Nurses

A groupp of nurses pose in front of buildings of General Hospital No. 2.

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When the United States entered the war in 1917, the Army Medical Department transformed Fort McHenry in a massive general hospital for returning wounded soldiers. An intensive construction process began, resulting in over 100 structures that eventually housed over 20,000 patients between 1918 and 1923. The first new building to be completed was Nurses Home No. 1, and in January 1918, the first chief nurse reported for duty.

Most nurses came to Fort McHenry – now known as General Hospital No. 2 – either through the American Red Cross, which was responsible for providing nurses to the Army, or through direct application to the superintendent of the Army Nurse Corps. Although nurses had provided their services to the military ever since the Revolutionary War, it was not until 1901 that Congress officially established the Army Nurse Corps. By November 1918, there were over 20,000 army nurses on active duty, half of whom served overseas.

 

A group of nurses posing at the base of the George Armistead monument.

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Requirements

Originally, the Army required nurses to be between 25 and 35 years old, unmarried, and either a citizen or with the declared intention of becoming one. They were also required to be height and weight proportional, have good moral character, and to have graduated from a training school for nurses. After the United States entered the war, it became clear that there was a massive shortage of nurses, and some of these standards were relaxed, including both the age limit and the educational requirements. Even so, shortages persisted and the Army turned to the use of civilian nurses, especially during the influenza pandemic in 1918. Although more than 1,800 African American nurses were certified by the Red Cross as eligible to join the Army Nurse Corps, discrimination and segregation prevented the service of all but a very few, and only then at the very end of the war .

Work Environment

Despite being part of the military, the Army Nurse Corps members did not have any official rank, and therefore they had no insignia on their uniform. Even though nurses were technically supposed to be treated as officers, they were not always accorded the same respect and privileges. They also were paid significantly lower wages than male officers, and did not have the same retirement benefits. The organized nursing associations began to advocate for Congress to pass legislation that would remedy these issues. This was achieved in 1920, when nurses could finally wear the insignia of a Second Lieutenant all the way to a Major; however, the Surgeon General still required them to be addressed as “Miss,” and their pay was only half of their male counterparts.

 

Nurses posing on the Rodman cannons in Fort McHenry's outer battery.

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The nursing associations had some help in their quest for legislation from suffragists, some of whom were nurses themselves , who wrote editorials calling for support of a military rank for Army nurses. The nurses at Fort McHenry might have read some of these with interest, along with other articles by suffragists. They were likely aware that the American Nurses Association voted to support the 19th Amendment a few years earlier. Those who were members of the Maryland Graduate Nurses Association might have even pledged their own support at the Association’s annual meeting in 1919. At least two women at Fort McHenry had direct connections to the suffragist movement and efforts to educate women on voting rights. While no African American nurses were able to serve at Fort McHenry during the war, there was an active suffrage movement in the Baltimore African American community, and it is possible that nurses who wanted to serve their country found their way to working towards gaining the vote instead.