by Mary Hooper
‘Oh! But the beds are ready.’
‘I dare say they’ll be filled tomorrow – I’ve heard there are two more hospital ships ready to set off from Calais. Look, I’ll go in and tell Sister Kay the latest. She’ll confirm it with the commander, then you can go home to bed.’
‘That’s really decent of you,’ Poppy said. ‘By the way,’ she added as he turned to go, ‘I’ve applied for VAD work in France.’
He raised his eyebrows. ‘Good for you. I suppose that’s because I’m going to be out there?’
Poppy felt herself blushing. ‘Certainly not, Doctor Archer.’
‘Michael,’ he said.
But Poppy, already reaching for her outdoor coat and anticipating her bed, didn’t hear him.
Chapter Two
Sometimes, Poppy thought, it was hard to work out exactly how she felt about Freddie. She was devastated by the knowledge that he was married now and that she wouldn’t be seeing him again – at least, not like that. But at other times there was a feeling of something like relief that she didn’t have to worry any longer whether he loved her. He didn’t, and she would have to deal with it as best she could.
Her subconscious didn’t seem to have this same sensible approach, however, and several times she had a dream where Freddie turned up in her ward, dreadfully injured, and she glided to his side, put her hand on his forehead and somehow, miraculously, made him well again.
There was a strange contradiction, too, in Poppy’s thoughts about what nursing in France would be like. The notion of travelling to a foreign country was very exciting, but when she considered the type of nursing she’d be doing, it was quite terrifying, too. In Netley’s Hut 59 there were relatively few deaths – the men she cared for had proved robust enough to survive the journey to Blighty and, although they might need long-term care, were expected to live. Soon, however, she’d have to face the potentially stomach-turning injuries of men who’d come straight from the front line; men who had such horrendous wounds that nothing whatsoever could be done for them, except to try to give them a pain-free and peaceful end.
This matter was touched on a month later, when Poppy went to Devonshire House in London to be interviewed by one of the Red Cross matrons about her application to nurse abroad.
‘You do realise, don’t you, that in France you’ll see more serious injuries than anything you’ve encountered in Netley?’ her interviewer asked at the culmination of the meeting.
‘Yes, I do,’ Poppy replied firmly. She’d come a long way since her early training, when she’d been physically sick at the sight of a young soldier with his nose and part of his face burned, but had seen far worse since then. Before nursing, she’d never seen a naked male body – apart from her brother’s, as a baby – but now she could bed-bath a man, or hand out and collect bedpans without a moment’s hesitation or embarrassment. She felt that she could deal with almost anything.
‘We urgently need more nursing VADs in France, but only the very best are chosen to work alongside our fighting men,’ the matron commented, studying the paperwork on her desk. ‘You’ve supplied me with an excellent reference, however, and Sister Kay has spoken to me personally about your suitability, so I have no doubt as to your capabilities. I therefore have pleasure in offering you a place at one of our base hospitals in France.’
Poppy, feeling a lump come into her throat, managed to croak out her thanks. VADs were usually upper-class girls who’d received a good education and had a private income, and Poppy didn’t fit this specification at all. She’d been scared, too, that they’d want more information on her former job as a parlourmaid at Airey House and might contact Mrs de Vere, but it seemed that the nursing she’d done at Netley was sufficient to show them she was the sort of girl they wanted.
‘We’ll send details of your posting very soon, and you may not have much notice before you’re expected to join the ship and cross the Channel. Take any leave owing to you now and make farewell visits to your people as soon as you can.’
‘I will,’ Poppy said, for she was intending to go and see her mother straight after the interview. ‘Can I ask if it would be possible for me to work on a casualty clearing station? I’ve heard that’s where the most good can be done.’
