London to Kragujevac, December 1914–February 1915 Salonika port: the gateway to the Balkans. Elspeth stood with twenty other women on the harbour front, her suitcase by her side, a strong smell of fish and sea-salt in the air, watching the ten remaining VADs rowed ashore. The oarsmen – good-looking, sun-tanned Greek boys with well-muscled forearms – skilfully steered the rowing skiffs through the crowded waters and deposited the VADs and their baggage on the harbour wall. While the boats were unloaded, Elspeth looked back out to sea, at the Nile – the French passenger ship they had just arrived in – which was anchored nearby. Beyond the Nile was a line of dirty black colliers with green electric lights slung between their funnels, and beyond them a white hospital ship with a red cross on its flanks. ‘Why is everybody looking at us?’ someone asked, and Elspeth turned to Dr Frances Wakefield, the Serbian unit’s physician, who had spoken the words. Dr Wakefield was staring at the mix of people on the quayside: khaki-clad British and French troops; traditionally clothed Arabs, Greeks, Spaniards and Turks; tall, deeply black French Senegalese soldiers, red fezzes perched on top of their heads.
