It would probably come to no one’s surprise that the German prisoners were treated better than the Black nurses assigned to take care of them. These POWs themselves were shocked to learn about the racial hierarchy in America and presumably started chanting “One of us!” every time a white guard or officer addressed them. Because the white people sure were friendly toward them while they were being served by Black people calling them “Sir” and taking care of their boo-boos.
As the war escalated and thousands of injured U.S. soldiers started coming back home, the government urgently called for more nurses to join the Army Nurse Corps. There were almost 10,000 applications from Black nurses who wanted to join, but no. The U.S. wanted white nurses to care for their boys exclusively. Yes, Roosevelt and many, many Americans would rather have let their soldiers die from injuries than assign Black nurses to help save their lives. This is usually where we’d add a joke of some sort, but … *sigh*.
It was only in the final year of the war that the government gave in and allowed Black nurses to leave the POW camps and attend to U.S. soldiers in Army hospitals because America sure loves dragging its feet with progress. Still, there were only 500 Black nurses serving in the Army Nurse Corps by the end of the war, alongside 40,000 white nurses. Yay for (micro)change.
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Top Image: Chris Albert/Smithsonian Magazine
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