Liverpool Angels Read online

  ‘We’ve got to get him out of here – and soon,’ Jimmy said worriedly to his brother and Tommy.

  ‘I’ll go along the trench and get Captain Dixon,’ Tommy offered, shouting to make himself heard over the noise of the guns.

  Jimmy nodded. ‘Get a move on then.’

  Harry took off his muffler and wrapped it around Eddie’s neck, over the one he already wore. ‘It won’t help much, more’s the pity.’ Eddie was shivering, his skin felt clammy and his breathing was very laboured.

  Tommy duly arrived back with their grim-faced superior officer and they all crowded into the tiny dugout.

  ‘How long has he been like this, Private Mitford?’ the captain demanded of Tommy.

  ‘He’s had a terrible cough for weeks now, sir, but he only took really bad like this a few hours ago,’ Tommy replied.

  ‘He’s having trouble breathing, sir. We think he’s got pneumonia. He’s really bad,’ Harry added.

  ‘I can see that. Well, we’d better get him to the clearing station. Mitford, go and shout for a stretcher,’ Captain Dixon instructed Tommy, feeling his outrage and frustration growing. It was no wonder the lad was in this state; they were all permanently cold, wet and exhausted, for they got very little sleep.

  ‘Sir, if we can be spared we’ll take him ourselves. We’ll carry him if we have to,’ Jimmy suggested. Eddie was his mate and you could wait for ages for the stretcher-bearers to get along the line.

  The captain nodded; he understood the close comradeship these lads felt for their pals and the stretcher-bearers were already overworked with the casualties from the increased bombardment. ‘Get back as soon as you can and keep your heads down,’ he ordered before departing.

  It seemed as though it had taken them hours to negotiate their way back through the communication trenches towards the clearing station carrying Eddie between them but finally, exhausted, they made it. There were sick and wounded men lying everywhere, Harry thought grimly, far more than he’d ever seen before and some with terrible wounds.

  A medical officer approached them. ‘What’s his name, rank and battalion? What’s wrong with him? What are his symptoms?’ he asked, looking harassed.

  ‘Private Edward McEvoy, 18th King’s Liverpool. We think he’s got pneumonia, sir. He’s got a fever, having trouble breathing and he’s not really been conscious for the last half-hour. We’ve carried him,’ Jimmy informed the man.

  He nodded and sighed inwardly. Another one! Disease and the appalling conditions were killing as many of these lads as the shells and shrapnel were. ‘You can leave him with us now; we’ll get him to a hospital. You’ve done your best for him, now get back up the line,’ he said before turning to issue instructions to an orderly.

  Jimmy knelt down beside Eddie and touched him on the shoulder. ‘You’ll be all right now, mate. Soon have you in a clean, warm bed and you’ll be right as rain in no time at all, lucky blighter!’

  Tommy managed a grin as he nodded. ‘Yer always were a lucky so and so, Eddie McEvoy. I’m green with envy. Just don’t go falling fer any of them nurses now.’

  Harry wondered somewhat distractedly if Mae would be one of the nurses on the train that would take Eddie to Boulogne or Le Touquet or Le Havre, whichever one had room for another casualty, although he hoped it wouldn’t be Le Havre, which was the furthest away. He remembered what Eddie had said about there being no glory in succumbing to pneumonia. There was no glory in dying at all as far as he could see now, whether it was from terrible wounds or disease. He turned wearily away. It was a long trek back.

  Mae looked around her in some confusion. Ever since she had left Liverpool in the first week of the New Year with a dozen other nurses, including Lizzie Lawson and Ethel Rhodes, waved off at Lime Street Station by an anxious Maggie and a rather envious Alice, everything had seemed unfamiliar: different but a little exciting too. Now that they had finally disembarked from the Channel steamer she was for the first time in her life on foreign soil and it was unsettling. The streets were crowded with civilians and refugees – whose language she didn’t understand – and soldiers. The men were all weary-looking, their uniforms crumpled and caked with mud and dirt, their faces grey with exhaustion and cold as they marched or simply moved between the mass of buildings, most of which were makeshift hospitals, supply and ammunition depots, warehouses, stables, feed stores and rail yards. On the dockside ships were embarking wounded and sick men en route to hospitals in England, for there were too few French hospitals to cope – even the town’s casino had been turned into one. The ships were unloading more supplies and disembarking yet more soldiers, and everywhere there were horses and carts, a few motorised lorries and teams of mules pulling wagons and guns.

