Harriet Elizabeth Putman Standing on Hillside at Camp Sherman

This black-and-white photograph shows Harriet Elizabeth Putman standing on a hillside at Camp Sherman, surrounded by brush and trees. On the back, Putman had handwritten: "Everyone wanted to know if I was standing in a hole. No. Just on the hillside."

Putman was a 1914 graduate of Worthington High School and served as a U.S. Army Nurse stationed at the camp. While the exact dates of her service are not known, according to research by Putman’s grandson, Curtis I. Caldwell, Wing was positively known to have been stationed at the camp in October, 1918, and was there for a period of at least 12 months but less than 18 months.

Putman served at the camp during the 1918 Flu Pandemic, and herself contracted the flu, which, according to some estimates, killed three percent of the world’s population and more people than died in combat in World War I. At Camp Sherman, 5686 cases were documented, and 1777 died; a local movie theater in nearby Chillicothe was turned into a temporary morgue during the height of the pandemic.

Camp Sherman was located near Chillicothe, Ohio. The U.S. entered World War I in April, 1917, and Camp Sherman was one of many camps that were hastily assembled in response. The Army constructed over 2000 buildings on the site in summer, 1917, and the first draftees began arriving in September. The influx of military personnel increased the population of Chillicothe from 16,000 to 60,000, and the camp earned the nickname “Ohio’s Soldier Factory.” Several African-American units, which were segregated at the time, were trained at Camp Sherman. Along with soldiers, the camp was occupied by volunteers and employees such as conscientious objectors and women who worked as nurses. Over 120,000 personnel would pass through the camp between 1917 and its decommissioning in 1921. Part of the land the camp was on has become the Hopewell Culture National Historical Park.