Diary Entry from a Britsh Nurse on the War Front

Dear Diary, 2nd of June 1915

Well, times haven’t been all that easy these past months. The sights I’ve seen lately grip my heart terribly and make me worry heavily. I see the wounded men around me. All I can think is that this war has just begun and it can only get worse from here. And the stories I’ve heard from back home make me worry for my family and for my fellow countrymen.

Due to the war, the British government has declared that their citizens lessen the amount of food and provisions that each family gets. But instead of doing that, the richer class is buying up all the food from the stores. Big stores have run out of food and small stores are being forced to raise their prices. Of course, this leaves barely any food for the poorer classes and some groups of people have attacked the stores that are being bought-out by the richer class. Also, the richer class is taking out all their money out of the banks to keep in their houses. The fear of the banks closing for the war is the cause of this. The war is causing people to act differently and irrationally.

Thankfully, my brother, Richard, wrote to me a couple of months ago and let me know that my family had enough to eat. I hope they can last this war. I worry enough about them possibly being attacked by those brute Germans and their allies. I would hate to think that they didn’t have enough food to eat as well.

The Germans led a raid on Great Britain using aero planes on the 19th of January. At first, I heard that it was successful and that many had died and were wounded according to the newspapers. This frightened me greatly. Fortunately, later on, I came to find that only four people were killed and sixteen were wounded. To be honest, the news raised my spirits somewhat. It didn’t really seem like the war would go on much longer with the Germans leading attacks like that and with such little affect. Unfortunately that all changed soon enough.

On the 25th of May, we received a large amount of critically wounded soldiers. I had never seen so many. They were all on the floor moaning, coughing and puking up blood. However, there was something different about a lot of the men. For some reason, most of the men were choking and gasping for air. I had never been so confused in my life. I didn’t understand why they couldn’t breathe. The men would begin grasping their chests out of excruciating pain and agony. It tore me apart that I couldn’t help the pain go away. I didn’t know what to do.

Later, after all the nurses had attended to the soldiers, I came to find that the Germans used a new weapon on the troops. They used a type of chlorine gas. It spread to the trenches the men were in and forced them to climb out of them. Unfortunately, when the troops came up to higher ground, they were immediately hit by German ammunition. The gas that they used is supposed to make it hard for you to breathe and kills the lungs slowly. Oh I couldn’t imagine enduring pain like that. I truly admire those men fighting.

It pains me that I could not relieve the men of their agony. I wish this war would end. I wish the Germans would stop their war-mongering on the countries around them. Why can’t this end? Why do our people have to suffer for the German selfishness and greed? I hope that there is a change for the better soon.

Sincerely, Elizabeth Gordon