The matron shook her head. ‘We don’t allow VADs on casualty clearing stations, I’m afraid. Doctors and fully qualified nurses only.’ As Poppy’s face fell, the matron went on, ‘You have to realise that the most dreadfully injured men are coming into the clearing stations straight from the trenches. We operate a triage system, so vital decisions have to be made immediately as to whether patients will benefit from urgent medical intervention, can afford to wait in line, or will be impossible to save. Sometimes operations are performed there and then, with fighting going on all around. A VAD – invaluable though you are – doesn’t have the proper nursing qualifications to provide the doctors with the extra skills these situations need. Trained nurses in France are mostly older women who have more life experience.’
‘I see,’ Poppy said, disappointed.
‘But your strengths, Pearson, seem to be in hands-on care, and there are many other ways you can be of use. In a base hospital you’ll have a better chance of getting to know your patients, whereas at a clearing station the casualties are often like ships that pass in the night.’ Matron signed some forms and put them in an envelope. ‘I understand you’re receiving a small amount of money each week from a family friend?’
Poppy nodded. ‘My old schoolteacher, Miss Luttrell, kindly gives me a sum to cover my keep, uniform and so on.’
‘That’s very generous of her. I take it this will continue even though you’ll receive a small salary now?’
‘Miss Luttrell told me that the allowance is for the duration of the war – that I’m her war effort,’ Poppy said, smiling. ‘She was really keen for me to go on to college after school, but my mother couldn’t afford to send me. Then Miss Luttrell came into some money and said that it was too late for college, but she’d help me become a VAD.’
‘What an admirable idea!’ Matron sealed the envelope. ‘I’ll send your details for processing now and you’ll be hearing from us soon.’
They shook hands and Poppy, without thinking, bobbed a curtsey. Old habits died hard . . .
10th February 1916
Dear Miss Luttrell,
I am writing this on the train back to Netley. I’ve had my interview at Devonshire House and am very happy to tell you that the Matron-in-Charge has approved my application to work in France. I’ll give you my new unit number and hospital details as soon as I know them. I’d hoped to come and see you, but when it came to it I only just had time to go to Wales to see my mother (who’s still there with my aunt until the war’s over). She’s very pleased for me, but a little worried about how close I’ll be to the fighting.
It’s probably terribly immature of me, but I am very excited about going to France, a foreign country with a different language! My friend Matthews has been teasing me about the food she says I’ll have to eat: nothing but frogs’ legs and snails, apparently. I know already that the French version of Tommy is Poluis, and I can say hello, goodbye and thank you, so that’s a start.
I wonder where I shall be sent? To the coast, I hope. Or, even more exciting, perhaps to Paris. I shall let you know.
With all good wishes,
Poppy
‘How did you get on?’ Matthews asked the morning after Poppy’s return to Netley. They were in the hostel canteen, filling up with enough porridge and toast to see them through the day.
Poppy smiled. ‘I got in!’
‘There. I knew you would.’ There was a minute scraping of sugar left in the bowl and Matthews took this and sprinkled it on to her porridge, which looked grey and glutinous. She made a show of stirring it using both hands. ‘This stuff is so thick you could stand a wooden post in the middle of it!’
‘At Airey House,’ Poppy said, ‘the de Veres’ cook used to make porridge with double
cream and thick brown sugar. Sometimes she’d put the bowl under the grill and melt the top into toffee.’
Matthews sniffed. ‘No food shortages there then.’
‘None at all!’ Poppy’s thoughts drifted back to those mornings when she’d take the silver porringer into the Airey House breakfast room and find herself alone with Freddie. He’d give her one of those looks and she’d usually drop something or find herself unable to speak.
‘Hey!’ Matthews clapped her hands. ‘You’re dreaming about him again, aren’t you? Stop! He’s an utter beast and that’s all there is to it. Think of poor Miss Cardew, if you must think of someone; the boy she loves was carrying on with someone else even as she was planning their society wedding.’
Poppy nodded. ‘I know all that, but . . .’
‘Let’s think about – talk about – someone else,’ Matthews said. ‘Like your brother.’
‘I really don’t think talking about Billy will cheer me up.’
‘No, but where is he? Still in Dottyville or has he rejoined his regiment?’
