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    Australian Army Nursing Service

    Around 2,860 nurses from the Australian Army Nursing Service (AANS) served during the First World War, some 130 serving on Lemnos. They tended the sick and wounded at 3AGH and 2ASH between August 1915 and January 1916.

    Conditions were rudimentary. Initially, the nurses slept on the ground without mattresses. Their uniforms were not suited to the hot summer, but the women froze in winter. Eventually, the appalling conditions led to an investigation of 3AGH’s Colonel Fiaschi. Major General Fetherston concluded Fiaschi ‘treated Nurses shamefully – No consideration whatever … I believe the Hospital would have collapsed but for the Nurses’.

    The nurses’ resourcefulness and compassion were invaluable, especially on their arrival. From day one of the campaign, Australian nurses also served on hospital ships. In each of these medical settings, nurses’ care extended to social and emotional support.

    ‘The wounded men were being brought in motor ambulances from a mine sweeper & put at my feet. I could weep hysterically now it is over. I got them in the shade & rushed to my tent for my cup & pillow & two sheets a sister had given me out of her 6 she had brought with her – & got them tea from our billy tea & tried to keep the flies from their wounds.’

    – Sister Betha McMillan, letter, 23 Aug. 1915
    Patients being treated outside the ward tents.

    PATIENTS BEING TREATED OUTSIDE THE WARD TENTS. nM7Bo6ZY - STATE LIBRARY NSW

    The attire of the 3AGH nurses and the officer indicate just how the cold winter was. They wear heavy British overcoats with upturned collars, woollen hats, and puttees on their legs.
    Nurses bundled up in heavy British overcoats (collars upturned) and woollen hats, with puttees on their legs. J01424 - Australian War Memorial
    Sick men are conveyed in a lighter from 1ASH, in East Mudros, to a hospital ship anchored in the harbour.
    Sick men are conveyed in a lighter from 1ASH, in East Mudros, to a hospital ship anchored in the harbour. C02289 - Australian War Memorial