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Elsie Inglis was not the first, nor will she be the last woman who has found help in the story of the Maid of Orleans, when the causes dear to the hearts of nations are at stake. It is easy to hear the words that would pass between these two leaders in the time of their country’s warfare. The graven figure of Joan was instinct with life, from the undying love of race and country, which flowed back to her from the woman who was as ready to dedicate to her country her self-forgetting devotion, as Jeanne d’Arc had been in her day. Both, in their day and generation, had heard —
‘The quick alarming drum —
Saying, Come,
Freemen, come,
Ere your heritage be wasted, said the quick alarming drum.’
‘Abbaye de Royaumont,‘Dec. 22, 1914.
‘Dearest Amy, – Many, many happy Christmases to you, dear, and to all the others. Everything is splendid here now, and if the General from headquarters would only come and inspect us, we could begin. The wards are perfect. I only wish you could see them with their red bedcovers, and little tables. There are four wards, and we have called them Blanche of Castille (the woman who really started the building of this place, the mother of Louis IX., the Founder, as he is called), Queen Margaret of Scotland, Joan of Arc, and Millicent Fawcett. Now, don’t you think that is rather nice! The Abbaye itself is a wonderful place. It has beautiful architecture, and is placed in delightful woods. One wants to spend hours exploring it, instead of which we have all been working like galley slaves getting the hospital in order. The equipment has come out practically all right. There are no thermometers and no sandbags. I feel they’ll turn up. Yesterday, I was told there were no tooth-brushes and no nail-brushes, but they appeared. After all the fuss, you can imagine our feelings when the “Director,” an official of the French Red Cross, who has to live here with us, told us French soldiers don’t want tooth-brushes!
‘Our first visitors were three French officers, whom we took for the inspecting general, and treated with grovelling deference, till we found they knew nothing about it, and were much more interested in the tapestry in the proprietor’s house than in our instruments. However, they were very nice, and said we were bien meublé.
‘Once we had all been on tenterhooks all day about the inspection. Suddenly, a man poked his head round the door of the doctor’s sitting-room and said, “The General.” In one flash every doctor was out of the room and into her bedroom for her uniform coat, and I was left sitting. I got up, and wandered downstairs, when an excited orderly dashed past, singing, “Nothing but two British officers!” Another time we were routed out from breakfast by the cry of “The General,” but this time it turned out to be a French regiment, whose officers had been moved by curiosity to come round by here. The General has not arrived yet.
‘We have had to get a new boiler in the kitchen, new taps and lavatories, and electric light, an absolute necessity in this huge place, and all the theatre sinks. We certainly are no longer a mobile hospital, but as we are twelve miles from the point from which the wounded are distributed (I am getting very discreet about names since a telegram of mine was censored), we shall probably be as useful here as anywhere. They even think we may get English Tommies.
‘You have no idea of the conditions to which the units came out, and they have behaved like perfect bricks. The place was like an ice hole: there were no fires, no hot water, no furniture, not even blankets, and the equipment did not arrive for five days. They have scrubbed the whole place out themselves, as if they were born housemaids; put up the beds, stuffed the mattresses, and done everything. Really, I am proud of them! They stick at absolutely nothing, and when Madame came, she said, “What it is to belong to a practical nation!”
‘We had a service in the ward on Sunday. We are going to see if they will let us use the little St. Louis Chapel. There are two other chapels, one in use, that we hope the soldiers will go to, and a beautiful chapel the same style of architecture as the chapel at Mont St. Michel. It is a perfect joy to walk through it to meals. The village curé has been to tea with us.
‘Will you believe it, that General hasn’t arrived yet! – Your loving
Elsie.’
Mr. Seton Watson has permitted his article in the December number of the New Europe (1917) to be reprinted here. His complete knowledge of Serbia enables him to describe both the work and Dr. Inglis who undertook the great task set before her.
‘Elsie Inglis was one of the heroic figures of the war, one whose memory her many friends will cherish with pride and confidence – pride at having been privileged to work with her, confidence in the race which breeds such women. This is not the place to tell the full story of her devotion to many a good cause at home, but the New Europe owes her a debt of special interest and affection. For in her own person she stood for that spirit of sympathy and comprehension upon which intercourse between the nations must be founded, if the ideal of a New Europe is ever to become a reality.
