Mama Josie and the Angels of Bataan
World War II both brought many and shone a light on many horrors. (See my post on Hiroshima and Nagasaki) But among the awfulness there were shining stars. This is the story of Mama Josie and the Angels of Bataan. Early Life Josephine Nesbit was born on the family farm in Butler, Mo on December 23, 1894. Nesbit was the seventh of ten children. Farm life was hard. Even the children rose at dawn and did chores. Both her parents died before she turned twelve. Orphaned first her grandmother and later a cousin in Kansas took her in. She left high school at 16. Nursing as a Career Her sister was a nurse. After Nesbit spoke to her sister’s supervisor, she chose to become a nurse. Nesbit became a registered nurse in 1914. An army recruiter came to Kansas City in 1918. He wanted nurses to join the Army Nurse Corps to help with the Spanish Influenza epidemic. Nesbit joined the Reserve Army Nurse Corps. By 1941 Nesbit had been an Army Nurse for twenty-two years. She’d enjoyed the travels of a peace-time nurse. On her second tour, Nesbit was a lieutenant and second-in-command at Stenberg General Hospital in Manila, the […]