Anne Morgan's War In France

                                           
Anne Morgan was born on July 25, 1873, into the lap of luxury as the youngest of four of rich and savvy banker John Pierpoint Morgan's children in Highland Falls, New York.  In 1902 she became acquainted with Jane Adams of Hull House in Chicago and she was a woman concerned with the issues affecting women. She also combined her humanitarian works with a business discipline that she got from her father who passed away in 1913 leaving her very wealthy.  She left for France to set up house near Versailles with two other women.  When war broke out she tried to raise money to help France out.

In July of 1917, she formed CARD or the American Committee for Devastated France (known by its French acronym).  Dr. Anne Murray Dike was president of the organization and she was Vice President and Treasurer.  Over the course of seven years, they had 350 American women who came over to help with the reconstruction of the Red Zone of France.  They believed in helping France because France helped us out during the Revolutionary War.

In the Red Zone, six out of twenty towns escaped any damage.  110 houses were destroyed, 3,000 factories were totaled, and only 196,000 people were left out of 530,000.  In 1917 the Germans liberated an area of it, Picardy, where they worked.  They were given authority by French General Phillipe Petain and set up headquarters at the Chateau de Blerancourt.  The soldiers built on seven barracks for the women.

Their first duty was to see to the immediate needs of the people with food and medical attention.  While the women were called nurses and they were trained as nurses, a first for the times, some of the women were actual doctors, dentists, and surgeons.  They had offered up their services to the military but the French who don't have many female doctors were against women working in the military hospitals so the women went to work with private organizations with the civilian population.  These women had to pay their own way over so many of them came from a certain social standing in society and they had to be able to drive a vehicle because they would be driving trucks around the countryside and repairing them as well in order to get to the people in need of their services.   People were living in shacks next to their bombed out homes, in trenches, and in caves so their needs were great.

Most of the reconstruction would have to wait until the end of the war to begin and once that happened they began in earnest.  They didn't stop at food or sanitary conditions but they also gave people back their will to live.  They handed out hoes and seed and later agriculture equipment to get people farming again.  With the children, they got them back in school as soon as possible.  Back then for boys that meant learning a trade and for girls that meant the domestic arts. For the girls, they also taught them canning and sterilization.  But most importantly they showed them that there was an education to be had beyond what they were being taught.

Milk stations were set up as soon as possible in Soisson so mothers could bring their children there to get fresh sterilized milk for their babies.   They also handed out free baby carriages to the mothers.  Libraries opened up for people to check out books and bookmobiles began cruise along the back roads to lend out books to people and to those who couldn't read the women went out to read to them.  270,000 loans were made in two years.

On December 24, 1919, Santa Claus came to visit the area and hand out presents and candy to the children though he didn't have his sled--he came in one of the CARD trucks.  475 children were seen by Santa that day.  She also introduced basketball to the children and had the girls participating in sports along with the boys.

While Anne Morgan certainly donated money to the cause, she was not the main donater.  She would fly to the United States and have fundraisers. She had organizations in 25 cities that were devoted to raising money to the cause.  One night a boxing match at Madison Square Garden between Benny Leonard and Ritchie Mitchell raised $80,000 for the cause.

But she had a motto and it was "I will provide emergency aid but then God helps those who help themselves".  CARD was not meant to be permanent.   They trained French nurses to take over for when they left and they left a sizable treasury in place.  Anne Morgan and Dr. Anne Dike both became the first American women to receive the Legion of Honor by the French government. For Anne, the work would not be finished as when World War II came around and she would help out as much as her health would let her.  She would die in 1952.  Her work lives on in A.M.S.A.M. (Association Medico Sociale Anne Morgan) in Soisson, France.