Series I: Medical Personnel: Biographical Files and Correspondence, 1936-1988, inclusive

Series I. Medical Personnel: Biographical Files and Correspondence 1936-1988.This series includes correspondence from and biographical material on hundreds of medical volunteers from over 25 countries (Includes materials written in Spanish, French, Russian, Rumanian and German). Particularly informative are questionnaires sent by Martin and filled in by dozens of doctors, nurses, ambulance drives and other medical personnel detailing their activities in Spain and their subsequent experiences. These also provide data on political affiliations before and after the war and personal motivations for going to Spain. Much of the correspondence to and from Martin chronicles the later lives of the volunteers and offers insights to the range of attitudes regarding Martin's efforts to record their work in Spain. Additionally, this series contains materials donated to Martin, including Spanish Civil War letters (originals and copies), diaries and journals (typescripts and photocopies) personal essays, clippings, leaflets, and other ephemera. Martin also collected medical writings and other materials published by the medical volunteers.

Notable in this series are: English volunteer Monica Milward Barnett's diary (transcription), which provides information on the Spanish Medical Aid Committee office in Barcelona; John Patrick O'Reilly's handwritten ward instructions from Villa Paz; a typescript in English of Mary Bingham de Urquidi's "Mercy in Madrid: a Personal History of the Spanish Civil War" (published in Spanish in 1975 under the title Misericordia en Madrid, an English-language version has never appeared in print); recollections of Dutch nurse Johana Maas; letters written by Ave Bruzzichesi to Dr. Leo Eloesser describing the withdrawal of foreign units from Spain, as well as files on Dr. Eloesser which include dispatches to the Medical Bureau from Spain; Spanish Civil War documents and Medical Bureau ephemera from Jose Dhaga, a native of Peru who volunteered with the North American medical unit; correspondence and material related to Alba Novac and her husband William Ryan, a combat volunteer who appeared before HUAC as a cooperative witness; files on Frances Vanzant, the only woman doctor attached to the American unit; information on George Zlatovski, charged in 1957 with spying for the Soviet Union; and Helen Freeman's 1949 letters, written from Germany while working for the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee.

Letters to and from Martin's close friends Anne Taft Muldavin and Toby Jensky offer insights on Martin's life and work over a forty-year period. This series also contains a biographical file on Martin, notes she took on her return to Spain in 1972, and a hospital ward journal she kept in Spain during the war. Research progress reports and rough drafts of Martin's manuscript "Proud within Themselves" (her unfinished history of the medical units) can be found here.