I had my diploma to show that I was a graduated nurse, that is, so the diploma said, and in addition to that I received the signatures of eighty-eight physicians of Portland, recommending me as an efficient nurse, so I thought I had sufficient proof that I was capable to do at least ordinary nursing.
My recommendation from the physicians was as follows:
Portland, Oregon, July 31, 1912.
THIS IS TO CERTIFY that we, the undersigned, physicians and surgeons in the City of Portland, Oregon, have been well acquainted for many years with Elizabeth Schoffen, otherwise known as Sister Lucretia, and have been thoroughly familiar with her work as a nurse and member of the order of Sisters of Charity of Providence at St. Vincent's Hospital in the City of Portland; that in our opinion she is a thoroughly competent nurse;
That for a number of years prior to July, 1911, she was in charge of one of the floors at St. Vincent's Hospital, and was an efficient and capable superintendent and officer; that to the best of our knowledge and belief, while a nurse at St. Vincent's Hospital and particularly while in charge of one of the floors, she performed faithfully and efficiently all duties entrusted to her by the management of the hospital and by the doctors who came in contact with her.
As I have stated above, I received the signatures of eighty-eight prominent physicians and surgeons of Portland to this document, the original of which I have in safe-keeping.
With these recommendations and the promise of several of the physicians who were prominent at St. Vincent's that they would help me get started in my work, I opened a nursing home in East Portland with a friend nurse, in September.
Nearly every day during the fall and winter I went in search of work—most of the time walking, as nickels were not very plentiful—visiting the doctors' offices, hoping against hope that I might induce them to send a few patients to the Home.
During the winter we just about made expenses. As yet, I had a very faint idea of how the Roman Catholic boycott was influencing the pubic—probably not openly, but influencing it just the same, so that people were afraid to come to the Home, or to send anyone there. By the end of winter I realized that I could not succeed in this manner, but, nevertheless, I put forth every effort.
It had been almost a year since I had left the Romish institution. I had not become accustomed to the ways of the world sufficiently to know how to search for work intelligently. I was completely "down and out," not knowing what to do to make my living except to nurse, and I had been a failure at that up to this time, being unable to obtain the work. My sorrow weighed upon my mind and heart, which was already broken and crushed by the awful Romish convent cruelty and oppression. No priest, no sister, nor was ever a messenger from any of their so-called "religious and charitable" institutions, sent to me to do a kind turn whatever. After thirty-one years of service to the Roman Catholic System, it seemed to me that the hardest and harshest of masters, not of hell itself, would have shown me a little mercy.