Sarah Griffin Chapman
(1918–2010)
U.S. Navy Nurse Corps
Sarah Griffin Chapman, from Americus, Georgia, graduated from nursing school at West End Baptist Hospital in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1943. She joined the Navy in January 1944 and served in Oran. After World War II she was stationed in Bainbridge, Maryland, and in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. An accident in Cuba led to her unique service during the Korean War. The following is transcribed from a telephone interview Chapman gave to Jan K. Herman, historian at the Bureau of Medicine and Surgery, on March 18, 2002.
One day I was out on a picnic with a group. We were walking along the edge of a cliff when I got too close to the edge and fell about 25 or 30 feet down into the water. I landed on top of coral. . . . The other people I was with on the picnic got some sticks and made a stretcher. When they reached me they floated me back to shore and got an ambulance. They put my left leg in a Thomas splint. I had fractured the tibia of the left leg. They didn’t realize that the heel of my right foot was jammed up into the ankle. . . . So they put my left leg in a cast; nothing was done to the right foot. . . . I was semi-conscious for a few days; I don’t remember too much. I recall waking up and screaming with pain in my left leg. When they cut the cast off I had wet gangrene from above the knee to the end of my foot. From then on the gangrene gradually went down to my toes. At first I lost the two middle toes—the second and third toe. I couldn’t put any weight down on my foot. If I did, I’d get a blister on the big toe.
[Chapman was transferred to Bethesda Naval Hospital and on to Mare Island Naval Hospital on the West Coast, where she was placed under the care of Dr. Thomas Candy.]
When I got out there they decided that the best thing was to remove my limb below the knee—the left leg. . . . I had no problems and got along fine. In July I had a prosthesis and was walking on it and making good progress. Of course, they didn’t let me go very fast. You had to take things gradually and go to physical therapy for exercise on your stump.
[Chapman was home awaiting orders to return to active duty when the Korean War began and the Navy needed to recruit medical personnel.]
Charles Asbell, who was in charge of the amputees under Dr. Candy, wrote me a letter suggesting that I write a letter to BUPERS. They still told me I couldn’t come back into the Navy. But when they began getting all the amputees, I am assuming that Dr. Candy talked to [Rear Admiral] Swanson [the Surgeon General]. I got a letter from Swanson asking me if I would come back on active duty and work with the amputees. I wrote back immediately telling him that if he thought I would be of value to the Navy, I would be happy to come back. I then got my orders to return to active duty in October of 1950. [Her reply to Rear Admiral Swanson read:] “Since you think that I could render a valuable service to the Navy and to my country in rehabilitation of the amputees in the naval hospital, Oakland, California, I would be happy to volunteer for active duty for this assignment.” And he said yes. . . .
Dr. Candy wanted me because he liked how hard I worked to become a good walker. . . . So I worked with the amputees from October 1950 to January of ’53. . . . I was very happy that they thought I was capable of doing something like that. I loved the Navy and I wanted to be a part of it. . . .
We had a ward full of patients—forty-some patients. They were both below-the-knee, above-the-knee, and quadruples. . . . I told them that if they put their minds to it, they could walk again. I actually didn’t do any nursing. I just worked with them and told them that if they worked hard they could accomplish what they wanted to and live a normal life again. . . .
My days were very challenging, sometimes very disappointing and sometimes very rewarding. There were so many different personalities to work with each day. Some didn’t want to walk and I had to be creative to get them to. . . . Once a week I went around with Dr. Candy. . . . We’d make rounds and Dr. Candy would talk to the patients. The patients would then come down to see me. I talked to them about working on their balance and strengthening their legs and muscles. I told them they would have pain but that they would just learn to live with it. I told them that if they walked properly and did the things they needed to do like balancing and building up their muscles in the remaining leg and arms, why they wouldn’t have any problems. . . .
I remember the times we had and the problems we faced. I think about many of my patients and wonder what happened to them. Sometimes I remember specific patients. I’d talk to a patient who was despondent and refused to walk. I was determined that he was going to walk.
