Gutenberg.org
birth and death are a mystery. Her birth is 1888, and she worked in a canteen during WWI from 1917-1919. This is all I can really find out about her aside from the reading of her letters which in themselves give little direct description of herself. It's freely available at
She has authored one other book, and a play. Other than that information, there is nothing else I could find about her. Wikipedia does not have anything, and there are no images anywhere. That is quite a shame. Should she have had a camera it would have been twice as interesting.
A part of the reason I decided to read this book is because I don't read enough lady authors. I really need to improve that.
Kathleen's letters are extremely well written short narratives. She has a knack for entertaining the reader with candid descriptions of her life in the American camp in which she worked. She would have been 28 to 30 years of age over the course of these letters. I try to draw an image of her, but it is difficult. She talks very little about herself and her life in America. The narratives are about her life in France during the war.
Most of my impressions of the author are rather vague and without any substance from the reading. In my mind I see a portly white woman, probably Irish with a name like Kathleen. She sounds like the aunt figure to many of the young men for whom she cares. She writes, while sick in Paris away from her canteen,
...some day I'll get back to the hut again I suppose, and when I do, if those boys aren't almost half as glad to see me as I am to see them, why I'll know that some other canteen lady has been surreptitiously stealing their affections, and I shall put poison in her soup.
- from January 30
Her narratives are highly skilled: short, sometimes action filled, with colourful descriptions which make the letters very entertaining. Her description of an enemy bombing raid on Paris:
As I watched, a burning plane looking like a great tinsel ball seared its way through the sky, falling just to the right of Paris.
- from January 31
By the time the war is through and the cleanup process has begun, she is given leadership roles. Even though she has completed her duty in France, when she hears about the awfulness of Verdun, she volunteers to help with her canteen. She has a positive effect on those around her. She will steer around rules in order to help everyone she can. She smuggles beans and other items to a starving village.
Prophetically, she writes,
They're not beaten for good, the prisoners invariably declare. Just as soon as the Americans have gone and things have calmed down a bit, they are coming back to France again, they say, and this time they will settle matters with the French for good and all.
Conflans, March 30, 1919
Of course, they were right. They would be back in less than two decades, more vicious and evil than before.
So many of the boys, she remarks in her final letter, had gone to the war wanting to escape their home.
"I used to want to get away from home," confided one boy to me, "but when I get back there again I"m just going to tie myself so tight to Mother's apron-strings that she'll never get the knot undone."I enjoyed reading this book. I don't think I've ever read a book covering the war aside from assigned chapters in public school.
I spent a lot of time looking for more information on this author. But there is very little. It is a shame, as I am very curious what became of her. If anyone knows more than I do, please contribute it in the comments section below.
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