About BC Books Online
BC Books Online was created for anyone interested in BC-published books, and with librarians especially in mind. We'd like to make it easy for library staff to learn about books from BC publishers - both new releases and backlist titles - so you can inform your patrons and keep your collections up to date.
Our site features print books and ebooks - both new releases and backlist titles - all of which are available to order through regular trade channels. Browse our subject categories to find books of interest or create and export lists by category to cross-reference with your library's current collection.
A quick tip: When reviewing the "Browse by Category" listings, please note that these are based on standardized BISAC Subject Codes supplied by the books' publishers. You will find additional selections, grouped by theme or region, in our "BC Reading Lists."
Description
With her soft linen head scarf and white apron emblazoned with a red cross, the Voluntary Aid Detachment nurse, or VAD, has become a romantic emblem of the First World War. This Small Army of Women draws on diaries, letters, and interviews to tell the forgotten story of the nearly two thousand women from Canada and Newfoundland who volunteered to “do their bit” at home and overseas.
Middle-class and well-educated but largely untrained, VADs were excluded from Canadian military hospitals overseas (the realm of the professional nurse) but helped solve Britain’s nursing deficit and filled gaps in Canada’s domestic nursing ranks. Their dedication and struggle to secure a place at their brothers’ bedsides reveals much about women’s contributions to the war effort, the tensions between amateur and professional nurses, and women’s evolving role outside the home.
Contributor Notes
Linda J. Quiney is a historian and retired lecturer and serves as an affiliate with the Consortium for Nursing History Inquiry at the University of British Columbia.
Editorial Reviews
Linda Quiney has written a carefully researched, lively, and accessible book. Both historians and general readers will value its compelling story of a group of courageous women whose accomplishments have been largely neglected in histories of the First World War.
— Michigan War Review Studies
Linda J Quiney’s This Small Army of Women documents the Canadian and Newfoundland volunteer nurses in WW1. The book is an interesting mix of facts, figures and analysis, interspersed with personal stories of these Voluntary Aid Detachment nurses – VADs. This Small Army of Women is another good addition to the recent scholarship on the role of medical women in the war.
— Great War 100 Reads
