Healing Wounds: A Vietnam War Combat Nurse's 10-Year Fight to Win Women a Place of Honor in Washington, D.C.

by Diane Carlson Evans, Bob Welch (Editor), Joseph Galloway (Foreword by)

Overview

Featured in Kristen Hannah’s new book The Women

What is the price of honor? It took ten years for Vietnam War nurse Diane Carlson Evans to answer that question—and the answer was a heavy one.

In 1983, when Evans came up with the vision for the first-ever memorial on the National Mall to honor women who’d worn a military uniform, she wouldn’t be deterred. She remembered not only her sister veterans, but also the hundreds of young wounded men she had cared for, as she expressed during a Congressional hearing in Washington, D.C.: “Women didn’t have to enter military service, but we stepped up to serve believing we belonged with our brothers-in-arms and now we belong with them at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. If they belong there, we belong there. We were there for them then. We mattered.”

In the end, those wounded soldiers who had survived proved to be there for their sisters-in-arms, joining their fight for honor in Evans’ journey of combating unforeseen bureaucratic obstacles and facing mean-spirited opposition. Her impassioned story of serving in Vietnam is a crucial backstory to her fight to honor the women she served beside. She details the gritty and high-intensity experience of being a nurse in the midst of combat and becomes an unlikely hero who ultimately serves her country again as a formidable force in her daunting quest for honor and justice.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781682619124
Publisher:	Permuted Press
Publication date:	05/26/2020
Pages:	288
Sales rank:	23,012
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 9.10(h) x 1.10(d)

About the Author

Diane Carlson Evans, a former captain in the Army Nurse Corps who served in the combat zone of Vietnam is the founder of the Vietnam Women’s Memorial Foundation, Inc. She served as president and CEO of the Foundation’s board of directors—headquartered mainly in Washington, D.C.—for thirty years. Today she advocates for veterans and speaks nationally about the contribution of women during wartime. Evans has received numerous honorary doctorate degrees and prestigious awards from civic and veterans organizations. Learn more at www.dianecarlsonevans.com.

Bob Welch is a seasoned journalist and the award-winning author of more than twenty books. Among them is American Nightingale, about the first World War II army nurse to die after the landings at Normandy. The Wizard of Foz: Dick Fosbury’s One-Man High-Jump Revolution won the 2019 Track & Field Writers of America’s Book of the Year.

Table of Contents

Foreword Joseph Galloway xi

Preface xiii

Part I Facing the Past

Chapter 1 The Wall 3

Chapter 2 The Footlocker 11

Chapter 3 The Ball of Clay 19

Part II Surviving Vietnam

Chapter 4 Innocence on the Farm 33

Chapter 5 Prelude to Vietnam 43

Chapter 6 Vung Tàu 51

Chapter 7 Eddie Lee Evenson 62

Chapter 8 Screaming to Death 70

Chapter 9 The End of One War 82

Part III Hiding in the Light

Chapter 10 Goodbye, Vietnam 95

Chapter 11 Picking Up the Pieces 102

Chapter 12 Finding a New Life 109

Chapter 13 Keeping the Secret 121

Part IV Finding a Purpose

Chapter 14 A New Journey 133

Chapter 15 Resistance 148

Chapter 16 Showdown 163

Part V Refusing to Die

Chapter 17 Second Storm 179

Chapter 18 Resurgence 189

Chapter 19 Finding Our Memorial 203

Chapter 20 The Statue Comes to Washington 214

Chapter 21 At Last 226

Epilogue 241

Author's Note 245

Afterword: A Daughter's Reflection by Carrie Evans 249

Acknowledgments 255

Glossary and Abbreviations 263

For More Information 267

Editorial Reviews

"Diane Carlson Evans went from working as a combat nurse to becoming a national advocate for all the women who served during the Vietnam War. What makes Healing Wounds different from other nurses' wartime memoirs is the aftermath. Evans came home with the awful inventory of battle in her memory. She married and became a mother of four, yet the loss and sacrifice she witnessed in her fellow nurses and patients never left her. This emptiness, combined with the country's indifference to the women's war efforts, drove her into the political world to push for a statue to honor those females who served, next to the statue of the Three Soldiers at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. One powerful Washington, D.C. committee vetoed the idea and said if there was a statue dedicated to women, the next statue might have to be for the dogs who served in the K-9 units. It is this compelling story of perseverance that will make you angry, proud, and inspired."

Elizabeth M. Norman

"A powerful book. A necessary book. Within the first dozen pages, tears were flowing. Diane took on three heroic tasks in her life: serving as a combat nurse in Vietnam; despite ferocious opposition, leading the battle for a monument on the Mall to women who served in Vietnam; and telling her story in this book of the emotional price paid when she was shamefully rejected and reviled by fellow Americans. Diane recovered from the war and its aftermath by acting, doing, and salvaging the memories of the women who served. We owe her an incalculable debt."

Theodore Roosevelt IV

"I was Lieutenant Sharon Lane's Head Nurse when she was killed by a rocket while on duty in our hospital in Vietnam. She is remembered with her name etched on the Wall in Washington, D.C. Diane Carlson Evans' long journey fighting for us has helped heal my deep emotional wounds and those of thousands of sister veterans who lived through that war and who are honored and forever remembered by the Vietnam Women's Memorial."

Colonel Jane Carson

"It’s been said before, but it’s worth repeating: To create a great memoir you 'only' need two things: a compelling story and the ability to tell it compellingly. Diane Carlson Evans has three compelling life stories to tell. And she tells them exceptionally well in her new, eye-opening memoir..."

The VVA Veteran

"'The sun is shining on us,' Diane Carlson Evans said on a radiant fall day as she opened the ceremony to dedicate the Vietnam Women's Memorial on November 11, 1993. I was among 25,000 others who celebrated in a triumphant moment for our nation, for all women who served in Vietnam, and for Diane, whose dignity, decency, and courage are of the highest caliber I know. I was in Vietnam as a twenty-two-year-old reporter. Diane, a twenty-one-year-old nurse. We thought we were all grown up. Healing Wounds affirms what I have long believed: the best Vietnam war stories are love stories. Diane's love of her country, her patients, and her fellow nurses, carried her through the mud and blood of Vietnam. Her love carried her over every obstacle placed in her path in the ten years, ten years, it took her to spearhead her vision into reality. Don't be fooled by her Minnesota nice. Diane is a woman warrior who fights with love and courage of her convictions instead of bullets. Healing Wounds is exquisitely painful, heartbreakingly beautiful, and ultimately, triumphant. Finally, the sun is shining on Diane Carlson Evans."

Laura Palmer

"Evans' book is a soulful accounting of her long-fought journey to recognize the immense contributions and sacrifices of women during the Vietnam War."

Chuck Hagel

"A fascinating, yet heart-rending chronicle of Diane Carlson Evans' heroic journey and her decade-long struggle to honor the women who served during the Vietnam War. Every Brother and Sister veteran, their families, and those who haven't served, should read Healing Wounds."

John Finley Sommer