U.S. Army nurses line the rail as their ship pulls into Greenock, Scotland, on August 15, 1944. Photo by Meyer, U.S. Army Signal Corps, National Archives. Click the photo to see it larger. The KNOWOL logo doesn’t appear on prints.
On August 15, 1944, a U.S. Army Signal Corps photographer named Meyer took this picture as a ship pulled into Greenock, Scotland. Newly arrived Army nurses lined the rail and waited for the gangplank to be lowered to the dock. Greenock is a port on the Firth of Clyde, in western Scotland.
What to Look For
Two men stand by the rail in the front of the picture. One wears a peaked cap and a shining oilskin coat, and the other, in a dark wool sweater, holds a heavy rope looped over the rail. Behind them, the nurses wear steel helmets with chin straps, long belted raincoats and canvas bags on shoulder straps, and many have a white armband with a red cross. One nurse wears glasses, and one near the middle of the group is smiling. Above them, a lifeboat hangs in its davits and a lantern hangs from the mast.
Black Nurses in a Segregated Army
The nurses in this photo are Black women, and they served in a segregated Army. The Army Nurse Corps accepted only a small number of Black nurses during World War II. In 1941 the Army allowed 56. In 1943 it raised the limit to 160. Army leaders argued there were few jobs for Black nurses, because they were only allowed to care for Black troops in Black wards or hospitals. In 1944, under political pressure, the Army dropped its quota.
In the United States, Black Army nurses were only allowed to treat Black soldiers and German prisoners of war. The Army’s own history names one unit of Black nurses in England. In June 1944, sixty-three Black nurses went to the 168th Station Hospital there to care for German prisoners of war. The Archives’ record for this photo doesn’t name these nurses or their unit.
When the war ended in September 1945, 479 Black nurses were serving in an Army Nurse Corps of about 50,000. By then, Black Army nurses had served in Africa, England, Burma and the Southwest Pacific.
About This Photo
- Archive title: “U.S. Army nurses, newly arrived, line the rail of their vessel as it pulls into port of Greenock, Scotland, in European Theater of Operations. They wait to disembark as the gangplank is lowered to the dock.”
- Date: August 15, 1944
- Place: Greenock, Scotland
- Photographer: Meyer, U.S. Army Signal Corps (the Archives gives only the last name)
- Collection: Photographs of American Military Activities, Records of the Office of the Chief Signal Officer (Record Group 111), National Archives at College Park, Maryland
- Photo number: 111-SC-192605-S, National Archives Identifier 531204. The Archives holds it as a negative.
- Also listed: No. 141 in the Archives’ Pictures of African Americans During World War II, under Women in the Military
- Rights: Public domain, a work of the U.S. government
- Restoration: KNOWOL, 2026, from the Archives’ highest resolution scan
KNOWOL prints this restored photo on luster photo paper in the 12 x 18 inch size, plain or in a black or white wood frame. Click here to get your copy of the Army nurses at Greenock photo.
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