Original caption: "arriving in Australia, the first Negro nurses to reach these shores try bicycle riding near their quarters in Camp Columbia, Wacol, Brisbane." 268th Station 2nd Lts: L-R: Beulah Baldwin, Alberta Smith, and Joan Hamilton. 11/29/1943. NARA ID 178140880.
"First Negro WAVES to enter the Hospital Corps School at Nat'l Naval Medical Center, Bethesda, MD." L-R Ruth C. Isaacs, Katherine Horton and Inez Patterson. 3/2/1945. NARA ID 520634.
BLACK (military) NURSES ROCK!
By Miriam Kleiman, Public Affairs
For (the day after) National Nurses Week, we highlight Black nurses who served with courage and distinction in World War II. "In the European Theater... are the first units of Negro nurses and WACS to go overseas... They are described by their Commanding Officer as being the equals of any nurses in the area..." ---Truman Gibson, Jr, chief adviser on racial affairs to Secretary of War Henry Stimson
Statement by Truman Gibson, Jr., Special Aide on Negro Affairs to Secretary of War Stimson, 4/9/1945. NARA ID 40019813 (full doc below). Gibson was the 1st Black American awarded the Presidential Medal of Merit, for advocating for black soldiers during WWII.
Capt. Della H. Raney, Army Nurse Corps, head of nursing at hospital at Camp Beale, CA, "has the distinction of being the first Negro nurse to report to duty in the present war..." NARA ID 535942.
"American Negro nurses, commissioned second lieutenants in the U.S. Army Nurses Corps, limber up their muscles in an early-morning workout during an advanced training course at a camp in Australia. The nurses will be assigned to Allied hospitals in the southwest Pacific theater." 2/1944. NARA ID 535782.
Commissioning ceremony: Phyllis Dailey, 2nd from right, became the 1st Black nurse in the Navy Nursing Corps 3/8/1945. NAID 520618.
See also:
Pictorial History of Black Women in the US Navy during World War II and Beyond, by Dr. Tina Ligon, Rediscovering Black History.
The Closed Door of Justice: African American Nurses and the Fight for Naval Service, by Alicia Henneberry, The Text Message.