“I don’t know why you want me to do this,” he’d complain. “You don’t know my pain. You have two legs and don’t know how it is. You can’t possibly know what I’m going through.”
At that point, I’d reach down and knock on my prosthesis. That would generally set them straight. From then on, they had no more excuses.
Mildred Stumpe (Kennedy)
(1931–2003)
U.S. Marine Corps
After a short stint in college and work in a St. Louis real estate company, Mildred Stumpe joined the Marine Corps. Her three older brothers had served in the Army in World War II, and despite the common perception that women in the service did not have a good name, they thought military service would be good for their “spoiled” little sister. Stumpe served two and a half years of her three-year enlistment; she opted for a marriage discharge at the urging of her Marine husband when he took orders to Korea in 1952. She and her husband eventually settled in Connecticut and raised three children. She worked part-time in retail grocery for thirty years. In 2001 Mary Jo Binker interviewed her for the oral history program at the Women in Military Service for America Memorial Foundation.
I kind of felt like I would never get out of the state of Missouri and I was an adventuresome person. I thought, well, this is one way to get out of Missouri. . . . I went to Parris Island. Then after Basic I went to supply school in North Carolina. . . . I had an easier time than most people [in Basic]. I get along very well with people. . . . I met these two girls from Missouri [on the train to Parris Island] and we became very good friends. And of course they were going through the same thing in boot camp as I was so we kind of cried on each other’s shoulders.
• • •
It was a new era in my life. I had no qualms about it. I knew I would make it. . . . And [I had] the right attitude.
• • •
When we first started we had men DIs. But then as we progressed more we had women. . . . About the only thing different between now and back then is now women fire actual weapons, which we didn’t do. But your discipline—and, I remember, oh, God—this drill instructor was a very tall, thin man, and he used to . . . we were stupid, let’s face it. He would swear under his breath. In other words, he couldn’t swear at us. But you could see his lips going through the SOBs and so forth. . . . In basic you were kept under such stern control that actually you didn’t have a chance to . . . you know, we were segregated. I remember I was there on Christmas. And I remember the big deal on Christmas Eve was marching to church, and actually seeing young males . . . I don’t think any of us got much out of church—we were too busy looking at the guys.
[Binker asks about black women. Mildred Stumpe Kennedy says they lived in an integrated barracks.]
We were all in the same boat. If someone became teary-eyed, she had a lot of shoulders to cry on. And we were all . . . the same people.
[Binker asks about Stumpe’s assignment to ordnance supply.]
At that point, anything was better than your basic training. And there were several of the friends that I had made, close friends, they were also assigned to North Carolina. So that was the good part. I was put into ordnance supply—like, a six-week course. And it was just so neat because you could go out with boys, you could look at boys. Especially when you’re eighteen years old. And yet, you couldn’t go very far because . . . being in North Carolina, none of the guys had cars. . . . It was kind of nice not to always have someone loo
king over your shoulder and telling you what to do. There were things such as dances, to where a busload of women Marines would go and there would be dancing, and at twelve o’clock they packed us up and took us back to the barracks.
[After supply school, Stumpe was assigned to Camp Pendleton.]
It’s in southern California, not too far from San Diego. Near La Jolla. I loved it. . . . First of all, you didn’t have as many people in the barracks. You had a little more privacy. And you actually had a nine-to-five job.
[Binker asks about Stumpe’s responsibilities. She replies that her job in ordnance supply was locating weapons and placing orders for another department to ship them to Korea.]
What we were doing was, like, locating the weapons and putting an order in for them. And then it was sent to [another department] and they took care of notifying manufacturers. We did not do any of the actual shipping. What we did was to locate. And we had lists of everything in ordnance. Then someone else took over. [The requisitions] went from our department to another department.
We had a lot of fun. And I don’t think . . . I guess I was in a good department. It was small. And I never felt any pressure. And it was just a great place to be. . . . I was the only woman Marine in there. There were civilians. And there were male Marines.
