Four Years After World War Ends, Volunteers Continue Support of Disabled Soldiers, 1922

“Red Cross Heals Wounds of War” from the Rockingham Post-Dispatch, October 12, 1922.

25,000 Disabled Ex-Service Men in Hospitals After Four Years of Peace…Chapters’ Field of Service…Every Veteran Needing Help Gets Individual Attention of Sympathetic Workers

When on November 11 the world halts to observe the fourth anniversary of Armistice Day, and the American Red Cross inaugurates its Annual Roll Call for the enrollment of the 1923 membership, the people of the United States may well pause to think of the unparalleled contribution to the cause of peace made by our Army and Navy in the World War. The glory of it is a common tradition; but the wounds of war remain. They are not healed in a day, in a year, nor in four years. And on Armistice Day there will be under treatment in Government hospitals over 25,000 ex-service men, broken physically by wounds, exposure, nervous strain and exhaustion incident to their service in the war.

The Government without stint is undertaking to furnish these disabled men with the compensation and medical care to which they are entitled, yet their especial care is a duty of the Red Cross. Why? Because the Government cannot handle the cases of ex-service men individually; it must handle these men in bulk under a standardized policy. The Government has neither the authority, the funds or the equipment for working out the problem of the individual man. There is where the American Red Cross finds its greatest field for service, aiding through its very active Chapters in reaching the disabled man with immediate practical help, assisting his family while his claim is emerging from the process of adjustment, furnishing articles of comfort, funds to tide over the difficult periods, the friendly touch of personal encouragement, helpful recreation and worry-dispelling amusement. It is the warm hand of sympathy and understanding which the American Red Cross extends to the majority of these disabled ex-service men, some of them friendless in the whirl of life, thousands of them with wives and children dependent upon them, and hundreds of them frequently helpless in the face of grim necessity.

2,679 Chapters Aiding Veterans

In this work, upon whose accomplishment the American Red Cross is urging a record-breaking enrollment in the Roll Call which opens on Armistice Day and closes with Thanksgiving Day, 2,679 Chapters in all parts of the country are engaged. This is 350 more than were working for ex-service men last year when approximately $10 million was expended by the National Organization and the Chapters working together in harmonious unity.

For the current fiscal year National Headquarters appropriated $3,030,692.90, an increase of $365,560.84 over the amount spent for the work among ex-service men in the year ended June 30 last. Since it is estimated that the Chapters will expend close to $7 million from their own funds, the grand total of Red Cross expenditures for this single work is expected again to reach the $10 million mark by June 30, 1923.

Hospital and District Office Work

During the fiscal year a total of over 1,000 persons, paid and volunteer, has been engaged in Red Cross duty in hospitals or district offices of the U.S. Veterans’ Bureau. An average of 8,000 new cases requires definite and particular attention each month. The demand for Chapter-made articles for hospital patients is constant.

During last year Service Claims and Information Service at National Headquarters handled 37,200 compensation and insurance claims, 24,500 allotment and allowance cases, and 9,700 miscellaneous claims. Since February, 1919, it has disposed of 64,174 allotment checks payable to veterans which the Post Office Department reported undeliverable.

The chapter is the unit of the Red Cross organization which is accessible to every disabled veteran or his family. Between July 1, 1921, and June 30, 1922, the chapters had reported 1,665,079 instances of service to ex-service men and their dependents, at a cost estimated from reports now at hand of more than $5,340,000.

The basis of this far-reaching work by the Red Cross is the individual needs of the disabled veteran to the end that he may obtain his rights under the law, that his especial wants may be immediately supplied, that his own and his family’s situation may be rendered happy and cheerful, and that their outlook for the future may visualize incentives for independent and fruitful effort.