"Einstein was right – time really is relative. Weeks feel like years and also like minutes at the same time"

Dispatches from the Frontline brings you podcasts from the diary of World War 1 nurse. At the same time, they also are a recording of how three artists re-directed their creative energies at home, on rehearsing on zoom and recording and editing on audacity during Melbourne’s lockdowns in 2020 and 2021 at the height of the Coronavirus pandemic.

The Great War lasted four years (1914-1918). Everyone thought it was going “to be over by Christmas”. At the beginning of 2020, the world was asking the same question. How long will our “war on the pandemic” last? As we recorded the Sister Nan Reay’s descriptions of tending to the wounded soldiers from the trenches, we noticed how the language of war had become the current parlance of 2020. We were facing “the war on Covid”, the “frontline”, the “battle against the coronavirus” and daily reminders of how to survive our “war on Covid”. It seems that our language has not changed in over 104 years. In fact, the survival practices of keeping people alive – good hygiene, quality care, respect, tolerance and humour are enduring human qualities to help us survive.

For more information on Dispatches from the Frontline project, go to: www.dispatchesfromthefrontline.org

Dispatches from the Frontline is brought to you by:

Geraldine Cook-Dafner – Narrator

Naomi Edwards - Director

Alex Dafner – Voice recording and editing

Zoltan Fecso – Music composition, sound design and editing

Tristan Meecham – Creative Producer, All the Queen’s Men

Image – Sarah Corridon

Dispatches from the Frontline is supported by funding from the Public Record Office Victoria, Creative Victoria and Regional Arts Victoria

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Nan Reay arrived in England, from Australia, in December 1912 with her mother Lucinda (Louie) and sisters Millie, Beatrice, Amy and Alice. She then nursed privately in London until the outbreak of war in 1914. When war was declared she immediately put her name forward to join the war effort and was recruited to join the Australian Voluntary Hospital (AVH) established by Lady Dudley in England. 

Lady Dudley raised the funds and established the AVH in a remarkably short time in August 1914 to give expatriate Australians in Britain the opportunity to support the war. 

By August 27th the AVH left for the Front with Lady Dudley as Superintendent to establish their work at St Nazaire. 

There were eighteen nurses, sixteen of whom were Australian, eighty non-commissioned officers and men, including twenty-five medical students. 

Nan Reay records this day by noting that she received her “first army pay. In this episode she describes her journey into the “unknown” as she travels to the harbour of Le Havre, in north western France.

The AVH served as a military hospital from 1914-1916 on the Western Front and for much of this time, it was the only Australian presence on the Western Front. It has been described as the United Nations of emergency healthcare because it was established as an independent field hospital to care for French, Russian, Serbian and Portugese soliders, as well as Commonwealth soldiers. 

By the end of October 1914 the AVH moved to Wimereux, a coastal town situated five kilometres north of Boulogne on the north-west coast of France. The town was an important hospital centre during WW1.

At the end of the war, in 1918, Lady Dudley was appointed C.B.E. and was awarded the Royal Red Cross for her work with the AVH. 

World War 1 Timeline for Episode 1

28 June 1914.Austro-Hungarian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife, Sophie Chotek, are assassinated by Bosnian Serb nationalist Gavrilo Princip. Austria suspects Serbia is responsible.

28 July 1914 

Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia.

August 1914 

Germany declares war on Russia, France and Belgium.

Britain declares war on Germany.

Austria-Hungary declares war on Russia.

France and Britain declare war on Austria-Hungary.

Japan declares war on Germany.

Austria-Hungary declares war on Belgium.

The United States declares its neutrality.

“The Retreat from Mons” is written across the left hand margin between the entries for 2 and 3 September in Nan Reay’s handwriting. 

The Battle of Mons took place in Belgium on 23 August 1914, when the German army forced the British Expeditionary Force into a retreat.

For more information on Dispatches from the Frontline project, go to: www.dispatchesfromthefrontline.org

Dispatches from the Frontline is brought to you by:

Geraldine Cook-Dafner – Narrator

Naomi Edwards - Director

Alex Dafner – Voice recording and editing

Zoltan Fecso – Music composition, sound design and editing

Tristan Meecham – Creative Producer, All the Queen’s Men

Image – Sarah Corridon

Dispatches from the Frontline is supported by funding from the Public Record Office Victoria, Creative Victoria and Regional Arts Victoria

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Due to the advance of the German army, the Australian Voluntary Hospital is established at St. Nazaire instead of Le Havre. Nan Reay arrives on the 6 September and noticing St. Nazaire to be a little cleaner than Le Havre, sets to work with her colleagues to get everything ship shape at headquarters.

We are introduced to Gabriel, (Ida Gabriel) Nan’s Australian friend with whom she had sailed back to Australia in 1913 after accompanying a ship load of migrants from England to Australia in 1912. Nan Reay is comforted by meeting Melbourne Hospital colleagues and friends who have also joined the AVH. 

For the first time, Nan describes her patients and their injuries. We are introduced to the word “Tommies” which was slang for common soldier in the British army in WW1. 

World War 1 Timeline for Episode 2

4 September 1914.Germany invades Belgium and advances to within 48 kms of Paris. They are stopped at the First Battle of the Marne (6-12 September) in north-eastern France by the French armies and the British Expeditionary Forces. The Germans dig in north of the Aisne River, and a system of fighting known as trench warfare that is to typify the Western Front (areas of Belgium and France) for the next four years begins. 

During the battle, the French had around 250,000 casualties and the British lost 12,733 men. Although the French and British were able to prevent the Germans from a swift and decisive victory, the German army was not beaten and their successful retreat ended what was expected to be a war which would be “over by Christmas”.

For more information on Dispatches from the Frontline project, go to: www.dispatchesfromthefrontline.org

Dispatches from the Frontline is brought to you by:

Geraldine Cook-Dafner – Narrator

Naomi Edwards - Director

Alex Dafner – Voice recording and editing

Zoltan Fecso – Music composition, sound design and editing

Tristan Meecham – Creative Producer, All the Queen’s Men

Image – Sarah Corridon

Dispatches from the Frontline is supported by funding from the Public Record Office Victoria, Creative Victoria and Regional Arts Victoria

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.