Decades after the war, June Wandrey thought back fondly on one of her first assignments as a nurse at Fort Custer in Battle Creek, Michigan. “One ward was full of fellows suffering from pilonidal cysts, affectionately called Jeep Seats,” Wandrey recalled. “It was the most cheerful ward. Each AM, when the Major and I walked in to change their dressings and check their surgery, I’d call out, ‘Bottoms up, fellows.’ Thirty plump pairs of smiling buns would turn skyward.” Twenty-two-years-old when she enlisted in the Army Nurse Corps, Wandrey was 5′ 2″ tall with, in her own words, “finely honed muscles that were dynamite ready.” (She signed one of her first letters away from home, “Your littlest tomboy.”) In March 1943 Wandrey journeyed across the Atlantic where for the next two and a half years she would serve throughout Western Europe and North Africa as a combat nurse. The work was bloody, often exhilarating, sometimes tedious, and very dangerous. Almost a year after her arrival, Wandrey wrote to her family in Wisconsin to give them an idea of the conditions in which she and her colleagues lived and, quite literally, operated.
2-9-44 Somewhere in Italy
Dear Family,
It has been a hellish bit of night duty. Admitting critically wounded patients on the double, getting them cleaned up, starting I.V.s, changing dressings, getting them something to eat (if they could), and giving medications. You have to keep involved records of everything for the Army; that’s as it should be.
To compound the misery, it started to pour and the tents leak. They are filled to over capacity and there is no place to put the poor soldiers to keep them dry. We’re high up in the mountains and it gets bitter cold, noisy too. The big guns boom all night long and shake the ground. My fingers are so cold I have to warm them over my candle so that I can hold the pen to write.
The Germans bombed and strafed a hospital on the beachhead a few days ago. Latest reports listed 23 dead and 68 wounded. The dead included two nurses, six patients, 14 of the hospital personnel, and a Red Cross worker. The dead patients were in the receiving ward with wounds suffered at the front and were waiting to be operated on. The hospital was more than half a mile from the nearest military target. Fragmentation bombs were dropped on the operating and administrative areas and the ward tents. Two litter bearers were hit while carrying a “chest case” to the operating ward. The men tried to hold up the litter but they had to let it drop. The report said the patient has a chance of pulling through.
Incidentally, we, too, were scheduled to go in on the beachhead but our orders were cancelled at the very last minute. Mother, I feel your prayers for me are getting top priority. We were also scheduled for the Salerno landings, and they also were cancelled at the last minute.
I wish you could see me tonight. For a change, I swore that I was going to be WARM. Over the first layer, (my long woolen underwear, a wool sweater, a wool olive drab shirt), I wear a pair of men’s fatigues. My GI shoes, which are two sizes too big for me, are also men’s. They are covered with mud to the tops.
Wearily,
June
Less than two and half months later, in late March 1944, Wandrey was stunned to receive the following letter from her beau, an officer residing in the States. (Names have been changed to protect the privacy of certain individuals.)
June Darling,
Had intended writing to you on Saturday evening and at the same time take care of a lot of old correspondence which I’ve accumulated over a period of months. Was OD that night and, after making early rounds, I stopped at the Club for supposedly a few minutes but got stuck in a bridge game, which lasted out the evening. Had a few good cards and also a lot of bad. Haven’t played much bridge since Mary left.
Yesterday was another beautiful day, just about as nice as any spring day could be. Went for a long walk in the afternoon and then last night went to the show in Bay Shore with Pat the WAC officer. The picture we saw was “Up in Arms”, very good but somewhat misleading as to the grand and glorious life of the Army Nurse Corps.
Received two letters from you this morning, darling, both quite old, and another on Friday written March 14th. Am very happy to hear that you have had the opportunity to go to the Rest Camp for a little vacation. It was long past due, and I know has been pleasant. I still so much wish, however, that you might have been returned to the States instead and still hope that that day will not have to be too far in the future.
Darling, there is something I have wanted to write about for the past several weeks and is something I feel should be discussed. Regardless of the final outcome, I feel that it is no more than fair to all concerned that I tell you now, otherwise I’m afraid that some day I might feel the perfect heel and be ashamed even to face myself. If you’ve not already guessed, I am referring to the love tangle I’ve become involved in.
On one or two previous occasions, I’ve mentioned Mary in my letters. Whether you had ever thought or wondered if I was becoming too interested in someone else, I don’t know, but it almost seems that at time you must have.
Our friendship started very casually with an occasional date, never dreaming of or having any desire to go steady with anyone. In a short while, however, it became quite apparent that ours was to be more than just a casual acquaintance, at which time I laid the cards on the table and told Mary all about you because I did not want to find a one-sided love affair developing, and then some day for her to be badly hurt. After that I felt much better, had a clear conscience and things went along fine. Months went by and friendship turned to love, I know we both realized it but were afraid to face it. Was even afraid to admit it to myself, not knowing just how to cope with the situation. She felt much the same, not wanting to hurt you nor wanting to be hurt herself. I never once thought it would be possible to fall in love with someone else nor that I could be so much in love with two different persons. I found that I was wrong.