[Binker asks if she was treated well.]
Oh my goodness, yes. See, I guess back then we didn’t know about things like that . . . but . . . no. There was never any harassment. . . . I felt that even though I was in uniform, I was treated as a woman.
[Binker asks if she was concerned about the war.]
No. Don’t forget—we were eighteen, nineteen years old. . . . In fact, if you want to back up just a little. I first arrived in California when I was going to my job, the assignment, they sent a young Marine to pick me up in a Jeep [at the barracks] to take me to the office. And he was a nineteen-year-old. And we fell in love. . . . When I met him he was a corporal. He was from Connecticut. He’d been in a little longer. . . . He also worked in ordnance. . . . I kept telling him, “You don’t fall in love this fast. You’re lonely. You’re away from home.” But he kept at it, and we did not stop dating.
[She tells Binker that they did not need permission to marry.]
We went to see the priest at the Ranch House chapel in Camp Pendleton. And we had a little formal wedding. May 31st, 1952. But back then we got a leave together, a thirty-day leave. First we flew to Missouri. He met my family. We stayed there two weeks. Then we flew to Connecticut and I met his family and we stayed here two weeks and then went back to California. And it was cold, I would say maybe in like February, and then we decided to get married. . . .
[Then] he got orders to Korea. He didn’t want me to stay in the Marine Corps in California by myself. So we decided—back then, if you got married you could get out. So we decided I should get a discharge and go back to Missouri while he was in Korea.
[She says that she could have stayed on, and she was sad that she agreed to seek a discharge, because she didn’t want to leave the Marine Corps. Binker asks if she thinks of herself as a pioneer.]
I always say that if I hadn’t gotten married and stayed in the Marine Corps, I probably would have been commandant of the women Marines now. . . . I think we were the gateway to women going into the armed services, because back when I was a Marine there were only three platoons and one company. . . . It multiplied. They found out that, hey, having women in the service was pretty doggone good.
Because I was a Marine—I don’t know if this is a novelty—I am held in such esteem, it’s unbelievable. There was a gentleman [who] was in the Navy during the Korean War. He calls me his “hero.” Isn’t that amazing? Because I was a Marine. And he thinks I have so much stamina [despite my health problems]. It was my Marine Corps background that made me so motivated, that got me living as an ordinary human being again [after a serious illness]. . . . In my mind, I figured it was from being a Marine.
I certainly enjoyed my time in the Marine Corps. Looking back, I wish I’d stayed in. I met some beautiful people, and it was quite an experience. I got out of Missouri!
8
The Vietnam War
“What the Hell Am I Doing Here?”
Lt. Bobbi Hovis, Navy Nurse Corps, walked out of the U.S. Navy Hospital in Saigon and realized that she was staring down the barrels of several guns emplaced by the Vietnamese Army (ARVN). Just a few weeks earlier, a crew including Hovis and four other Navy nurses spent four days in an abandoned five-story apartment on Tran Hung Dao, Saigon’s main thoroughfare, setting up the first U.S. Navy hospital in Vietnam. A little after noon on November 1, 1963, they found themselves in the middle of a war.
Realizing that she could be caught in a crossfire between ARVN rebels and the National Police Force, Hovis dashed inside and up the stairs. When she heard a burst of gunfire, she went up to the fifth-floor balcony and saw the street below engulfed in a hailstorm of bullets. Pedestrians took cover in doorways, while the occupants of buildings popped out on balconies and rooftops to see what was happening. A male staff member joined Hovis. A bullet hit the balustrade wall directly in front of them. They dropped to the floor, crawled back inside, and took cover under a desk.
The shooting grew louder. Soon the sounds of machine gun and antiaircraft fire and the explosions of rockets fired from American-made T-28 fighter bombers filled the air. Staying low, Hovis and her colleagues watched the T-28 pilots open fire on the presidential palace, pull up, climb steeply, and then return. The sky clouded with smoke.
