Julia Stimson had been born into a prominent, well-heeled family with the firm belief that everyone should strive to make a difference: a belief she staunchly supported. Julia’s path led her to the fairly new and evolving profession of nursing. In April 1917, she was in her mid-30s and already the superintendent of nurses at Barnes Hospital and head of nursing training at the prestigious Washington University in St. Louis, and turning out some of the finest nurses in the country.
However, with a war raging in Europe and the United States preparing to join the fight, when the Red Cross proposed sending American medical units over early to relieve the exhausted British doctors and nurses, Julia jumped at the chance to accompany the unit from Barnes, designated American Red Cross Base Hospital 21, and to be of service. With only six weeks to recruit additional nurses, organize, and train, Julia, the doctors, and staff worked a miracle to be ready to proceed to France and the frontlines.
THE WAR NURSE by Tracey Enerson Wood is the historical fiction account of the real Julia Stimson’s work with the Red Cross and Base Hospital 21 at Rouen, France. Told from Julia’s point-of-view, it is built on Stimson’s actual letters to friends and family back home in the states and borrows information and tales gleaned from the diaries of other nurses who served in similar circumstances and settings during World War I. It is a riveting fictional recounting of human feelings, emotions, and experiences, and nursing history in its near infancy, and includes a lovely but bittersweet romantic subplot.
There is mention of how the war is progressing during the time frame of the story but it is not dwelt upon in great detail. The same can be said of battle injuries and trauma; they are mentioned enough that the reader will understand the magnitude of the situation but not in gory detail. The author incorporates other well-known historical figures, alive and present during the events of the story, in interesting and plausible ways, and this enhanced my feel for the time and place. So many stories use World War II as a backdrop and this historical story of this earlier, lesser-featured conflict was intense, exciting, and completely fascinating.
Julia is a strong-minded, strong-willed heroine, an unusual portrayal of a woman of the early 20th century, but apparently true-to-life according to her contemporaries. With the first-person viewpoint, we are privy to her personal vulnerabilities, doubts, fears, and convictions, and I connected with her from the very start. The story is rounded out with a number of other well-developed fictional characters who I also came to know and love. I really appreciated that the author included an accounting of which characters were actual historical figures and who were fictional because they all became real to me.
THE WAR NURSE is a fascinating new novel of people and events in WWI. I highly recommend it to readers of historical fiction, especially those with an interest in World War I, nursing, and stories of women in American history who made a difference, but have been forgotten or overlooked by mainstream histories.
Another gripping historical fiction masterpiece from international bestselling author Tracey Enerson Wood
She asked dozens of young women to lay their lives on the line during the Great War. Can she protect them?
Superintendent of Nurses Julia Stimson must recruit sixty-five nurses to relieve the battle-worn British, months before American troops are ready to be deployed. She knows that the young nurses serving near the front lines of will face a challenging situation, but nothing could have prepared her for the chaos that awaits when they arrive at British Base Hospital 12 in Rouen, France. The primitive conditions, a convoluted, ineffective system, and horrific battle wounds are enough to discourage the most hardened nurses, and Julia can do nothing but lead by example—even as the military doctors undermine her authority and make her question her very place in the hospital tent.
When trainloads of soldiers stricken by a mysterious respiratory illness arrive one after the other, overwhelming the hospital's limited resources, and threatening the health of her staff, Julia faces an unthinkable choice—to step outside the bounds of her profession and risk the career she has fought so hard for, or to watch the people she cares for most die in her arms. Based on a true story, The War Nurse is a sweeping historical novel by international bestselling author Tracey Enerson Wood that takes readers on an unforgettable journey through WWI France.
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