In this latest installment in our Faces from the Album series, we present two New Orleanians, Mrs. Helen Garcia Brooks and Dr. John Douse McCarthy, who both served in Cuba during the Spanish American War. In a previous post, we introduced the Ninth Volunteer Infantry Regiment, one of the “immune” regiments featured in the opera La Flamenca by New Orleans Creole of color composer Lucien-Léon-Guillaume Lambert (1858–1945).

Mrs. Helen Garcia Brooks (1879-1947)

Helen Garcia was born in New Orleans on 23 September 1879 to Jean-Baptiste Garcia and Lutecia d’Aquin. On her mother’s side, she was a great-great-granddaughter of Noël Carrière, a free Black patriot of the American Revolution.

She enrolled in the Sarah Goodridge Training School for Nurses, which was attached to New Orleans University. In April 1898, the United States declared war with Spain and began its intervention in the Cuban War for Independence. Throughout the country, men rushed to volunteer for the armed forces. Fifteen hundred women signed up as contract nurses in the newly organized Nurse Corps division. Among this number was Helen Garcia, who served in hospitals at San Juan and Guantanamo, and the U. S. General Hospital at Santiago. In exchange for their wages of thirty dollars a month, these women worked long shifts tended to the wounded and an even greater number who suffered from yellow fever or typhoid.

Garcia served as a contract nurse from July 1898 through March 1899. She must have left a lasting impression upon the men and women with whom she served because in the Archives of Xavier University of Louisiana are nine cabinet cards all inscribed to Helen Garcia from soldiers and fellow nurses at San Juan, San Luis, and Santiago (See cabinet cards below).

On 9 November 1925, Mrs. Helen Garcia Brooks was awarded the Spanish War Service Medal and the Cuban Medal of the Veterans of the Spanish American War. She applied for an received a pension based upon her service in April 1924.

Upon returning to New Orleans, Helen worked as a sick nurse for eight years until she married Dennis Brooks (d. 1955) on 19 March 1907. While Helen took on the role of a homemaker, her husband worked for several decades as a cook onboard steamship traveling from New Orleans to points in the Caribbean and South America. They made their home at 8921 Pear Street in the Hollygrove section. Though they had no children, they were active in the upbringing of their godson, Wallace Lawrence Hendley (who later migrated to Seattle). During World War I, Mrs. Brooks also served as a volunteer nurse as a part of the war effort. 

In October 1928, Mrs. Brooks traveled to Havana to attend the 30th National Encampment of the United Spanish American War Veterans. 

The Louisiana Weekly, 27 October 1928, p. 1.

Mrs. Brooks was a member of the Ladies’ Sodality at St. Joan of Arc Church; Saint Joan of Arc Court No. 22, Knights of Peter Claver Ladies Auxiliary; and the Ninth Immunes Regiment Camp No. 12 of the Spanish American War Veterans’ Women’s Auxiliary.

She died on 29 July 1947 at sixty-seven years old. She was buried on 4 August 1947 from Saint Joan of Arc Church and was interred in Mount Olivet Cemetery.

John Douse McCarthy, M.D. (1873-1947)

Dr. John Douse McCarthy was born in New Orleans on 27 August 1873 to Lionel McCarthy and Emma Pickett Douse. He was named for his maternal grandfather, John Francis Douse. He was baptized on 27 August 1879 at Saint Joseph’s Church in Baton Rouge. On his paternal side, he was descended from Barthélémy-Daniel de MacArthur, a French colonial soldier under Bienville.

In April 1897, he passed the State Board examination to become a physician. Just a year later, he enlisted in the Ninth Volunteer Infantry Regiment on 23 June 1898 as a private. Given his educational background, he was promoted to Sergeant Major on 19 July 1898. He was discharged on 25 May 1899. Upon returning to New Orleans, he obtained a federal position as a watchman on the dry dock at the U. S. Naval Station.

On 9 July 1902, he married Miss Sidonia Catherine Martinez, a member of the faculty of Southern University, and the daughter of Manuel Martinez and Joséphine Dupré. When Dr. McCarthy began a family, he also began a thirty-year career with the Postal Service as a postal clerk. During that time, many individual patients did not have the means to regularly see a doctor and most physicians and druggists relied upon their highly competitive annual elections as providers to benevolent and mutual aid organizations for a large part of their business. A job with the federal government offered stability that even the practice of medicine could not afford.

Dr. McCarthy was very active in the United Spanish War Veterans through Ninth Immunes Regiment Camp No. 12 and Duncan B. Harrison Camp No. 31. He was an active Catholic layman and a member of the Holy Name Society and St. Vincent de Paul Society of Saint Katherine’s Parish. He also was a member of Father Cuddy Council No. 21 of the Knights of Peter Claver and served for several years as that order’s National Treasurer. He also held membership in the Economy Society.

With his wife, Sidonia (d. 1960), he had two daughters, Lois Josephine (Mrs. Albert) Bouise and Ursula (Mrs. Robert) Perkins; and two sons, Theron Joseph McCarthy and John Douse McCarthy, Jr. They made their home at 1808 Iberville Street, between North Derbigny and North Roman streets. In October 1926, Dr. McCarthy applied for and received a pension based upon his Army service. In August 1933, he retired from the Postal Service after thirty years of service. Dr. McCarthy died on 6 January 1947. He was buried with a High Requiem Mass in Saint Katherine’s Church and interred in his family tomb in St. Louis Cemetery No. 1 (St. Louis Parallel 1).

Sources: “Negro Woman Decorated,” The Times-Picayune, 21 November 1925, p. 20, col. 1; Helen Brooks obituary, The Times-Picayune, 2 August 1947, p. 2, col. 7; “Received Medal,” The Louisiana Weekly, 28 April 1934, p. 4. The pension for Ellen Garcia (as her name was sometimes rendered) is Application No. 1500463 and Certificate No. A-5-21-28 and can be obtained from the National Archives in Washington, D. C.; William Hilary Coston, The Spanish American War Volunteer: Ninth U.S. Volunteer Infantry. (Middletown, Pennsylvania: W. Hilary Coston, 1899), 150; John D. McCarthy, Sr. obituary, The Times-Picayune, 7 January 1947, p. 2 col. 8. The pension for Dr. McCarthy is Application No. 1557541 and Certificate No. A-11-19-27 and can be obtained from the National Archives in Washington, D. C.

Jari C. Honora

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