The Lusitania's Last Voyage
made from the top of the paddle box. This necessitated all hands going up a very narrow companion-way, built on the side of the paddle box and so too narrow and too steep to permit the carrying of a stretcher. I went aboard and carried the two cripples ashore on my back. To get them ashore this way must have hurt them terribly, but never a groan from the woman nor from the man. The fact that injured people could show such nerve as this gave us fellows who were not injured the physical strength to do all that we did do.
One of the women in our boat went along with the girl with the broken leg to the hospital, and so I felt she'd be well taken care of. This chap B—— refused to let anyone accompany him to the Marine Hospital, having perfect confidence in the four Naval Reserve men who carried the stretcher, and certainly that confidence was justified.
( 41 )