  ‘Where do we go now?’ Ethel enquired, looking as bewildered as both Mae and Lizzie at the crowds and traffic that surged around them.

  ‘We’re to report to Sister Allinson at the Gare de Boulogne, wherever that is,’ Lizzie read from a scrap of paper taken from her pocket.

  ‘Maybe we should ask someone,’ Mae suggested, and then headed towards two young men who stood nearby, peering intently into the engine of a motorised ambulance and looking perplexed. ‘Excuse me, I’m sorry to trouble you, but could you help us?’ she asked politely.

  They both turned and she noticed that the taller of the two was quite handsome with brown wavy hair and blue eyes and he did not have that exhausted look that seemed to cling to all the other men in the vicinity.

  ‘How can we help, miss?’ he asked, smiling and hastily wiping his hands on a rather grubby rag.

  ‘You’re an American!’ Mae blurted out in surprise at his accent.

  He smiled again broadly, revealing perfect teeth. ‘I am indeed. Phillip ‘Pip’ Middlehurst from Boston, Miss … er?’

  ‘Strickland. Mae Strickland. We’ve just arrived and have to report to the Gare de Boulogne and we haven’t a clue where or what it is,’ she informed him, wondering what on earth an American was doing here.

  ‘I guess then that you’re new recruits for the hospital trains?’

  Mae nodded. ‘Yes, we’ve to report to a Sister Allinson.’

  ‘Then I’ll be delighted to escort you there, ladies. Lenny here will stay with the ambulance, won’t you, Len? Not that either of us has got a clue as to why it refuses to start.’

  The other young man nodded amiably and turned back to inspect the engine as the little group moved off up the street.

  ‘Is it far?’ Mae asked her companion.

  ‘Not really, only a couple of blocks. Boulogne isn’t a very big town, you’ll soon find your way around,’ he replied. ‘I did,’ he added.

  ‘Can I ask you a personal question, Mr Middlehurst?’ Mae enquired a little hesitantly, although he seemed friendly enough.

  He grinned down at her. ‘Fire away, Miss Strickland, but I have a feeling I know what it is you’re curious about. What is a boy from Boston doing here in France in the middle of a European war?’

  Mae smiled up at him; she liked his direct manner. ‘That’s about it.’

  He became serious. ‘I’m a volunteer. Although my government’s policy is that it’s not America’s war, there are many folk back home who think we can’t just stand on the sidelines and watch, me included. So, being able to drive an automobile, I volunteered for the American Field Ambulance Service, which is a non-combatant group officially under the control of the Red Cross, and here I am. All the way from Back Bay to Boulogne.’

  ‘It’s very gallant and … brave of you,’ Mae replied, feeling that both adjectives were somehow inadequate to describe the selflessness of his actions.

  Pip Middlehurst shook his head. ‘Nope. I’m not nearly as gallant or brave as the men and boys who are over here fighting,’ he replied grimly. ‘I just transport them from the clearing stations to the trains and the trains to the hospitals.’ He glanced down at the girl beside him and thought of the two others following behind. None of them were any older than his own sister, he surmi
sed, and wondered if they were prepared for the sights and experiences that awaited them. ‘Where is “home” for you, Miss Strickland?’ he asked to lighten the conversation. Even in the drab and rather severe uniform she was a pleasant and very pretty girl with that light blonde hair and blue eyes: a real ‘English rose’.

  ‘Liverpool, and this is the first time I’ve been more than ten miles outside it,’ Mae answered candidly, holding up her long skirt to keep it out of the dirt.

  ‘I know it. We docked there when I came over on the Aquitania. It sure is a fine city.’

  Mae nodded, swallowing hard. Any mention of Cunard’s remaining big transatlantic liners always reminded her of her da. ‘It is but there are poor areas too,’ she replied, thinking of the slums.

