During the devastating 1918 influenza pandemic, Catherine Marie Fischer of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, made the ultimate sacrifice while serving her country as a nurse at Camp Dix, New Jersey.
Fischer succumbed to influenza and its complications on October 13, 1918, leaving behind a legacy of bravery and compassion at just 23 years old.
Fischer’s selfless service placed her directly in the path of the 1918 influenza epidemic, the deadliest pandemic in modern history.
Her willingness to care for the sudden influx of influenza patients ultimately led to her own infection. Tragically, she developed pneumonia shortly afterward and passed away, leaving her community mourning the loss of a promising young Wilkes-Barre native.
Her obituary was published in the Wilkes-Barre Record on October 16, 1918:
Catherine Marie Fischer, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Andrew Fischer, of 272 East Northampton street, died at Camp Dix, N. J., on Sunday last at 2:30 p.m. after a brief illness of pneumonia.
The deceased was a graduate of the Wilkes-Barre High School with the class of 1914, and entered the Wilkes-Barre City Hospital, from where she graduated in 1917.
She was prominent in the city and her large number of friends will be grieved to learn of her death. The body of the deceased was brought to her home in the city and accompanied to the station at was Camp Dix by Red Cross nurses and military escort.
She is survived by her parents and the following brothers and sisters:
Andrew, stationed at the Naval Training Camp, Puget Sound, Wash.; Mrs. Joseph Regan, William and Elizabeth.
Funeral will be held this morning from the family home at 9 a. m. and interment will be in St. Nicholas Cemetery.
Read more about the 1918 influenza pandemic in the Coal Region
Photographs show makeshift emergency hospital in Lykens, Pennsylvania during pandemic | 1918
“Honor the Nurses” – 1918 Influenza Pandemic in the Coal Region
A patient’s haunting experience in a Coal Region influenza hospital in 1918
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