‘I don’t know,’ Poppy said. ‘And neither does Ma.’ Finishing the porridge, she poured herself a pile of cornflakes and added some milk. There being no sugar left in the bowl, she began to crunch her way through them.
‘Your ma still doesn’t know about . . . ?’
Poppy shook her head. After Billy’s regiment was sent to the front, he’d been shipped back to England and admitted to Netley with a gunshot wound to his foot – a wound which had proved to be self-inflicted. Doctor Michael Archer had kindly pulled strings on their behalf and, after having Billy’s leg seen to, managed to get him sent to a hospital in Scotland, nicknamed ‘Dottyville’ by its inmates. Here he’d received treatment for the condition known as neurasthenia and recently renamed shell shock. Poppy knew that Billy was extremely lucky not to have been court-martialled for his actions. The punishment for cowardice under fire was severe – he could have been shot at dawn.
‘Ma knows he was injured, but she doesn’t know how it happened.’ Poppy sighed. ‘I hope she never finds out. She’d be so ashamed of him.’
There was a moment’s silence, then Matthews said, ‘And yet . . .’
Poppy looked at her questioningly.
‘And yet, when you think about it, it takes a certain bravery to shoot yourself in the foot, doesn’t it? I don’t think I could do it.’
‘You’re just saying that to make me feel better,’ Poppy said.
Matthews shrugged.
Poppy had mixed feelings about the letter from Billy which came a week or so later.
A farmyard nr edinbro
Hiya Sis,
Well they have let me out and i have a certificat to show that i am as sane as the next man – which if this war is still going on is not very sane at all. I have a month when i will be working on a farm jest outside of edinbro and then they say i will be returning to duty. I do not no what this will be like. I am feeling alright now but if they are thinking of sending me to the front i don’t know what i will do. I am not going back in those trenches with rats mud and dead bodys no matter what.
No wonder they call it dottyville. The peeple in charge are as mad as the inmates or madder if that is possibel. They row between themselves about what is the right treatment for a chap. Some say bedrest and quiet. Some say shout at them and make noises to frighten them so they will get used to it. They take picktures so there is a record of what they do. Mind you, your doctor pal did a good job in getting me here as i am about the only private. I think all the others are officers. Anyone would think it is only the nobs get troubled in there heads and the rest of us poor blighters jest have to put up with it. I will write to ma and tell her i am going to work on a farm – she will like that. You can write to me here – it will be forwarded on.
Love from your brother Billy x x x
Chapter Three
Poppy paused at the foot of the gangplank of HMS Paris Belle and looked back over the bustling dockyard. She had a sudden feeling of panic – suppose this was the last time she saw England! Suppose the ship was torpedoed by a U-boat, or bombed by German aeroplanes, or hit a mine? Suppose she drowned and never saw her home and family ever again? It would break her mother’s heart, her little sisters would forget all about her, and all that would remain of her would be a photograph on the mantelpiece, fading gently year by year.
My country, England! she thought. A wave of something like nostalgia swept over her and she was groping in her bag for a handkerchief when she suddenly got shoved in the back by a soldier’s hefty kitbag.
‘Hey. Sorry, ma’am!’ a voice said in a rich drawl. ‘Didn’t see you there.’
‘My fault!’ Poppy said, and then as the man apologised again, added that it didn’t matter in the slightest. ‘But, excuse me, you’re Australian, aren’t you?’
‘Nope,’ the soldier said with a grin.
‘American?’
He shook his head.
‘Canadian!’ Poppy said.
He nodded. ‘Right! The difference is,’ he continued, ‘that Canada and Australia are in the war, the Yanks aren’t. Not yet. Although a lot of their medics are over as volunteers.’
‘Hey! What’s the hold-up?’ someone shouted from further down the gangplank.
Poppy mumbled an apology, smiled at the soldier and ran up the last dozen steps of the plank on to the ship.
