Backwash of War, The

"War, superb as it is, is not necessarily a filtering process, by which men and nations may be purified. Well, there are many people to write you of the noble side, the heroic side, the exalted side. I must write you of what I have seen, the other side, the backwash." - Ellen La Motte, Volunteer Nurse, May 4, 1916

During World War One, Ellen La Motte became one of the first American war nurses to volunteer to go to Europe - and she witnessed its horrors firsthand as she worked near the Western front. Her controversial book, which the US banned in 1918, vividly and graphically describes the "backwash of war": the dirty, smelly, lice- and disease-ridden bodies of the wounded French soldiers she cared for. They compose the “human wreckage” of highly organized and industrialized warfare. Sometimes cynical, sometimes poignant, La Motte's observations retain a freshness that makes for compelling reading. Arranged into 14 vignettes depicting typical events and scenes, The Backwash of War paints a picture of that conflict that, sadly, still resonates powerfully today.