Nursing orderly

Olive Harcourt is a singer and musician of international repute who trained in Dresden and lived in Germany for some years. In 1916 she put her musical career on hold to come to Dorset with sister Florence to work as an orderly at Beaucroft Red Cross Hospital in Colehill.

Her diaries are full of colourful stories about life in a small Red Cross Hospital.

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Among the bullets...

March 07, 1918 James Sansom: Three miles from the front line. We stay here till the evening of the 8th when we stretcher bearers start for the reserve lines to form an ADS [Advanced Dressing Station]

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The Epitome of a Victorian Lady

Olive Harcourt was “Epitome of a true Victorian lady”, her ward Joan Cocozza told us at her home in Bristol.

Visitors were announced, gentleman friends kissed her hand, women kissed her cheek.

“It was an utter surprise when I began reading her diaries and learned of the time she cared for wounded soldiers,” she said.

During WW2, Joan, then a young girl, would spend half her week living with her family, and the other half living with Olive at her grand house in Clifton, where Olive taught her to play the upright piano she later left her when she died in 1958.

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Dear Eric

March 21, 1918 Lady Monkswell: To Mrs Dyer's, as far as Parnham Down with Robert and Lorna. Met Mrs Pitt-Rivers, Lady Avebury’s sister in law. She was in coat and boots - Land Women’s costume, becoming and suitable. Heard of dear beautiful Eric Lubbock's heroic death last year (air man)

Captain Eric Lubbock MC of the 45th Squadron Royal Flying Corps was Lady Monkwell’s nephew. His A1082 Sopwith Strutter was attacked by 2 Albatros D.IIIs and shot down, at Railway Wood near Ypres in 1917. Both Lubbock and observer John Thompson were killed

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Me Unmarried

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General Allenby

By the end of March 1918, stretcher bearer James Sansom and the troops on the front line in Palestine reach the Jerusalem to Nablus road, having taken Jerusalem from the Turks at the end of 1917.

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Night Attack

March 29th 1918: Stretcher bearer James Sansom of 230th Field Ambulance is in the line on the Jerusalem to Nablus Road with 74th division. A night attack on Amman is being launched in a few hours

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Married Love published

March 26th 1918

My Book Married Love “to increase the joys of marriage” is finally published today.

I have some things to say about sex, which so far as I am aware have not yet been said......

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Explore by day, month or person here on the blog or on our five Twitter feeds: @Voicesfrom1918 @LadyMonkswell @MarieStopes1918 @JamesSansom230 and @OliveHarcourt.

Voices from 1918 has been developed by artists Sharon Hayden and Alastair Nisbet in partnership with Wimborne Community Theatre, Dorset History Centre and the Priest’s House Museum, Wimborne with funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund.

Thanks to all who have helped us with this project: Maria Gayton and staff at Dorset History Centre where we found Lady Mary Monkswell’s diaries; Joan Cocozza, ward of nursing auxiliary Olive Harcourt; Portland Museum where we found James Sansom’s diaries; the British Library and Wellcome Libraries; Priest’s House Museum in Wimborne and Gill Horitz from Wimborne Community Theatre.

We’ve used a new simpler type of blogging system which we beta tested for indie developer Janis Rondorf of Instacks software.

Posts created as simple text files are dropped into a folder on the webserver without the need for complicated formatting making it easy to upload material quickly.

We’re always happy to share more details about our work - email us using the link at the bottom of the page and we’ll get back to you.

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