Gesicht des Krieges

Martha Gellhorn

A Woman's Struggle

A typewriter, a hospital ship and a headstrong woman.

Martha Gellhorn showed us that this was all it takes to effect change.

As a fearless journalist, she reported from countless war zones for half a century, even though – or especially then – when she wasn’t permitted to. For her, it was always about giving a voice to the civilians she met and using her own voice to prevent the horrors of war from repeating. Her story about D-Day was and remains one of the biggest events she has ever covered.

Because she wasn’t allowed to report on the invasion firsthand, Martha Gellhorn sneaked onto a hospital ship with the pretextual intention of wanting to nurses. She hid in the bathroom until the ship was already out at sea.

On June 6, 1944, the Allied troops invaded Normandy during World War II. The operation let to the liberation of France and later the rest of Western Europe and therefore laid the groundwork for the Allies’ victory on the West Front. It is still known as the largest seaborne invasion in history. Approximately over 5000 people died that day.

Martha Gellhorn was the only woman and female journalist to witness the events at the coast of France firsthand that day.

Back in London, she wrote her report and sent it to her publishers at Collin’s Magazine. Consequently, she was arrested for having sneaked onto the hospital ship illegally. Shortly after, she escaped and took off for Italy. Her article appeared in Collin’s Magazine next to that of her former husband Ernest Hemingway, Ernest, with whom she competed in the run-up to D-Day as to which of the two would be allowed to report on the event. But that is a story for another day...