Allie Pleiter - Homefront Hero

The captain of her heart

Dashing and valiantly wounded, Captain John Gallows could have stepped straight out of a navy recruitment poster. Leanne Sample can’t help being impressed—although the lovely Red Cross volunteer tries to hide it. She knows better than to get attached to the daring captain who is only home to heal and help rally support for the war’s final push. As soon as he’s well enough, he’ll rush back to Europe, back to war—and far away from South Carolina and Leanne. But when an epidemic strikes the university campus, John comes to realize what it truly means to be a hero—Leanne’s hero.

“You gave a stunning presentation, Captain. Yours is a harrowing tale.”

A flicker of a shadow came over his eyes at her use of the word. It was instantly replaced by the cavalier expression. “Ah, but so heroic and inspiring.”

“It makes it unfair that your leg pains you so much.”

She expected him to give some dashing dismissal of the judgment, but he paused. He looked at her as if she were the first person ever to say such a thing, which couldn’t possibly be true. “Why?” It was said in the oddest tone.

“I…” She fumbled, not knowing the answer herself. “I should think it a terrible shame. It seems a very brave thing you’ve done.”

“Wars need heroes,” he said, “and those of us in the wrong place at the wrong time find ourselves drafted into that need. I don’t ponder whether I limp from justice or bravery, Nurse Sample. I just try to walk.”

His smile had a dark edge to it as he walked away. With an odd little catch under her chest, Leanne noted that while he hid it extremely well, he still limped.

ALLIE PLEITER

Enthusiastic but slightly untidy mother of two and RITA® Award finalist Allie Pleiter writes both fiction and nonfiction. An avid knitter and unreformed chocoholic, she spends her days writing books, drinking coffee and finding new ways to avoid housework. Allie grew up in Connecticut, holds a B.S. in speech from Northwestern University and spent fifteen years in the field of professional fundraising. She lives with her husband, children and a Havanese dog named Bella in the suburbs of Chicago, Illinois.

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Have I not commanded you?

Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid;

do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God

will be with you wherever you go.”

— Joshua 1:9

To Suzanne,

a brave hero and a warrior in her own right

Acknowledgments

A wise writer brings lots of good counsel

with her into a historical manuscript.

In addition to John M. Barry’s invaluable book

The Great Influenza, I owe thanks to many other good people who served as sources: Paula Benson, Dr. John Boyd of the 81st Regional Support Command, Susan Craft, Kristina Dunn Johnson

at The South Carolina Confederate Relic Room

and Military Museum, Mary Jo Fairchild at

the South Carolina Historical Society,

Mary J. Manning (and the entire outstanding museum) at the Cantigny First Division Foundation, Nichole Riley at Moncrief Army Community Hospital, Stephanie Sapp at

Jackson Army Base U.S. Army Basic

Combat Training Museum, Christina Shedlock at the Charleston County Public Library and Elizabeth Cassidy West and the other dedicated librarians at the South Caroliniana Library at the University of South Carolina at Columbia. Any factual errors should be laid at my feet, not at the excellent information these people provided me.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Epilogue

Dear Reader

Questions for Discussion

Chapter One

Camp Jackson Army Base

Columbia, South Carolina

September 1918

“I still can’t believe it.” Leanne Sample gazed around at the busy activity of Camp Jackson. Even with all she’d heard and seen while studying nursing at nearby University of South Carolina, the encampment stunned her. This immense property had only recently been mere sand, pine and brush. Now nearly a thousand buildings created a self-contained city. She was part of that city. Part of the monumental military machine poised to train and treat the boys going to and coming from “over there.” She was a staff nurse at the base army hospital. “We’re really here.”

“Unless I’m seein’ things, we most definitely are here.” Ida Landway, Leanne’s fellow nurse and roommate at the Red Cross House where they and other newer nurses were housed, elbowed her. “I’ve seen it with my own eyes, but I still can barely believe this place wasn’t even here two years ago.” Together they stared at the layout of the orderly, efficient streets and structures, rows upon rows of new buildings standing in formation like their soldier occupants. “It’s a grand, impressive thing, Camp Jackson. Makes me proud.”

Leanne had known Ida briefly during their study program at the university, but now that they were officially installed at the camp, Leanne already knew her prayers for a good friend in the nursing corps had been answered. Different as night and day, Leanne still had found Ida a fast and delightful companion. Ida’s sense of humor was often the perfect antidote to the stresses of military base life. As such, their settling in at the Red Cross House and on the hospital staff had whooshed by her in a matter of days, and been much easier than she’d expected.

Still, “on-staff” nursing life was tiring. “There was so much to do,” Leanne said to Ida as she tilted her face to the early fall sunshine as they chatted with other nurses on the hillside out in front of the Red Cross House. “Too many things are far more complicated in real service then I ever found them in class.”

“A free afternoon. I was wondering if we’d ever get one. Gracious, I remember thinking our class schedules were hard.” Ida rolled her shoulders. “Hard has a whole new meaning to me now.” This afternoon had been their first stretch of free time, and they’d decided to spend an hour doing absolutely nothing before taking the trolley into Columbia to attend a war rally on the USC campus that evening.

“However are you going to have time to do this?” Ida pointed to a notice of base hospital events pinned to a post outside the Red Cross House. “I feel like I’ve barely time to breathe, and you’re already lined up to teach knitting classes.”