REVIEWS


Book Review #1 by John Gilinsky,HSI

Gregory,Bridget (Gregory,Topsy - Editor)
"Dear Wisconsin.../...Love Vietnam letters and diary pages
written by American Red Cross worker Bridget Gregory while
serving aboard the hosptial ship USS Sanctuary AH-17 off the
coast of Vietnam 1968-1969"

Big Bend,Wisconsin,USA: Topsy Gregory
[iv], 144 pages (photos,map)
ISNB: 0 - 9653492 - 0 - 9
To order copies please contact:
John White / Katerine M.Gregory
5711 Greenwood Avenue North,Seattle,Washington U.S.A.98103
PRICE: $7.95 US (includes p & p within North America)

"Sir,I can’t possibly compete with girls and booze.
Any patient too sick to go on liberty is too sick for any recreation at all!"

Hospital ship memoir literature tends to focus more on the persons recalled rather than the ship itself. This tendency while understandable is unfortunate as the ship’s design,equipment,administration and operations could be of interest not only historically but medically as well. What might be the special needs or concerns of such maritime based health care delivery environments as affected by specific circumstances? Unfortunately 20th.century memoirs especially are penned more often than not by "lower echelon" nurses interested in the "bigger picture" beyond the confined decks of their vessel(s),the occasional patient presenting an all too brief page or less in their "war memoir" and the even rarer ship’s officer who concentrates on the ship’s crew and purely nautical affairs including port calls. Mutual professional distancing between armed forces personnel,naval/merchant marine crew and the medical staff self-consciously generates self-censorship distorting participant’s memories of such experiences. Moreover inextremis situations such as armed conflicts heightens personal focusing on both virtues and vices which in turn furnishes considerably more audience appeal than any descriptive writing of a "bandage barge". Unfortunately such personal focuses may serve to allegedly diminish these work’s potential historical value. As medical subjects their author’s personal "views" are seen as being incompatible with "objective" medical cum scientifically trained observations. Regrettably not only the historical professional but the medical community at large therefore typically dismisses such memoirs as anecdotal propaganda or misperceives such works as being indistinguishable from young adult pulp fiction. What values then can such memoirs generally have for historians or researchers of hospital ships?

Bridget Gregory’s book falls under the above personal focus memoir rubric. This is not to say that it omits to deal with critically and fundamentally significant hospital ship operational,design and equipment content but rather that the author’s professional duties,her civilian status,sex and familial editorial choices have presumably restricted such specific publishable information. As a maternally derived and edited compilation from her 27 year old (1968) daughter’s letters home and personal journal extracts the book may further reflect this heightened maternal pride with her daughter’s evolving self-awareness as an American Red Cross recreational worker aboard one of the two major American hospital ships in the war: USS Sanctuary AH-17. What then can we glean about the Sanctuary while Bridget was aboard her from May 18,1968 till May 4,1969? Stationed as an American Red Cross worker (ARC) at Chanute Air Force Base,Rantoul,Illinois for 3 years after her college graduation Bridget vents her frustrations at the lack of "adventure" at Chanute during a regional ARC meeting at which unbeknownst to her a senior ARC personnel officer is present. A few months later the same ARC personnel officer calls her and offers her a year long posting on the SANCTUARY. No doubt the Navy was looking for spunky women! It is unclear if Bridget ever did get her 1 week of Naval orientation aboard a Great Lakes naval vessel and her 2 weeks of ARC orientation (maybe higher ups thought that Bridget had the "right stuff"). Like all large administrations Bridget’s orders come through slowly. Normative naval bureaucracy manifests the apparently ad hoc nature of at least processing the handful of civilian support workers staffing the hospital ship. Bridget’s first day of hospital ward work aboard the Sanctuary is poignantly summed up: "The hard part is to keep smiling when you see a nineteen year old triple amputee - only one arm left"(p.18). Time after time we read of Bridget’s honest emotional responses to stressful circumstances as when she fumes then rhetorically retorts to the senior medical officer’s condescending suggestion that in order to win simple board games Bridget visit some of the "head patients". New staff hospital ship adjustment clearly varies but with a mandate to continuously facilitate r & r to any and everyone on board Bridget and any recreational worker face a challenging assignment.

