Series 03: John Brady Nash letters, January 1914-December 1915 - Page 522
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[Page 522]
[At the top of this and following pages of this letter is the word "Girls". Not transcribed.]
Tabbie dear: The attacks on Ramsay Smith were I think dictated by jealousy and the pursuing of the persecution to which he has always been subjected since he came to Australia. Whatever justification there was for it in the first instance there is none for allowing it to be carried into his position on this military business, with which we are all engaged. Of course it is simply due to the ignorance and want of training in the men who have for the first time worn military uniform, and who could not forget that they should be with it on removed from the category of tourists or travelling photographers, my little commedian is mainly responsible for the trouble I think, he is bad enough and dirty enough to be the cause for anything that is bad and dispicable, a coterie around him who know not the difference between right and wrong have been willing tools in his hands and the silly ass who for so long was my chief aided and abbetted by his weakness and jealously the whole proceeding. I shall be much surprised if Ramsay Smith does not defeat all his detractors in the end, because there can be no denying the fact that with the aid of Barrett, unexperienced as this officer was, that they saved the situation in Egypt for the wounded Australians. Of their work I was but an onlooker, at the vicious talk of their opponents I was unfortunately a listener. However he laughs best who laughs last, and I fancy that it will not be the commedian and his crowd who will have the last smile.
It was very good of the Minister for defence to refer to the loss sustained by Mena House hospital by my leaving it, had I been treated with courtesy I should have been content to put forth my best efforts to make the place second to none in Egypt, I had all the material necessary but owing to the ignorance and jealously of Martin it was not possible for me to use them. However that is all left behind me and my best efforts will be put forward to make up for lost time. I fancy that four months in my present position have shown that I have capacity for things out of the common, and now that my health has fully recovered I feel fit for undertaking. If at Galipoli or elsewhere bad luck does not dog me I shall do my best to deserve well of you and of those whom I came to represent. Just fancy Grey as chief of staff at any hospital? At No. 1 the surgical side was depleted by circumstances over which Smith and Barrett had no controll.
Mrs. Newmarch is at present in Cairo, she is going to live at Heliopolis, not at the hospital but at a place close by, to the Pug told me the other night. I think that I told you that the soldier son is being sent on to London, his father told me that they operated upon the wrong side in Alexandria. A lot or such incompetency has been taking place during the war. 'Tis true.