'Stretcher-bearers': (21) Nursing Orderly Class 1

We were told that volunteers were required to train for a six weeks Nursing Orderly Class I course at another nearby town.
Of the eight class II orderlies in "A" company, only four wanted to take the opportunity. The others opted for a good rest. Nobody from "B" Company came forward and the four from H.Q. Company were not over-enthusiastic.
We left at about 3 p.m. and arrived at a Casualty Clearing Station some two hours later. We found that 152 Field Ambulance had billets in the same area and joined them. The next morning at 8 a.m. we reported for training at the CCS , where our arrival had not been expected, it appeared. Eventually we were conducted to the medical wardmaster for distribution to the medical wards and I was sent to Acute Medical. where immediately someone thrust a mop into my hands. This I declined and asked to see the Sister who was then in consultation with the MO. However, she came over and I told her that we were there for a course, not purely as fatigue men. This did not please her, so she called the MO who did his best to mollify both of us.
It then became apparent that working for the exam would play second fiddle to floor cleaning and plate-washing. In fact, most of us could modestly claim proficiency in floor ""bumping", which we performed with heavy, weighted sweepers that made the polished hospital floors shine. Nurses were not slow in assigning to us this chore, and we readily undertook the labour, both as manly protectors of the "weaker" sex and to avoid tasks for which we had no training. We also became adept at treating post prostate gland patients, not that we were likely to come across a single case in the field, but because nurses understandably preferred other duties.
I decided to work independently from the one medical dictionary I had borrowed, and to learn as much as possible while the rest of the unit was enjoying a month's rest..
The patients on acute medical were interesting and I gleaned some knowledge of treatment for Primary Pneumonia, Bronchitis, Cerebro-spinal fever, B.T and M.T Malaria and Acute Rheumatic fever
After a few days we had a welcome change of Sisters, but both of them were too lazy to bother much with ward work, so we soon settled down to our own routine, which was roughly as follows:
Breakfast. 7.- 7.30 am.
Washing up patients' breakfast 7.30 -7.45.am.
Sweeping the ward 7.45 - 8.00 am.
Washing the ward 8 - 8.30 am.
Bed making, tidying ward and TPRs. 8.30 - 10 am.
Treatments 10 - 11 am.
Break and further treatments 11 foll
Lunch 12 noon foll.
In the afternoon there were the usual repeat treatments and cleaning. In the evening we again took temperatures, pulse and respirations (TPRs). By far the busiest work consisted of fetching, serving and washing up patients' meals.
We asked for a course of lectures and especially for training in coping with gunshot and shrapnel wounds. This had some effect. A notice was placed on orders that we should attend lectures on Mondays, Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays.
On Monday a surgeon arrived to deliver a preliminary lecture on "Bones". Although this appeared to be the traditional theme of surgeons and we had experienced similar lectures many times before, we were glad to see him. After Monday, however, he cam no more, but the matron who was billed to star once a week did make her maiden speech, her only appearance before the actual exam.
About the middle of our third week a Captain Brown astonished the few of us who were still sufficiently optimistic to attend in case there might be a lecture. He dealt in some depth with the respiratory tract.
Time passed until barely a fortnight before the six weeks' course ended. By now we had received just four lectures and no examination date had been announced.
Fortunately, at the eleventh hour, the medical specialist stepped in to help us, providing a good course of lectures lasting the remaining two weeks.
On Sunday we assembled for a two hour written paper which was followed that afternoon by a hasty practical and oral examination. The matron pitched the examination agreeably low and had not prepared for it. Consequently, when she asked me to make a bed for a patient suffering from acute rheumatic fever, I found myself confronted with one spring bed, one sheet and a few blankets. So we started a game of make-believe on these lines;
"First I would turn the mattress." (First trap avoided).
Matron, beaming. "That's right. Pretend you've done that. We have no mattress.
"Then I would........
Matron. "Good."
"Then I would tuck the sheet in over the bolster, if we had..."
Matron, quickly. " Assume the bolster is there."
"And a pillow, if we have one."
Matron. " I think that will be enough bed-making. Now, can you tell me what this box contains?
It was a gleaming black tin box with bold white letters declaring "Catheters".
"Catheters", I hazarded, scenting a trap.
"That's right. Good", she beamed again.
( I was batting on a good wicket so far a catheters were concerned, having landed at Ipswich hospital patients suffering from enlarged prostate glands, several also with carcinomas (cancer). The matron became quite chatty, but at the time I felt that young men casualties were unlikely to need cathetererization. I was to be proved wrong. There was certainly one case at Cassino, a few months later.)
The examination had been on a Sunday. It finished at about 3 p.m. and I went straight to the lecture room to listen to a record recital of classical music, but had been there only twenty minutes when Peel came in to say that we were moving back to the unit in half an hour. This greatly annoyed us, since we had not packed and had arranged to celebrate the end of our course and exam that night.
In fact, we had become too settled, enjoying the comfortable life of a Casualty Clearing Station.
Several of us passed the examination. (This meant a rise in daily pay of and permission to wear a blood-red stripe on the right sleeve. None of us chose to wear the stripe on the snobbish ground that it made us look like bus conductors, but later at Cassino, I did meet one man wearing it.)
After a cold, cramped journey in the back of a 30 cwt lorry we arrived at Isernia to spend the night in 11 Field Ambulance headquarters.

The following morning we reported back at "A" company and were placed on night duty where the greater proportion of patients were sick, but some battle casualties were reaching us and we received several serious cases. One post operation patient never regained consciousness, but died suddenly and quietly in the early morning hours. I had been feeling for his heartbeat and used a stethescope for a long time, realising eventually that he was dead. We brought in a stretcher and removed the body before the other patients awoke.
Another night we had two Germans, both suffering from gunshot wounds. They told us they were glad they had fallen into our hands because they did not want to become prisoners to the Russians later on. They were both pleasant.

What remains of Isernia lies in a hollow basin ringed by craggy snow-capped peaks which are most formidable to the north. In this area is Cassino, where gunfire flashes leap from the snow in bright orange. The weather there is bitterly cold and we are already receiving frostbite casualties.
Snow still lies in hard, dirty heaps in gutters and against buildings, for the morning sun, although warm, does not stay long enough to melt it.
About 8 a.m. the Italians organise demolition gangs here, perhaps half a dozen men with spades and shovels and a horse and cart. They start clearing buried roads, repairing drainage systems and searching among the rubble for their dwellings and crushed salvage. Most of the bodies had already been recovered before we arrived here.
While the men are busy, the women collect firewood from the ruins, drawing water from the town pump or washing clothes at places where pipes have been broken and water is seeping through to the surface.
There is very little shopping to be done because there is only one grocer's in the town. This shop advertises fancy knives in its front window for the benefit of the troops, but I did notice that a few vegetables and some meat extract cubes were for sale.

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