Even physical adjustment may pose a concern. On her fourth day aboard she gets seasick but Dramamine apparently helps to keep this under control and is very effective later when she actually admires the beauty of huge waves while the ship sails in a typhoon. We would like to know more about seasickness as it affects other staff and the patients but that is all that we read about this. Exacerbating at times her overall stress level is her work ethic. She volunteers to assist in Roman Catholic masses,play organ for church services,sing with a shipboard folk group,play games with the Vietnamese children,do television commercials and act as the shipboard weather girl beyond her regular duties. While a superficial observer might cynically state what a lovely assignment all play we should realize that this was working at making play healthy and productive for its observers and/or participants. Essentially Bridget was a "quality of life enhancement aid worker" in an isolated and at times inhospitable working environment.

Psychological stresses associated with her work are far more deleterious to her personally and professionally. Other staff handle their stresses differently. Some such as the nurses professionally distance themselves from others including even the female ARC recreational workers aboard at least during special "nurse" occasions. According to the author the chief nurse forbade any of her nurses to have anything to do with the radio/tv people. Perhaps the chief nurse may have been anti-media influenced with the dressing up in drag of a chief petty officer as the "weather girl" on the ship’s tv station. We wish we could read more about Dr.Buzz Barnett and his exclusion by "higher authority" from a July 4/68 shipboard talent show as his lyrics allegedly satirize the hospital ship’s work along with Dr.Dave Davis’s supportive petition for inclusion of same. This mocking vocational self-depreciation is mirrored in the self-produced r & r materials such as Dr.Barnett’s "Hospital Ship" game patterned after "Monopoly" with ship’s offices in lieu of railroads. Bridget along with other ARC workers poetically compose a nurse’s party mock menu to assuage their feelings of neglect when they are not invited to the nurse’s party. These reveal a hospital ship’s staff that recognize their self-generated or maintained adaptation measures necessary for themselves in order to successfully operate especially long term in occupationally related stressful conditions.

One of the primary stress coping mechanisms for all staff including Bridget is humour. Hospital corpsmen apparently initiate a contest to see the maximum that a patient’s urine bag could hold with an official capacity of these as 3000 CC. One bag which may be the winner holds 3225 CC at which point a nurse orders the bag dumped. Little acts become meaningful. A coworker covertly blows out the candles on a faux birthday cake that both made by using a box covered with shaving cream and using ARC toothpaste for lettering for a 22 year old who has tubes in his nose and a closed wired jaw. She reflects in her journal if she will be able to withstand the stresses of seeing so much carnage on such young previously healthy men and it is clear that by her seeing humour in such situations that this alleviates some of her stress.

Another stress coping mechanism is physical escapism. Shore excursions for official business are valued as personal leaves in part by Bridget who then from her land based perch refers to the Sanctuary as a "floating bedpan" while gulping down long sought beers in an officer’s club at Da Nang,Vietnam. On August 9,1968 she writes after the Sanctuary docks in the Philippines: "God but its good to be able to feel grass underfoot and to see people and to walk more than 520 feet without having to turn around"(p.51) demonstrating that all care givers and their support staffs of hospital ships can go "hospital ship crazy" or what Bridget calls "shipitis"(p.57). One wonders whatever happened to the blue bathtub delivered to the ship in July/68 for a nurse. We do not know if this is the same,now pink painted bathub referred to in August/68 when the SANCTUARY goes to Subic Bay,Philippines for an overhaul and the tub is offloaded due to the crew’s pressure. They did not wish to be stigmatized in the navy as the only ship with a bathtub! We can only wonder how the majority of staff and guests compensated for their blocked escapism.

