- Contributed by听
- Bramley History Society
- People in story:听
- Mrs M M van den Bosch
- Location of story:听
- St. Bartholemew鈥檚 Hospital, London
- Background to story:听
- Civilian Force
- Article ID:听
- A4447299
- Contributed on:听
- 13 July 2005
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This story was submitted to the People鈥檚 War site by Bramley History Society and has been added to the website on behalf of Mrs M M van den Bosch with her permission and she fully understands the site鈥檚 terms and conditions.
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I started training as a nurse just after the Munich crisis in 1938.
I was in fear of losing communication with my parents, who lived in Tonbridge, when St. Bartholemew鈥檚 Hospital staff were evacuated to St. Albans. A skeleton staff was left in London.
We waited in empty wards expecting 鈥 what?
The hospital started filling up during the 鈥減honey war鈥 when men who had been sitting on the Maginot Line fell victim to 鈥榝lu, bronchitis, pneumonia, and TB鈥, arrived on our doorstep.
Dunkirk 鈥 There was a great invasion of patients. Everyone was on duty for hours, and the hospital filled up with long-term patients. As they were slowly discharged after many months we took over routine care of civilian patients who filled the empty beds.
The Battle of Britain brought in severely burned pilots. Sir Archibald McIndoe, who had a ward in Barts, treated them. Eventually they were transferred to a specialist hospital in East Grinstead, leaving room in Barts for Londoners who had been seriously injured in the bombing with burns and multiple injuries.
The last few months of my training was spent in London with the skeleton staffs that were still at Barts.
One memorable night during the London bombing in mid-September 1941 or 1942, I was travelling from St. Albans to Tonbridge by Greenline buses, changing at Victoria. At some time during the fiercest moment the driver and conductor got out and suggested we go no further. In the usual phlegmatic way of the British the passengers sat on the bus hopefully. With true British grit the driver and conductor said 鈥淲ell, if you want to go on we鈥檒l get going!鈥 A young soldier insisted that I should wear his helmet 鈥 I did, feeling very silly, and returned it saying that I thought his need was more important than mine. I arrived home safely, but the sky-line was ablaze over London, and we heard something of the incidents that had occurred that night.
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