Expansion and Empowerment

The Nursing Sisters of Canada were a group of female nurses dedicated to serving sick and injured troops during times of war. In the First World War, three thousand one hundred forty-one Nursing Sisters served, with over two thousand of them overseas. On the home front, women raised money for the war effort, knitted sweaters and mittens for soldiers, rolled bandages, and sent care packages. While these traditional tasks were extremely important and there is absolutely nothing wrong with choosing to participate in such a way (many described women as being “soldiers on the home front” ), women had been doing all these jobs for many years– even the Canadian Nursing Sisters were founded in 1885 during the North-West Rebellion. These tasks were nothing new for them and there was no growth for women who wanted to support the country in roles other than the pre-established and socially accepted work – unlike the events of the Second World War.