Certainly a dysfunctional berthing and/or ward arrangement that precludes such escapism is the 3 tiered bunking for the malaria convalescents deep in the ship’s bowels. While this may have for administrative and logistical reasons been beyond the control of the ship’s executive boredom quickly sets in and physical fights erupt that require the master of arms to quell. Racially based ward division not only mirrors the racial tensions of home as the black patients divide the ward into "Detroit" and "Motown" but is an attempt by the patients to exert some control over their limiting environment. This illustrates the importance of allowing some "ownership" by patients of their environment for hospital ship administrators despite confined spaces.

Bridget learns to delegate work to presumably some ambulatory patients under the guise of "patient participation and motivation" and is candid about this being used by her to relieve herself of work details. Psychological insight,quick thinking and rationalization also assist her in diminishing some of her responsibilities. Thus when the ship’s captain inquires about recreation for those patients retained on board for being too ill for shore leave Bridget responds: "Sir,I can’t possibly compete with girls and booze. Any patient too sick to go on liberty is too sick for any recreation at all!". (p.90).

Cumulating stress indications reflect an increasingly violent and spreading conflict. R and R activities such as beach parties are sometimes canceled due to anticipated enemy actions. Bridget witnesses a just medivaced patient to the ship die while being carried on a stretcher for medical attention. She also hears of fragging or attempted murder by soldiers of their officers. A young crewmember from Wisconsin is accidentally killed aboard just 2 hours after clowning in the ARC office saddening the whole ship. Another medical corpsman returning home upon completion of his tour of duty is murdered in the USA. Vietnamese civilian orphans become significant as inpatients as 1968 draws to a close and Bridget experiences first hand their suffering as she turns down a French nun’s request to adopt a couple of them. Bridget gives candy to napalmed Vietnamese girls who are aboard one of whom can’t close here eyes and her nose is melted off with her fingers fused together. Increased patient loads mean increased work loads which physically tire Bridget. Repetitive letter writing for patients numbs her handwriting hand and the numerous death notices and emergency leave requests don’t bolster her morale either. Navy officialdom (both male and female) anger the civilian aid worker. As an attractive young civilian working in a sea of young men Bridgett receives her share of unwelcome sexual advances. She attends to a paralyzed young soldier due to friendly fire. Reaching the end of her tether Bridget vents as the ship’s captain abruptly cancels the voyage to the Philippines and returns to station due to heavy enemy action in February 1969. Why then does she comply with an ARC request to extend her duties aboard the ship till mid-May,1969?

Bridget comes to not only realize but value the relative comforts of the hospital ship compared especially to in-field operational conditions of the troops along with her wide latitude of action that her civilian status allows. Perhaps more importantly though despite her feelings of frustration and depression and expressing a wish to leave the ship badly she realizes that her experiences are developing her overall producing a more worldly,mature and sensitive person. Towards the end of her stay both she and her close co-worker feel maternal concerns for a former patient who worked for them aboard the hospital ship when they hear that he has been wounded again and will be sent stateside. The ship itself for all her expressed stressed out moments is affectionately if sardonically referred to as the "Big White Mother" (p.133).

This is a finely written humane memoir of a young woman’s "adventure" aboard a U.S. hospital ship that did yeoman service during a still confusing war. Minor editorially based flaws like typos as "German agreements"(read Geneva agreements),incontinently textually strewn abbreviations with no glossary of same and virtually non-existent photo captioning as well as a paucity of ship related details mar a good memoir. Bridget’s memoir though should rank high as a useful resource for anyone attempting to comprehend social historical aspects of hospital ships in armed conflicts.

Reviewed by John Gilinsky,Hospital Ship International(HSI)


Book Review #2 by John Gilinsky,HSI

Barnichon,Dr.Gilles
"Les Navires Hopitaux Francais Au XXe Siecle. French Hospital Ships During The XXth.Century (English Translation by Pierrick Roullet)"
Le Touvet,France: Editions Marcel-Didier Vrac (M.D.V.) 1998
168 pages (photos and plans)
ISBN: 2 - 910821 - 20 - X
To order copies:
Editions Marcel-Didier Vrac (M.D.V.)
Rue de la Choquette
38660 le Touvet,FRANCE
PRICE: 190 French Francs (plus packing and postage)

