Home Front to War Front: The Navy Nurse Corps During World War II

The Navy Nurse Corps was created in 1908, when President Theodore Roosevelt signed the Naval Appropriations Bill. Twenty women were selected to become the corps’ first members. These women were referred to as the “The Sacred Twenty.” On December 7, 1941, when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, the Navy Nurse Corps, was one of the first groups to respond. These women were important in preventing further deaths following the attack. However the experiences of Navy nurses during World II are often left untold because their story is overshadowed by the Army Nurse Corps, which doubled in size during the war. However, not one person’s experience is typical. This paper tells the stories of the women in the Navy Nurse Corps during World War II, through the experiences of Dora Cline Fechtmann, Dorothy Still Danner, Mary Rose “Red” Harrington and other Navy nurses

“The Most Vivifying Influence:” Operation Delta in Preparing the Canadian Corps for the Hundred Days

Preparation and training for Operation Delta in May and June 1918 provided the Canadian Corps with vital experience for the types of operations conducted during the Hundred Days. Delta was a proposed attack on the southern portion of the Lys salient formed by the German April offensive in Flanders. The operation represented a clear break with the operational concepts employed in 1917 prior to Cambrai. It was a difference between seeing a play diagrammed on a blackboard and actually running it in conditions just short of combat. Having a concrete plan to prepare schemes against was an invaluable element in readying the corps for the strains of the Hundred Days. It helped in overcoming the challenges of ridding the corps of old thinking, mastering the new, and at an accelerated tempo. It was also a valuable rehearsal for the circumstances faced by the corps at Amiens. Finally, it demonstrated how the Canadian Corps differed from the British Army in creating and inculcating a corps level doctrine and the mechanisms used by the senior commanders and staff to disseminate, enforce, and practice it

The Camel Corps Experiment

“Did you know there was a push to create a Camel Corps right before the beginning of the American Civil War?” This certainly seems like an interesting piece of trivia to share around the dinner table, but what was the Camel Corps and what insights can it provide on U.S. military thinking in the mid-19th century? I believe that the Camel Corps Experiment, regardless of whether it was deemed an utter failure or not, demonstrated progressive military thought and the desire of its advocates to explore advancements in both mobility and technology for military practices. [excerpt

“Always Ready for any Sticky Job”: The Canadian Corps of (Civilian) Firefighters in the Second World War

The Canadian Corps of (Civilian) Firefighters was created. In 1942 to assist the British National Fire Service (NFS) in fighting fires caused by German bombings. Some 400 specially-recruited Corps members served in Britain from 1942 to 1944 under often very hazardous conditions. Its story remains one of the forgotten and more unique Canadian contributions to the war effort

Boston University Percussion Ensemble, November 6, 2009

This is the concert program of the Boston University Percussion Ensemble performance on Friday, November 6, 2009 at 7:30 p.m., at the Boston University Concert Hall, 855 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, Massachusetts. Works performed were Le Corps Á Corps by Georges Aperghis, Palindromes by Jared Soldiviero, Gather by Keeril Makan, Quick Blood by Adam B. Silverman, Suite by Lou Harrison, and First Construction (in Metal) by John Cage. Digitization for Boston University Concert Programs was supported by the Boston University Center for the Humanities Library Endowed Fund

“Get Tough Stay Tough: Shaping the Canadian Corps, 1914-1918 (Book Review)” by Kenneth Radley

Review of Get Tough Stay Tough: Shaping the Canadian Corps, 1914-1918 by Kenneth Radle

Achieving high coverage of larval-stage mosquito surveillance: challenges for a community-based mosquito control programme in urban Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Background: Preventing malaria by controlling mosquitoes in their larval stages requires regular sensitive monitoring of vector populations and intervention coverage. The study assessed the effectiveness of operational, community-based larval habitat surveillance systems within the Urban Malaria Control Programme (UMCP) in urban Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. Methods: Cross-sectional surveys were carried out to assess the ability of community-owned resource persons (CORPs) to detect mosquito breeding sites and larvae in areas with and without larviciding. Potential environmental and programmatic determinants of habitat detection coverage and detection sensitivity of mosquito larvae were recorded during guided walks with 64 different CORPs to assess the accuracy of data each had collected the previous day. Results: CORPs reported the presence of 66.2% of all aquatic habitats (1,963/2,965), but only detected Anopheles larvae in 12.6% (29/230) of habitats that contained them. Detection sensitivity was particularly low for late-stage Anopheles (2.7%, 3/111), the most direct programmatic indicator of malaria vector productivity. Whether a CORP found a wet habitat or not was associated with his/her unfamiliarity with the area (Odds Ratio (OR) [95% confidence interval (CI)] = 0.16 [0.130, 0.203], P < 0.001), the habitat type (P < 0.001) or a fence around the compound (OR [95% CI] = 0.50 [0.386, 0.646], P < 0.001). The majority of mosquito larvae (Anophelines 57.8% (133/230) and Culicines 55.9% (461/825) were not reported because their habitats were not found. The only factor affecting detection of Anopheline larvae in habitats that were reported by CORPs was larviciding, which reduced sensitivity (OR [95% CI] = 0.37 [0.142, 0.965], P = 0.042). Conclusions: Accessibility of habitats in urban settings presents a major challenge because the majority of compounds are fenced for security reasons. Furthermore, CORPs under-reported larvae especially where larvicides were applied. This UMCP system for larval surveillance in cities must be urgently revised to improve access to enclosed compounds and the sensitivity with which habitats are searched for larvae

