Agnes von Kurowsky

Agnes von Kurowsky
Agnes von Kurowsky in Milan, 1918
Born	January 5, 1892 Germantown, Philadelphia
Died	November 25, 1984
Nationality	American
Education	Bellevue Nurses Training Program
Occupation	Librarian
Medical career
Profession	Nurse
Institutions	Red Cross

Agnes von Kurowsky Stanfield (January 5, 1892 – November 25, 1984) was an American nurse who inspired the character "Catherine Barkley" in Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms.

Kurowsky served as a nurse in an American Red Cross hospital in Milan during World War I. One of her patients was the 19-year-old Hemingway, who fell in love with her. By the time of his release and return to the United States in January 1919, Kurowsky and Hemingway planned to marry within a few months in America. However, in a letter dated March 7, 1919, she wrote to Hemingway, who was living at his parents home in Oak Park, Illinois, that she had become engaged to an Italian officer. Although Kurowsky did eventually return to the United States, they never met again. Their story is shown in the 1996 film In Love and War.

Hemingway used his experiences in Italy as the basis for ten short stories. Fictionalized characters based on Kurowsky appear in his short stories "A Very Short Story" and "The Snows of Kilimanjaro", as well as his novel A Farewell to Arms.

Agnes von Kurowsky Stanfield was born on January 5, 1892, in Germantown, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Her parents met while her German-born father was teaching languages at the Berlitz school in Washington, D.C.. One of her uncles was the famous Chicago architect William Holabird, and her maternal grandfather was Gen. Samuel Beckley Holabird, who served as a Quartermaster in the United States Army.

Although her family would move many times during her childhood, Agnes came to regard Washington as her home. She attended the Fairmont Seminary and a training program for the public library in Washington. She got her first job in 1910 as a cataloguer for the library there. In 1914 she decided to leave the library and attend nursing school. In her words "[The library] was too slow and uneventful. My taste ran to something more exciting."