Ww1: Letter From a Nurse in The Trenches

WW1: A letter from a nurse

If I had know a little of what the trenches looked and smelled like, I would never have become a nurse. My name is Jeanne Louise, and I was 32 years old, when I decided to become a nurse for the British army, in September 22, 1917. The main reason I decided to join the medical unit was because I wanted to see the world past the city. Upon reaching my destination at the trenches, I was bombarded by the horrifying sounds of constant artillery fire, men howling in pain, and the disgusting smell of rotting flesh. My first patient was a man with a bad case of trench foot. My job was to hold the man’s arm, while another doctor sawed his leg off. It took us about 2 hours, and all that I could here was the artillery fire, and the man I was holding crying out to us to put him out of his misery. Finally, after 40 minutes of crying and shouting, the man lost consciousness, and just in time, because I could not bear to listen to his pleas another minute, without losing the will to go back home. After a few days of treating patients of bullet wounds, we got a patient who was wounded so badly, I didn’t see how he could still be alive. Later I learned that his name was Lt. Richard Evans. He had a bullet wound in his chest, and in his right leg. The first thing we did was give him a lot of alcohol to drink, so he wouldn’t feel as much pain as he would have if he hadn’t drank alcohol. But after a couple of minutes we realized that he wouldn’t be able to survive, due to his blood loss. So, we did our best to comfort him till he dies. But before he died he told me of his wife, and his unborn child, and told me to tell them that he loved them every second till he died. After 20 days, I got orders to go back to the hospital in the city, and to help the people with trench fever. I did this, but could not help notice that even though we might help them a little bit, but we could never cure them of the dreams about the trench that scarred them. I was a nurse for 1 year, but I saw more horrible things than any person could see if they lived a 100 years then I did in this 1 year.