Did Any Women Fight On The Western Front?

[centurion]

Not responsive to the original question, which was restricted to British women, But:

Mlle Marie Marvingt of France reportedly served on the front lines with the 42nd Battalion of Chasseurs de Pied (BCP) disguised as a man and under an assumed name. She also apparently was later associated with the Italian 3rd Alpini, and photos exist of her in both French and Italian uniforms.

Her story perhaps explains why it is so hard to document such activities-- Most nations prohibited women from serving as soldiers in WWI. Thus, as in Marvingt's case, they were only able to do so in disguise, usually under another name, and frequently with the connivance of male personnel. I suspect that most such service was very short-term (a couple of months at most).

Since they were not legally/officially in their respective militaries in most cases, they cannot be tracked by military records, etc.

As an aside, I have read in several places (can't lay hands on the references right now) that it was a common belief at the time that a woman serving in the military was some kind of a war crime, and therefore those who had done so tended to keep quiet about it afterwards.

According to this http://www.sharedhistories.com/what/ambassadors-blog/item/112-marie-marvingt one of the connivers was called Foch who would have had a certain amount of influence one suspects

[Milan]

Since the thread went bit off topic, if I may add Milunka Savić, what a life. ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milunka_Savi%C4%87 )

[centurion]

That's interesting but much further off the OP topic as not WF

[Milan]

Ooops, that's right, appy-polly-loggies.

[Doc2]

According to this http://www.sharedhistories.com/what/ambassadors-blog/item/112-marie-marvingt one of the connivers was called Foch who would have had a certain amount of influence one suspects

Yes, she was good friends with Foch (some have suggested they were lovers, but there seems to be no documentation for that)-- However, the referenced article only relates to Foch in reference to the Italian Episode (3rd Alpini). As regards the 42nd BCP, she only referenced a young Lieutenant and implies some higher level support, without naming names.

The referenced article is interesting, but is in error in a few ways-- She did not have "4 brothers and a sister" in Metz. Two (or maybe 3) brothers were stillborn before her birth, and another died soon after birth, but the year is unclear. Her family in Metz consisted only of Herself, Mother, Father, and one brother.

Also the photograph is not of Marvingt, but of Hélène Dutrieu.

That aside, she did serve in Combat on the Western Front.

[Doc2]

Continuing the hijacking of this thread from its original question (which seems to have been answered as regards UK forces and the Western Front)---

The Revue Historique des Armees, 3rd Trimester 2013, pages 3-11, has an extensive article on women who formally were inducted into the Polish forces in the 1914-1920 era, most frequently in underground, militia, or resistance armies. The Organisation Militaire Polonaise (POW) was a paramilitary organization around Crakow, which contained several female sections. Most were used in non-combat roles, but not all-- the POW continued to be used until the 1920s. Female combats seem to have been primarily after 1917.

Several females fought during the early part of the war, usually disguised as men.

At the defense of Lvov (Lwow) at the end of 1918, there were 427 females among the defenders, most of whom took part in active combat. After January 1919, a female militia was formed, which contained a combat group as well as other non-combat sections. This section was totally integrated into the Polish Army as a combat force in January 1919. Their use as combatants was "on-again, Off-again" for the rest of their existence, as there was a strong effort to keep them in non-combat roles, allowing them to fight only in the most dire straits.

Other towns had armed militias with female members-- They usually performed guard and convoy protection duties, rather than direct combat, but.... during the grand Bolshevik offensive of July 1920, "the women... fought against the enemy cavalry at the side of the men..." At least 30 were captured by the Russians.

I suspect there were a lot more women directly involved in the fighting in Eastern Europe (Not the Western Front) than we have been aware of previously.

[seaforths]

We're going off on a tangent from the initial question, but the Russian Army included at least three battalions of women: the 1st Women's Death Battalion, which took part in the 1917 Kerensky Offensive, another centred around Moscow and The Black Hussars of Death. In addition, five Russian women pilots are known to have flown in combat.

Gareth

Extract from 'Flight' Magazine 23 April 1915:

[johnboy]

Quote fro OP #1

This has got me wondering if any British females - of any age - tried to join up for fighting (rather than nursing) &, if so, did any actually make it to the trenches & fire a shot in anger?

