15th Evac Hospital

[Walt's Daughter]

Just found this too - Excerpts taken from the Army Nurse Corps

 

Anzio

To speed up the slow pace of the Allied northward advance through Italy against the fierce German defenses at Cassino and the Gustav Line, Allied strategists planned a landing behind the German lines. On 22 January the British and American troops launched a successful surprise attack and landing on the Anzio beachhead. Because surprise was complete, the projected 12 percent casualty rate was held to less than 1 percent throughout the initial landing. The Germans, however, quickly regrouped for a stubborn defense that pinned the Allied forces in the beachhead for four months and stalled hopes for a rapid advance. Within the congested invasion perimeter, casualties mounted as the Allies repulsed persistent Luftwaffe and ground attacks.

 

The 33d Field Hospital and the 95th and 96th Evacuation Hospitals landed with the Anzio beachhead assault force and quickly set up operations. Approximately two hundred nurses were assigned to these units. On 24 January 1944, two days after the landing, the first bombs fell near the medical facilities. That night three British hospital ships, H.M.S. St. David, H.M.S. St. Andrew, and H.M.S. Leinster, were attacked by Luftwaffe aircraft while evacuating casualties from the beachhead. As in the case of the Newfoundland, the ships were well lighted and clearly marked with the red cross. The St. David, with 226 medical staff and patients aboard, received a direct hit and sank. The two Army nurses on board were among 130 survivors rescued by the damaged Leinster. One of these nurses, 2d Lt. Ruth Hindman, had survived the earlier bombing of the Newfoundland.

 

On 7 February a German plane attempting to bomb the port at Anzio was intercepted by a British Spitfire. While trying to gain altitude, the German pilot jettisoned his antipersonnel bombs on the 95th Evacuation Hospital. The direct hit on the surgical section killed 26 staff and patients, including 3 nurses; 64 others were wounded. The day before, several news correspondents had decided among themselves that the constant shelling had rendered one nurse

 

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too nervous to carry on much longer. Yet after the bombing, this nurse calmly took charge, rallied the surviving staff (nurses and corpsmen), and guided their treatment of the wounded. Nevertheless the commander of the medical installations in the Mediterranean theater decided that the 95th Evacuation Hospital had lost too many key personnel to function effectively. He replaced the unit with the 15th Evacuation Hospital, formerly stationed at Cassino. The 15th arrived at Anzio on 10 February, just in time to witness the bombing of the 33d Field Hospital. Long-range enemy artillery fire killed 2 nurses and I enlisted man and wounded 4 medical officers and 7 enlisted men. Both nurses were off duty at the time of the attack. One nurse had stopped at the tent of the other to borrow a book when a shell hit the tent, killing them instantly. Meanwhile, another shell smashed the generator of the operating tent, which caught fire. Medical personnel evacuated the forty-two patients by flashlight without incident, and for their bravery four nurses—1st Lt. Mary Roberts, 2d Lt. Elaine Roe, 2d Lt. Virginia Rourke, and 2d Lt. Ellen Ainsworth— received the first Silver Star medals awarded to women in the U.S. Army. Ainsworth, who was killed during the attack, was awarded the medal posthumously.

 

Throughout February and March, medical installations on the beachhead continued to receive direct hits. On 29 March the 56th Evacuation Hospital was shelled, leaving 3 officers, 1 nurse, 14 enlisted men, and 19 patients wounded and 4 patients killed. Whenever the air raid sirens at Anzio sounded, those patients who could put on their steel helmets and crawled under their cots to avoid flying shrapnel. Nurses and corpsmen lifted others to the ground. Patients whose condition rendered them immovable became very nervous, and nurses ignored the danger to stay with them.

 

In April the 36th Engineer Regiment excavated 3 1/2-foot foundations for the hospital tents and reinforced these protective earthworks with sandbag walls. Patients and medical personnel inside the hospitals were finally protected from flying shrapnel although not from direct hits.

 

A later observer explained that the medical detachment at Anzio was "part of a front that had no back. The beachhead was 15 miles wide and 7 miles deep and allowed no retreat from enemy fire." The large, impassable Pontine Marsh forced the invaders to locate their antiaircraft batteries, airstrips, maintenance shops, food' gasoline, and ammunition dumps (all lucrative targets) on the edge of the medical area. Enemy bombers often missed their targets and hit the hospitals. The frequent enemy hits on the congested corner occupied by the main

 

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medical installations earned it the nickname "Hell's Half Acre." Many soldiers believed that they were safer in their frontline foxholes than they would be in the hospitals.

 

The Fifth Army command allowed the nurses to remain at Anzio regardless of the danger and the mounting casualties because they were desperately needed. Between January and June the Anzio field and evacuation hospitals admitted 25,809 battle casualties, 4,245 accidental injuries, and 18,074 medical casualties (disease). These soldiers were stabilized and evacuated rapidly and efficiently. The performance of Army nurses at Anzio reinforced the fact that women could function effectively under fire on the front lines.