Navy Nurses in Saigon

This apartment building, unremarkable except for the armed guards behind the concrete wall topped with wire grenade screens surrounding it, housed the second U.S. military hospital established in the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam), and the first one run by the U.S. Navy.  (Naval History and Heritage Command image)    

By Alicia Pullen
HRNM Educator
 
As the American military presence grew in South Vietnam during the early 1960s, the need for medical support was crucial. In response to this, the Naval Station Hospital in Saigon (also called Station Hospital Saigon) was established on October 1, 1963. The facility treated patients of all nationalities and provided a safe place for people to seek medical support. Navy medical personnel and other staff delivered care to patients and handled the day-to-day tasks of the hospital. Nurses, in particular, served a vital role at the hospital by working long shifts and attending to the wounded. Their experiences were unparalleled, as they grappled with the harsh realities of their environment and the constant threat of terrorism.

The hospital was originally an abandoned “French-hotel apartment.”[1] This building was a five-story structure with plenty of rooms. Renovations required extensive work, such as constructing “wire grenade screens” along the entire perimeter of the property.[2] The first medical staff on-site were responsible for cleaning the interior and exterior. Bedding and equipment where brought in. By winter, the hospital was filled to capacity with “increasing numbers of Navy physicians, dentists, nurses, and hospital corpsmen.”[3] There were also administrative assistants, janitorial staff, and Vietnamese employees. Later, the courtyard was used for supplies, an “emergency room, and operating room,” and a helicopter pad was constructed nearby to facilitate the transport of patients to other treatment facilities.[4] To prevent terrorist attacks, the hospital received full-time security from U.S. military police as well as Vietnamese soldiers and police.

All nurses at the Naval Station Hospital were required to wear white uniforms and caps while on duty. Their daily routine included administering medication, helping to transfer outgoing patients, and providing medical support to doctors. Nurses also had to prevent and treat patients with infectious diseases. Among those diseases included malaria, hepatitis, and amoebiasis. Nurses offered moral support to patients by listening to their stories and sharing their experiences during evening events, such as movie nights at the hospital.[5] Grace Moore, an Army nurse during the Vietnam War, recalled, “we were their emotional support system. We were their mother, their wife, their girlfriend, their sister. You listened a lot, did a lot of hand-holding, comforting.”[6]

Although the hospital was necessary for those living in and around Saigon, violence was prevalent. On one account, Lieutenant Darby Reynolds, a Navy nurse at the hospital recalled a tragic event that put the lives of nurses, including her own, at risk. On Christmas Eve, 1964, a bomb-laden car drove into an underground parking garage near the hospital. After the bomb detonated, many victims were injured and were brought to the hospital for medical treatment. Reynolds, along with four other Navy nurses, were injured. She then recalled going to work after the attack to help a wounded patient with an injured leg. Reynolds’ immediate actions that day demonstrated her commitment to helping patients in any situation and to the best of her ability.  All five of the Navy nurses received the Purple Heart and were the only Navy nurses to be awarded the medal during the Vietnam War.[7]

Capt. Archie Kuntze, Commander, U.S. Naval Support Activity (NSA), Saigon, presents Purple Heart medals to (left to right) Lt. Barbara Wooster, Lt. Ruth Mason, and Lt. j.g. Darby Reynolds for wounds sustained during the Christmas Eve 1964 bombing of the Brink Barracks.  A fourth nurse, Lt. Francis Crumpton, was flown earlier to Clark Air Force Base, Philippines, for treatment.  Cmdr. Miles Turley (far right), Kuntze's executive officer, was wounded during a separate attack on New Year's Day 1965, two weeks before this photograph was taken.  (Naval History and Heritage Command image)

The work of Navy nurses in Vietnam and the overwhelming number of patients they helped, speaks to both their skillfulness and compassion. At the Station Hospital, nurses were both efficient and effective in providing emergency care to patients. Their duties and responsibilities during those uncertain times showed the vital role they played in providing medical care and emotional support to the patients they served.

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[1] Morin, Aline E. "Navy Hospital in Saigon." The American Journal of Nursing 66, no. 9 (1966): 1977-979. Accessed April 11, 2020. doi:10.2307/3420172.

[2] Herman, Jan K. Navy Medicine in Vietnam: Passage to Freedom to the Fall of Saigon. The U.S. Navy and the Vietnam War (Washington, DC: Naval History and Heritage Command, 2010), 1–50.

