Pennsylvania 1917
Julie Doherty had been studying at Temple University School of Medicine in Pennsylvania since 1914. She enjoyed the study and the life style and excelled in all her subjects.
She graduated as Dux of the Class and could have chosen any hospital in America to serve her internship. She chose the Western Front in France.
Her brother Jack had been fighting in France since June 1917 and despite receiving letters from him on a regular basis she worried about his welfare. She felt that having come from a military family dating back to the Civil War, she should serve her country.
Julie enlisted as a Medical Officer and sailed to France on 25th November 1917. On the Carpathia!
It was a pleasant trip; as an officer she had her own cabin and the seas were smooth. The Carpathia docked at Bordeaux on 8th December and she immediately caught the train to the Front.
Dr Doherty was assigned to a dressing station near Cantigny located just behind the Front.
The untried American troops were assigned the task of capturing and holding Cantigny. General Haig saw this as a test for the American fighting spirit.
The Major in charge of the medical team was Steven Duncan, an experienced doctor and formerly Chief Surgeon at John Hopkins in San Francisco.
‘OK, listen everybody. Tomorrow when this operation commences in earnest there will be many casualties. If any of you have worked in a casualty ward and have experienced the mayhem that quite often occurs, triple that intensity and stress. That will give you some idea about what it’s going to be like.
‘Today you should all be checking your instruments, particularly the sharpness of your saws. I am afraid you’re going to need them. Nurses make sure there are sufficient bandages and there are sufficient vials of ether and morphine.
‘Good luck everyone and let’s all have a drink when it’s over.’
Unfortunately the quiet before the storm was cut short; the Germans got wind of the attack and fired fifteen thousand mustard gas shells into the American trenches.
The dressing station received over two hundred and fifty burns patients over a three-hour period. Men with blistering hands, others with blistering skin on their faces, others with blindness. The team rushed to try and give these poor blighters some relief. Julie had never seen anything like it. By the end of the night all patients had been taken by ambulance to the field hospital nearby.
The team were advised to try and get some sleep, as the offensive attack would still be taking place the next morning. Julie collapsed on her stretcher and was asleep in five minutes.