When she got off this ship, she thought, she would be in France. A foreign country. They ate strange food there and, according to the magazines Poppy had seen, dressed very stylishly. They had different money, a different language, and it was all going to be very odd.
She found herself a wooden slatted seat on the top deck. Her mother had told her to stay outside in the fresh air as long as possible, and if she felt sick, to stare at the horizon and chew a piece of ginger. Where she could get such a thing, her mother hadn’t said.
The journey, she’d been told, was about twelve hours, provided the ship didn’t have to go off course to avoid German shipping. She carried troops, equipment and possibly, for all Poppy knew, guns and ammunition, so could not sail under the patronage of the Red Cross. They would disembark at a well known French port, although, because of security, Poppy hadn’t been told which one. There she’d receive notification as to the hospital she’d be working at.
It was windy out on deck and Poppy did up the top button of her cloak, jammed her winter-uniform felt hat tightly over her fair hair, checked that the lock of the rather battered suitcase she’d borrowed from Ma was still holding, and closed her eyes.
She’d had a very emotional morning, first of all saying goodbye to Matthews, Jameson and the rest of her VAD friends at the hostel, then – even worse – bidding farewell to the patients of Hut 59. The girl who was to be her replacement had started two days before, a pretty girl with dark eyes and hair long enough to plait right round her head who’d already been nicknamed Indian Queen by the boys. Poppy also had to bear Private Sharp telling her that he thought the new VAD looked like Lillian Gish, the glamorous movie star.
She felt ashamed at any petty feelings of jealousy, however, when the boys brought out the autograph book they’d made for her. Every man on the ward who had use of his arms had written something: something funny or sentimental or both. Three of them had written poems. Somehow, too, they’d found out her first name and the book’s pages were liberally strewn with poppies in scarlet crayon.
Then there were the thoughtful presents: a brooch made from a piece of shrapnel which had been removed from Private Taylor’s back, a white lawn handkerchief embroidered with Private Tippett’s regimental badge and several hand-carved wooden figures. Poppy started to read the contents of the autograph book, but faltered at the first poem, which declared:
She cheers us when we’re lonely,
She bandages us when we fall,
Our Very Adorable Darling
Is the loveliest VAD of all.
Already feeling emotional, Poppy nearl
y broke down at this, and decided to leave the reading of the book until she was on her own. Sniffing, she’d thanked everyone and promised to send them messages care of Moffat, the other long-term VAD in the ward. There was no sign of Michael Archer, which was a little disappointing, but she thought he might have received his orders and already be Out There.
The Paris Belle slowly filled up with passengers. They were mostly in uniform: doctors, nurses and VADs, orderlies, bandsmen and small groups of men intending to rejoin their regiments after convalescence. Most men were wearing the khaki of the British soldier, but there were other Allied uniforms in different shades of grey or khaki, and a few French soldiers in very smart grey-blue trench coats.
As Poppy sat watching the work going on along the quayside, huge crates came on board containing mail bags. This caused her to think how many there were and how desperately each letter was longed for – which in turn led to thoughts of Freddie again, and his last letter assuring her that there was nothing between him and Miss Cardew. Fancy her being so stupid as to believe him!
Then another thought struck her: suppose he hadn’t actually gone through with the wedding? The newspaper report had said that it would take place quietly on New Year’s Day, but what if, once on leave, Freddie had decided that it was Poppy whom he really loved? And now – well, now she was fleeing the country and he’d never be able to find her! This notion only occupied her for a few moments, however, until she faced the fact that Christmas had been more than two months ago and even the slowest writer in the world would have found a way to get an important message through in all that time.
Far below where Poppy was sitting, a dozen horses came on board, shaking their manes and twitching their tails. Following them came crates containing tinned food and medical supplies, and then such diverse objects as pigeons in cages, bicycles, tin baths, inner tubes for car wheels, crates of beer and piles of new kitbags were loaded into the vastness of the hold. Finally, the great doors were shut, the gangway removed and a shout was given of ‘Anchors away!’.