The answer would appear to be NO.

[SiegeGunner]

Were there armed resistance movements in the occupied parts of Belgium and France, and, if so, were women perhaps involved in combat roles?

[bcarleton]

I note with interest several pictures including women in Signal Corp (US), Field Ambulance (UK) and more in Atlantic Magazine's 'In Focus' feature on WWI. While there is nothing showing any woman going over the top with a bayonet in her teeth, the captions indicate these women were in the field and at least 3 km to the action. Fun viewing go to http://www.theatlantic.com/static/infocus/wwi/wwisoldiers/

[Khaki]

I doubt that it happened, and has already been mentioned making it in as a recruit past the BEF medical, barracks life and other issues is unlikely. However it is possible that by assuming the identity of a person already in the army, perhaps someone home on leave and unwilling to return, it could happen, but very unlikely and never reported, afaik.

khaki

[seaforths]

I've not long started reading what I hope will turn out to be an interesting book on the subject of women serving at the front in various roles that might be considered masculine and against the grain of society at the time. Yes, the Russians are included along with photographs (scary ones).

[BereniceUK]

[seaforths]

Nice one Berenice - looks interesting.

I do know of a stenographer that served in France but I'm not sure how close to the action she was.

[BereniceUK]

Very interesting indeed. I have the book somewhere, it hasn't emerged yet after moving, but I do remember from it that there were Russian female fatal casualties in the front lines.

[seaforths]

Very interesting indeed. I have the book somewhere, it hasn't emerged yet after moving, but I do remember from it that there were Russian female fatal casualties in the front lines.

That doesn't surprise me in the least if they are going to put themselves in the front line they are going to take similar hits to those of the men I would imagine. Even our nurses were casualties and they weren't as far forward. Mind you, looking at some of the photos of them in the other book (Female Tommies...) I bet the caused a fair few themselves - a Paddington stare from one of those would stop me in my tracks!

[BereniceUK]

A couple of photographs here http://historyandthesockmerchant.blogspot.co.uk/2013/07/the-womans-battalion-of-death-not-dodgy.html

[Ghazala]

Interesting article in The Times today....

Female Tommies.

The First World War witnessed one of the biggest changes in the demographics of warfare, as thousands of women donned uniforms and played an active role in armed conflict for the first time in history. To say “women” is rather misleading, as some of the female combatants were mere teenagers , such as 14-year-old Marina Yurlova, who joined a group of Russian Cossacks on the Turkish front in 1914. Their stories, many of which are little known, are recounted through their diaries, letters and memoirs in Female Tommies: The Frontline Women of the First World War.

Treated like a boy soldier, Yurlova was given menial tasks and lived alongside the men. Despite her lack of combat experience she was desperate to fight and secretly joined a night-time raid. Suddenly finding herself facing an enemy charge, she steadied her horse and drew her sabre, holding it out in front of her. All around her, fellow Cossacks brought their swords down on the enemy with deadly precision. Yurlova did her best to copy them, and through luck (and the protection of her commanding officer) she survived.

Yurlova was one of up to 1,000 women who served in the Russian army during the First World War. Most pretended to be men; typically their gender was discovered only if they received medical treatment. The most famous Russian female soldier was Maria Bochkareva, who never hid her sex. Wounded several times, she always returned to the front. In early 1917, with Russia facing revolution and desertion within the ranks, the country’s Provisional Government created an allfemale combat battalion. Commanded by Bochkareva, its aim was to lead the charge and shame male soldiers into following them. Drawing attention worldwide, including visits from the British Suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst and the American journalists Bessie Beatty and Rheta Childe Dorr, the “Women’s Battalion of Death” did indeed go “over the top” in July. They secured a number of German trenches, but, overstretched and with little support, were forced to pull back.

