“A white city of desolation”: Verdun as seen by three British nurses

• Main Author: Sylvie Pomiès-Maréchal
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Centre de Recherche et d'Etudes en Civilisation Britannique 2015-01-01
• Series: Revue Française de Civilisation Britannique
• Subjects: World War One; nursing; social representations; propaganda; gender
• Online Access: http://journals.openedition.org/rfcb/294

This paper focuses on the experience of British nurses, drawing on the personal accounts of K. Burke, W. Kenyon and S.M. Edwards, three British women posted on the Verdun front. Though acting at different levels of responsibility, these young volunteers went through converging experiences. Trying to put down in words this unspeakable reality, their eyewitness accounts echo one another. This paper will first address military and historical aspects as developed by Kenyon and Burke. It will then explore the social dimension of these accounts, reflecting on the significance of early 20th century social representations and wartime expectations. Propaganda, its distortion of motherhood and its instrumentalisation of femininity and masculinity will also be developed. This paper will finally analyse the nurses’ focus on compassion and the domestic image attached to nursing.