‘Though her lifework had hitherto lain in utterly different fields, she saw in a flash the needs of a tragic situation; and when war came offered all her indomitable spirit and tireless energy to a cause till recently unknown and even frowned upon in our country. Like the Douglas of old, she flung herself where the battle raged most fiercely – always claiming and at last obtaining permission to set up her hospitals where the obstacles were greatest and the dangers most acute. But absorbed as she was in her noble task of healing, she saw beyond it the high national ideal that inspired the Serbs to endure sufferings unexampled even in this war, and became an enthusiastic convert to the cause of Southern Slav unity. To her, as to all true Europeans, the principle of nationality is not, indeed, the end of all human wisdom, but the sure foundation upon which a new and saner internationalism is to be built, and an inalienable right to which great and small alike are entitled. Perhaps the fact that she herself came of a small nation which, like Serbia, has known how to celebrate its defeats, was not without its share in determining her sympathies.
‘The full political meaning of her work has not yet been brought home to her countrymen, and yet what she has done will live after her. Her achievement in Serbia itself in 1915 was sufficiently remarkable, but even that was a mere prelude to her achievement on the Eastern front. The Serbian Division in Southern Russia, which the Scottish Women’s Hospitals went out to help, was not Serbian at all in the ordinary sense of the word. Its proper name is the Jugoslav Division, for it was composed entirely of volunteers drawn from among the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes of Austria-Hungary who had been taken prisoners by the Russian army. Thousands of these men enrolled themselves on the side of the Entente and in the service of Serbia, in order to fight for the realisation of Southern Slav independence and unity under the national dynasty of Kara George. Beyond the ordinary risks of war they acted in full knowledge that capture by the enemy would mean the same fate as Austria meted out to the heroic Italian deputy, Cesare Battisti; and some of them, left wounded on the battle-field after a retreat, shot each other to avoid being taken alive. Throughout the Dobrudja campaign they fought with the most desperate gallantry against impossible odds, and, owing to inadequate support during the retreat, their main body was reduced from 15,000 to 4000. Latterly the other divisions had been withdrawn to recruit at Odessa, after sharing the defence of the Rumanian southern front.
‘To these men in the summer of 1916 Serbia had sent a certain number of higher officers, but, for equipment and medical help, they were dependent upon what the Russians could spare from their own almost unlimited needs. At the worst hour Dr. Inglis and her unit came to the help of the Jugoslavs, shared their privations and misfortunes, and spared no effort in their cause.
‘History will record the name of Elsie Inglis, like that of Lady Paget, as pre-eminent among that band of women who have redeemed for all time the honour of Britain in the Balkans. Among the Serbs it is already assuming an almost legendary quality. To us it will serve to remind us that Florence Nightingale will never be without successors among us. And in particular, every true Scotsman will cherish her memory, every believer in the cause for which she gave her life will gain fresh courage from her example.
R. W. Seton-Watson.
CHAPTER IX
SERBIA
‘Send thine hand from above; rid me, and deliver me out of great waters, from the hand of strange children.’
‘And pray ye that your flight be not in the winter. For in those days shall be affliction, such as was not from the beginning of the creation which God created unto this time, neither shall be.’
‘On either side of the river, was there the tree of life: And the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.’
Dr. Inglis remained at home directing the many operations necessary to ensure the proper equipment of the units, and the difficult task of getting them conveyed overseas. From the beginning, till her return with her unit serving with the Serbian army in Russia, she had the sustaining co-operation both of the Admiralty and the Foreign Office. In the many complications surrounding the history of the hospitals with the Allied armies, the Scottish women owed very much to both Secretaries of State for Foreign Affairs, and very particularly to Lord Robert Cecil in his department of the Foreign Office.
It was not easy to get the scheme of hospitals staffed entirely by women, serving abroad with armies fighting the common and unscrupulous foe, accepted by those in authority. The Foreign Office was responsible for the safety of these British outpost hospitals, and they knew well the dangers and privations to which the devoted pioneer band of women would be exposed. They made many stipulations with Dr. Inglis, which she accepted, and abided by as long as her work was not hindered. No care or diplomatic work was spared, and if at the end of their service in Russia the safety of the unit was a matter of grave anxiety to the Foreign Office, it had never cause to be ashamed of the way this country’s honour and good faith was upheld by the hospitals under the British flag, amid the chaotic sufferings of the Russian people.