[3] Ibid., pg. 5

[4] Ibid., pg. 5

[5] Morin, pg.1977, See also, "Factoids—US Naval Station Hospital Saigon." (n.d.)., last modified August 2014, https://www.womensmemorial.org/factoids

[6] DiFilippo, Dana. “'Blood Smells the Same,' but for Vietnam Nurses, the War Never Ends.” WHYY News, September 8, 2017. https://whyy.org/articles/vietnamnursesdd/.

[7] Herman, pg. 7

Artifacts of the Month: Captain Ruth Moeller, MSC, USN

By Joseph Judge
Hampton Roads Naval Museum Curator

In honor of women’s history month the artifacts of the month are personal items from Captain Ruth Moeller, USN.  Capt. Moeller was an educator and administrator who served the Navy for three decades as “an officer and a lady.”

Items on display this month include uniform items that once belonged to Capt. Moeller such as the Navy Tiara (upper left) as well as commemorative coins and personal decorations.  (Photograph by Marta Nelson-Joiner)

Capt. Moeller's personal decorations included the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Medal, the American Campaign Medal, the World War II Victory Medal, and the National Defense Service Medal (two awards).(Photograph by Marta Nelson-Joiner)

USS Solace (AH-5) in 1943. Solace, the second Navy hospital ship to carry that name, was built in 1927 as the passenger ship SS Iroquois by the Newport News Shipbuilding and Drydock Co., Newport News, Va. The liner was converted into a hospital ship at the Atlantic Basin Iron Works, Brooklyn, N.Y. In March 1942, Solace was ordered to the South Pacific and in the ensuing months shuttled between New Zealand, Australia, New Caledonia, Espiritu Santo, the New Hebrides, and the Fiji Islands, caring for fleet casualties and servicemen wounded in the island campaigns. (Official U.S. Navy Photo)

Capt. Moeller was born in 1916 in Nebraska.  In 1939 she was appointed a reserve officer in the Navy Nurse Corps and was called to active duty in March 31, 1942.  The young nurse shipped to the South Pacific aboard the hospital ship USS Solace (AH-5).  During World War II, she also was stationed at the Naval Hospital in Portsmouth, VA. 

The seal of the Navy Nurse Corps from Capt. Moeller's collection. (Photograph by Marta Nelson-Joiner)

In 1947, after further studies at the Medical College of Virginia and other places, she transferred from the Nurse Corps to the Medical Service Corps.  Congress established the Medical Service Corps as a staff Corps of the Navy engaged in medical support work.  Part of the Corps was the Women’s Specialist Section.


In 1957, she was assigned to the Naval Medical School, Bethesda, as officer in charge of the Physical Therapy Technicians School.  She also assumed additional duty as Assistant to the Director, Medical Service Corps for Women Specialist Officers.

It was under the leadership of Captain Moeller, who had become the Assistant for the Women’s Specialist Section in 1962, that the Navy eliminated the word “Women’s’’ from the section’s title thereby making it the “Medical Specialist Section.” In 1965, men actually joined the section.


President Lyndon B. Johnson signs Public Law 90-130. Captain Ruth Moeller is standing third from the left.  The Nov. 8, 1967, event opened promotions for women to general and flag ranks, lifted ceilings on other ranks and removed the two-percent ceiling on the number of women allowed on active duty. (Courtesy Women's Memorial)

In 1967, Capt. Moeller was one of the women standing beside President Lyndon Johnson when he signed the law opening general and flag ranks to women. The law also removed the 2% ceiling on the number of women in each service branch.

Capt. Moeller retired on September 1, 1969 as an admired clinician and mentor to junior officers and enlisted corpsmen alike. She passed away in 2014 at 98 years of age, and in accordance with her wishes was buried at sea.

Captain William De Valin and the Party of the Year, 1925

In October 1925, the commanding officer of the Norfolk Navy Yard decided to have a Halloween party at the officers' club. He invited all of the region's senior Naval and Marine officers to attend and told them it was going to be a costume party. To make the party truly a party, he needed alcohol. Being that this was the era of Prohibition, legally obtaining such beverages was hard to do.

Fortunately for party goers, one officer in Hampton Roads oversaw the largest supply of legal alcohol in the area, Captain William De Valin, commanding officer of the Portsmouth Naval Hospital. The Volstead Act, the Federal law that officially made the transportation, production, and possession of alcohol a crime, provided for two exceptions: religious use (i.e. wine for Holy Communion) and medicinal purposes. Although the American Medical Association denounced the use of alcohol as a valid treatment option, the medical community had long used whiskey and other hard liquors as antiseptics and analgesics. During Prohibition, patients seeking hard liquor for such purposes had to get a special prescription. Much of Dr. De Valin's supply came from seized contraband found on Navy ships that had attempted to bootleg whiskey and champagne into NOB Norfolk from the West Indies. Once the trial of the accused bootleggers was over, Naval authorities often transferred the booze over to the Hospital.

