Elna Allran Jones Collection

Details

Who's responsible?: Martha Blakeney Hodges Special Collections and University Archives, UNCG University Libraries (Repository)
How much has been digitized?: Only a part of this collection has been digitized.
What's in the full collection?: January 1999 oral history transcript; photographs; newspaper Battey General Hospital,1945; newspaper "The Army Needs You!", 1944; newspaper "What Every Cadet Nurse Should Know", 1944; newspaper Cadet Nurse Corps News, April 1945; Programs/Menus: Thanksgiving, 1945; Christmas, 1945; Easter, 1947; Fort Benning Theatre Guild, circa 1944-1947; Poem; newspaper: Army Nurses newspaper: non-combatant; Miscellaneous Postcards and Souvenirs, circa 1945-1946; Cadet Nurse Patch With Caduceus Pin; Cadet Nurse Patch; Caduceus Pin; photgraph album, 1945-1947 containing photographis from: Camp Rucker, Alabama, Nurse Basic Training Center; Battey General Hospital, Rome, Georgia; Regional Hospital, Fort Benning, Georgia; New York Port of Embarkation, and Brooklyn Station hospital, Camp Kilmer, New Jersey.
Full biography: Elna Violet Allran Jones (1923-2019) of Hickory, North Carolina, served in the Cadet Nurse Corps and Army Nurse Corps (ANC) in the 1940s, followed by a twenty year career in nursing. Elna Violet Allran Jones of Hickory, North Carolina, graduated from high school in 1940. She attended Lenior-Rhyne College in Hickory for one year before beginning training at Charlotte Memorial Hospital School of Nursing. In 1944, Jones joined the Cadet Nurse Corps. She graduated in July 1945 and joined the Army Nurse Corps. She reported to Camp Rucker, Alabama, but World War II ended before she finished basic training. Jones had committed to a two-year term and was thus assigned briefly to Battey General Hospital in Rome, Georgia, before being transferred to Fort Benning in Columbus, Georgia. She was later stationed at Camp Kilmer, New Jersey, and assigned to the New York Port of Embarkation, where her duty was to ride on trains transporting wounded soldiers returning from overseas. She was discharged as a first lieutenant in July 1947. After World War II, Jones worked as a nurse at Harborview Hospital in Seattle, Washington, before returning to North Carolina in 1955 to work at the Children's Home in Winston-Salem. Five years later, she moved to Greensboro and took a nursing position at Moses Cone Hospital. In April 1973, Jones returned to work at the Children's Home, while also volunteering at Camp Dogwood summer camp for the blind. In 1977, she went to work for the Greensboro School for the Deaf, where she remained for twenty years. Jones died 10 July, 2019 in Greensboro, North Carolina.
Topics: Women's History
Military
Branch of service: Army -- Army Nurse Corps
Conflict: World War II era (1940-1946)
Subject headings: World War, 1939-1945
United States. Army--Women
Contributing Institution: Martha Blakeney Hodges Special Collections and University Archives, UNCG University Libraries

: Elna Allran Jones and friend; Elna Allran Jones (right) and a Cadet Nurse Corps friend both wear the gray and white striped summer uniform and beret outside Charlotte Memorial Hospital, North Carolina, circa 1944.

: Elna Jones and friend; Elna Jones in WAC uniform with Hobby hat stands beside a civilian friend, circa 1945.

: Elna Jones and patients; Elna Jones, in nursing uniform, poses with four male patients, circa 1945.

: Elna Jones and two men; Elna Jones, in nursing uniform, stands between a man in a suit and a man in fatigues, 1944-1947.

: Elna Jones in nurse uniform; Elna Jones in Army Nurse Corps brown and white seersucker hospital uniform and cap at Camp Kilmer, New Jersey, circa 1946.

: Elna Jones in uniform; Elna Jones posing in Army Nurse Corps uniform, circa 1945.

: Elna Jones with two patients; Elna Jones in her Army Nurse Corps brown and white uniform stands outside with patients Scotty (left) and Ollie (right) at Camp Kilmer, New Jersey, in 1946 or 1947.

: Oral history interview with Elna Allran Jones; Primarily documents Elna Allran Jones's early life; her service with the Cadet Nurse Corps and Army Nurse Corps (ANC); and her post-World War II career as a nurse. Jones discusses her parents and her background, then comments on her decision to join the Cadet Nurse Corps and subsequent training and decision to join the ANC. She describes basic training at Camp Rucker; her assignment to Battey General Hospital in Georgia; and her duties at Fort Benning, Georgia. Of particular interest is her description of treating German prisoners of war and American soldiers with post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms. Other topics include riding troop trains with wounded soldiers while stationed at Camp Kilmer, New Jersey; hospital facilities and staff; her hours, uniform, and off-duty activities as a member of the ANC; and her reflections on the general climate and culture of the United States during World War II. Jones also describes her employment as a nurse at many facilities, including Harborview Hospital in Seattle, the Children's Home in Winston-Salem, Moses Cone Hospital in Greensboro, and the Greensboro School for the Deaf. She also describes her personal life, especially her conversion to Christianity.