Personal Strength

Interviewer: What gave you the strength, personal strength to be able to deal with these, these wounded men, disfigured men? I think I remember that God loves us all, if we let him and that he loved them no matter how bad they were and that I remember because I know when I went once I didn’t think I was going to be able to face it, but as I say they were such rascals you know. You sort of had to fight back. You know the things they’d do or tease you or call you, but the nurses were good at that hospital too and I think some of them married some of the boys. But we had them all over, French sailors, mmm hmm sailors!! French sailors there, Australians, Americans. They were all, all had different needs. I remember feeding Mike Safranski, he was American, I don’t know what rank he was, captain. All I saw of him for ages was white, white bandages all around his face. I could see where his eyes were and his mouth was and I remember talking to him, “Would you like me to feed you something? ”, “Yes.” I don’t know whether it was marshmallows I pushed into his mouth, you know. I could see where his eyes were and I said, “I can’t see your eyes”. But that was scary you know that you couldn’t see a face. I saw a picture of him afterwards and he’s a good looking fellow. It’s not an ordinary hospital so you never knew what you were going to see!