Odessa Chambers: Asheville Nurse with Base Hospital No. 65 in WWI
By Matthew M. Peek, Military Collection Archivist, State Archives of North Carolina
Constance Odessa Chambers (who went by “Odessa”) was born on March 4, 1888, in the town of Mars Hill in Madison County, N.C., to Hugh Johnson and Hester L. Chambers. By 1900, the Chambers were living in Madison County, and Hugh Chambers was working as a farmer. By 1910, the Chambers family was living in Buncombe County, N.C., and Hugh Chambers was still working as a farmer.
Odessa Chambers attended the Meriwether Hospital and Training School for Nurses in Asheville, N.C. She graduated in the class of 1916, which had a total of six women in it, on May 11, 1916. She would be working as a nurse in Asheville when the United States entered World War I. She volunteered for the U.S. Army Nurse Corps (ANC) in July 1917, but would not be called until the next. Chambers was appointed from civilian life to join the ANC, which at the time of WWI had fewer than 420 active Army nurses in service. She would be inducted into service on March 20, 1918, in Asheville.
Odessa Chambers traveled to and stayed in New York City prior to being sent overseas. While there, she and a number of other female nurses stayed in a New York City hotel while assigned to the U.S. Army General Hospital No. 1 in the city [believed at the time to be run out of the Bellevue Hospital, as the early General Hospital No. 1 staff had been]. Although the original General Hospital No. 1’s staff had traveled to France by this time, the number and site of the hospital was still being used stateside apparently for training, and before women were assigned to their permanent hospital station overseas. She was assigned there until July 31, 1918, when she was attached to a mobile hospital station. She remained there until the day she left the United States.
Chambers left the United States aboard a troop transport ship on August 31, 1918. After arriving in France, she was attached to the newly-formed Base Hospital No. 65. The hospital center at Kerhuon, France, was situated four miles southeast of Brest, and about 1.5 miles from the railroad station of Kerhuon. The center was planned to consist of eight base hospitals, with a total capacity of 8,000 beds, for embarkation purposes. However, only 4,000 beds had been provided when the armistice was signed on November 11, 1918, and further construction was abandoned. The construction of the center was to be completed by September 15, 1918. However, at that time only about 50 per cent of the buildings were under roof; few of them were entirely finished; the water and sewerage systems still were under construction; and there were no roads or walks of any kind.
Base Hospital No. 65 was the first unit to report at Kerhuon on September 16, 1918, and on September 20th the center was organized. Subsequently, the following additional arrived: Base Hospitals Nos. 105, 92, 120. Unlike the other hospital centers of a like capacity, the Kerhuon center always operated as one hospital, with at least 90 per cent of their activities devoted to receiving, preparing, and evacuating patients to the United States.
Base Hospital No. 65 handled over 40,000 patients during this period. The hospital eventually had a capacity of 4,000. 100 nurses and 200 enlisted men looked after a large number of sick and dying men. The hospital handled wounded men, cases of influenza, pneumonia, pleurisy, cerebro-spinal meningitis, and insanity. In October 1918, the Chief Surgeon of the American Expeditionary Forces called upon Base Hospital No. 65 for two operating teams to be sent to the front as traveling medical teams. This called for a highly trained operating room nurse for each team — two North Carolina women were chosen for these roles. They went with their teams as assigned and spent many weeks in active duty close to the front lines. Supplies, staffing, beds, and time were always short at Base Hospital No. 65.
Chambers traveled a bit in France and possibly to other countries while on leave after the Armistice in November 1918. On January 1, 1919, she was assigned to work in the American Red Cross nurses hut at Base Hospital No. 65. At the end of January 1919, Chambers and several other nurses took a leave of absence to travel through southern France. After return from leave, she worked in the Casual Nurses’ office of Base Hospital No. 65 assisting a woman named Ms. Rose, where Chambers assisted in finding boat accommodations for nurses being returned to the U.S. as hospitals near the front lines in France and Belgium were being closed down. She assisted in preparing temporary residency at the hospital, including getting fresh bedding and the beds made, for these returning nurses.
Odessa Chambers would remain stationed in Kerhuon through March 14, 1919. Chambers became ill with pneumonia while in Brest, France; the military officials thought it would be best to return her for care to the U.S. On March 26, she was transported aboard the troop transport ship SS Leviathan back to the U.S. from Brest, France.
She was assigned to the U.S. Embarkation Hospital No. 4 in New York City, until April 17, 1919, while recovering from her illness. On April 18, Chambers was transferred to Camp Hospital No. 42 at Camp Wadsworth near Spartanburg, S.C. She remained stationed there until September 1919, when she was given her Army discharge that would not go into effect until November 3, 1919.
After returning from the war to Asheville early before her discharge took effect, Chambers began giving talks about her nursing experiences in Europe, including to the Asheville Association for Public Health Nursing in October 1919. In September 1920, she became seriously ill, and was being treated at the Meriwether Hospital. On May 4, 1921, Chambers was elected as a staff nurse for the Asheville Association for Public Health Nursing by their board of directors, and began working for the association on June 1, 1921. By October 1921, she was serving with other nurses of the Asheville Association for Public Health Nursing conducting public health visits to Asheville city schools.
By 1924, Chambers was working as a nurse in the Asheville, and she remained working as a nurse in the city until her retirement. She would never marry. Chambers remained close with and lived with starting around the mid-1920s her sister Lillian Anders’ family. She would join the American Legion at some point. On September 7, 1927, Odessa Chambers left with other members of the American Legion from New York City aboard the SS Pennland to attend the 9th Annual Convention of the American Legion in Paris, France, on the tenth anniversary of the United States’ Army’s arrival in France. The convention was held from September 19–24, 1927.
She would continue to serve as a nurse in Asheville for many years after this, though her exact date of retirement is unknown. In 1935, it appears that Chambers was honored for her WWI nursing service in the Army Nurse Corps, in some program or ceremony involving her grandfather. She presented an address about her experiences in the war and with the other nurses during this event. Constance Odessa Chambers died after post-operative issues following surgery at the Oteen Veterans Administration Hospital in Asheville, N.C., on January 6, 1963.
The Military Collection at the State Archives of North Carolina holds Chambers’ original Base Hospital No. 65 memory scrapbook, with items from her time in the Army Nurse Corps and in France during WWI. The book includes numerous photographs of Chambers and her fellow hospital staff members. The North Carolina Museum of History also holds several artifacts from Chambers’ WWI service.
Resources
- Odessa Chambers Papers, WWI 156, WWI Papers, Military Collection, State Archives of North Carolina, Raleigh, N.C.
- Rosalie A. Ferguson Collection, WWI 134, WWI Papers, Military Collection, State Archives of North Carolina, Raleigh, N.C. Photographs viewed online at https://www.flickr.com/photos/north-carolina-state-archives/sets/72157711878544412/
