After escaping from slavery in 1863, Ann Bradford Stokes was captured and taken aboard the Union hospital ship USS Red Rover. She volunteered as a nurse and became the first African-American woman to serve aboard a U.S. military vessel.
A 1985 U.S. Naval Academy graduate, Rear Adm. Bette Bolivar retired in 2021 after serving as the Commander, Navy Region Southwest.
Catherine S. Long married into Louisiana’s legendary political family and spent nearly four decades immersed in state and national politics as a politician’s wife. When her influential husband died suddenly in 1985, Democratic Party leaders believed Cathy Long was a logical choice to succeed him, having served as his campaign surrogate and close advisor.
The first woman to graduate from the US Navy’s Health Professions Scholarship Program in 1983.
The first woman pilot in the Navy, Lt. Cmdr. Rainey was commissioned in 1970. On July 13, 1982, she was killed in an aircraft accident while training another pilot.
She and her brother, orphans, enlisted together early in the US Civil War.
Loreta Velazquez published her memoirs in 1876. She served the Confederacy as Lt. Harry Buford, a self-financed soldier not officially attached to any regiment.
US Civil War soldier Mary Owens, discovered to be a woman after she was wounded in the arm, returned to her Pennsylvania home to a warm reception and press coverage. She had served for eighteen months under the alias John Evans.
French heroine known as the “Military Heroine of La Vendée,” who later wrote and published her autobiography.
Venezuelan independence patriot