Local Memoirs
Memoirs of a Red Cross Nurse

Alice Mackenzie was brought up in Drumnadrochit. When war broke out she was in her early twenties and she signed up with the Red Cross. Some people chose to work with the Red Cross abroad but Alice chose to stay in Scotland. She went to work in what had been Kilmacholm Hydro Hotel, on the outskirts of Glasgow, but for the duration of the war became a naval hospital for convalescents who had been treated in hospitals elsewhere.

Alice remembers it as being very hard work but also a very happy time. There were two large wards with 30 beds, another smaller ward with about 20 beds and then there were single rooms for the officers. Some of the patients had lost limbs, or were blinded, but usually injuries were of a less serious nature – and the patients were able to enjoy playing snooker or  practising their putting.

Alice remembers most of the soldiers as being British, though there were some Canadians. The sailors dressed in navy suits and ties, not their naval uniforms.

The soldier were brought back into the country through Greenock naval base and eventually returned to their duties, after appropriate leave, or discharged if they were considered unfit.

Female patients were treated at Overton which was ˝ mile away. Later Alice moved to Methven castle, which had become an army convalescent home.

Again it was hard work but lots of fun. She remembers the practice air raid drills when the sirens would sound and they would have to evacuate the building. Alice also recalls going into Glasgow to the pictures and returning during the blackout, sometimes in the pitch black.

Harry Lauder, a famous entertainer at that time came to perform for the staff and the patients and she remembers him throwing cigarettes and chocolate into the audience, as of course both these items were rationed at the time. Alice used to swop her chocolates for cigarettes with girls who didn’t smoke!

Methven Castle today.

Alice had a friend whose parents had a grocer shop and they used to manage to somehow secretly send tins of food to her – Alice recalls the delight of sharing a tin of condensed milk!

Before the end of the war Alice was discharged due to ill health and it was when she was in hospital in Glasgow with diphtheria  that she recalls hearing the Clydebank bombing. Some people could tell from the sound of the engines if the plane was one of ours or not. They would hear the sounds of the bombs and the guns then listen to the radio the next day to learn of the damage that had been done. Despite rationing and blackouts and potential air raids Alice still recalls her time with the Red Cross as a happy one.