In October 1914, Sister Hilda Samsing sailed from Melbourne as one of the first twenty-five Australian nurses sent to war. Over the next four years her diary recorded everything she saw - from the chaos of Egypt's overwhelmed hospitals to the hospital ship Gascon anchored off Anzac Cove, where exhausted soldiers came aboard looking as though they were 'walking in their grave clothes.' Born in Norway, raised in rural Victoria, and trained at Melbourne Hospital, Samsing was sharp-eyed, outspoken, and unflinching. She named names, challenged incompetence, and wrote with a directness that sets her account apart from the more restrained official record. Walking in Their Grave Clothes presents Samsing's previously unpublished diary in full, drawn from the original held at the Australian War Memorial. Edited and annotated by John Dixon, this is an essential primary source for anyone interested in the Anzac story, the Gallipoli campaign, and the experience of Australia's wartime nurses.