The day shift returned to quarters in an evening lull. By 8 p.m., tanks rumbled through the city. Shells exploded around the nurses’ quarters; a 105-mm howitzer thumped on the city outskirts. Fuel farms at the Saigon River were burning. Hovis heard a whine and an explosion nearby: a shell had hit the building across the street.
The ARVN attacked the presidential palace at 3:30 a.m. that Saturday under a full moon. Tanks and armored personnel carriers jammed the streets; hundreds of troops marched slowly behind them in the moonlight. Flares illuminated the smoky sky. Soot and dust covered Hovis and her six companions, now trapped in their quarters. Cordite fumes burned their eyes. Their heads ached from the repeated explosions.
At six-thirty that morning, the gunfire stopped. The artillery fell silent. A white flag waved over the presidential palace compound. The seventeen-hour military coup had ended. President Ngo Dinh Diem tried to escape; he was captured later that day, tortured, and executed.
The war in Vietnam had begun.
By the beginning of the Vietnam War, both military women’s policy and the attitude toward the women’s components had stagnated or regressed. The women’s components rejected any semblance of feminism. Policies aligned with stereotypical ideas of the 1950s about a woman’s proper role in society. Most servicemen viewed the women’s components as a ladies’ auxiliary rather than a force multiplier. Recruiters and assignment officers considered physical appearance a critical attribute. Prospective women recruits posed for four photographs: front, side, back, and full-face. Physical training was intended to keep women “fit and trim” but not to improve their ability to serve in the field. Enlisted women and officers received instruction on grooming, hair styling, and application of makeup. Officers diverted the most attractive women, regardless of their technical expertise, into front-office clerical jobs or protocol. The directors of the women’s components tolerated the double standard and even pushed servicewomen to maintain a “feminine” appearance, but they struggled behind the scenes for continued acceptance of women in the military and survival of the women’s components. In short, women’s military policy institutionalized segregation and discrimination.
A very small number of nurses and WACs served in Vietnam during the early days of the war. Two WACs arrived in December 1964 to train South Vietnamese Women’s Armed Forces Corps servicewomen in Saigon.
Three hundred more military nurses trained in field skills such as camp site selection, tent set
up, road marching, map and compass work, field sanitation, and disaster planning arrived in February 1966. By the end of the war, almost six thousand nurses and medical technicians had served in country. In addition to treating American and South Vietnamese wounded and enemy prisoners of war, they volunteered for public health missions in local communities. One nurse, Lt. Sharon Lane, ANC, died of enemy fire when a rocket hit her quarters. Six other Army nurses and one Air Force nurse also died in the line of duty.
Policies on the assignment of women were inconsistent. Nurses served under fire during the Tet Offensive in 1968 and routinely experienced more danger and inconvenience in the field than men assigned to headquarters commands in Saigon and on other major facilities. However, the Army refused women in the line assignment to Vietnam even when they volunteered. Only about five hundred WACs, fewer than forty women Marines, and a very small handful of Navy and Air Force women served in country. Almost all had volunteered to go. Exclusion from the combat zone reduced women’s opportunities for promotion, especially in the Air Force, which combined men’s and women’s promotion lists. Women prohibited from serving in Vietnam received lower pay and fewer benefits: they were ineligible for hostile fire pay, cost of living allowances, tax exemptions, choice follow-on assignments and training, and accelerated promotion. Exclusion of women also forced men to carry the lion’s share of the burden of one-year combat rotations.
Women returning from Vietnam, especially hospital staff, faced many of the same reintegration challenges as the men with whom they served. A 2015 Department of Veterans Affairs study of women veterans who served in Vietnam found that 20 percent experienced post-traumatic stress disorder: flashbacks and nightmares, survivor’s guilt, medical trauma, and mixed feelings about saving the lives and treating the wounds of the enemy. Some experienced sexual harassment and assault. In addition, upon their return, society did not recognize them as veterans because of their sex. To this day, many women who served in Vietnam or during the Vietnam era discuss their military experience only reluctantly. Or they remain silent.
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