"Laughingly labeled a BEDPAN COMMANDO by the troops, June Wandrey recorded WWII from ambulance and tent as her mobile surgical unit followed the infantry. BEDPAN COMMANDO is a nurse’s story of a man’s war from Fort Custer to Dachau and all the bloody spots in between. Across North Africa and on to Sicily, Italy, France, Germany, Allach and Dachau, these women fought death, despair, and exhaustion with humor, tears and guts. 234 Pages from her diary and letters and illustrated with 70 never-before-published photographs, BEDPAN COMMANDO chronicles Wandrey’s coming-of-age while the world learned to capitalize the word Holocaust. Hysterical, historical, funny and sad. Young, confident and energetic, she climbed the gangplank on the SS Santa Elena bound for the battlefields of North Africa, Sicily, Italy, France and Germany. From her diary, notes and letters, live with her the life of a surgical nurse in a Field Hospital, often operating within the sounds of the guns. Feel with her the despair and infinite sadness as she cares for and comforts the wounded soldiers. Empathize with her agonized cry from the horrors of Allach and Dachau, “Where are you, God?”" (from Amazon.com)
A great book to get first hand accounts of what it really meant to be a nurse during WWII. Journal entries of author's thoughts and feelings made me feel like I "was there".
ReplyDeleteThe book may be graphic for some students, especially when author describes the wounded and when assisting with medical needs at the liberated camps of Allach and Dachau.