G.I. Nightingales: The Army Nurse Corps in World War II

Weaving together information from official sources and personal interviews, Barbara Tomblin provides an account of the U.S. Army Nurse Corps in World War II. She describes how over 60,000 army nurses, all volunteers, cared for sick and wounded American soldiers in every theatre of the war, serving in the jungles of the Southwest Pacific, the frozen reaches of Alaska and Iceland, the mud of Italy and northern Europe, or the heat and dust of the Middle East. Many of the women in the Army Nurse Corps served in dangerous hospitals near the front lines - 201 nurses were killed by accident or enemy action, and another 1600 won decorations for meritorious service. These nurses address the extreme difficulties of dealing with combat and its effects in World War II, and their stories are all the more valuable to women’s and military historians because they tell of the war from a very different viewpoint than that of male officers. In addition to the nurses’ insights about the daily workings of war, Tomblin also discusses the history of the Army Nurse Corps and addresses the implications of its decision to enlist African-American nurses and the experiences of these women out in the field.