NURSES: from The Story of The Anzacs

If there were heroes at the Dardanelles, there were heroines, too, for who would deserve this name were it not the nurses,' The work which they did in Egypt and at Mudros was of a kind which no wounded Australian or New Zealander is ever likely to forget. They left comfortable homes for the heat and rigour and danger of the Military Hospitals, where they ran far greater risks of illness and break-down than they would have incurred in nursing work conducted under peace conditions.

Each one of them seemed able to perform the maximum of work with the minimum of sleep and rest. However tired they were, they never failed to have a smile and a kindly word for each soldier under their care. Nor was their endurance limited to the conditions of hospital life, as was shown when the transport "Marquette," carrying 600 British troops, 150 other men, and 36 New Zealand nurses of the First Stationary Hospital, was torpedoed in the Aegean.

After the torpedo struck the vessel the nurses were lined up, 18 on each side of the ship: one writer, Surgeon Captain Harrison, says, "The behaviour of the nurses was magnificent; I never saw anything like it - not the slightest sign of panic: everyone showed a spirit that would not have shamed the bravest troops of the whole world." When ordered to take to the boats the nurses said, "No, the fighting men first." New Zealand may well be proud of her heroic daughters.