A June Departure with Plenty of Tea
Keller appears to have left Belgrade in June 1915; she had remained on duty there longer than her intended six-month term. Agnes Gardner, another of the original nurses, wrote that the ten American nurses who left that June traveled together:
“We joined Sir Thomas Lipton's yacht, the Erin, at Salonique [sic], making a delightful trip to Naples; from there we took an Italian steamer homeward, after many months spent in a country among people who love the American sisters and will long remember our efforts to alleviate their sufferings.”
Once back in Hicksville, Nurse Keller encouraged people to support the Red Cross, speaking to the high school’s students about her experiences in Serbia. She later agreed to be drafted from the Red Cross into the Army Nurse Corps, from which she returned to Hicksville in 1919, just in time for the July 4th post-War celebrations.
Mary Frances Keller packed a lot of service and accomplishment into one life, a life which I am not yet prepared to say that I have finished researching. I will not be surprised by anything more that I learn about this amazing person.
