Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 188, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 August 1915 — Hospital Barges. [ARTICLE]

Hospital Barges.

Northern France is rich in waterways, and hospital barges are already running between Paris and the battlefront, under the auspices of the Union des Femmes de France. The hold »s enameled white and fitted with 40 beds, and at the end is the nurse’s retiring-room. The barge-master’s cabin is converted into a living-room for two surgeons. There is an ope-at-ing-room, too, with washing gear, an electric plant, and a perfect system of heating. To convert a Seine barge into a gondola of this kind costs a bare |SOO, and the results are beyond praise—especially to fracture cases, to whom the jolting road is agony. The wounded are hoisted in by means of small cranes, and the barge is then towed by steam or motor yachts lent by wealthy persons, who are more than glad not only to lend their boats free of charge, bnt to navigate them ijj, person, thus sharing in the work of mercy.