Elsie Inglis Part 10

We are all learning much from this war, and I know ---- will say it is all our own faults, but I am not sure that the theory that it is part of the long struggle between good and evil does not appeal more to my mind. We are just here in it, and whatever we suffer and whatever we lose, it is for the right we are standing.... It is all terrible and awful, and I don't believe we can disentangle it all in our minds just now. The only thing is just to go on doing one's bit.... Miss Henderson is taking home with her to-day a Serb officer, quite blind, shot right through behind his eyes, to place him somewhere where he can be trained. I heard of him just after I had read Eve's letter, and I nearly cried. He wasn't just a case at that minute, with my thoughts full of Jim. Dear old Jim! Give him my love, and tell him I'm _proud of him_. And how splendidly the regiment did, and how they suffered!

"Ever your loving sister, "ELSIE MAUD INGLIS."

Another of her Unit, who worked with Dr. Inglis not only during the year in Russia, but through much of the strenuous campaign for the Suffrage, gives us these remembrances:

"OUR LAST COMMUNION.

"'He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty.'

"Dearer to me even than the memory of those outstanding qualities of great-hearted initiative, courage, and determination which helped to make Dr. Elsie Inglis one of the great personalities of her age is the remembrance of certain moments when, in the intimacy of close fellows.h.i.+p during my term of office with her on active service, I caught glimpses of that simple, sublime faith by which she lived and in which she died.

"One of my most precious possessions is the Bible Dr. Inglis read from when conducting the service held on Sunday in the saloon of the transport which took our Unit out to Archangel. The whole scene comes back so vividly! The silent, listening lines of the girls on either hand--Hospital grey and Transport khaki; in the centre, standing before the Union Jack-covered desk, the figure of our dear Chief, and her clear, calm voice--'He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High.' One felt that such a 'secret place' was indeed the abode of her serene spirit, and that there she found that steadfastness of purpose which never wavered, and the strength by which she exercised, not only the gracious qualities of love, but those sterner ones of ruthlessness and implacability which are among the essentials of leaders.h.i.+p.

"Dr. Inglis was a philosopher in the calm way in which she took the vicissitudes of life. It was only when her judgment, in regard to the work she was engaged in, was crossed that you became aware of her ruthlessness--her _wonderful_ ruthlessness! I can find no better adjective. This quality of hers, perhaps more than any other, drew out my admiration and respect. Slowly it was borne in on those who worked with her that under no circ.u.mstances whatever would she fail the cause for which she was working, or those who had chosen to follow her.

"Another remembrance! By the banks of the Danube at Reni, where at night the searchlight of the enemy used to play upon our camp, in the tent erected by the girls for the service, with the little altar simply and beautifully decorated by the nurses' loving hands, I see her kneeling beside me wrapt in a deep meditation, from which I ventured to rouse her, as the Chaplain came towards her with the sacred Bread and Wine.

Looking back, it seems to me that even then her soul was reaching out beyond this present consciousness:

"'Here in the body pent, Absent from Him I roam.'

The look on her face was the look of those who hold high Communion. So 'in remembrance' we ate and drank of the same Bread and the same Cup.

Even as I write these words remembrance comes again, and I know that, although her bodily presence is removed, her spirit is in communion still."

FOOTNOTES:

[15] _A History of the Scottish Women's Hospitals._ Hodder and Stoughton. 7s. 6d.

[16] _With the Scottish Nurses in Roumania_, by Yvonne Fitzroy.

[17] We recall her great-uncle William Money's strict observance of the Sabbath.

[18] "The Dobrudja Retreat," _Blackwood_, March, 1918.

[19] _Blackwood_, March, 1918.