In the spring of 1915 Dr. Eleanor Soltau, who was in charge of the First Serbian Unit, became ill with diphtheria in the midst of the typhus epidemic which was devastating the Serbian people. The Serbian Minister writes of that time: —
‘They were the first to go to the help of Serbia when the Austrians, after they were defeated, besides 60,000 prisoners, also left behind them epidemics in all the districts which they had invaded. The Scottish women turned up their sleeves, so to speak, at the railways station itself, and went straight to typhus and typhoid-stricken patients, who were pitifully dying in the crowded hospitals.’
Colonel Hunter, A.M.S., wrote after her death: ‘It was my privilege and happiness to see much of her work in Serbia when I was officer in charge of the corps of R.A.M.C. officers sent out by the W.O. to deal with the raging epidemic of typhus and famine fevers then devastating the land. I have never met with any one who gave me so deep an impression of singlemindedness, gentleheartedness, clear and purposeful vision, wise judgment, and absolutely fearless disposition… No more lovable personality than hers, or more devoted and courageous body of women, ever set out to help effectively a people in dire distress than the S.W.H.,’ which she organised and sent out, and afterwards took personal charge of in Serbia in 1915. Amidst the most trying conditions she, or they, never faltered in courage or endurance. Under her wise and gentle leadership difficulties seemed only to stir to further endeavour, more extended work, and greater endurance of hardship. Captain Ralph Glyn writes from France: —
‘I see you went to the funeral of that wonderful person, Dr. Elsie Inglis. I shall never forget arriving where that S.W. unit was in the midst of the typhus in Serbia, and finding her and all her people so “clean” and obviously ready for anything.’
The Serbian nation lost no time in commemorating her services to them. At Mladenovatz they built a beautiful fountain close to the camp hospital. On 7th October 1915 it was formally opened with a religious service according to the rites of the Greek Church. Dr. Inglis turned on the water, which was to flow through the coming years in grateful memory of the good work done by the Scottish Women’s Hospitals.
IN HONOUR OF DR. ELSIE INGLIS
(Obiit Nov. 27, 1917.)
At Mladenovatz still the fountain sings
Raised by the Serbs to you their angel friend,
Who fought the hunger-typhus to its end;
A nobler fountain from your memory springs,
A fountain-head where Faith renews its wings
– Faith in the powers of womanhood to bend
War’s curse to blessing, and to make amend
By Love, for Hate’s unutterable things.
Wherefore, when cannon-voices cease to roar,
A louder voice shall echo in our ears
– Voice of three peoples joined in one accord,
Telling that, gentle to your brave heart’s core,
You faced unwavering all that woman fears,
And clear of vision followed Christ the Lord.
[Note. – Two years ago the Serbians dedicated a simple fountain in ‘Mladenovatz’ to the grateful memory of one they spoke of as ‘the angel of their people.’ The Rumanian and Russian refugees in the Dobrudja will never forget her.]
H. D. Rawnsley.
The Englishwoman, April and June 1916, has two articles written by Dr. Inglis, under the title ‘The Tragedy of Serbia.’ The literary power of her narrative makes one regret that she did not live to give a consecutive account of all she passed through in the countries in which she suffered with the peoples: —
‘When we reached Serbia in May 1915, she was lying in sunshine. Two storms had raged over her during the preceding months – the Austrian invasion and the terrific typhus epidemic. In our safe little island we can hardly realise what either meant. At the end of 1914, the Austrian Empire hurled its “punitive expedition” across the Danube – a punitive expedition that ended in the condign punishment of the invader. They left behind them a worse foe than themselves, and the typhus, which began in the hospitals they left so scandalously filthy and overcrowded, swept over the land.’
Dr. Inglis describes ‘the long peaceful summer,’ with its hopes of an advance to their aid on the part of the Allies. The Serbs were conscious the ‘Great Powers’ owed them much, for how often we heard the words, ‘We are the only one, as yet, who has beaten our enemy.’