Since this was a costume party, the commanding officer of the Navy Yard's Marines, Colonel Henry Davis, came dressed as Sunbonnet Sue, a popular quilting pattern and children's book character. De Valin came dressed as a Scottish bagpiper and, more importantly, brought with him several pints of whiskey and champagne.

All of the guests partook of the liquor and, by all accounts, the party was a huge success. After a few drinks, Davis and De Valin entertained the guests with their best rendition of Scottish highland dances. One person, however, thought De Valin was having too much fun. Commander Robert Heiner, De Valin's executive officer, believed his boss to be out of control. After the party was over, he filed charges against De Valin.

One of the costumes depicted Sunbonnet
Sue, a popular children's book and quilting
pattern. 

Heiner accused De Valin not only of being drunk, but of using the Hospital's supply of liquor improperly and groping women at the party. He also charged that De Valin was so drunk that he attempted to put pajamas on a horse. When the accusation reached the desk of Secretary of the Navy Curtis Wilbur, this former chief justice of the California Supreme Court was not pleased. While denying that he was on a crusade to completely rid the Navy of all liquor, Wilbur nonetheless was not happy with constant reports of bootlegging and misuse of liquor by the Navy's Medical Corps. He personally ordered an investigation into the party and De Valin's actions. Enough evidence was discovered and the Secretary ordered a formal court-martial for May 1926.

Ironically, though it was well-known that every officer at the party drank, none of them were charged with violating the Volstead Act. Indeed, the Navy only accused De Valin of misuse of the Hospital liquor supply and actions unbecoming an officer. The charge of dressing up the horse was never brought up (De Valin later claimed to a newspaper reporter, however, that he was simply fixing the bandages on the horse's legs).

The trial brought up all the embarrassing events of that fateful night: the booze, the wild costumes, the dancing, and the alleged groping. Heiner testified that this party was not the first time his commanding officer raided the Hospital's liquor cabinet. He claimed that De Valin would also take some during hunting trips in the Virginia countryside. Colonel Davis and Commander Charles Blakely, commanding officer of the battleship USS Texas (BB-35), came to De Valin's defense. They both claimed that De Valin was not drunk and, while he danced with several women, he never touched them improperly. Of course, upon cross examination, Commander Blakely did admit that he personally advised De Valin that his actions were questionable and that he should leave the party.

The panel cleared De Valin of the more serious charges of conduct unbecoming an officer, but it did find him guilty of misusing the Hospital's liquor supply. For that, the court punished him by demoting him down several ranks on the promotion list. Sensing also that Heiner and De Valin had serious personal issues with each other, Wilbur transferred De Valin to the Naval hospital in Philadelphia.

Smoke Break Aboard USS Cumberland

The Naval Museum's USS Cumberland collection houses six different smoking pipes, all of different shapes and sizes. Most of the pipes shown in these photographs are made of clay. Clay pipes were simple to make, easily customized into different shapes, and affordable for enlisted sailors. Two of the pipes in the museum's collection have words on them; however, we are not sure if these words mark the name of the manufacturer or of the sailor to whom the pipes belonged. The names do not appear on Cumberland's roster from the day she sank. There is also one pipe with an oyster shell in it. Since the ship’s destruction, oysters have formed large colonies on Cumberland’s wreck.

During the Civil War, sailors liked to smoke in order to pass the time. In the 1860s, Americans still frequently used snuff boxes, but pipe tobacco use in the U.S. Navy increased significantly during this time period. A mid-19th century writer described the smoke pipe culture when he wrote, "Then you wish to hear something about tobacco and the way people use it? Well, light your pipe, give me a match for mine, and sit down here in the shade, and I will tell you what observations I have made at home and abroad."

In more than one Civil War memoir, writers mentioned that during their downtime, they would light a pipe and stare at the endless ocean. Raphael Semmes, commanding officer of CSS Sumter and Alabama, ensured his sailors' tobacco pouches were never empty. He would take tobacco from a captured ship and distribute it among his company. When Alabama was in port, U.S. diplomats frequently tried to convince Semmes' sailors to desert the Confederate cause by offering them lavish amounts of smoking tobacco.

