was alive with rats and vermin ; there

1 The word "nurse" was limited in its application to those who cared for the young, until late in the sixteenth century. Shakespeare (1590) uses the word in the "Comedy of Errors," describing a wife who claims it as her duty to nurse her husband:

"I will attend my husband, be his nurse. Diet his sickness, for it is my ofRce."

In 1784, Cowper wrote, "The nurse sleeps sweetly, hired to nurse the sick," and another writer (1843) relates the story of a young man who flung himself out the window while his nurse was asleep.

was neither soap nor towels, and only one kind of food, Irish stew, for men so ill that they should have had the most careful nursing and delicate food. Into this scene of misery and squalor came Florence Nightingale, called by the British Government to be the first woman nurse to enter a British military hospital. She came with a group of women from her hospital and seemed a real angel of mercy to those sick and dying men. The dirt was cleaned away; the men were bathed and given fresh clothing; new temporary buildings were built; good food was served the men; letters home were written for them; and the number of those who recovered from their wounds was increased greatly. The story has often been told that at the conclusion of each day, after every one in the great hospital had become quiet for the night, Miss Nightingale made a personal tour of inspection through the wards. For those men in direst distress she had a word of loving encouragement or a gentle pat of reassurance. Each night the invalids watched for her coming, and the story goes that as she flitted by with a lamp held high in her hand, the soldiers would turn and kiss her shadow as it fell on the wall when she passed their beds. It was from this that she won the name of "The Lady with the Lamp." Henry W. Longfellow wrote a poem about her, which he called "Santa Filomena," and after picturing the "great army of the dead," the "trenches cold and damp," the "wounded from the battle plain in dreary hospitals of pain," he says:

Lo! in the house of misery A lady with a lamp I see

Pass through the glimmering gloom,

And flit from room to room.

And slow, as in a dream of bliss, The speechless sufferer turns to kiss

Her shadow, as it falls

Upon the darkening walls.

On England's annals, through the long Hereafter of her speech and song,

That light its rays shall cast

From portals of the past.

A Lady with a Lamp shall stand In the great history of the land,

A noble type of good,

Heroic womanhood.

In recognition of Miss Nightingale's services the people of England raised a large sum of money as a testimonial of their love and gratitude, which at her request was devoted to the extension of hospital work in London and to the founding of the first hospital training school for girls. This brought about one of the greatest benefits to mankind of modern times, the ''trained" nurse, educated, methodical, clear eyed and clear headed. It was, then, Florence Nightingale who founded nursing as a profession for women and her name is dear to every soldier and sailor.

DOROTHEA LYNDE DIX

Over the main portal of Memorial Hall, at Harvard University, there hung for many years two beautiful flags, the United States colors, bequeathed to the college by Dorothea Dix, for whom they were made and to whom they were presented by the government in recognition of her services during the Civil War. In time the colors faded and were replaced by newer and fresher flags. So, perhaps, has the name of the donor faded somewhat and grown dim with years; to girls of the present generation, the name of Dorothea Dix is not so familiar as it was to the girls of two or three generations ago. However, her name will never fade from the annals of her country, but will continue to shine as a bright golden star.

As Florence Nightingale was "Lady-in- Chief" of the British hospitals in Scutari and Balaklava during the Crimean War, so was Dorothea Dix appointed to be "Superintendent

FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE of Women Nurses" during the Civil War in the United States, with power "to select and assign women nurses to general or permanent military hospitals, they not to be employed in such hospitals without her sanction and approval, except in cases of urgent need."

Miss Dix was not, like Miss Nightingale, a nurse; indeed, the two women were unlike in most respects except for a keen eye to detect suffering, a sympathetic heart for all sufferers, and a clear brain and steady hand to devise and carry out ways to relieve those in physical or mental distress.

Dorothea Dix was not born to wealth and delicate surroundings, nor to sheltering love and protecting care. She was brought up in all the strictness of New England Puritanism, and grew to be a very lonely but self-reliant and efficient girl. By the time she was fourteen years old Dorothea began to earn money. She put on long skirts, made her waists after the style of older women, and taught school. Troubled by the condition of some poor neglected children who were too badly off to attend school, the young girl begged the use of a loft in her grandmother's barn for "a schoolroom for social and religious purposes." This little barn-loft school developed into a mission and proved to be the beginning of a new ideal for dealing with children. Later on, Miss Dix conducted a boarding school in Boston for young ladies, always maintaining a charity school in addition for worthy girls who could not pay for an education.

Miss Dix was nearly forty years old before she found that her life work was not to be teaching. One day she was asked to take charge of a Sunday School class held for the women in a jail not far from her home. After the Sunday School was over, she visited the jail and was especially impressed by the condition of a few insane persons among the prisoners. She soon began a thorough, systematic investigation of the methods of caring for this class of patients. There were in the whole United States at that time only seven asylums for the insane, who for the most part were sent to prisons or almshouses, where they suffered shamefully from neglect and abuse. From that time throughout the next forty years. Miss Dix spent her time going up and down the land and across the sea to England and the Continent, pleading for the erection of separate hospitals for the insane and for kindly treatment of these peculiarly unfortunate and helpless subjects. The nature of her work was so appealing and its results so widely appreciated, that in fifteen years she received public testimonials from twenty state legislatures, from the Federal Congress of the United States, and from the British Parliament.

Although not a nurse herself, no one studied the requirements for successful nursing more thoroughly than Dorothea Dix. Nowhere is there greater need of wisdom in the selection of officials than in an insane asylum, and for years Miss Dix appointed, rejected, advised, observed, and corrected officials and methods in hospitals all over the land. With the outbreak of the Civil War, women nurses volunteered by the thousands. Many of them were totally inexperienced and unfitted for such duty. There was no Red Cross to pass on their qualifications, to train them, or to decide where they were most needed. Who could better be called to this position than Miss Dix?