American Daughter Gone to War; On the Front Lines with an Army Nurse in Vietnam
Albert Guida (Author photograph) New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1992. First Edition [Stated], First Printing [Stated]. Hardcover. 25 cm. 352 pages. Acid-free paper. Illustrations. DJ is in a plastic sleeve. A former army nurse during the Vietnam War describes her days and nights, dating fighter pilots, tending to wounded soldiers, and getting a taste of the tragedy of war while working in a Saigon intensive care unit. An idealistic young nurse in 1966, Winnie Smith requested assignment to an intensive care unit in Saigon to care for wounded American soldiers. The horrors she saw and endured there were to change her life. The initial camaraderie of war, drinking to relax and the pleasure of leave on East Asian beaches soon wore thin. Struggling daily to keep dying men alive - to calm terrified memories and offer solace for ruined young lives - undermined Winnie's idealism and her strength. Once back in America, the reality of life after the nightmare of war left her isolated and dismayed, and any years later she still battled with flashbacks and uncontrollable bouts of crying. Only the support of other veterans, and the astonishing courage and endurance she had found in Vietnam, helped Winnie begin her long road back to peace. Daughter Gone to War is a mirror for America's own loss of faith over the course of one of the most shattering conflicts of the century, and an inspiring account personal heartbreak and renewal. Derived from a Kirkus review: A searing account from former Army nurse Smith of her tour of duty in Vietnam and its devastating personal aftermath. Joining the Army 'to see the world,' Smith was a gung-ho supporter of the war, and an initial period at an Army base in Japan with all the comforts of home did little to dispel her enthusiasm. In fact, the `warriors' air of bravado and cocky self- assurance fanned [her] notions about war' even as she `was drawn to the strong kinship among them, a sense of family.' And this closeness would make her stint in Vietnam even worse, because the men she liked, and sometimes loved, often were killed, lost in action, or horribly wounded. Hospitals she served in, like the Third Field Hospital in Saigon, were nightmarish places of inadequate supplies and equipment, squalid living quarters, and men with wounds so terrible that it was difficult at times for Smith not to show her own horror and dismay. The local Vietnamese were exploitative and resentful, nothing seemed to work, and the war was obviously not going well. Her tour over, Smith returned to the US, but had difficulty adjusting to her family, old friends, and new jobs. Peter, whom she had met in Vietnam, asked her to marry him, but terrified of losing him—he was a professional soldier—she turned him down. In the years that followed, Smith went to graduate school and moved to San Francisco, but was troubled by often debilitating memories and flashbacks. With the help of a veterans' support group, she finally exorcised her memories and recovered sufficiently to attend the 1985 dedication of N.Y.C.'s Vietnam Memorial, where the warmth of the crowd's welcome was a `long- awaited dream come true.' No false heroics, no patriotic gloss, only the Vietnam War in all its grim reality. Condition: Very good / Very good.
Keywords: Vietnam War, Military Medicine, Army Nurse Corps, Saigon, Napalm, Amputation, Cam Rahn Bay, Wounded, Nurses, Intensive Care Unit, Third Field Hospital, Soldiers, Twenty-fourth Evacuation Hospital, Long Binh, Fort Leonard Wood, Camp Zama, Memorial
ISBN: 0688111882
[Book #26690]
Price: $45.00