Heroic Courage

Probably my greatest hero is Eleanor Roosevelt, a woman possessed of far more convictions, courage and strength, in my opinion, than her politically-sensitive husband. But this column is not about Ms. Roosevelt. Rather it is a look at a hero I had never heard of before buying this bookmark—Nurse Edith Cavell.

Her death occurred before a German firing squad on October 12, 1915, but her story began on December 4, 1865, in the English village of Swardeston where she was born the daughter of the local reverend. Edith showed her passion for action and leadership ability early on, when, as a young girl, she became aware of her father’s need for a room to accommodate the growing number of children attending Sunday school. She wrote to the bishop, and he promised to help if the village would raise some of the cash. Edith and her sister went to work, selling their hand-painted cards. They raised the money, and the room was built.

In her teens, she attended several boarding schools where she proved an able pupil teacher and was recommended for a post in Brussels. On a Continental vacation, she visited and came away much impressed by a free hospital in Austria. When, in 1895 she returned to Swardeston to help nurse her father through a brief illness, the experience solidified her determination to take up nursing as a career, and in April 1896 she began training at London Hospital.

Edith worked with typhoid fever patients at the hospital, and in private practice with pleurisy, pneumonia, appendicitis and more typhoid. In 1899, she returned to hospital work and at Shoreditch Infirmary became Assistant Matron in 1903. It was here that she pioneered follow-up work, checking on patients after their discharge.

Edith returned to Brussels in 1907 to nurse the child of Dr. Antoine Depage. The doctor quickly recognized her experience and talents, and chose her to head up what had become a passion of his—training lay Belgian nurses to replace the well-meaning but unqualified nuns who acted as nurses then. L'Ecole d'Infirmiere Dimplonier opened in October 1907.

“The old idea that it is a disgrace for  women to work is still held in Belgium” she wrote home, “and women of good  birth and education still think they lose caste by  earning their own living." That quickly changed when the Queen broke her arm and sent for one of Edith’s trained nurses. Within a few years, the nurses coming out of the school were being sent to hospitals, communal schools and kindergartens, and Edith was giving lectures to doctors and nurses.  

Edith was in England visiting her mother when news broke out of the German invasion of Belgium. She returned there in early August of 1914 and, in accordance with her principles, began treating the wounded of any nationality. When Brussels fell, many nurses were sent home but Edith remained. She became a “protected” member of the Red Cross, but being such did not allow for the underground activities in which she participated. According to Edith Cavell it was autumn 1941 when “two stranded British soldiers found their way to Nurse Cavell's training school and were sheltered for two  weeks. Others followed, all of them spirited away to neutral territory in Holland. Quickly an ‘underground’ lifeline was established. Guides were organised, and some 200 allied soldiers helped to escape. This organisation lasted for almost a year, despite the risks. All those involved knew they could be shot for harbouring allied soldiers.”

On July 31, 1915, two members of the underground were arrested. Five days after that, Edith was taken in and interrogated. In Belgium Under the German  Occupation: A Personal Narrative, published in 1919, Brand Whitlock, U.S. Minister in Belgium, wrote:

It was the morning of Thursday, October 7, that the case came on before the court martial in the Senate chamber where the military trials always took place, and Miss Cavell was arraigned with the Princess de Croy, the Countess de Belleville, and thirty-two others . . . The charge brought against the accused was that of having conspired to violate the German Military Penal Code, punishing with death those who conduct troops to the enemy. Its basis in German military law is found in  paragraph 68 of the German Code, which says: Whoever, with the intention of helping the hostile Power, or of injuring the German or allied troops, is guilty of one of the crimes of paragraph 90 of the German Penal Code, will be sentenced to death for treason.

Among the crimes mentioned in paragraph 90 is that of “conducting soldiers to the enemy.” Miss Cavell did not deny having received at her hospital English soldiers, whom she nursed and to whom she gave money; she did not deny that she knew they were going to try to cross the border into Holland . . . One of the judges said that she had been foolish to aid  English soldiers because the English are ungrateful.

“No,” replied Miss Cavell, “the English are not ungrateful.”

“How do you know they are not?” asked the inquisitor.

“Because,” she  answered, “some of them have written to me from England to thank me.”

It was a fatal admission on the part of the tortured little woman; under the German military law her having helped soldiers to reach Holland, a neutral country, would have been a less serious offence, but to aid them to reach an enemy country, and especially England, was the last offence in the eyes of a German military court.

Pleas to spare the lives of those sentenced to death promptly went out, but the sentences moved forward with awful swiftness. The verdict came in the afternoon of October 11, and Edith’s sentence was to be carried out early the next day, October 12, at Tir Nationale (the National Rifle Range).