‘Not till September did any real sense of danger trouble them. Then the clouds rolled up black and threatening on the horizon – Bulgaria arming, and a hundred thousand Germans massing on the northern frontier. They began to draw off the main part of their army from the Danube towards the east, to meet their old enemies. The Powers refused to let them attack, and they waited till the Bulgarian mobilisation was complete. The Allies discounted the attack from the north; aeroplanes had been out, and “there are no Germans there.” There are no signs whatever of any military movements, so said the wiseacres. The only troops there are untrained Austrian levies, which the Serbs ought to be able to deal with themselves, if they are up to their form last year.
‘Then the storm broke. The 100,000 Germans appeared on the northern frontier. The Bulgars invaded from the east, the Greeks did not come in, and the Austrians poured in from the west. The Serbian army shortened the enormous line they had to defend, but they could not stand against the long-distance German guns, and so began the retreat.
‘“What is coming to Serbia?” said a Serb to me, “we cannot think.” And then, hopefully, “But God is great and powerful, and our Allies are great and powerful too.” Strong men could hardly speak of the disaster without breaking down. They looked at one so eagerly. “When are your men coming up? They must come soon.” “We must give our people two months,” the experts among us answered, “to bring up the heavy artillery. We thought the Serbs would be able to hold the West Morava Valley.” “It is too hilly for the German artillery to be of any use,” they said.’
Dr. Inglis goes on to relate how all the calculations were wrong, how the Austrian force came down that very valley. The Serbs were caught in a trap, and that 160,000 of their gallant little army escaped was a wonderful feat. ‘That they are already keen to take the field again is but one more proof of the extraordinary recuperative power of the nation.’
Dr. Elsie gives an account of the typhus epidemic. The first unit under Dr. Soltau, in 1914, was able at Kragujevatz to do excellent work for the Serbian army after its victories, and it was only evacuated owing to the retreat in October 1915. The unit had only been a fortnight out when the committee got from it a telegram, ‘dire necessity’ for more doctors and nurses. The word dire was used, hoping it would pass unnoticed by the censor, for the authorities did not wish the state of Serbia from typhus to be generally known. We shall never know what the death-rate was during the epidemic; but of the 425 Serbian doctors, 125 died of the disease, and two-thirds of the remainder had it.
The Scottish Committee hastened out supplies and staff.
‘For three months the epidemic raged, and all women may ever be proud of the way those women worked. It was like a long-drawn-out battle, and not one of them played the coward. Not one of them asked to come away. There were three deaths and nine cases of illness among the unit; and may we not truly claim that those three women who died gave their lives for the great cause for which our country stands to-day as much as any man in the trenches.’
Dr. Inglis speaks of the full share of work taken by other British units – Lady Paget’s Hospital at Skopio, ‘magnificently organised’; The Red Cross under Dr. Banks ‘took more than its share of the burden’; and how Dr. Ryan of the American hospital asserted that Serbia would have been wiped out but for the work of the Foreign Missions.
Miss Holme tells of some of her experiences with her leader: —
‘Kragujevatz.
‘One day, Dr. Elsie Inglis took me out shopping with her, and we wanted a great many things for our hospital in the way of drugs, etc., and we also wanted more than anything else some medical scales for weighing drugs. While we were in the shop Dr. Inglis saw hanging up in it three pairs of these scales. So she asked the man, in her most persuasive manner, if he would sell her a pair of these scales for our hospital use. He explained at length that he used all the scales, and was sorry that he could not possibly sell them. So Dr. Inglis bought some more things – in fact, we stayed in the shop for about an hour buying things to the amount of £10, and between each of the different articles purchased, she would again revert to the scales and say, “You know it is for your men that we want them,” until at last the man – exhausted by his refusals – took down the scales and presented them to her. When she asked “How much are they?” he made a bow, and said it would be a pleasure to give them to her.
‘When we were taken prisoners, and had been so for some time, and before we were liberated, the German Command came bringing a paper which they commanded Dr. Inglis to sign. The purport of the paper was a statement which declared that the British prisoners had been well treated in the hands of the Germans, and was already signed by two men who were heads of other British units. Dr. Inglis said, “Why should I sign this paper? I do not know if all the prisoners are being well treated by you, therefore I decline to sign it.” To which the German authorities replied, “You must sign it.” Dr. Inglis then said, “Well, make me,” and that was the end of that incident – she never did sign it.