  ‘We have some of those in Boston. I guess every city does. Well, here we are,’ he announced as they reached the railway station and he ushered them inside. ‘The main offices are just over there to the right; I’m sure your Sister Allinson will be pleased to see you all.’

  Mae smiled at him. ‘Thank you, Mr Middlehurst, we would have been wandering around the town for ages without your help.’

  He laughed. ‘I wouldn’t bet on that, not three attractive young ladies such as yourselves.’ He held out his hand for Mae to shake. ‘I’d better be getting back now and try to get that darned engine fixed, but I’m glad to have been of service. Good luck and as you’ll be on one of the hospital trains and I’m always ferrying wounded from them I guess we’ll see each other again.’

  Mae shook his hand and smiled. ‘Thank you and I … I’ll look forward to seeing you.’ She started to turn away but he touched her arm.

  ‘Perhaps we could even have coffee when you get some time off and you can tell me how you’re getting along? There’s no shortage of cafés here where it’s served but I’m afraid tea is something the French don’t really go in for much.’

  ‘I’d like that and I don’t drink just tea,’ Mae replied, wondering if and when she would get some time off but thinking that he was very nice and she would like to get to know him better.

  ‘He was a very pleasant young man and he seemed to be quite taken with you, Mae,’ Ethel remarked teasingly. Mae didn’t have time to answer as they had reached Sister Allinson’s office.

  They knocked and entered rather hesitantly, not knowing quite what to expect. Mae had assumed that this woman would be very much like Sister Forshaw: brisk, efficient, indomitable, meticulous, her uniform starched and immaculate. She wasn’t. She was tall and angular and her uniform would have given Sister Forshaw a fit of apoplexy. Her hair was confined under a simple, unstarched short veil gathered at the back, her apron and cuffs were also unstarched and her somewhat faded blue cotton dress was covered by an Army greatcoat; she had a permanently harassed look about her.

  ‘Nurses Lawson and Rhodes, you are both to join number three train. Nurse Strickland, you’re on number five train,’ she informed them, ticking off their names on a list. ‘There are six trains that run between here and the casualty clearing stations, which are approximately ten miles behind the front-line trenches so there is little personal danger to you, although artillery fire is almost constant. You’ll get used to the noise. Each train carries two or three medical officers, four sisters, half a dozen nurses and about forty orderlies, and up to four hundred sick and wounded men. You have each been allocated a first-class compartment, which will be your billet, but don’t think it will be luxurious. As well as it serving as your bedroom, office and bathroom it is also a storeroom for supplies both medical and practical. You will have one half-day off per fortnight – if you can be spared – and apart from that the train will be your “home”. You will be responsible to a nursing sister and ultimately to the senior medical officer on board. Is all that clear?’

  They all assented and were then directed to their respective trains. Mae was a little disappointed that she would not be with Lizzie and Ethel for they had trained together and had become friends but she squared her shoulders, picked up her bag and followed the orderly out on to the station concourse and then across the tracks to the rail head where number five train stood awaiting departure, the last of the wounded having been taken either to the hospitals in the town or directly to the waiting ships.

  ‘’Ere you are, miss. ’Ome from ’ome! They’re bigger than our trains but they’re a damned ruddy sight slower.’ The orderly grinned as he passed over her bag and helped her up the rather high steps.

  She thanked him and made her way along the narrow corridor, which was being washed down, to find yet another sister who would supervise her. When she was at last shown her billet she realised that Sister Allinson had been serious when she’d said the compartment wasn’t luxurious.

  ‘Get your things unpacked, Nurse, and then report back to me immediately,’ Sister Chapman instructed briskly before leaving her.

  Mae glanced around the cramped space. There was a bunk about six feet long and three feet wide, a folding canvas washbasin, a jug for water, a mirror attached to one wall and a small locker. Every other available bit of space was taken up with supplies. They were stacked floor to ceiling and there was hardly room to move. She sighed and began to try to make room for her clothes, toiletries, sewing and mending kit and the Army greatcoat that she had been issued with. Well, this was what she had volunteered for so she’d better get on with it, she told herself sternly. After all, it was far, far better than anything the lads in the trenches had. She would at least be warm and dry and had a bunk to sleep in. The train juddered suddenly into life, causing her to momentarily lose her balance, and she realised that they were on their way back to the clearing station to pick up more sick and wounded. She’d better get a move on, she thought; soon she’d have work to do: work for which she’d been trained but which in reality she had little experience of. She suddenly wished that Alice were with her.