From Source Records of the Great War, Vol. III which has been excerpted on FirstWorldWar.com the experience of Reverend H. Stirling Gahan, the minister who attended her the evening before her execution, is both inspiring and deeply disturbing: 

On Monday evening, October 11th, I was admitted by special passport from the German authorities to the prison of St. Gilles, where Miss Edith Cavell had been confined for ten weeks. The final sentence had been given early that afternoon. To my astonishment and relief I found my friend perfectly calm and resigned. But this could not lessen the tenderness and intensity of feeling on either part during that last interview of almost an hour.

She said: “I have no fear nor shrinking; I have seen death so often that it is not strange or fearful to me."

“I thank God for this ten weeks’ quiet before the end. Life has always been hurried and full of difficulty. This time of rest has been a great mercy. They have all been very kind to me here. But this I would say, standing as I do in view of God and eternity, I realize that patriotism is not enough. I must have no hatred or bitterness towards any one."

We partook of the Holy Communion together, and she received the Gospel message of consolation with all her heart . . . We sat quietly talking until it was time for me to go.  She gave me parting messages for relations and friends . . . Then I said “Good-by,” and she smiled and said, “We shall meet again.”

Gahan was not permitted to accompany her on her final journey. But Le Seur, the chaplain appointed by the Germans to minister to prisoners did, and he told his story in The Truth, a book by Wilhelm Behrens, who was in charge of prisons in Brussels at the time of the execution:

At the first grey of dawn, with a heavy heart, I got into the motor car and drove out to the prison. In the cell a flickering gas-flame was burning. The condemned lady had packed all her little property with the greatest care in a handbag. I accompanied her through the long corridors of the great prison. The Belgian prison officials stood there and greeted her silently with the highest respect. She returned their greetings silently. Then we boarded the motor-car which awaited us in the yard . . . When we arrived at the Tir National, a company at full war strength (two hundred and fifty men) stood there, in accordance with the regulations, under the command of a staff-officer. We clergymen led the condemned persons to the front. The company presented their rifles. The sentence was read out, and then the clergymen were permitted to have a last word with the condemned persons. I thought I had to make this as brief as possible. I took Miss Cavell's hand and only said (of course in English) the words: “The Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the Communion of the Holy Ghost be with you for ever. Amen.” She pressed my hand in return, and answered in those words: “Ask Mr. Gahan to tell my loved ones later on that my soul, as I believe, is safe, and that I am glad to die for my country.” Then I led her a few steps to the pole, to which she was loosely bound. A bandage was put over her eyes, which, as the soldier who put it on told me, were full of tears.

Immediately the sharp commands were given. My eyes were fixed exclusively on Miss Cavell, and what they now saw was terrible. With a face streaming with blood—one shot had gone through her forehead—Miss Cavell had sunk down forwards, but three times she raised herself up without a sound, with her hands stretched upwards. I ran forward with the medical man, Dr. Benn, to her. He was doubtless right when he stated that these were only reflex movements . . . A few minutes later the coffins were lowered into the graves, and I prayed over Edith Cavell’s grave, and invoked the Lord’s blessing over her poor corpse. Then I went home, almost sick in my soul.

Edith was initially buried at the Tir Nationale, but at the war’s end her remains were returned to England. They were formally escorted to Westminister Abbey for burial service on May 15, 1919, then transported to Norwich where she lies buried outside Norwich Cathedral in a place called Life’s Green.

Whitlock’s description of the events from the time of Edith’s arrest until after her death are poignant. They may not be objective—certainly feelings against defeated Germany were exceedingly high in 1919—but I believe they express perfectly the subjective reality. A long excerpt (which can be found at The Case of Nurse Edith Cavell is well worth reading for the flavor of the period. Here, though, I have borrowed the final paragraph which expresses my feelings as I complete this.

And when the horror of  her cruel and unjust fate shall have faded somewhat in the light of its emergent sacrifice, the few lines she wrote and the simple words she spoke as she was about to die will remain to reveal the heights that human nature may attain, and to sanctify a memory that will be revered as long as faith and honour are known to men.

Could there be a greater hero?

Bookmark specifications: Nurse Cavell
Dimensions: 7 1/2” x 2 1/2”
Material: Heavy paper
Manufacturer: Unknown
Date: Unknown
Acquired: eBay
 
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Almost since her childhood days of Mother Goose, Lauren has been giving her opinion on books to anyone who will listen. That “talent” eventually took her out of magazine writing and into book reviewing in 2000 for an online review site where she cut her teeth (as well as a few authors). Stints as book editor for a newspaper and contributing editor to Booklist and Bookmarks magazines has reinforced her belief that she has interesting things to say about books. Lauren shares her home with several significant others including three cats, 700 bookmarks and nearly 1,000 books that, whether previously read or not, constitute her to-be-read stack. She can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it