‘So convinced were some of the people belonging to the Scottish Women’s unit that the British forces were coming to the aid of their Serbian ally, that long after they were taken prisoners they thought, each time they heard a gun from a different quarter, that their liberators were close at hand. So much so indeed, that three of the members of the unit begged that in the event of the unit being sent home they might be allowed to stay behind in Serbia with the Serbs, to help the Serbian Red Cross. Dr. Inglis unofficially consented to this, and with the help of the Serbian Red Cross these three people in question adjourned to a village hard by which was about a mile from the hospital, three days before the unit had orders to move. No one except Dr. Inglis and three other people of the unit knew where these three members were living. However, the date of the departure was changed, and the unit was told they were to wait another twenty days. This made it impossible for these three people to appear again with the unit. They continued to live at the little house which sheltered them. Suddenly one afternoon one of the members of the unit went to ask at the German Command if there were any letters for the unit. At this interview, which took place about three o’clock in the afternoon, the person was informed that the whole unit was to leave that night at 7.30. Dr. Inglis sent the person who received this command to tell the three people in the cottage to get ready, and that they must go, she thought. But the messenger only said, “We have had orders that the unit is to go at 7.30 to-night,” but did not say that Dr. Inglis had sent an order for the three people to get ready, so they did nothing but simply went to bed at ten o’clock, thinking the unit had already started. It was a wintry night, snowing heavily, and not a night that one would have sent out a dog!
‘At about half-past ten a knock came to the window, and Dr. Inglis’ voice was heard saying, “You have to come at once to the train. I am here with an armed guard!” (All the rest of the unit had been at the station for some hours, but the train was not allowed to start until every one was there.) So Dr. Inglis came herself for us. It was difficult to get her to enter the house, and naturally she seemed rather ruffled, having had to come more than a mile in the deep snow, as she was the only person who knew anything about us. One of the party said, “Are you really cross, or are you pretending because the armed guard understands English?” She gave her queer little smile, and said, “No, I am not pretending.” The whole party tramped through the snow to the station, and on the way she told them she was afraid that she had smashed somebody’s window, having knocked at another cottage before she found ours in the dark, thinking it was the one we lived in, for which she was very much chaffed by her companions, who knew well her views on the question of militant tactics!
‘The first stages of this journey were made in horse-boxes with no accommodation whatsoever. Occasionally the train drew up in the middle of the country, and anybody who wished to get out had simply to ask the sentry who guarded the door, to allow them to get out for a moment.
‘The next night was spent lying on the floor of the station at Belgrade, the eight sentries and all their charges all lying on the floor together; the only person who seemed to be awake was the officer who guarded the door himself all night. In the morning one was not allowed to go even to wash one’s hands without a sentry to come and stand at the door. The next two days were spent in an ordinary train rather too well heated with four a side in second-class compartments. At Vienna all the British units who were being sent away were formed into a group on the station at 6 A.M., where they awaited the arrival of the American Consul, guarded all the time by their sentries, who gave his parole that if the people were allowed to go out of the station they would return at eight o’clock, the time they had to leave that town. This was granted. Dr. Inglis with a party adjourned to a hotel where baths, etc., were provided. Other members were allowed to do what they liked.
‘The unit was detained for eight days at Bludenz, close to the frontier, for Switzerland. On their arrival at Zürich they were met by the British Consul-General, Vice-Consul, and many members of the British Colony, who gave Dr. Inglis and her unit a very warm-hearted welcome, bringing quantities of flowers, and doing all they could to show them kindness and pleasure at their safe arrival.
‘It is difficult for people who have never been prisoners to know what the first day’s freedom means. Everybody had a different expression, and seemed to have a different outlook on life. But already we could see our leader was engrossed with plans and busy with schemes for the future work of the unit.
‘The next day the Consul-General made a speech in which he told the unit all that had passed during the last four months, of which they knew nothing.’
To her Sister
‘Brindisi, en route for Serbia,‘April 28, 1915.
‘The boat ought to have left last night, but it did not even come in till this morning. However, we have only lost twenty-four hours.
