The Cellar-House of Pervyse

About this film

LibriVox recording of The Cellar-House of Pervyse by Mairi Chisholm and Elsie Knocker, Edited by G. E. Mitton. Read in English by Expatriate Mairi Chisholm and Elsie Knocker were two British nurses and ambulance drivers whose staggeringly heroic efforts during World War I saved countless lives and earned them life-long honor. They were especially known for their determination to treat wounded soldiers on the front lines instead of transporting them at great risk to "safer" hospital facilities, even though many of their actions went directly contrary to official bureaucratic regulations. In November of 1914, they took the step for which they are most famous. They decided to leave the corps and set up their own dressing station five miles east in a town named Pervyse, north of Ypres, just one hundred yards from the trenches. Here, in a vacant cellar which they named the "Poste de Secours Anglais" ("British First Aid Post"), the two would spend the next three and a half years aiding the wounded in the Belgian sector. Knocker gave most of the medical attention, while Chisholm transported the injured, often in terrible conditions and under fire, to a base hospital 15 miles away. No long…

Directors & creators

Mairi Chisholm and Elsie Knocker

Subjects

librivox; audiobooks;World War I; women's literature

View on archive.org ↗