Men's VAD in Folkstone
It is often overlooked that about one third of all VAD members were men. They mostly worked as hospital orderlies and on the transport of patients from railway stations to the hospitals. When air raids began they worked as first aiders and, in some cases, rescue workers. The following report produced by the Commandant of a men's VAD at Folkestone tells of work there in the first two years of the war.
VAD KENT 43 Folkestone
Commandant: H O Jones, AMICEI
Medical Officer: G P Searle, MRCS, LRCP
Quartermaster: W C Marsh
Asst. Quartermaster: J W Walton, LDS
Class Secretary: J H Fox
Detachment Report
August 1914 to December 1915
The Detachment was raised in September 1914, and temporarily attached to VAD Kent 17 (Deal) the nearest Men's BRCS Detachment, being separately registered as "Kent 43" in April 1915.
In company with other Kent VADs it was mobilised by the War Office orders in October, 1914 and was at once engaged, in conjunction with VAD Kent 9 (St John's) and the Folkestone Fire Brigade (which is attached to the NFBU branch of the BRCS) at Folkestone Harbour, on the removal of hundreds of wounded Belgian soldiers brought here by sea on ordinary passenger and cargo steamers, the majority being treated in temporary hospitals improvised in the larger local hotels, under the organisation of Colonel Wilson, RAMC, then Principal Medical Officer at Shorncliffe Camp. They also assisted with the transport and treatment of the wounded refugees brought into the Harbour from the torpedoed steamship "Amiral Ganteaume", and with the exchanged British and German wounded prisoners sent from and to Flushing in the early part of 1915.
In addition to Transport work, members of the Detachment undertook regular duty, morning and evening, as orderlies at the Manor Court Nursing Home, Folkestone and all day Sundays and occasional all-night reliefs at Bevan Military Hospital, Sandgate, which latter was staffed by the combined ladies BRCS Detachments of the district, but was too far away for the men of this VAD (all being Folkestone business and working men) to do regular duty during the week.
They also, from June 1915, undertook at the request of the Chief Constable, the provision of squads to take duty in turns at the Police Station each evening, to attend to the rather numerous street and other accidents which occurred, principally to soldiers, owing to the War-time lighting conditions and traffic, and the presence of large numbers of military in the streets after dark.
The Detachment also has charge of the "Emergency" Hospital arranged for by the Town Council, at the Technical Institute, in case of Air Raid casualties, which have, fortunately, not occurred so far.
The Detachment, between November, 1914 and December, 1915, assisted at Shorncliffe Station, with the detraining and transport to local hospitals, of 58 convoys of wounded British soldiers, totalling about 4,700 men, over 3,000 being cot cases.
On the receipt, by the Central Military Hospital, Shorncliffe, of a message from Dover Harbour or Southampton, that a hospital train was expected, a telephone message was sent to the Head Fire Station, Folkestone (the Commandant being also Chief Officer of the Fire Brigade) on which arrangements were made for the despatch of the available men of both the VAD and the Fire Brigade to Shorncliffe Station for the time stated; a message was also passed on to the Commandant of VAD Kent 9 (St John's) who also called out his men.
On arrival at the Station, the Officers in charge of the VADs reported to the Medical Officer from Shorncliffe Camp or the Officer representing him, prepared stretchers on the platform, and stood-by until the train arrived (often two hours after schedule time), when the walking cases were first detrained, taken to the Station Waiting Rooms for refreshments provided by a local ladies' organisation (who were at the same time taking refreshments to the cot cases in the train before removal) and thence to hospital, some in cars lent by local motorists and some in motor chars-a-banc or omnibuses. The cot cases were then removed, loaded into motor ambulances (in 1914 and the early part of 1915, British Red Cross cars garaged in the town en route for France, cars from the Queen's Canadian Hospital, Beachborough, and the ambulance belonging to the local St. John Ambulance Brigade, and during the autumn of 1915, a plentiful supply of motors of the Canadian Red Cross Society, driven by men of the CAMC) and distributed to local hospitals, in accordance with the number of beds notified as available.
Up to the end of 1915, the following members of the Detachment were serving abroad:
Pharmicist J F Cunningham and Member C O Humphrey, in France, and Members W Hilder and L E Owen in Serbia, with the Joint Red Cross Committee.
Also Members W W Cladingbowl with the RFC, H F Jackson with the RNAS, and A V Hoad, WJC Hall and F W Wratten with RE.
(Signed) H O Jones, Commandant
Notes:
Transcript of a document in Folkestone Library (Local Studies Collection, WW1 file)
Abbreviations used in the text:
BRCS = British Red Cross Society
NFBU = National Fire Brigades' Union
RAMC = Royal Army Medical Corps
CAMC = Canadian Army Medical Corps
RFC = Royal Flying Corps
RNAS = Royal Naval Air Service
RE = Royal Engineers