| Accession Number | E05447 |
|---|---|
| Collection type | Photograph |
| Object type | Black & white - Glass original whole plate negative |
| Maker |
Unknown Australian Official Photographer |
| Place made | France: Picardie, Somme, Amiens Harbonnieres Area, Villers-Bretonneux Area, Villers-Bretonneux |
| Date made | 3 August 1919 |
| Conflict |
Period 1910-1919 First World War, 1914-1918 |
| Copyright |
Item copyright: Copyright expired - public domain
|
An outdoors group portrait of unidentified Australian, New Zealand, British and French servicemen ...
Description
An outdoors group portrait of unidentified Australian, New Zealand, British and French servicemen and women outside the soldiers club on the occasion of its opening by Lieutenant Colonel J E Mott MC, 48th Battalion (second row, centre). The servicewomen are members of Queen Mary's Army Auxiliary Corps. This club was managed by Miss Ettie A Rout (the woman in the centre) and used by troops stationed in the Villers-Bretonneux area. Miss Rout was an Australian born, New Zealand bred, anti venereal disease campaigner who in 1915 formed the New Zealand Volunteer Sisterhood. During the war she also ran several soldier's clubs in Egypt, England and France. She would inspect brothels in the company of Army medical officers and on behalf of the Sisterhood issue a statement in the form "..we are all convinced that at the present time it makes safe and suitable provision for the sexual needs of the troops"-see AWM private record 3DRL/6487 item 55. In 1919 and 1920 she ran a Red Cross depot in Villers-Bretonneux and was awarded a French decoration for this work.