Personal Memoirs & Diaries Books

CHAPTER ILEAVE HOME—BASE HOSPITAL NO. 11—CAMP DODGE "Very well then, Father, you have my permission and best wishes." How the approving words and blessing of good Archbishop Mundelein thrilled me that memorable morning in 1918. The rain-washed freshness of April was abroad in Cass street; and the soft breeze, swaying the curtain of the Chancery window where he was seated, brought incense of... more...

August 1st. Up very early, and by water to Whitehall to my Lord's, and there up to my Lord's lodging (Win. Howe being now ill of the gout at Mr. Pierce's), and there talked with him about the affairs of the Navy, and how I was now to wait today at the Privy Seal. Commissioner Pett went with me, whom I desired to make my excuse at the office for my absence this day. Hence to the Privy... more...

FOREWORD Liége on the Line of March, or An American Girl's Experience When the Germans Came Through Belgium, is a unique story. No other American probably was in the exact position of Miss Bigelow who was at the Château d'Angleur, Liége, Belgium, with the family of Monsieur X. at the outbreak of the war and experienced with them and the people of their country those tragic events which, up... more...

I OFF FOR MESOPOTAMIA It was at Taranto that we embarked for Mesopotamia. Reinforcements were sent out from England in one of two ways—either all the way round the Cape of Good Hope, or by train through France and Italy down to the desolate little seaport of Taranto, and thence by transport over to Egypt, through the Suez Canal, and on down the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf. The... more...

WHEN IT BEGAN Before the war I was living in London, with chambers at Lincoln's Inn. I was not surprised when the trouble started. Ever since 1904 it was reasonably clear to me that our country would have to fight the Germans or go under. The days before we declared war on Germany were spent in London. During the last few of them it was as though a terrible thunderstorm was hanging overhead, ready... more...

INTRODUCTION I eagerly avail myself of the Author's invitation to write a foreword to her book, as it gives me an opportunity of expressing something of the admiration, of the wonder, of the intense brotherly sympathy and affection—almost adoration—which has from time to time overwhelmed me when witnessing the work of our women during the Great War. They have been in situations where, five... more...

“The land where I was born” was, in my childhood, a great battleground. War—as we then thought the vastest of all wars, not only that had been, but that could ever be—swept over it. I never knew in those days a man who had not been in the war. So, “The War” was the main subject in every discussion and it was discussed with wonderful acumen. Later it took on a different relation to the new... more...

DIARY OF SAMUEL PEPYS. FEBRUARY 1667-1668 February 1st. Up, and to the office pretty betimes, and the Board not meeting as soon as I wished, I was forced to go to White Hall in expectation of a Committee for Tangier, but when I come it was put off, and so home again to the office, and sat till past two o'clock; where at the Board some high words passed between Sir W. Pen and I, begun by me, and... more...

LETTER I ORANGE RIVER CAMP ORANGE RIVER, November 18, 1899. The sun is just rising on Orange River Camp. Our tents are pitched on the slopes of white sand, soft and deep, into which you sink at every step, that stretch down to the river, dotted with a few scraggy thorn-trees. There are men round me, sleeping about on the sand, rolled in their dark brown blankets, like corpses laid out, covered from... more...

When, late in last autumn, I determined to start for the Confederate States as soon as necessary preparations could be completed, I had listened, not only to my own curiosity, impelling me at least to see one campaign of a war, the like of which this world has never known, but also to the suggestions of those who thought that I might find materials there for a book that would interest many here in... more...