European colonial and imperial history paradoxically in contemporary anti-colonial historians' works have never been more popular academically. Amongst the myriad reasons for such professionally preferred subject areas is the rise in Anglo-American circles of medical history as a specialization incorporating state or public health foci. This "off-shore" mirror is itself a progeny of classical pre-World War Two European medical history. Moreover,glorifications of national prownesses have never been stronger within the new unified Europe. Dr.Barnichon's book on 20th.century French hospital ships,while not an academic book,manifests both this traditional history of medicine historiographical emphasis on public or state health along with this national pride represented in the author's concentration on France's logistical supports of colonial hegemony. What values therefore does his work have for the historian of hospital ships particularly?

As part of the author's traditional historiographical approach French naval hospital ships are given predominance. Yet the French army has a long history of internal waterway evacuations which Barnichon essentially ignores. Such exclusionary coverage perpetuates the false impression that most if not all hospital ships were naval or at least naval administered. Despite such exclusionism the author refers early in his book to the Franco-Prussian War's "bateaux-mouches" used for riverine military ambulance purposes. The book's frontispiece of a World War I military ambulance barge pictorially represents the very considerable uses made by the French army during World War I of internal waterway evacuations yet no further details are given. Co-incidentally the French army also had World War I larger riverine casualty evacuation vessels comparable to the transshipment/ferry unit as the "ARIADNE"(an ex-Cherbourg port liner tender)that Barnichon does describe in relationship to the Dardanelles campaign.

Total warfare embodies the mobilization and uses of all sectors of societies. Barnichon's typical cursory coverage or non-treatment of non-governmental bodies though such as the French Red Cross Society,with some notable exceptions,generates a misperception of a monolithic omnipotent French state monopolizing the development of its war time hospital ships. Public health advocacy or professional groups,nunneries and women's societies are just some of the private organizations that played very important roles in the development of hospital ships including peacetime development.

Amongst the contributions that these organizations produced in the development of hospital ships,especially prior to World War I,was the influencing of states in the establishment of international conventions related to hospital ships. However the author's discussion of such international legal instruments is flawed. He dismisses in one sentence the pivotal 1868 Additional Articles thereby ignoring the international legal precedent that these articles set for the 1899 Hague Convention on hospital ships. Barnichon does accurately describe this 1899 Convention and the far lesser known 1904 customs duties/port fees Convention. Oddly though he omits any reference to the 1907 X Hague Convention on hospital ships despite this convention's paramountcy in World War II.

However the author offers up much hitherto little known or unknown especially to Anglo-American historians materials on hospital ships. The intensive systemic French uses of Dunkirk as a port of evacuation and/or stationary shipboard treatment location from the late fall of 1914 to early 1915 will be news to most. There are many other intriguing facts,such as the December 1915 dismissal from command of a hospital ship commander for not responding to a British merchant ship's distress calls,that one will pleasurably discover in perusing the book's contents.

Barnichon's commonsense chronological order and alphabetical arrangement of the vessels is commendable. His synoptical histories furnish readers with archival based research information that sheds much new light especially on the World War I hospital ship's mercantile owner's state relationships. This in turn illuminates the very real economic hardships that such shipping firms suffered as a result of their ships being either requisitioned and/or chartered. An excellent month-by-month chart of all major World War I vessels is given on page 164.

Unfortunately one can only presume that the publisher/editor(s) of this book decided to limit if not restrict the author in the both the degree and amount of information especially medical that he offers. Thus it often becomes very difficult to ascertain stated bed capacities,the presence or non-presence of surgical theaters or specialized equipment such as x-ray devices. A mere two reduced reproductions of plans of smaller medical missionary(fishermen)vessels appear at the end of the volume. With all the discussions of especially wartime conversions at least some typical detailed plans to convey at least an idea of the amount of conversion work involved should have been incorporated. Even basic ship information such as gross registered tonnage and basic dimensions are lacking in some cases. Some glaring omissions occur with the most recent vessels. Thus "GOELO" and "ILE de LUMIERE" both chartered as medical vessels in the late 1970's and early 1980's by the French organization "Medicins du Monde" for use in succoring Vietnamese "boat people" and the French government's "ACANTHE" used during 1989 for aid to Lebanon Civil War's victims are not mentioned. A comprehensive and diverse bibliography will be useful for further research though one memoir source not listed is Juan d'Aspe's[pseudonym](i.e. Jean Henri Leon Dupas)"Memorial d'un navire blanc: journal d'un chirurgien de marine durant la drole de guerre" Paris: 1960 that deals with the author's experiences with the hospital ship SPHINX in World War Two(the SPHINX was also used by the French in World War I as a hospital ship). The publisher still should be highly commended if not congratulated for publishing in France a well translated bilingual maritime reference work.