Although Russia was the only country officially to put women in combat roles, there were other individuals who found their way into the trenches. A British woman, Flora Sandes, travelled to Serbia in 1914 as a voluntary nurse where she fell in love with the country and its people. When the Bulgarians and the Austrians invaded Serbia in the autumn of 1915, international medical workers faced a choice of fleeing across the wintry mountains or facing enemy occupation. Sandes opted instead to join the Serbian army. She made the ultimate transition from nurse to soldier, eventually attaining the rank of second-lieutenant. Treated with courtesy and respect, she generally shunned officers’ privileges, preferring to sit with the men around the campfire, drinking and smoking. Sandes was badly wounded by shrapnel as the army attempted to relieve Serbia but, like Bochkareva, she too returned to fight once more.

The French aviatrix Marie Marvingt also defied convention. A fully qualified pilot before the war, but working as a Red Cross nurse, she campaigned for the militarisation of women. While treating an injured pilot, she discovered during their conversation that his plane would remain grounded in his absence. Having found out the name of his commander, she then convinced the latter to allow her to fly the next mission — a bombing raid on a German aerodrome at Frescaty — in the injured pilot’s place. Later, Marvingt heard that the French infantry were complaining that pilots had a good life, sleeping in safety far behind the line. She disguised herself as a foot soldier so that she could find out for herself, and succeeded in becoming a full fighting member of a French infantry regiment for a month. She was only discovered when some of her red hair slipped out of her helmet and fell loose about her face during a regimental inspection. Marvingt went on to win military commendations for her role as a French bomber pilot.

Generally, however, waging war was considered men’s work, with no room for women at the the front and only grudging acceptance of them behind the lines. The general view was that women were life-givers, not life-takers — but even qualified female physicians encountered resistance. When the French doctor Nicole Girard Mangin was called up for service, her commanding officer was outraged that he had accidentally been assigned a female medic. The French Medical Services refused to rectify the situation, but the decision was nevertheless taken to transfer Mangin to Verdun — an area thought to be relatively safe. The German attack on Verdun in February 1916 took the French by surprise. Mangin refused to leave wounded patients behind, and when forced to retreat drove her casualties under shell fire to the relative safety of snow-covered woodland.

Initially treated with suspicion, women in the trenches were an unknown entity. A pair of British women from the “flying ambulance”, Elsie Knocker and Mairi Chisholm, set up a first-aid station right on the edge of the Belgian trenches in Pervyse in 1914. Serving soup and hot drinks in the trenches, they often called across the short distance to the Germans inviting them to join in. The Germans permitted Knocker and Chisholm to venture into no-man’s land to rescue downed pilots, provided they wore their nurses’ wimples and did not try to salvage the planes.

Female Tommies: The Frontline Women of the First World War, by Elisabeth Shipton, is published by the History Press, £18.99

[Lummox]

What a sad story of Dorothy Lawrence the only woman who fought at the Somme after dressing up as a man.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2537793/She-fought-Somme-disguised-Tommy-did-Dorothy-die-unloved-unlauded-lunatic-asylum-Incredible-story-British-woman-fight-trenches.html

[David Filsell]

Nice to know from the Mail that it was Bird..... Faulks who immortalised the Somme - I had always that it was Murpogo!

[LUCAS]

On 23/06/2014 at 09:00, johnboy said:

The OP specifically refers to BRITISH women on the Western Front.

Better late than never, for the sake of adding information: actually, the OP asks if any British females served in a combat role. As I understand the question, this could mean "in any army" of the time. So I will mention Flora Sandes, who fought with the Serbian Army and attained the rank of Captain. She became a national (Serbian!) hero.

 

 

 

 

[johnboy]

Was she British and did she serve on Western Front?

[LUCAS]

Ghazala mentions her above: she was British, female, born in Yorkshire to Irish parents and moved later to Suffolk. She ended up in the Serbian Army where by the end of the war she had attained the rank of Captain. She is a war hero in Serbia - streets named after her, on a stamp etc. Wikipedia has a bit of info on her.

[LUCAS]

6 minutes ago, johnboy said:

Was she British and did she serve on Western Front?

Oh, and no, not the Western Front but I feel quite strongly that sexism, being alive and well, means the more women's names that we can put forward in the interests of information, the better. These women were beyond inspirational and deserve to be better known. 

[johnboy]

You could start a new topic rather than not answer the OP.