‘It has been a most luxurious journey, except the bit from Naples here, and that was rather awful, with spitting men and shut windows, in first-class carriages, remember. When we got here we immediately ordered baths, but “the boiler was broken.” So, I said, “Well, then, we must go somewhere else” – with the result that we were promised baths in our rooms at once. That was a nice bath, and then I curled up on the sofa and went to sleep. Our windows look right on to the docks, and the blue Mediterranean beyond. It is so queer to see the red, white, and green flags, and to think they mean Italy, and not the N.U.W.S.S.!
‘I went out before dinner last night, and strolled through the quaint streets. The whole population was out, and most whole-hearted and openly interested in my uniform.
‘This is a most delightful window, with all the ships and the colours. There are three men-of-war in, and half a dozen of the quaintest little boats, which a soldier told me were “scouts.” I wished I had asked a sailor, for I had never heard of “scouts.” The soldier I asked is one of the bersaglieri with cock’s feathers, a huge mass of them, in his hat. They all say Italy is certainly coming into the war. One man on the train to Rome was coming from Cardiff to sell coal to the Italian Government. He told us weird stories about German tricks to get our coal through Spain and other countries.
‘It was a pleasure seeing Royaumont. It is a huge success, and I do think Dr. Ivens deserves a lot of credit. The wards and the theatre, and the X-Ray department, and the rooms for mending and cleaning the men’s clothes were all perfect.’
To Mrs. Simson
‘S.W.H., Kragujevatz,May 30/15.
‘Well, this is a perfectly lovely place, and the Serbians are delightful. I am staying with a charming woman, Madame Milanovitz. She is a Vice-President of the Serbian Women’s League, formed to help the country in time of war. I think she wanted to help us because of all the hospital has done here. Any how, I score – I have a beautiful room and everything. She gives me an early cup of coffee, and for the rest I live with the unit. Neither she nor I can speak six words of one another’s languages, but her husband can talk a little French. Now, she has asked the little Serbian lady who teaches the unit Serbian, to live with her to interpret. Anyhow, we are great friends!
‘We have had a busy time since we arrived. The unit is nursing 550 beds, in three hospitals, having been sent out to nurse 300 beds. There is first the surgical hospital, called Reserve No. 3. It was a school, and is in two blocks with a long courtyard between. I think we have got it really quite well equipped, with a fine X-Ray room. The theatre, and the room opposite where the dressings are done, both very well arranged, and a great credit to Sister Bozket. The one thing that troubled me was the floor – old wood and holes in it, impossible to sterilise – but yesterday, Major Protitch, our Director, said he was going to get cement laid down in it and the theatre. Then it will be perfect. He said to Dr. Chesney, “This is the best surgical hospital in Serbia.” You must not believe that quite, for they are very good at saying pleasant things here!
‘There are two other hospitals, the typhus one, No. 6 Reserve, and one for relapsing fever and general diseases, No. 7 Reserve, both barracks. We have put most of our strength in No. 6, and it is in good working order, but No. 7 has had only one doctor, and two day Sisters and one night, for over 200 beds. Still it is wonderful what those three women have done. We have Austrian prisoners as orderlies everywhere, in the hospitals and in the houses. The conglomeration of languages is too funny for words – Serbian, German, French, English. Sometimes, you have to get an orderly to translate Serbian into German, and another to translate the German into French before you can get at what is wanted. Two words we have all learnt, dotra, which means “good,” and which these grateful people use at once if they feel a little better, or are pleased about anything, and the other is boli, pain – poor men!
‘So much for what we have been doing; but the day before yesterday we got our orders for a new bit of work. They are forming a disinfecting centre at Mladanovatz, and Colonel Grustitch, who is the head of the Medical Service here, wants us to go up there at once, with our whole fever staff, under canvas. They are giving us the tents till ours come out. Typhus is decreasing so much, that No. 6 is to be turned into a surgical hospital, and there will be only one infectious diseases hospital here. I am so pleased at being asked to do this, for it is part of a big and well thought out scheme. The surgical hospital is to remain here. Alice Hutchison goes to Posheravatz also for infectious diseases. I hope she is at Salonika to-day. She left Malta last Sunday. We really began to think the Governor was going to keep her altogether! Her equipment has all come, and yesterday I sent Mrs. Haverfield and Mr. Smith up to Posheravatz to choose the site and pitch the tent.
