Anna is former US Army nurse recruited by the private British air ambulance company, Air Ambulance International, as a flight nurse on medical evacuation out of blockaded Berlin. Her role may be secondary, but nevertheless important.
In this excerpt, we learn about her background and how she chanced upon this extraordinary opportunity. The story of her grandfather is described is based on a historical incident that took place in Georgia in May 1919.
“Aunt Flora?” Anna called out as
the screen door chinked shut behind her. “Aunt Flora? It’s me. Anna.” The
spacious kitchen with its big, wooden counters and endless cupboards stretching
along the back of Judge Warren’s neo-classical mansion in Eastman, Georgia had
been the realm of Aunt Flora for as long as Anna could remember.
Aunt Flora had first brought Anna here when she was eight years old. That was about two years after her mother had left her father because he’d beaten her once too often. Her mother had been trying to make enough money to keep herself and her daughter in clothes and food by working at a diner where truckers stopped. They lived in a shack out back, without electricity or running water. Then, out of the blue, Aunt Flora had arrived and there had been a terrible fight between the sisters. In the end, Aunt Flora stuffed a pathetic pile of worn-out things — all Anna owned — into a cotton sack and brought Anna to Eastman on the bus.
At the time, Anna had never before been in a town with streetlights and rows of pretty houses with big green lawns. Eastman had awed her even before Aunt Flora marched her up to the big, red brick house with towering white pillars and a chandelier hanging over the porch — much less introduced her to a white lady who smelled of flowers. The latter was Miss Josephine, the wife of Judge Warren, and Aunt Flora’s employer.
When Anna turned fourteen, she was one of just three girls allowed to go to the private high school for coloured people. Anna’s grades were so good that Aunt Flora wanted to pay the fees out of her own pocket, but Miss Josephine wouldn’t let her and made the payments instead. Miss Josephine came to Anna’s graduation too, the only white woman in the whole auditorium. After she graduated, Miss Josephine helped her get into nurse’s training, too.
The adult Anna was thankful but not beholden to Miss Josephine. She’d worked hard to get those good grades, to qualify as a nurse and to serve her country.
“That you, Anna?” Aunt Flora called, coming in from the front of the house.
“Yes! Miss Josephine sent for me. Do you know why?”
Flora gave her a look that said she was in big trouble. “Ah don’t know why Miss Josephine sent for you Anna Elizabeth, but Ah can sure as blazes guess! Which is why you are goin’ to sit you’self down at that table and get you’ ears blistered.” Anna might be 26 years old, a qualified nurse and living in her own apartment over on Elm Street, but she respected Aunt Flora too much to talk back. She pulled out a wooden chair and plopped down, but she held herself upright and looked at her aunt with an expression bordering on defiance. She was prepared to defend everything she’d said and done.
Aunt Flora stood with her fists planted on her hips and she glared down at Anna. “Now what Ah heard — and likely what Miss Josephine heard — is that you been meddlin’ in this business with the Basey girl, saying she shouldn’t have to carry her baby to term—”
“Aunt Flora! Rosie Basey’s a child. She’s just twelve and she’s all skin and bones! She’s not strong enough to carry a baby to term — much less the child of that fat, white—”
“Don’t you dare say that bad word in mah kitchen!” Aunt Flora stopped her.
“If somebody doesn’t do something soon, she’s going to die!” Anna protested furiously.
“Yes and everyone from here to Savannah knows you think that! Which means that if some mornin’ that child turns up without a baby in her belly, you goin’ to be in such hot water, there ain’t nothin’ Judge Warren can do to save you!”
“Abortion isn’t illegal if it’s necessary to save the life of the mother,” Anna countered. “I’ve been reading up—”
“Don’t go talkin’ legal gobbledegook with me, Anna Elizabeth. This don’t have nothin’ to do with the law. No one goin’ to give you a chance to defend you’self in some court where some fine lawyer paid for by the NAACP might point his finger at Cabe Lawson and demand he stand trial for rape—”
“Which is exactly what he should do!” Anna interrupted. “Why don’t people see that and demand it? A helpless twelve-year-old girl was raped by a white —” She bit her tongue, looking for a word she was allowed to use, “— ape, and nobody in this county has the guts to stand up and say so, much less help her!”
“Cabe Lawson’s got a rich daddy and people don’t want a lot of Yankee newspapermen comin’ down here to make fun of them and call them names. Before they let that happen, they will string you up on the nearest tree and use you for target practice like they did you’ great-granddaddy.”
Anna was blindsided. She’d come here expecting a lecture about being too outspoken. She’d expected Miss Josephine to gently advise her to keep a lower profile and for Aunt Flora to amplify the message more forcefully. She had not anticipated talk of lynching — and no one had ever told her that her great-grandfather had ended that way. “Great-Granddad Washington was lynched?” Anna asked in a dazed voice.
Aunt Flora nodded, and suddenly the rage that had burned in her was doused as if by a gust of rain. Aunt Flora seemed to shrink before Anna’s eyes, her anger replaced with something closer to despair and pain. A chill gripped Anna. “Why?” she whispered, already sensing how terrible the truth might be. “Why did they lynch him?”
Aunt Flora sank into the nearest kitchen chair and without looking at Anna she answered in a wooden tone, “They lynched him because he beat to a bloody pulp the boy who done raped me and shot the white boy goin’ after you’ mother.”
