Krankenvärter - who's that?

[avadski]

Hi,

 

in one of my MVK award documents I can read the following:

 

Krankenvärter der Reserve-Sanitäts-Kompagnie No.1 Sebastian Riedersberger.

 

Could any of the native German speakers tell me who exactly a "Krankenvärter" was? Google translates it as medical nurse, so do we have a male equivalent of a medical nurse here?

 

Thanks very much in advance.

[speedytop]

I found two explanations for "Krankenwärter" in the internet:

 

The hospital is a place where people who have been trained in a hospital and examined by the district physician can go to. In the military, since 1863, 26 nurses have been trained annually for each army corps in larger hospitals from among the enlisted men who have served for a year, in order to provide the field hospitals with personnel fully familiar with the servicing and care of the sick.

 

"Nurses" were less well trained than the female nurses because they were more "for the rough" (carrying patients, holding uncooperative patients, etc.).

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

[GreyC]

The medical corps in the army of the Kaiserreich consisted of four main groups, one of which were the Militärkrankenwärter, conscripts unfit or unsuited for normal military service with weapons. They only got a short military training and constituted the main body of the Lazarett-personnel. They had distinctive uniforms. At the start of the war a Sanitätskompanie consisted of 312 men, most of them Krankenträger (245 stretcher-bearers) but also 8 Militärkrankenwärter. Feldlazarette were equipped with 60 personnel, among them 14 Militärkrankenwärter in 1914. Kriegslazarett-Abteilungen had a staff of 127, of which 40 were Militärkrankenwärter. Kranken-Transportabteilungen were manned with 31 men, of which 8 were Militärkrankenwärter.

GreyC

 

Edited November 28, 2022 by GreyC

[avadski]

Thank you guys! Very informative, much appreciated.