North Carolina Nursing History

Mary Ione Branch Bain (who went by “Ione” for most of her life) was born on January 24, 1897, in Halifax County, N.C., to Thaddeus Leroy and Mary Branch. Ione’s mother died by 1900, leaving her father to raise four children alone. Prior to World War I, Branch had trained as a nurse. After the United States entered World War I, Ione Branch decided to enlist in February 1918 while she was living in North Wilkesboro, N.C. She traveled to Greensboro, N.C., to consult with Dr. John Wesley Long, who was in the process of organizing a primarily North Carolina federal base hospital — U.S. Army Base Hospital No. 65. Branch received her orders on March 28, 1918, and she proceeded to report at U.S. Army General Hospital №18 in the town of Waynesville in Haywood County, N.C. She was appointed a Nurse R.A. ...

Read the full article "Ione Branch Bain: A North Carolina Nurse in WWI" by Matthew Peek (2019), Military Collection Archivist, State Archives of North Carolina