  Her inexperience hadn’t lasted long, she thought wryly two weeks later as she wearily negotiated the long swaying corridor of the train on her way back to her billet. She’d lost count of the number of times she’d walked up and down this corridor today, her long skirt seeming to catch on every protruding corner. There were at least three rips she would now have to mend and she heartily wished skirts could be a more practical length. Not only did they catch but their hems became caked in mud and dirt as she scrambled down the steps on to the tracks at the wayside halts where the stretchers were laid out in rows. The orderly had been right, she thought. French trains were bigger but they were interminably and frustratingly slow.

  She opened the door to her cramped compartment and, moving aside a box of bandages, sat down on the edge of the bunk. At least she had something to look forward to tomorrow, she thought. Her first afternoon off and she was going to meet Pip Middlehurst in the Rue Nationale for coffee.

  She took off her short veil and removed the pins from her hair, letting it fall over her shoulders. She would fine comb and then wash it, she decided. The fine-combing was yet another daily chore for the wounded soldiers were all verminous, having come directly from the trenches, and it was inevitable that the nurses picked up both head and body lice. Combing her hair and searching her clothes every night was absolutely essential.

  Rummaging amongst the boxes and packages she found her mending kit and, taking off her uniform dress, she hastily pulled on the flannel dressing gown Maggie had insisted she bring. First she’d have to brush the dried mud from the hem, then mend the rips, then she’d have to wash her apron, cuffs and veil in lukewarm water in her canvas folding bowl when all she wanted to do was lie down and sleep.

  She’d seen Pip on three occasions since she’d joined the train and each time he’d come over to have a few words with her. But neither of them had been able to spare the time for long conversations, so she still knew very little about him – but no doubt she would remedy that tomorrow. They’d made the arrangements to meet in the Café Arc-en-ciel on the last occasion and she was looking forward to a few hour
s away from the endless work on the train. She was more than experienced now in tending the wounds of the men who were carried on stretchers or who hobbled aboard. Those able to stand were seated eight to a compartment; those unable to do so were laid on their stretchers across the seats and on the floor. She could still remember how appalled she’d been that first day that their wounds had received only the very basic attention at the Field Dressing Stations. Men had been brought aboard with bandages caked in blood and dirt, some with only rifles acting as splints for shattered bones. As gently as she could she had picked out fragments of muddy uniform from gaping wounds and mangled flesh, cut away filthy uniform sleeves and trouser legs to reveal the horrific damage caused by shrapnel. Inevitably many of those wounds were already septic and suppurating. The men must have been enduring terrible pain and there was nothing to ease it save morphine for the worst cases, but few complained and she had felt desperately sorry for them. It had come as something of a surprise to realise that not all the men had sustained wounds; some were very ill with pneumonia, enteritis, dysentery or chronic rheumatics, but they all shared one thing: the need to sleep. She had never seen so many utterly exhausted men in her life.

  She sighed heavily; it would be another hour yet before she herself could sleep, and she still had the letters to Alice and Aunty Maggie to finish for she wanted to post them tomorrow.

  At least it wasn’t raining, she thought thankfully as she left the train the following afternoon. The sky was grey and a blustery cold wind whipped at her skirts as she made her way along the Rue Faidherbe towards the Rue Nationale where the Café Arc-en-ciel was situated. For the first time in a fortnight she was not wearing her uniform and it felt somehow liberating to be dressed in her dark blue skirt, white blouse and warm black wool jacket, her hat firmly anchored by two long pins. She found the café without much trouble: the faded painted rainbow from which it took its name above the door helped. It was warm but rather dimly lit, she noted as she pushed open the door. Pip was sitting waiting for her but instantly got up to guide her to her seat.