Mary was transferred and has been gone five weeks, which has given me the opportunity to think this through more clearly and on an unbiased basis but still has not enabled me to arrive at any satisfactory decision. Darling I’ve had many sleepless and worried nights but can’t see through the fog I’m engulfed in. This, June, is just one more and important reason why I want you to return to the States now, because I don’t want this to drag out indefinitely. It has been more than difficult to write this letter, darling, but at least I now feel as though a heavy weight has been lifted from my heart and mind.
My love, Del
Wandrey sent the letter to her family, along with the attached note:
Mother, Daddy and Ruthie, it is cruel “To lift the weight from a man’s heart and mind,” who is living stateside in great comfort and luxury in his custom-tailored uniforms and dump it on another’s heart and mind, who is living in a tent in the mud, being rocked by artillery fire in the mountains, and harassed by low-flying German fighters. I can understand civilians not knowing how war is fought, but I cannot understand how officers can be so naive. He says, “Return to the States now.” Am I supposed to go to General Mark Clark, letter in hand, and get permission to leave the battle zone? Lying creatively, in a short letter, I gently let him off the hook. In spirit, I joined the legion of soldiers in ETO who received a Dear John letter. “Love postponed on account of war” became my battle cry
Just,
June
Despite the heartache, Wandrey maintained her sense of humor. Throughout her hundreds of wartime letters to friends and family, Wandrey was constantly making puns, relating humorous anecdotes, and sending mildly risqué poems. In June 1944 she had the opportunity to see the Vatican, and the visit, as described in the following letter to her older sister, turned out to be rather eventful.
6-15-44 Italy
Dear Betty,
Today was my turn to go to the Vatican; I wore my dress uniform with a skirt. I went with our Catholic chaplain. Two Catholic nurses from another hospital joined us as we were crossing the Piazza S. Pietro. The Swiss Guards wear the most colorful garb, big black tam-o-shanters, blue and black leg-o-mutton blouses, and knee breeches. They carry staffs. The men who guard the Pope have helmets with plumes, spears, and multi-colored garments on the same order as the Swiss guards. They are the Papal colors of the early Roman Empire. There were thousands of GIs at the audience with the Pope.
We stood in the front row. The Pope stopped right in front of me. He’s as small as I am. I gave him a big smile and he extended his ring to me to kiss. Methodists just don’t go around kissing old men’s rings as you well know, so I didn’t. If one thinks of the sanitary aspects of that antiquated custom, it’s repulsive. Instead I extended my hand to him, gave him a happy, hearty handshake. We chatted briefly. I told him I came from Wisconsin. Also about the great fishing there and put in a good word for Father Nurnberg. Are he and Mom still discussing religions? The Pope blessed a rosary and gave it to me. I’m going to give it to Mrs. B. when I get back. It isn’t safe to send things home.
Perhaps I rattled his Papal cage, but I meant no disrespect. His position I salute. The Catholic nurses on either side of me wanted to hit me over the head after it was over. They were burned up because he didn’t speak to them and wasted his attention on me. They broke out a package of cigarettes and started to smoke in the Vatican. To me that was a sacrilege. The Vatican is a wonderful, incredibly beautiful building made so by the paintings and sculptures. The Judgement Day is magnificent. There must be a thousand rooms in the compound. I think even an atheist would be moved by the Holy nature of this place.
I have an infected finger from a jab with a dirty needle in the OR. The sulfadiazine I’m taking has made me absolutely sluggish and it doesn’t become me.
Love,
June
“Dearest family,” Wandrey reported from Germany on April 6, 1945, “It’s midnight and the church bell in the village is toiling; it sounds so mournful. At the moment, I’m sitting here alone with Sammy our only patient.” Wandrey became especially fond of Sammy, whom she described as a “young, handsome, black-haired, married, Italian-American enlisted infantryman [with] an angelic singing voice.” Fragments from a German grenade had ripped through his chest, legs, skull, and right arm, and there was no chance he would survive. The next day, an anguished Wandrey wrote home after Sammy succumbed to his injuries.
4-7-45 Germany
Dearest family,
Despite Sammy’s desperate battle to live, he slipped away just as morning broke. It broke my heart. Desperately tired, hungry, and sick of the misery and futility of war, I wept uncontrollaby, my tears falling on poor Sammy’s bandaged remains. Later this morning, our long overdue ambulance came to retrieve us. I couldn’t bear to leave Sammy; I sat on the ambulance floor next to his litter and held his corpse as we bounced over the pockmarked roads on his last trip to Graves Registration. When he died, part of me died too. His magnificent singing voice was stilled forever, but ’til the end of my days, I will still hear him say, “Nurse, you have a smile like a whooooole field of sunflowers.”
So sadly, June.
Exactly six months and ten days later June Wandrey was heading back to the States. In her last overseas letter to her family, she wrote: “I have no idea how long it will take us to cross the Atlantic this time. It’s incredible that I should be coming home in one piece. Love, June.” Wandrey would receive a total of eight battle stars for campaigns in Tunisia, Sicily, Naples-Foggia, Anzio, Rome-Arno, Southern France, Rhineland, and Central Europe.
