At the close of this statement, we take great pleasure in adding that donations in various forms from every part of the world and from rich and poor have ever been flowing into the coffers of our Society. We have never failed to appropriate these gifts to our relief funds in compliance with the donors’ wishes.
We shall be always grateful for these practical expressions of sympathy and generosity which are extended to both belligerents, for whose comfort and relief, when sick and wounded, we are most earnestly praying and devoting ourselves. May Providence help our cause.
Since the issue of our last report on the Red Cross work, much progress has been made in all the different ways of alleviating the sufferings of the war-victims, seventeen Relief detachments on hospital ships and twenty-two on land being dispatched in addition to those which had previously been in service since the outbreak of the Russo-Japanese war. The following are the details of the institutions in which our Relief detachments are at present working:
| Hospital Ships These are owned and entirely managed by the Red Cross Society of Japan. | 2 |
| Relief detachments serving on board eighteen hospital ships owned by the Army All these hospital ships together with the two Red Cross hospital ships are constantly in the service of transportation of the sick and wounded from the front to Japan and from one port to another at home. The number of the Relief detachment serving on board each hospital ship runs from 1½ to 3 Relief detachments according to the tonnage of the ship. | 38 |
| Relief detachments dispatched to the hospitals at home under both the Naval and Military authorities | 78 |
| Depot of Supply This is at the base of Etape in order to distribute various supplies as are necessary for medical and relieving purposes. | 1 |
| Relief detachments at the front These detachments consist of field hospitals and relief stations in Korea and Manchuria. | 32 |
| Column of Stretcher-bearers The members of the column are located separately along with Etape lines serving in carrying the sick and wounded with stretchers, wagons, horses, etc. | 1 |
In addition to such institutions, there are thirteen agencies at home and one at the front established by the Headquarters of the Society in order to facilitate the management of the whole Relief detachments at home and abroad, numbering 152 Relief detachments in all; and of Relief stations established in such ports and railway stations as are convenient and necessary for giving rest and refreshment to the sick and wounded on their homeward way and also medical treatment in cases of emergency, to say nothing of renewing bandages. These are worked voluntarily by the members of the branches of the Red Cross Society of Japan, surgeons, nurses and the members of the Ladies’ Volunteer Nursing Association.
The nurses of both sexes, dispatched up to date, number in all over 4,700, five Relief detachments out of which have been formed and placed entirely in the Russian prisoners’ hospitals and stations. The approximate amount of the expense for the work up to the end of this year is estimated to be as much as 5,160,000 Yen.
The members of the Ladies’ Volunteer Nursing Association of the Red Cross Society of Japan have constantly and strenuously rendered their services ever since the outbreak of the war in making bandages and caps for the patients, in looking after them at the relief stations, which we have already mentioned, in visiting them at the hospitals, in helping them to write to their families at home, in distributing among them books, magazines, newspapers and various things they could collect, in actually nursing the sick and wounded of both belligerents, if necessary, and in various other ways. The members of forty-one branches, together with those of the headquarters of the Association number nearly 10,000, including Princesses, the wives of the Nobility and of diplomatic staffs and other distinguished ladies who have joined.