BACK OF THE FRONT IN FRANCE
Reading edition
LETTERS FROM AMY OWEN BRADLEY
MOTOR DRIVER
OF THE
AMERICAN FUND FOR FRENCH WOUNDED
WITH SIXTEEN ILLUSTRATIONS
BOSTON
W. A. BUTTERFIELD
59 BROMFIELD ST.
Copyright
W. A. BUTTERFIELD
September, 1918
Dedicated
TO THE MANY WORKERS FOR
THE AMERICAN FUND FOR FRENCH WOUNDED
WHOSE LABORS HAVE ENABLED HELP
AND ENCOURAGEMENT
TO BE BROUGHT TO SO MANY BRAVE SOLDIERS
AND DEVOTED WOMEN OF FRANCE
IN THEIR TIME OF TRIAL
FOREWORD
These letters from a young American girl in France to her family, were written without thought of publication. She is still in France and has therefore been unable to revise them herself, or correct errors due to the haste with which they were written.
They are the simple record of what she has seen and felt in France, in doing work that has taken her from Brittany to the Alps.
R. M. B.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I PAGE
Winter in Paris 1
CHAPTER II
Brittany and Its Hospitals 14
CHAPTER III
A Visit To Verdun 41
CHAPTER IV
Pershing’s Troops Arrive 57
CHAPTER V
Back of the Front at Nancy 63
CHAPTER VI
Chambéry and Our Soldiers on Leave 103
ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
Interior of A. F. F. W. Dépôt at Quimper Frontispiece
Exterior of A. F. F. W. Dépôt at Quimper 14
Miss Key with a German prisoner and a French doctor 24
United States flag on Mairie at Quimper 26
Sisters at a hospital 30
“Maggie” in center of a ruined town 43
The morning shave, back of the trenches 48
Pet baby wild boar 50
“Somewhere” near Verdun 56
Motor of Zeppelin at Bourbonne 71
Remains of a “Taube” at Champenoux 74
Poste de Secours 99
American soldiers at Chambéry 121
American soldiers on Y. M. C. A. steps at Chambéry 128
Belgian tuberculosis hospital at Chambéry 133
A. F. F. W. Dépôt at Chambéry 143
INTRODUCTION
The American Fund for French Wounded started its work of emergency relief for the sufferers in France in April, 1915, as a part of an English organization. By December, 1915, the desire to help France and to testify to the deep sympathy with her cause had resulted in such a rapid growth of the organization in this country that an independent American society was formed with a central distributing depot in Paris.
The work in America has been carried on by many hundreds of committees throughout the entire country. In these committees thousands of workers have for more than three years given countless hours of labor, preparing and packing surgical dressings, hospital supplies and garments, refugee clothing and comfort bags. Over 40,000 cases filled with these supplies have been forwarded to France in that time, besides motor cars and trucks for the delivery service of the Fund, and sums of money for immediate emergency calls.
In France, these supplies have been distributed from the Paris Depot and from the many branch depots and dispensaries, this work being carried on with the approval of the French Government and in coöperation with the American Red Cross.
It is hoped that these letters may help some of the many devoted workers of the Fund to follow in imagination their handiwork until it reaches those who are so sorely in need across the sea.
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