Ambulance Trains

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They were also used during the Second World War which included in England and Scotland to transfer the wounded to the many temporary and permanent UK Military Hospitals for further recuperation and treatment. Most of these military hospitals were located in rural locations so that servicemen would not suffer unduly from air raids by the German Luftwaffe. The main line train companies actively helped the Army, Navy and RAF with supply and conversion of the ambulance trains and during WWII this was sanctioned by the Railway Executive Committee. The war diaries of QA Sisters who served aboard hospital trains and ambulance trains can be read in Women in the War Zone: Hospital Service in the First World War. The book Sub Cruce Candida: A Celebration of One Hundred Years of Army Nursing has more photographs of ambulance trains used by the military. Ambulance trains were also called first aid trains, hospital trains, casualty evacuation trains or travelling hospitals. They were specifically designed so that nurses of the Red Cross and the Queen Alexandra's Imperial Military Nursing Service (QAIMNS) and army medical officer doctors and orderlies of the Royal Army Medical Corps (RAMC) could continue the care of evacuated soldiers. As can be seen in the photo above the interior of the ambulance train would be fitted with beds down each side to maximise the number of wounded that could be transported. The book It's a Long Way to Tipperary: British and Irish Nurses in the Great War by Yvonne McEwen has extracts from the war diaries of QA's who served aboard hospital trains some of which had been published anonymously by the Nursing Times during the Great War. An example of such an extract: They were bleeding faster than we could cope and the agony of getting them off the stretchers on to the top bunks is a thing to forget. Some of the ambulance trains were also fitted out with an operating theatre. To ensure better hygiene and the ability to scrub down these theatres would be completely tiled. Emergency operations would be performed despite the movement of the train, the cramped conditions and poor lighting. A QARANC wall plaque and shield is available to buy through Amazon. The QA shield is hand made and ready to hang on the wall. . Buy Now. Findextrawork Since leaving the QA's we have done an assortment of self employed work and jobs, some which only take an hour a week, others have been full time. We have written about these at our other website Findextrawork at www.findextrawork.co.uk where we share the information for free to help others with information and resources about earning more money. Visit Findextrawork for more information. By the Second World War there was about 30 ambulance trains in operation. Each carriage was painted with a red cross on white background on the roof and side so that enemy planes would identify them as hospital trains and not troop or supply trains. This prevented them being a legitimate target under the Geneva convention. A typical ambulance train would have 14 carriages. The first carriage would hold the brake carriage and boiler, depending on the number of stretcher cases there would usually be six carriages made into bedded wards, one carriage for patients who could sit on seats and one carriage that was a combined operating theatre, pharmacy and medical store. Two carriages would be fitted into a cookhouse and dining room whilst two more carriages would serve as accommodation for the medical and nursing staff. The last carriage was the brake end and general store. The staff carriages were usually converted from the first class carriages and compartments to ensure the comfort of the nursing and medical staff who would be stationed permanently to the ambulance train. Work was arduous and many of the casualties came straight from the battlefield such as the Battles of Ypres in the First World War. QAs were kept busy preserving the lives of badly wounded soldiers until they could be evacuated to military hospitals. The book The Roses of No Man's Land by Lyn MacDonald has diary extracts and accounts of QA Sisters who worked in the hospital trains that took casualties from The Front of World War One. This includes unloading stretcher cases at Boulogne, Le Touquet, Rouen and Le Havre where journeys from Belgium could have taken up to three days. The evacuation of casualties from Regimental Aid Post, to Field Dressing Station through to Casualty Clearing Station before being evacuated by ambulance train and then to Britain is described in more detail in The Roses of No Man's Land. Operation Dynamo Operation Dynamo was the military codename for the evacuation of British and Allied troops from the battle of Dunkirk. Operation Dynamo took place from the 26 May to the 4 June 1940. The name was given as Operation Dynamo because the planning was done in the Dynamo Room of Dover Castle where the planner, British Vice Admiral Bertram Ramsay briefed the Prime Minister Winston Churchill. During Operation Dynamo the ambulance trains and their staff worked round the clock to transfer wounded soldiers, airmen and seamen to military care facilities and hospitals. During the German advance into France at the beginning of WWII ambulance trains were used to evacuate the wounded and to surgeons performed life saving operations during the journeys whilst the QAs tended to the wounded and injured administering pain relief and changing dressings. They too became casualties of war. In his book Front-line Nurse: British Nurses in World War II Eric Taylor cites that of the 14 hospital trains that were in use in France 9 were lost through bombing or capture. In Britain civilian nurses worked aboard hospital trains during the evacuation of patients from cities that were bombed by the German Luftwaffe. Ambulance trains were used during the Korean War in 1953 when wounded POWs were repatriated as art of Operation Little Switch. QAs nursed aboard these ambulance trains and more can be read on our Korean War and the QARANC page. The Real Tenko The latest book about British Army nurses and nursing describes a dark chapter in the history of the QAs. The Real Tenko: Extraordinary True Stories of Women Prisoners of the Japanese by Mark Felton is an account of the fall of the Far East to Japan. It comprehensively covers war atrocities performed by the Japanese troops to women stationed in places such as Singapore and Hong Kong. This included Sisters of the QAs who were stationed in hospitals such as BMH Bowen Road Hong Kong and BMH Singapore. Read the Qaranc.co.uk review or Buy Now with free delivery available. View more British Army Nursing Books - with free delivery available. If you would like to contribute to this page, suggest changes or inclusions to this website or would like to send me a photograph then please e-mail me. The photos and pictures on this page have been kindly sent to us for inclusion on this page. If you would like to contribute photographs then please contact us. For the official Army QARANC webpage please go to www.army.mod.uk/home.aspx For the QARANC Association website please go to www.army.mod.uk/army-medical-services/qaranc/9884.aspx ********************************************* Help Needed** A reader of Qaranc.co.uk is researching the exhumation of Heinrich Himmler in Luneberg, Germany circa 1945-46. He thinks that two nurses from the QAIMNS attended the exhumation due to the poor state of health of Walter Schellenberg. He would like to learn if any of the nurses kept a diary of the events leading up to the exhumation or sent any personal letters home to friends or family that may have provided an insight into Walter Schellenberg and the exhumation. Please contact Qaranc.co.uk if you have any information. Qaranc.co.uk have recently learnt about two former Military Hospitals that we would like to write about. These are the British Military Hospital at Wuppertal in Germany and BMH Benghazi. If you know any information, would like to share your memories or have photographs that we can use on the site then please contact Qaranc.co.uk A reader is writing an article about the demise of the Military Hospital for the RAMC Magazine and seeks some help. There was, in Kuala Lumpur, a hospital called BMH Kinrara. He would like to know when it opened and closed, what happened to the buildings and the staff. He thinks that Kinrara closed as Terendak opened and that the staff were transferred across to 34 Company RAMC? He would also like any information about the Military Maternity Hospital, Penang. If you can help then please contact Qaranc.co.uk There is a lovely photo of three QA Midwives from the 1960s about half way down on the Royal Herbert Hospital page. If you can help with information about the Maternity Unit in Woolwich or identify the QA Officers then please contact Qaranc.co.uk The BMH Dhekelia has new photos which includes a stunning picture of the demolition of the original building and some staff photos. The contributor would like some help with the date it was demolished and would love to hear from anyone who worked with her relative.			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