Moonraker Posted 22 November , 2016 Share Posted 22 November , 2016 Flora Sandes is already well-known to some of us. Moonraker Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghazala Posted 22 November , 2016 Share Posted 22 November , 2016 From Post 43 above... 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. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
James A Pratt III Posted 27 November , 2016 Share Posted 27 November , 2016 There is some doubt whether any Russian female pilots really flew in combat in WWI. According to the book "The Russian Military Air Fleet in WW I" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ghazala Posted 3 December , 2016 Share Posted 3 December , 2016 This was in my paper today.. Taken from Alan Mallison's book 'Too Important for the General's' I believe. "One of those wounded during the Monastir offensive was Flora Sandes, the Yorkshire-born daughter of an Anglo-Irish clergyman. She had joined an ambulance unit in 1914, working for 18 months in a field hospital in Serbia, but during the retreat to Albania had enlisted in the ranks of an infantry regiment, rising to sergeant-major. Later commissioned and awarded Serbia’s highest decoration, the Orden Karadordeve Zvezde (the Order of Karadorde’s Star), her memoir of the retreat, with its Dunkirk-like evacuation in February 1916 and the move to Salonika via Corfu, An English Woman-Sergeant in the Serbian Army, was published in London later that year with a foreword by the Serbian chief of staff, raising much money for Serb relief funds." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bob lembke Posted 25 December , 2016 Share Posted 25 December , 2016 In a thread on uniforms, a picture was posted with a question raised about the uniforms worn by four male guards. A second related thread was started, with no photo. The photo was of a Finnish Red Guards' womans' company, about 35 women, some (displayed) partially in Russian uniforms, captured by a German unit and turned over to the "white" Finns. The picture, which first was posted with no context, was very moving to me, and I didn't fully understand why. I looked into it, and discovered that (supposedly), the Finns marched these women (or at least 26 of them) to a swamp, forced them to dig their own graves, and shot them. This of course was largely a civil war, which tend to be nasty. My father loved the Great War, but did not like the civil war in Germany in 1919. He took part in shooting 26 Red (German) sailors at the Vorwarts building in January 1919. He described it to me in detail. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bob lembke Posted 25 December , 2016 Share Posted 25 December , 2016 This was of course in this Forum, and recently. There is one thread, with the picture described, and a decent number of posts, and a related thread with (from memory) only a few posts and no picture. I would be interested if others view the photo and sense something, which I evidentially did. I did not know the women were going to be shot when I sensed whatever I did, anyone going there now after reading this would know that. The women probably either knew that they were going to be shot, or suspected same. Civil wars are nasty. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bob lembke Posted 25 December , 2016 Share Posted 25 December , 2016 I found the photo, and I brought it to the top of the threads under the "Eastern Front" sub-forum under "Other Theaters" sub-forum. If anyone finds this interesting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bosun Bob Posted 15 February , 2020 Share Posted 15 February , 2020 Just think of the elaborate and complex subdifuge nessesery for a woman to pull this feat off it does seem unlikely that even a woman of extraordinary skills in planning prior knowledge of the recruitment process would even bother with such a difficult to achieve ambition. However, participation in a front line gig could, I suppose, be pulled off if a female were to sign up as a VAD or a driver and slip into a combat role that way. Some F.A.N.Y were enlisted in the Belgium Army as a way to thwart the British Army authorities who held the belief that the Front was no place for a Gal. The Belgium Army were apparently less fusty about it than the British. Bruce. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marilyne Posted 15 February , 2020 Share Posted 15 February , 2020 The question is an interesting one. I want to add just one tiny little detail to what has already been said ... my opinion, you do what you want with it. The thing is the definition of the word "fight"... while no woman could pass herself off as a man to really go participate in the fighting on the front as a man would (except Dorothy), there is such a thing as "participating in the hostilities"... and that they did... OK... wille elaborate later, I have three hungry travel companions here who want their eggs... M. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnboy Posted 15 February , 2020 Share Posted 15 February , 2020 OK... wille elaborate later, I have three hungry travel companions here who want their eggs... Stick with the priorities! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Madmeg Posted 16 February , 2020 Share Posted 16 February , 2020 Well there was an Australian teenager who tried to join up (twice). Australia was part of the Briish empire at the time. I believe she made it as far as getting on board a troop ship before she was found out by her boots- she wasn;t able to source the correct colour. But I can;t for the life of me remember her name and a quick google serch hasnt turned her up yet. I have a copy of Flora Sandes autobiography somewhere. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Madmeg Posted 16 February , 2020 Share Posted 16 February , 2020 ah found her - Maud Butler. https://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-11-03/ww1-stowaway-maud-butler-dared-to-challenge-stereotypes/9116112 she didn't manage to join up but she did manage to avoid the medical by stowing away. It does raise the interesting but unlikely possibility that others might have got further. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marilyne Posted 16 February , 2020 Share Posted 16 February , 2020 Intersting story, that of Maud Butler. Just elaborating a bit on what I wrote earlier - this time before trying to motivate the guys to go out... we kinda hit a rough spot here because the AirBNB found by our fearless travel-leader does not meet the standards of our dear T. and now he's moaning in his corner... means we're in for four days of moaning... oh well... So about "participating in the hostilities"... This is maybe not going to answer the question completely, but please bear with me for a moment. Fighting is one thing... but the fighting cannot be done alone ... there is the whole support behind it to make the fighting happen, right?? And so when the question is asked "did women fight"??? I'm tempted to say: yes ... they made the fighting happen, by manning the radios and telephones, by driving people and things around, by nursing, by supporting... so maybe the women did not "fight" in the strict sense of the word, but they most certainly participated in the conflict and the war effort. M. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnboy Posted 16 February , 2020 Share Posted 16 February , 2020 As renee in Alo, Alo would say. Good moaning Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marilyne Posted 17 February , 2020 Share Posted 17 February , 2020 4 hours ago, johnboy said: As renee in Alo, Alo would say. Good moaning It's not René, it's the spy/postal guy!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnboy Posted 17 February , 2020 Share Posted 17 February , 2020 Probably. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AOK4 Posted 17 February , 2020 Share Posted 17 February , 2020 5 hours ago, Marilyne said: It's not René, it's the spy/postal guy!! you mean policeman, not postman, Crabtree. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marilyne Posted 18 February , 2020 Share Posted 18 February , 2020 18 hours ago, AOK4 said: you mean policeman, not postman, Crabtree. Yes, sorry about that... SHAME on me.. M. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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