#24 Hospital at Horley

When I got to No. 24 it was 1200 beds with 24 wards and it was a very newly built hospital that had been built by the British people so it was a whole different set up because it was huge, we had four therapists and we worked very well together. Two of us would try to do the wards. We’d set off first thing in the morning about 8 o’clock with our machinery that we had to take and we’d try to cover 24 wards in some way and the other two would man the department for those that could get down to the department. Well, we were seeing lots of amputations and burns; all sorts of shrapnel wounds, gunshot wounds, feet that had come in contact with a shoe mine, land mine, just all kinds of things. And some of these had to be treated and then dressed afterwards. We just never had enough time. And after our supper in the evenings, often times we went back to make up our files, otherwise we would get way behind. But everybody, we all helped one another and the patients were very good help. You’d see a fellow with his arm up in an abduction splint up like this and he’d have a cigarette in one hand holding a cigarette for a fellow who didn’t have any hands or hands bandaged. And they would help feed the patients because there was sometimes only two nurses to a 24-bed ward.