Description
Object description
British nurse served with Spanish Medical Aid Committee in Valencia, Spain, 2/1937-6/1937; served with Sanidad Militar, Carlos Marx Div, Spanish Republican Army in Spain, 7/1937-9/1937; served with Medical Service, 35th Div, Spanish Republican Army in Spain, 9/1937-10/1938
Content description
REEL 1 Background in GB, 1911-1931: family circumstances; education at St Albans High School for Girls; attending Canon Skelton's Young People's Fellowship and attitude towards education; employment teaching young girl to read; sight of Mahatma Gandhi in Oxford; teaching experience; varied employment. Aspects of nursing training at University College Hospital, London, GB, 1931-1935: financial commitment; attitude towards nursing; attending church; character of working class patients.
REEL 2 Continues: cleanliness of patients; problems of patients not being able to acquire health insurance; common illnesses; attitude towards relationship between poverty and illness; comparison between private and non-private patients; background to starting midwifery course; students' complaints about training conditions; three month's work in cancer hospital.
REEL 3 Continues: degree of knowledge of international political situation; sense of isolation and quality of food in nurses' home; attending lecture by J B S Haldane; reaction of hospital authorities to political activities. Aspects of period as midwifery student at British Hospital for Mothers and Babies, Woolwich, London, GB, 1936-1937: opinion of standards; character of matron; attitude of matron to her volunteering to go to Spain; treatment of patients; local housing conditions; presents received from patients; helping young mothers; state of long term unemployed; question of status of midwifery as profession. Aspects of background to joining Spanish Medical Aid Committee in Spain, 2/1937: awareness of situation in Spain.
REEL 4 Continues: enquiring at Daily Herald about going to Spain; interview with Spanish Medical Aid Committee; mother's reaction to her volunteering for Spain; kitting out with uniforms; problems of lack of pay; request to go out to Spain and nurse Tom Wintringham; obtaining passport. Aspects of period as nurse with Spanish Medical Aid Committee in Spain, 2/1937-6/1937: journey to Spain, 2/1937; reception at the Pasionaria Hospital in Valencia; conditions in hospital; story of treating Tom Wintringham's and diagnosing his septicaemia; visits from Harry Pollitt and J B S Haldane.
REEL 5 Continues: question of treating International Bde volunteers; question of Spanish Medical Aid Committee's inability to find a placement for her; move to second hospital in Valencia and conditions there; story of escorting suicidal journalist to hospital ship; opinion of treatment received from Spanish Medical Aid Committee; question of treatment of deserters; opinion of role of intellectuals in Spanish Civil War. Recollections of period as nurse with Sanidad Militar, Carlos Marx Div, Spanish Republican Army in Spain, 7/1937-9/1937: joining group of British nurses in Aragon; lack of activity on Aragon Front; description of mobile operating theatre; move to positions near Zaragoza.
REEL 6 Continues: dealing with casualties; lack of equipment; nature of injuries; strikes in protest at bombing of Zaragoza. Recollections of period as nurse with Medical Service, 35th Div, Spanish Republican Army in Spain, 9/1937-10/1938: background to transfer to division; opinion of triage system; techniques for dealing with wounds; uniform and pay; opinion of political differences between International Bdes and Spanish Medical Aid Committee; typhoid epidemic; 9/1937; conditions and problems with rations and supplies; Nationalist air raids.
REEL 7 Continues: attitude to women smoking; comparison of pay with American nurses; obtaining medical equipment; opinion of stretcher bearers; move to Teruel during winter, 12/1937; hospital in school; attempts to keep warm; removal from hospital through Teruel town with septic arm to convalescent home near Valencia; contact with German volunteers; awareness of Nationalist advances, 1938; growing political awareness through contact with Communists in education classes; origins of divisional medical volunteers.
REEL 8 Continues: duties of mechanics; languages spoken in division; relations with civilians; treatment of refugees; description of chaos experienced under air attacks on refugees; retreat across River Ebro; story of coping with mass pneumonia; story of sustaining injuries in ambulance crash; treatment for facial injuries; situation on return to Ebro front, 4/1938.
REEL 9 Continues: May Day celebrations, 5/1938; further treatment to facial injury; capture of Nationalist 'hit' list; preparations of Cave Hospital at La Bisbal de Falset; dealing with wounded during Battle of Ebro; languages used to speak to wounded; Republican sentiment amongst Spanish peasantry; nature of wounds; organisation; opinion of rations; medical supplies; triage system; nursing Moorish and Nationalist prisoners; question of presence of pro-Nationalist doctors; awareness of political factions amongst Republican forces.
REEL 10 Continues: reaction towards Republican setbacks; Nationalist use of mortars during Battle of Ebro; dealing with casualties at night-time; clothing worn on duty; problems with scabies; use of saline drips; arrangements for feeding patients; opinion of stretcher bearers; use of alcohol amongst patients; character of Spanish doctors; treatment of patients with head wounds; opinion of work of surgeons; medical supplies; treatment of patient with high blood pressure; blood transfusions; shortage of blankets; lack of awareness of processing of dead.
REEL 11 Continues: method of checking patients were dead; burial of dead; visit by British female Member of Parliament; identifying wounded; question of morality rate; problems with dysentery; death of wounded due to delays in reaching cave hospital; sleeping in daytime; opinion of British and Canadian ambulance drivers; suffering from dysentery; rations; transfer to hospital across River Ebro; screening open wounds; conditions at second hospital including rations; removal to Spanish hospital on withdrawal of International Bdes, 9/1938; description of pay book.
REEL 12 Continues: joining group of Spanish women for political education in the Catalonian hills; transferring to British Bn, XV International Bde prior to their withdrawal from Spain, 10/1938. Aspects of journey from Spain to GB, 11/1938-12/1938: problems for Austrian and Hungarian doctors of 35th Division Medical Unit obtaining papers to leave Spain; leaving Spain; reception in France; sight of demonstrations in Toulouse, France; stay in Paris, France; suffering from cold; embarkation on ferry; receiving special treatment from British porter; family's reaction to her return. Aspects of period with Spanish Medical Aid Committee in GB, 1/1939-3/1939: relief work for committee; attitude to Nationalist victory in Spain; lecturing to London County Council on medical experiences in Spain.
REEL 13 Continues: reactions to sight of British Union of Fascists in London; anticipation of future war; opinion of left wing political attitudes in London. Attitude towards visiting Spain with International Brigade Association members during 1970s.