Surprisingly, the Navy did make attempts to persuade people to stop smoking during the Civil War. The Navy Journal, a 19th-century sailor's magazine, implored: "Indeed, smoking is a vile, barbarous habit, which ought not to be tolerated in a civilized community. We beg that our readers who are slaves to this unnatural propensity, will read the following extract, AND SMOKE NO MORE." After the war, doctors at the Naval Academy noticed that some midshipmen smoked so much that the doctors feared it would permanently damage the midshipmen's ability to think and function before they reached the Fleet. Nevertheless, given the number of pipes on board Cumberland and the fact that the grog ration was on its way out, those words and other warnings fell on deaf ears.

Behind Closed Doors: Graphic Novels and the US Navy

The USS George Washington (CVN-73) graphic novel, made by the US Navy to ease tensions about having a nuclear aircraft carrier in Japan.

In recent years, the U.S. Navy has used graphic novels as a tool to teach and communicate. One such example reassured Japanese citizens regarding the stationing of the nuclear aircraft carrier USS George Washington (CVN-73) in the port city of Yokosuka. Graphic novels have recently surged in readership, largely due to their popularity among relatively younger audiences. Unlike many comic books, graphic novels tell fully developed stories. The Navy saw an opportunity to use graphic novels as an age-appropriate way to simultaneously entertain and educate Sailors. One result was “The Docs,” a graphic novel that is both an interesting narrative with fictional characters, and a “voice of experience” testimonial based on actual situations encountered in Iraq at the height of the war and actual demands on Corpsmen under hostile fire.

"The Docs," a graphic novel created to train Navy Corpsmen about combat stress.

On Thursday evening, September 20, at 6pm, the Hampton Roads Naval Museum will host a FREE program about the Navy’s use of graphic novels. Visitors will learn about how training in the Navy has changed throughout the years. This program features Dr. Heidi Kraft, co-author of “The Docs.” Dr. Kraft received her Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the UC San Diego/SDSU Joint Doctoral Program in Clinical Psychology in 1996. Her active-duty assignments included the Naval Safety Center, the Naval Health Research Center, and Naval Hospital Jacksonville, FL. In February 2004, she deployed to western Iraq for seven months with a Marine Corps surgical company.  She left active duty in 2005 after nine years in the Navy, and now serves as a consultant for the US Navy and Marine Corps’ Combat Stress Control programs. 

The September 20^th program is free of charge. Complimentary food and drinks will also be provided. Dr. Kraft will be available for a book-signing after the program ends. All attendees will receive a free copy of “The Docs” (one per family, please). Reservations are required. Please call 757-322-3108 to reserve your seat today.

For all public questions and inquiries, please contact Laura Orr at laura.l.orr@navy.mil or 757-322-3108, or visit HRNM’s Facebook page at www.facebook.com/HRNavalMuseum. The event is co-sponsored by the Hampton Roads Council of the Navy League.

Chief Oliver and the Spanish Flu Epidemic

USS New Hampshire in Brest, France, December 1918

Quartermaster Chief Petty Officer J.T. Oliver's granddaughter (and donor of his photographs) relayed this story that Oliver told to her about how he had to get creative in preventing the spread of the deadly and highly contagious Spanish Influenza:

“On one of the U.S.S. New Hampshire's return trips from France, the hold of the ship was filled with coffins of men who died during the 1918-1919 Spanish Influenza Epidemic.  Antibiotics didn't exist in that era, so the threat of infection was great, and the coffins were draped with heavy tarpaulins drenched in disinfectant.  And the hold was off limits to the crew.

However, a group of ‘bad boys’ would sneak down into the hold of the ship at night and play poker, using one of the coffins as a table.  QMC Oliver was told to he had stop these poker games before the flu spread all over the ship.  So one night ... he crept down into the hold and hid in an empty coffin ... and waited for the poker game to start.  When it did and the ‘bad boys’ were focused on the game, he lifted the lid of the coffin and moaned, ‘ooooooooooooooooooooooooohhhhh,’ and let the lid slam closed.

The ‘bad boys’ were a little spooked.  ‘What was that?’  ‘I don't know.’  ‘It sounded like someone moaning.’  ‘I didn't hear anything.’  ‘I tell you I heard someone moaning.’  ‘You're hearing things.’  After a minute or two of silence, the ‘bad boys’ decided it was nothing, just the normal creaking of a ship at sea, and the game resumed.  A few minutes later, Oliver lifted the lid again and moaned in a much louder voice, ‘ooooooooooooooooooooooooooohhhhh,’ and let the lid slam closed.

This time the ‘bad boys’ left ... and in such a hurry that one of them had footprints up the back of his white jumper.  From that point on there were no more card games (or any other activity) in the hold of the ship.”