Page 19 - The Gazette Autumn 2024

The Gazette QARANC Association 19
it was his mother.
The hospital at Bayeux was packed up and they
moved up to Belgium just outside Brussels. This had been a private Belgium hospital at Brugman, used recently by the Germans so at least a purpose- built facility. Launa’s unit was just in time to receive casualties from the Battle of the Bulge. In theatre would be one QA sister, the surgeon and two RAMC orderlies.
When asked about working hours Launa said
“Interesting I think the army was so well organised, there is 24 hours you don’t need time off you just need time to work, time to have something to eat and a couple of hours to sleep and that was our routine.
“I had done a full a full shift in the tent operating ...and I was desperately in need of a sleep so went to my tent and lay down and was well away. I was almost unconscious, and I felt somebody kicking my leg. It was one of the QAs saying a message has been sent saying to go back to theatre as there is a whole pile coming in. I would say that I was almost paralysed I couldn’t move to get up I was that tired so eventually they shook me, and they pushed me around a little bit and gave me some water to drink.”
Launa went onto do a full theatre list with a Canadian surgeon until both collapsed onto the floor and stayed there asleep with the next shift walking around them. Launa had no memory of that shift or how they both ended up sleeping on the floor (she does remember his lovely blue eyes however).
The QA nurses on the wards were helped by Dutch volunteers. However, they were not all they seemed to be, one of the QA sisters got suspicious of how much time they were taking talking to patients recently back from the front. Agents were placed in among the Dutch helpers and soon some of them were arrested for spying.
It was whist at this hospital that Launa and her best friend were asked if they would volunteer for a secret mission, no idea where or what but they knew the Japanese may be somehow involved. They had to sign papers there and then, were told to tell no one their plans and left without saying goodbye to anyone. They were driven to a safe house where they met some members of FANY (First Aid Nursing Yeomanry) they then moved to Brugge and then Gent. After a few days waiting as suddenly as it had started the secret mission was aborted as the bomb had been dropped on Japan. She was never told what the mission was meant to be but has deduced she had been standing by to go out to Japan.
Launa also recalls the following incident before she left Belgium.
The most upsetting thing for me was to treat these minor wounds
of the commandant of Ravensbrück!
“The most upsetting thing for me was to treat these minor wounds of the commandant of Ravensbrück! Again, my whole theatre was cleared. Wearing what looked like very old workman’s clothes and I thought that’s odd he has got some wounds I have got to treat, very minor he doesn’t need a surgeon just cuts and stuff so fair enough but he was so unusual looking. He was very good looking and very fair fine hair and very blue eyes speaking very good English ...I had a sixth sense that I have always had that this was no workman ... is he a prisoner or some special agent who has been rescued from somewhere because I had noticed that the kinds of wounds he had he had been in some sort of fight.”
When she had finished tending to his injuries Launa says he gave himself away as being German as he just managed to stop himself clicking his heels together. Only later did she find out who he was. She also tended to some of the Belsen camp personal who needed to have surgery.
After her return to Belgium from her cancelled secret mission, Launa was relocated to India, arriving in November 1945 where she moved around six different camps before returning to the UK, and RVH Netley in August 1947 staying there until she finished her service on 3 April 1948.
On leaving the QAs, Launa continued to have an exciting career. She joined the Anglo Iranian Oil company as a theatre sister working in Abadan, Iran, where she met an ex RAF pilot also working for the company. They were married in 1949, returning to UK following the revolution, Launa moved around the UK, working on a surgical ward in Scotland and in a casualty department at the old Frimley Hospital in Camberley, then as a community nurse running clinics for the Surrey Health Board. Her final nursing role was in a private nursing home.
Launa and her husband Jim had three children. She nursed him through various serious illnesses and managed to keep him at home until his death. Today she lives in Exmouth. We thank Launa for sharing her memories as an eyewitness to history and for her service.
Olivia Barnes, Lead Oral History Project