The Backwash of War is a book by American nurse and author Ellen N. La Motte, that was first published in 1916. The book chronicles La Motte's experiences whilst working in a French field hospital as a nurse during World War I. The diary she kept was published in vignettes in Atlantic Monthly and then published in book form. Philosophical and poignant, La Motte writes with a bluntness and cyncicism that lays bare the horrors that the soldiers went through, and the doctors and nurses had to deal with. Some of the events are ...
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The Backwash of War is a book by American nurse and author Ellen N. La Motte, that was first published in 1916. The book chronicles La Motte's experiences whilst working in a French field hospital as a nurse during World War I. The diary she kept was published in vignettes in Atlantic Monthly and then published in book form. Philosophical and poignant, La Motte writes with a bluntness and cyncicism that lays bare the horrors that the soldiers went through, and the doctors and nurses had to deal with. Some of the events are written about with a well deserved sardonic tone - such as the man who tried to kill himself and...'Since he had failed-in the job, his life must be saved, he must be nursed back to health, until he was well enough to be stood up against a wall and shot.'
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