Dr.Barnichon's book is a very good introductory history that will hopefully stimulate further detailed researches into French hospital ships and their roles in the history of hospital ships generally. His work constitutes a fine,if flawed,important reference work that furnishes many details of the logistical,political,economic and international legal aspects of French hospital ship history. We can only hope that an amended and expanded second edition will appear.


Book Review #3 by John Gilinsky,HSI

Lockyer,John (Text) and Barnett,Alan (Illustrations)
"Lottie Gallipoli Nurse"
Auckland,New Zealand: Reed Children's Books an imprint of Reed Publishing (NZ) Ltd. 1998
32 pages Coloured illustrations
ISBN: 1 - 8694 - 8988 - 8 To order copies:
Reed Publishing (NZ)Ltd.,
39 Rawene Road
Birkenhead,Auckland,
NEW ZEALAND
PRICE:

In Australia and New Zealand April 25 has special significance. That is the day that is annually commemorated as "ANZAC Day." Much in the traditions of that other World War's glorious defeat "Dunkirk" the entire Gallipoli expedition of April 25,1915 to January 1,1916 has become ingrained into the the Australian and New Zealand national consciousnesses and mythologies as that wonderful supreme sacrifice of ANZAC male youth. As if to placate the anger of the survivors and their relatives and in turn their descendants over the extremely heavy casualties and ultimate retreat an entire cultural mythology has been generated about Gallipoli. This expedition undoubtedly though holds a great deal of interests for anyone interested in hospital ships. It is a pleasant surprise therefore to discover this children's book from down under.

Gallipoli was promoted by Winston Churchill of England as a means of shortening the war by knocking out Turkey and going after the soft underbelly of the Central Powers. The combined Australian and New Zealand troops referred to as the ANZAC Corps were to play a pivotal role in making a flanking attack that would cut off the Turkish defenders along the Straits of the Dardanelles. Tragically they landed in the wrong place which was later called ANZAC Cove and they were essentially pinned down initially to the beach areas and subsequently to a restricted beachhead. With insufficient manpower to make major tactical sweeps and suffering from both the terrain and the climate as well as facing increasing stiff opposition from the Turks the casualty rolls grew rapidly. Disease took as many lives and removed men from effective combat readiness as did Turkish bullets. As a result of this unforeseen setback the casualties in the beginning overwhelmed the meagre off-shore medical lift capacity.

One ship mobilized by the New Zealand government to succour this flood of casualties was the MAHENO. Aboard this hospital ship was New Zealand nurse Charlotte (Lottie) Le Gallais. Her brother,Ledra (Leddie) was already present at Gallipoli as a soldier. Mr.Lockyer bases his text on letters that both brother and sister sent home to their father as well as the war diary of a MAHENO officer.

As children's historical fiction goes Mr.Lockyer cannot be faulted for his research. The writing is well constructed. However the focus on human suffering generates one-dimensional characterization and falls under that ANZAC mythology referred to above. See how gallantly our boys die! In part this is understandable for a period piece that reflects the "romanticizing" of war including the Gallipoli expedition. As a reminder that hospital ships saw extensive Gallipoli service and especially as a youthful oriented reminder of this Lockyer's book is welcome.

Unfortunately not a single illustration anywhere appears of the MAHENO or even other hospital ships. The British used at least 100 such vessels cumulatively during the course of the Gallipoli expedition and Lockyer's book covers a sufficient time span between July to December,1915 so that the work's timeline could have accommodated at least specific name references to other hospital vessels.

