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Bletchley Park
-Date Unknown-
Britain's main decryption establishment during World War II where ciphers and codes of several Axis countries were decrypted (BBC). Women comprised 80% of the personal at Bletchley Park (Smith 2014, pp. 31–32). -
India's Women's Auxiliary Corps
Peak strength of 850 officers and 7,200 auxiliaries in the Indian army (The National Archives, "A Case Study - Women’s Auxiliary Corps (India) ") -
Britain's Women's Auxiliary Air Force (WAAF)
WAAF were involved in telephony, telegraphy and the interception of codes and ciphers, including at the Government Code and Cypher School at Bletchley Park. they were also mechanics, engineers, electricians and fitters for airplanes and undertook the interpretation of aerial photographs and provided weather report. (BBC, "Fact File : Women's Auxiliary Air Force") -
Invasion of Poland September 1 - October 6, 1939
(Photo: German troops parade through Warsaw after the invasion of Poland. Warsaw, Poland, September 28-30, 1939.
— National Archives and Records Administration, College Park, Md.) -
Winter War November 30, 1939 – March 13, 1940
(Photo: A Finnish machine gun crew during the Winter War. The Library of Congress) -
White Squadron
The 108th Medevac Light Transport Squadron, better known as the White Squadron (Escadrila Albă) was a female Romanian air ambulance participated in the campaigns at Odessa and Stalingrad and rose to fame during the war because their was nothing that compared. (Romanian Ministry of National Defense) -
Battle of France May 10, 1940 – June 25, 1940
(Photo: Hitler tours Paris with architect Albert Speer (left) and sculptor Arno Breker (right), 23 June 1940. United States National Archives and Records Administration) -
North African Campaign June 10, 1940 – May 16, 1943
(Photo: Australian troops approach a German-held strong point under the protection of a heavy smoke screen somewhere in the Western Desert, in Northern Africa on November 27, 1942. AP Photo) -
Special Operations Executive (SOE)
Regularly recruited women as agents to conduct espionage, sabotage and reconnaissance for the Allies. -
The Blitz September 7, 1940 – May 10, 1941
(Photo: Children in the East End of London, made homeless by the Blitz. New Times Paris Bureau Collection) -
Axis Invade Yugoslavia
Josip Broz Tito's Yugoslav National Liberation Movement claimed 6,000,000 civilian supporters and its two million women formed the Antifascist Front of Women (AFŽ). Around 100,000 women served with 600,000 men in Tito's Yugoslav National Liberation Army. (Jancar-Webster, Women & revolution in Yugoslavia, 1941-1945) -
Canadian Women’s Army Corps
The non-combatant branch of the Canadian Army for women established during World War II as an effort to release men from non-combatant roles in the Canadian armed forces to expand Canada's war effort. (Veterans Affairs Canada, "Women at War") -
German Invasion of Soviet Union
Thousands of Soviet women who volunteered were turned away although soon after on the orders of Joseph Stalin they were accepted. (Cook, Women and war: a historical encyclopedia from antiquity to the present, 2006) -
Seige of Leningrad September 8, 1941 – January 27, 1944
(Photo: Three men burying victims of Leningrad's siege in 1942. RIA Novosti archive) -
United States Navy Nurse Corps
Nearly 800 members serving on active duty by November 1941and over nine hundred inactive reserves. (NWHM) (Photo: Navy Nurse Corps POWs posing with Vice Admiral Thomas C. Kincaid, Commander of the 7th Fleet and Southwest Pacific Force, after their rescue from Los Banos, 23 February 1945. NWHM) -
Attack on Pearl Harbor
The Army Nurse Corps listed fewer than 1,000 nurses (history.army.mil) -
"Night Witches" - 588th Night Bomber Regiment
Fighter pilots of the Red Army -
Home Army
The dominant Polish resistance movement in German-occupied Poland. Polish women became couriers for the Home Army carrying messages between cells of the resistance movement and distributing news broadsheets, operating clandestine printing presses and during partisan attacks on Nazi forces and installations they served as scouts (Krwawicz, “Women Soldiers of the Polish Home Army"). (Photo: Female soldier of the Polish resistance "Home Army" (Armia Krajowa) . Pinterest) -
US Women's Army Auxiliary Corps
The official women's branch of the United States Army. (Photo: Members of the Signal Corps set up communications systems overseas. Women in Military Service for America Memorial Foundation. Inc) -
Office of Strategic Services (OSS)
Wartime intelligence agency of the United States during World War II and the predecessor of the CIA. (Photo: Virginia Hall, OSS spy. CIA Archive) -
President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Public Law 689 creating the Navy’s women reserve program (WAVES)
(Photo:WAVES officers pose on the navigation bridge of the USS General Omar Bundy. AP Photo) -
Battle of Stalingrad August 23,1942 – February 2,1943
(Photo: Red Army troops storm a building, and German prisoners, below, during the Battle of Stalingrad Getty Images) -
Women's Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron and Women Airforce Service Pilots
(Photo:Viola Thompson, Mary Clifford and Lydia Lindner are shown in this photo at Camp Davis AAF in North Carolina. Texas Woman's University) -
The U.S. Women's Army Corps recruited a unit of Chinese-American women to serve with the Army Air Forces as "Air WACs."
(Photo: A unit of Chinese American women was recruited to serve with the Army Air Forces as "Air WACs." They performed jobs such as aerial photo interpretation, air traffic control and weather forecasting. U.S. Army photo) -
Italian Social Republic and the Italian Resistance
Italian resistance to Mussolini's fascist regime existed since the begininng of his reign but their most impoortant role was to take down his Italian Social Republic that inevitably defeated him. Around 35,000 women (and 170,000 men) joined in the Resistance. (Photo: Italian Partisans, AP Photo) -
Normandy Invasion
Female Agents embedded in occupied europe gathered the info required to invade and found hide outs for arriving soldiers and transports weapons and soldiers throughout France. Nurses worked day and night because of the the mass injuries and causalities caused by D-Day. Photo: U.S. nurses walk along a beach in Normandy, France on July 4, 1944, after they had waded through the surf from their landing craft. They are on their way to field hospitals to care for the wounded allied soldiers. AP Photo -
Warsaw Uprising - August 1 – October 2, 1944
Female members of the Home Army were couriers and medics, but many carried weapons and took part in the fighting. (The Atlantic) (Photo: A group of young Jewish resistance fighters are being held under arrest by German SS soldiers.AP Photo) -
Battle of the Bulge December 16, 1944 – January 25, 1945
(Photo: Infantrymen fire at German troops in the advance to relieve the surrounded paratroopers in Bastogne. US Army) -
Battle of Berlin April 16, 1945 – May 2, 1945
(Photo: Russian soldiers raise a red victory flag over the Reichstag in Berlin after the German capital's capture in May 1945 marking the defeat of Germany in the Second world War. DailyMail)
