Military Archives - Page 2 of 75

Marie-Thérèse Le Chêne

Marie-Thérèse Le Chêne was the oldest woman the SOE sent to France—age 52 when she was served as a courier and distributed anti-Nazi materials from November 1942 to August 1943.

In July 1917, Mona Chalmers Watson was named the first Chief Controller of Britain’s Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps (WAAC) when it was formed. The thousands of WAACs worked as cooks and waitresses, clerks, communications operators, drivers, and more. She was already noteworthy as a suffragist, physician, and the first woman to receive her MD from the University of Edinburgh.

Trinidad Tecson

Philippine revolutionary who joined the revolutionary nationalist army Katipunan in 1895 to fight for her country’s independence from Spanish colonizers.

Velu Nachiyar

Born in 1730, Rani Velu Nachiyar was the first Indian queen to actively oppose the British, though she would be far from the last.

Lady Mo

The woman known as Ya Mo (Grandma Mo) was the wife of a government official in Nakhon Ratchasima, and was in her mid-50s in 1826 when King Anouvong of Vientiane invaded and seized the city while the governor was away.

Lü Mǔ

When her adult son was a local government official who was executed by the governor, ostensibly for a minor crime, Lü Mǔ planned and executed an uprising, part of the Red Eyebrows uprising that started in 22 CE

Mary Seacole

1800s Jamaican nurse and businesswoman

Chevalier d’Eon

The diplomat, soldier, and spy was notorious and scandalous long before they began presenting permanently as a woman in 1777

Deloris Ruddock

Deloris L. Ruddock was one of 855 African American women who served in the Women’s Army Corps (WACs) during the war. Officially known as the 6888th Central Postal Directory Battalion, the women called themselves the “Six Triple Eight” with the motto “No Mail, Low Morale.”