That was almost too much to take in. Anna stared at her aunt, her emotions in turmoil and her thoughts careening around her head. After a moment, she forced herself to focus on one fact. “You were raped by a white boy?” Flora nodded slowly. “And my mother?”
“You’ mother crawled out the window and ran into the woods screaming. Granddad heard her, saw a man chasin’ after her and shot him. Then he rushed into our bedroom and found me crushed on the bed hardly able to breathe, let alone cry for help —” she cut herself off and sat for several seconds with her eyes closed. Then she shook her head sharply as if to clear it of memories, and continued in a more matter-of-fact tone, “Granddad didn’t dare shoot in case he hit me, so he used his fists instead. When that boy couldn’t fight back no mo’, granddad kicked him outside and got me to the hospital. They wanted to keep me overnight, so he went home.” She stopped again to gather her strength and drew a deep breath before concluding, “The KKK was waitin’ for him. They overwhelmed him, strung him up, and shot him fifteen times.”
They stared at one another. Anna had a thousand questions. She drew a breath.
“Befo’ you ask,” Flora stopped her. “Yes, Ah did get pregnant, and that’s why Ah had to drop out of school. But Miss Josephine insisted on me comin’ and livin’ here, and Ah’ve had a home here ever since… and if you dare to lay you’ hands on an unborn infant—”
“Now Flora, there’s no need to use that tone of voice with our Anna,” Miss Josephine swept into the kitchen. Despite her 72 years, she was still elegant, but she was frail too. Anna guessed she weighed no more than 100 pounds, and her pale skin was marred by age marks that no amount of make-up could cover. Yet she was resolute and firm as she declared, “All Anna has been saying is that a mother’s life is as important as a baby’s and that a doctor ought to look into the matter. She’s quite right.”
As she spoke she crossed the kitchen to give Anna a hug and then gestured for her to sit down again, taking a seat herself.
“Anna, I didn’t send for you because of this business with the Basey girl. You’ve done nothing wrong, and you are quite right that something must be done to help her.” Miss Josephine’s bony hand with a large diamond ring reached out and covered Anna’s. “Trust me, Anna, the Judge and I will find a way to help. But your aunt is right, too. Some people around here don’t see straight, and they might make trouble for you. It’s time for you to consider other options for your future.”
Anna frowned, feeling patronized and muzzled. She wanted to protest, but she couldn’t bring herself to be rude — not knowing the full extent of Miss Josphine’s assistance to Aunt Flora. Miss Josephine continued, “I know how frustrated you’ve been since you returned from the army.” No doubt she did, Anna thought; she hadn’t made a secret of it. “The work here is monotonous and demoralizing and you’re earning donkey’s wages.” That summarised her life very well, Anna admitted. Her work consisted mostly of futile efforts to counter the effects of acute poverty on coloured women and children. Her daily bread was dealing with malnutrition, dysentery, rickets, TB, abuse, and neglect — with the occasional rape thrown in for variety, she thought bitterly.
Miss Josephine was continuing, “Now, I’m sure you remember Colonel and Mrs Howley, and you must have heard that Colonel Howley is now the US Commandant in Berlin”
“Of course!” Anna replied. How could she not have heard? She was amazed and thrilled to think that a man she had once given physical therapy to was now so important that he was often in the papers or on the radio. His wife had encouraged her to apply to the US Army Nursing Corps, and Anna was certain that the colonel had pulled strings to get her in.
“Well,” Miss Josephine continued, “it seems there is a terrible shortage of medical personnel in Berlin and Mrs Howley sent me a cable to ask if you would be interested in working as a nurse on an air ambulance. They thought of you because you speak German from working at that POW camp during the war.”
Anna was so astonished she could only stammer. “A flight nurse?” Ever since her army training near some Air Corps bases, she’d longed to fly. “With the army?”
“No, I’m afraid not. Mrs Howley says it’s a private British company, but this is still an amazing opportunity for you. It comes at a perfect time, too — when there are so many unkind rumours floating around. Some ignorant folks think you’ve become uppity and — wrong as they are — they could harm you.” Miss Josephine leaned closer to deliver this message. She was, Anna sensed, just as worried as Aunt Flora.
Anna nodded. She had joined the Army Nursing Corps to get away from Georgia. She’d wanted to see more of the country, more of the whole world. She’d dreamed of being sent to a field hospital in Europe. Instead, they’d sent her to a POW camp in Arkansas. Convinced she’d been shunted off to the POW camp because of the colour of her skin, she’d protested. That earned her a reprimand and blotted her record so much that, even when she uncovered an escape plot among some of the prisoners, she’d been given no recognition or reward. Maybe the army was different now that President Truman had ended segregation, but she wasn’t sure. So, working for a private company might be better. She’d just never imagined there might be any other way to get to Europe — or to fly.
How many hours had she stared up at the sky, watching those bright yellow training planes while she worked at that camp in Arkansas?
Miss Josephine brought her back to the present. “This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, Anna. I hope you’ll have the courage to seize it.”
Anna opened her mouth to agree but stopped herself and looked towards Aunt Flora. The older woman had tears in her eyes, but her voice was firm. “Go, Anna. Go and see the world — not just for you but for me and your mother and all of us stuck here in Dodge County!”
Find out more about the Bridge to Tomorrow series, the awards it has won, and read reviews at: https://helenapschrader.net/bridge-to-tomorrow/
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