A Lesson in Success: The Calonne Trench Raid, 17 January 1917

The Allied armies slugged it out on the Western front for nearly four years before finally achieving the breakout sought since November 1914. The four-division strong Canadian Corps led this “spearhead to victory.” Its commander was Lieutenant-General Sir Arthur Currie, and his corps was commonly referred to as the “shock troops” of the British Expeditionary Force and as “the enemy’s elite soldiers” by the German high command. This reputation stemmed from the Canadians’ impressive record of success in raiding the German lines throughout the war. The Canadian Corps’ flexibility, and initiative, the aggressiveness of its soldiers, and their ever improving skills of fire and movement continually added to the growing legend of Canadians being masters of the art of the trench raid. One operation in particular, a raid against the German lines along the Lens-Bethune railway northeast of Cite Calonne on 17 January 1917, was almost flawless in its planning and preparation, and near text-book in its execution and resulting effect

The Gardeners of Vimy: Canadian Corps’ Farming Operations During the German Offensives of 1918

“The Gardeners of Salonika” was Georges Clemenceau’s jibe at the French and British divisions tied down in entrenchments round the Greek port for a good part of the First World War, because all they seemed to do was dig, rather than launch a Balkan offensive. The Canadian Corps, from Field Marshal Haig’s perspective, was similarly removed from the war when Lieutenant-General Sir Arthur Currie, strongly supported by the Canadian government, refused to accept the piecemeal breakup of the Corps to help shore up the British line during the great German offensive which began in March 1918. Haig never forgave this rebuff, and his diary is studded with unfavourable comparisons of the Canadians with the Australians, who permitted their divisions to be detached from the corps organization and shifted to menaced sectors of the Western Front. As a result of Currie’s action, which Lord Derby, the British Secretary of War, forced Haig to accept, three of the four divisions which made up the national army were restored to Canadian command, occupying the Vimy bastion and lines extending from it northward. The Corps had last fought in a major operation in October/November 1917, at Passchendaele; it was not to be employed again (except for small operations incidental to holding a substantial portion of the front) until the climactic battle of Amiens in August 1918. In the interim, while the Allies fought with their backs to the wall to stem the great series of German onslaughts, the Canadians, secure in the immensely strong lines they had created around Vimy, were given opportunity to rest and to train for the moment when they would be used to spearhead a renewal of the Allied offensive against the German army. The Canadians held a vital and extensive part of the Allied line, and were obviously performing a major defensive function during the long weeks of the German offensive, even though their relative inaction occasioned much British resentment. In that sense they bear little resemblance to the Gardeners of Salonika. In another, however, they were the genuine article, and can legitimately be termed “The Gardeners of Vimy,” for during the spring and summer of 1918, as well as guarding the Vimy lines, the Canadian Corps was also involved in battle zone farming in a big way. How did the Corps come to be engaged in an essentially peaceful and bucolic enterprise, especially during such a critical period? This activity was completely unknown to me, until a few references in the enormous finding aid to Record Group 9 in the National Archives of Canada piqued my curiosity. The Canadian Corps, as a large fighting formation of over 100,000 men, required many non-fighting units and sub-units to support it in the field, supply it, provide it with reinforcements, medical services, legal and police services, and so on. All its parts generated masses of paper, and much of this is deposited in Record Group 9. Among this immense volume of documents is to be found a memorandum of early 1918 entitled “Suggested Establishment for Agricultural Employment Coy.,” signed by Major F.C. Washington, who is identified as “Canadian Corps Agricultural Officer.” Why did the Corps need an Agricultural Officer and an Agricultural Employment Company? The story that emerges from fragmentary evidence is incomplete, yet while hardly of cosmic significance, is an unusual and interesting one

Nurses\u27 Alumnae Association Bulletin - Volume 3 Number 6

My Thirty Months in a Jap Camp Alumnae Day Hi-Lights of the Alumnae Association Meetings New Linen System at Jefferson Welcome! Miss Jackson Condolences and Miscellaneous Items A Step Forward Bits of Chatter Concerning Jefferson Streptomycin Improvements in the Nursing Arts Laboratory Thirty-Eighth General Hospital News of Teaching Staff Graduation Prizes Student Anesthetists On Furlough Graduation Staff News Changes and Improvements in the Hospital Positions Overseas Boxes Deaths Army Nurse Corps Navy Nurse Corps Marriages Engagements Marriages of Nurses Overseas New Arrivals New Addresse