[20] _A History of the Scottish Women's Hospitals._

CHAPTER XII

"IF YOU WANT US HOME, GET _THEM_ OUT"

Through the summer months of 1917 Dr. Inglis had been working to get the Serbian division to which her Unit was attached out of Russia. They were in an unenviable position. The disorganization of the Russian Army made the authorities anxious to keep the Serbian division there "to stiffen the Russians." The Serb Command realized, on the other hand, that no effective stand at that time would be made by the Russians, and that to send the Serbs into action would be to expose them to another disaster such as had overtaken them in the Dobrudja. In the battle of the Dobrudja the Serb division had gone into the fight 14,000 strong; they were in the centre, with the Roumanians on the left and the Russians on the right. The Roumanians and Russians broke, and the Serbs, who had fought for twenty-four hours on two fronts, came out with only 4,000 men. Further slaughter such as this would have been the fate of the Serbian division if left in Russia.

"The men want to fight," said General Zivkovitch to Dr. Inglis; "they are not cowards, but it goes to my heart to send them to their death like this."

In July there had seemed to be a hope of the division being liberated and sent via Archangel to another front; however, later the decision of the Russian Headquarters was definitely stated. The Serbs were to be kept on the Roumanian front. "The Serb Staff were powerless in the matter, and entirely dependent on the good offices of the British Government for effecting their release."

Into this difficult situation Dr. Inglis descended, and brought to bear on it all the force of which she was capable. The whole story of her achievement is told in _A History of the Scottish Women's Hospitals_, in those chapters that are written by Miss Edith Palliser. Here we can only refer to the message Dr. Inglis sent to the Foreign Office through Sir George Buchanan, British Amba.s.sador at Petrograd, giving her own clear views on the position and affirming that "In any event the Scottish Women's Hospitals will stand by the Serbian division, and will accompany them if they go to Roumania."

At the end of the month of August the Unit, leaving Reni, rejoined the Serb division at Hadji-Abdul, a little village midway between Reni and Belgrade.

Dr. Inglis described it as a

"lovely place ... and we have a perfectly lovely camping-ground among the trees. The division is hidden away wonderfully under the trees, and at first they were very loath to let us pitch our big tents, that could not be so thoroughly hidden; but I was quite bent on letting them see what a nice hospital you had sent out, so I managed to get it pitched, and they are so pleased with us. They bring everybody--Russian Generals, Roumanian Military Attaches and Ministers--to see it, and they are quite content because our painted canvas looks like the roofs of ordinary houses."

"There was a constant rumour of a 'grand offensive' to be undertaken on the Roumanian front, which Dr. Inglis, though extremely sceptical of any offensive on a large scale, made every preparation to meet.

"The London Committee had cabled to Dr. Inglis in the month of August advising the withdrawal of the Unit, but leaving the decision in her hands, to which she replied:

"'I am grateful to you for leaving decision in my hands. I will come with the division.'

"Following upon this cable came a letter, in which she emphasized her reasons for remaining:

"'If there were a disaster we should none of us ever forgive ourselves if we had left. We _must_ stand by. If you want us home, get _them_ out.'"

Orders and counter-orders for the release of the division were incessant, and on their release depended, as we have seen, the home-coming of the Unit.

"The London Units Committee had feared greatly for the fate of the Unit if, as seemed probable, the Serb division was not able to leave Russia, and on November 9 approached the Hon. H. Nicholson at the War Department of the Foreign Office, who a.s.sured them that the Unit would be quite safe with the Serbs, who were well disciplined and devoted to Dr.

Inglis. At that moment he thought it would be most unsafe for the Unit to leave the Serbs and to try to come home overland.

"Mr. Nicholson expressed the opinion that the Committee would never persuade Dr. Inglis to leave her Serbs, and added: 'I cannot express to you our admiration here for Dr. Inglis and the work your Units have done.'"[21]

At last the release of the division was effected, and on November 14 a cable was received by the Committee from Dr. Inglis from Archangel announcing her departure:

"On our way home. Everything satisfactory, and all well except me."

This was the first intimation the London Committee had received that Dr.

Inglis was ill.

She arrived at Newcastle on Friday, November 23, bringing her Unit and the Serbian division with her. A great gale was blowing in the river, and they were unable to land until Sunday. Dr. Inglis had been very ill during the whole voyage, but on the Sunday afternoon she came on deck, and stood for half an hour whilst the officers of the Serbian division took leave of her.