As a realistic portrayal of military nursing aboard World War One hospital ships more specifics are needed. The heroine,Lottie seems to operate in a vacumn if not a trance for much of the time. What of her other erstwhile nurses or the doctors aboard the ship? Too few details of her specific medical duties are given perhaps because it is a children's book. While this may be speculative it does seem odd considering the omnipresent coverage of the physical,mental and emotional suffering that the book details. This last is commendable for putting human faces to the work of hospital ships in armed conflicts. It is also historically accurate to the extent that hospital ship board talk amongst the medical staffs especially was so demoralizing during the early stages of the Gallipoli campaign that stringent orders were issued to such medical staffs to refrain from such talk while aboard their ships or face military disciplinary measures.

The extraordinarily hard work that everyone put forth aboard these ships is evoked in passages such as found on page 16,viz.:

"I am absolutely worn out. I have been on the go for two days. No time to wash, no time to eat, no time to rest. There are so many wounded. Everyone pitches in - stokers,sailors,engineers,officers - helping to carry,wash,clean and feed the men..... The wounded are brought from the beach by lighters. The men are in terrible shape. Their wounds are shocking. A young lad came aboard first. He had been hit in the neck by shrapnel. It ripped down through his body and lodged in his groin. We couldn't do a thing for him and he knew it. There was bustle all around us but he wouldn't let go of my hand. He asked me to write to his girl and say it was the thoughts of her that kept him going. His last word was her name. That broke us all up. Even now I'm biting my lip,writing about him.....Lighters full of wounded. The men are a sorry sight - thin,lifeless and weak - just wasting away. They all have dysentery or fever and their bodies are crawling with fleas and lice."

Mr.Lockyer's text and Mr.Barnett's illustrations are a noble attempt to preserve the memories of the New Zealanders of ANZAC particularlly for the younger generations. Historically accurate in the main and realistically written this children's book is a significant if not unique contribution to the literary culture of hospital ships. Some wartime juvenille hospital ship fictional narratives were published especially during World War I. However these wartime narratives naturally capture far more of the romanticized if not propagandatistic purposes of their scribes rather than the gritty realism of "Lottie Gallipoli Nurse." Significant pedagological usefulness is therefore embodied in the latter's retelling of human suffering in armed conflicts,the concept of death,the extolling of human virtues brought out in crisis situations and how people remember their past(s). Lockyer's book can therefore be easily adapted for inclassroom use for diverse learning objectives and/or used at home.

BOOKS RECEIVED for future review here:

1) Steel, Philip W. (Editor) Penny,Leslie Fred (1898-1975)
"In the Shadows of the Hun"
[ n. pl. ]Paul Cave Publications Ltd.,(England) 1999 [vi],238 pages
ISBN: 0 - 8 6 1 4 6 - 0 9 3 - 6

2) Woolman, Jack
"Hospital Ship Memories of HMHS Tjitjalengka During World War II."
Studley, Warwickshire, England: Brewin Books Ltd. 2001 viii, 110 pages
ISBN: 1 - 8 5 8 5 8 - 1 9 7 - 4


Book Review #4 by John Gilinsky (HSI)
Pomarolli, Barbara Williamson
"'Seas of War' The Diary of a Red Cross Worker in Vietnam - USS REPOSE"
Greensboro,Georgia: P & W Publishing 1071 Jernigan's Bluff 30642 United States of America [ Author published soft cover cerlox bound 4to ]
ISBN: ? [website: www.seasofwar.com] PRICE: 15.00 US plus postage of 2.00 US within the United States [ii], 80 pages, b&w illustrations and photos.
This is a self-published and self-edited diary of a young American female Red Cross worker posted to the USS REPOSE stationed on the Vietnam establishment. Barbara Williamson (Pomarolli)served aboard the hospital ship from October 24,1966 to October 28,1967. Interestingly while the Repose was under way she was always escorted by one or two destroyers. This book is highly recommended as a very well edited account.