Anna Louise Tittman Memoir - University of Illinois Springfield

Anna Tittm 135 ;
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in one of the off corntries Uke China or Korea or smplqce like th t,
''and ~self, visited the city hospital, We first went N o two smal f
bulldings where the patients were crawded close toether. Every bed
had a bedpan under it needing attentf an. The odor kmn test [was dread- -
full and from the bathmom that had no outlet as the windows were double
and sealed. The sister in cha~ge would not open them under slny consideration.
A sick child was stowed away in me comer of the mom and the sister
first said that the doctor would not allow the window to be openpd.
MISS Lloyd was willing to take matters into her own hands and began
5
to
open the windm when the sister, alrnost weepfng, said tha@ if she di the
child would die. Across the street w a ~ the main hospital, a two sto brick
building. On entrance we found a cluttered up hallway, beds with pa ients
and beds without patients, hit and miss, in between which we could s arcely
wind our way. Chinese and Russian patients were in one ward. No in cation
of care. Scarcity of bedding and so forth. A docto7 and siste arrived
on the scene just as we completed our cursory visitqtion, and file
they were courteous, they did not permit us to go to the Becond floob.
They phoned some official for gedssion, and we were tola to return tommw.
We decided the trip would not be worthwhile.
After dinner, we went to the RRS, Railroad Service Hospit$l. Had a nice
little visit with Miss Daub, hrican Red Cross nurse and then to a moving
picture show at hrican engineer bmcks .'I See, we had) a whole X& of
those Amrican engineers over there. They could help wit$ the rikilmad, and
they codd help with this and that and the other. We had a bunch of them in
our barracks once. Piis is another sbory-one of the rimes wasn't well.
We were having a party that ni&t. Sbce the engineers hpdn't been there
for som tim, I said, [to the nurse] 'We '11 put you in there [in me of
thkir room 1. It ' ll be quiet ;" And the engineers care tcp the party and
stmed ri@t into that room and there she was. They were so surprised, but
they were nice and decent. They come out and told rw wha$ they'd dme. But
before we put in the nurse, the sick nurse, they had d a bottle of
whiskey under some of the beddfng and he cam for
And he
got it.
Q. He did get it?
A. Yes, he got it.
Q. Wouldnl t sore of these patients in the hospital here &it Harbin have been
better off at horn?
A. They didn't have horns, so ~llany of them. They were wanderem, you haw,
a lot of them. No, they would only-Wouldn t have any c w at all. And
then the doctor couldn't go to all the horns, you see. Apd we had som doctors,
Russian doctors, that worked wQh us, although we had our own doctors,
too. Not enough of them, and a pod r#mny of them were ov. They didn't
work so fast. We had a party of our mit go bathing in e water off of
a Russian Island.
Q. Now this is near Vladivostok? 7