Nursing in the World War 315 with which these plans were worked out offer striking testimony to the ability for leadership that may be found in bodies of women workers, and that can only find expression in freedom to act and through strength of organization. It has been said that, when our country was called on to mobilize, the nursing department of the Red Cross was more nearly pre- Nursing pared for war than any other depart- mobilization ment of the Red Cross or of the military organiza- tion. Miss Delano then had eight thousand nurses enrolled in her lists. But as the conflict went on, many prominent nurses believed that the use of volunteer aids would become inevitable under in- creasing pressure, and at the convention of the American Nurses Association, early in the summer of 1 91 5, a plan was accepted for preparing aids to work under nursing staffs if needed. The amateur nurse was already far to the front in the European war theatres, where volunteer aid was accepted as a first principle, and where social prestige carried many untrained women over the heads of fully trained professional nurses. But as war difficulties thickened, it was concluded that this country should send only trained women. This wholly fell in with the preference of nurses, especially those concerned in training and teaching.
