Women journalists have been in the media a lot recently; CBS News reporter Lara Logan’s sexual assault in Egypt, whilst covering the recent uprisings, has sparked a controversy as to whether it is appropriate for women to put themselves in dangerous areas, or appropriate for their editors to ask them.
Here are some examples of the media firestorm that engulfed this issue:
BBC HEADLINE: 19 February 2011
Lara Logan attack turns spotlight on female reporters
Fox News pundit Bill O’ Reilly asked the question:
"Is it worth the risk now, with all of the horror going on in the Middle East-- and it's been going on for years-- is it worth the risk for women to cover the news there?"
As someone who is hoping to become a journalist, perhaps in conflict zones, I have endeavoured to find out about those brave women journalists during the Great War, who were the trailblazers in that field. The first accredited woman foreign correspondent was Margaret Fuller who became commissioned by the New York Tribune to cover the Roman revolution in Italy in 1848. But even by 1914, women journalists, let alone women conflict journalists, were few and far between.
One such trailblazer Mary Roberts Rinehart, a successful writer of mystery novels and later known as the “American Agatha Christie”, was among the first American reporters to reach the Belgian front in the First World War.
In an account filed from Belgium for the Saturday Evening Post she wrote:
"The German lines are very close now. The barbed wire barrier tears my clothes... No man's land lies flooded but full of dead bodies... Here the stench begins... My heavy boots chafe my heel, and I limp. But I limp rapidly. I do not care to be shot in the back... I have done what no woman has done before, and I am alive."
Another trailblazer was Nellie Bly. Already famous for her journalism in America, she was on holiday in Europe on the outbreak of the war. She immediately travelled to the Eastern Front where she reported the war for the New York Evening Journal.
Here is one of her clippings. Beautifully written and incredibly moving, I think a feminine influence is seen in the way she is unafraid to write about her own feelings, and in her vivid descriptions of the scenery and the faces of the men.
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| Nellie Bly |
December 10, 1914
New York Evening Journal
“Nellie Bly’s Story of the War
PERILS OF THE CHOLERA”
The following is a continuation of the article by Miss Nellie Bly, special correspondent for the Evening Journal, now on the firing line in Austria:
Przemysl, Nov. 1 – Winter is here. Before this article reaches New York what shall the bitter cold show us? Can the horror be pictured? Countless thousands frozen in trenches, countless wounded frozen by the roadsides in their search for hospitals; countless thousands frozen in the freight trains on their way to the cities.
Daylight brought the same ugly picture – unending monotony of either dark-grey men or dark-blue men, moving briskly but unsmilingly everywhere. In windows, in doorways, in the streets, on the fields, marching in great unending columns here, standing in silent lines before straw-made sheds from which they get their food. Every few yards flies the flag most seen in all the world, the Red Cross, always so symbolic, with its red staining blood crimson the white. Everywhere they are, in school buildings, in hovels, on high land, in mud puddles, and always, in startling numbers, the yellow flag, the cholera. We pass the new cholera barracks where I was the other day. Men are bringing a rude black coffin out of one building. Three more coffins are being carried toward the gate, where wagons of the same queer construction as the one I am in stand waiting.
Patient, uncomplaining soldiers! Noble, brave doctors! I turn away.
RED CROSS AND YELLOW CROSS WAVE OVER VILLAGE.
We pass through a village, a cluster of filthy hovels built in a muddy swamp. The Red Cross and the yellow flag wave ghastly. Now the long trains of supply wagons begin. Men wrapped in blankets or bags, clapping their hands for warmth, gaze at us indifferently.
At a sudden turn in the road we come upon great wooden gates with square holes in them, apparently for cannons. We pass within to a sea of barbed wire. On every side, for miles and miles, it stretches.
Before us is a most wonderful view. We are on the brow of a hill. In the valley seem to be thousands and thousands of men. They are cooking or forming in line or marching or constructing new trenches and shelters from trees and straw for the unnumbered horses which are everywhere. At one place they are marching around a ring for exercise. It is the largest ring, with the greatest number of horses, I ever saw in my life.
Everywhere are the grave-shaped trenches where men lived, fought and died. On this ground the Russians were three weeks ago. Now they are only behind the next hill, 2,000 feet away. The many double crosses made of branches shows where hundreds fell as they retreated before the victorious Austrians.
The appearance of these camps, men and horses was vastly superior to those I saw the day I had my baptism of fire. The horses were larger and better fed. I did not see a sick, dying or dead one. The sanitary arrangements were excellent and filth was not visible.
MUD-STAINED SOLDIERS GATHER BEFORE THE ALTER.
We followed and took our places in the square formed by the troops around the altar.
The priests were in long white lace robes. The chaplain of the camp stood before the altar, cup in hand. An officer in red breeches and blue jacket assisted as altar boy.
It was an impressive sight, this early mass before those pale, mud-stained, shivering soldiers. On a broad board by the side of the altar, around a framed picture of the Emperor and Empress in their youth, lay sixty medals, all silver, of two sizes, with the exception of one gold and the iron crown. This, by the way, might be iron, but it does not show it. It is gold, with two branches of tree enamel. It is suspended on two wide ribbons of the national color.
After the priest had made a short address and prayer, and blessed the medals with holy water, three cheers were given for the Emperor and Austria. Then the commander of the brigade, Prince Schonburg, stepped before the altar and addressed the troops.
BRIGADE COMMANDER ADDRESSES HIS TROOPS.
He is a tall man, taller than any one among all the assembled there – so much that it is distinctly noticeable. He has a serious, strong face. His eyes are steady, sky blue and firm. He wore high black boots, the regular gray overcoat and cap. His manner was quiet, earnest and modest.
This address was delivered in an unaffected way, much as one would speak to close friends. The soldiers, their thousands of sky-blue eyes fixed trustingly upon him. These troops were from Tyrol, the country so frequented by Americans.
When the speech was ended, the next in command made a brief address, which was greeted by cheers. It was to the effect that Prince Schonburg, though long retired from military service, had, on the outbreak of war, rejoined the army – not as a dummy, alas, too plentiful, but as a real soldier. On several occasions, with drawn sabre, he has led his troops right into the face of the enemy’s fire. For these brave acts, the Emperor decorated him with the iron crown. He bowed his tall head gravely as the medal was fastened around his neck. Meanwhile the booming of guns at the base of a hill facing us continued at regular intervals. As usual we could see the little white smoke and hear the explosion, but we could not see or follow the course of the bullet which curved in the air and fell somewhere over the brow of the hill among the Russians.
“I expect a grenade at any moment,” said Lieutenant Frederick Pichl. “The Russians are in that gold-red woods there, 1,000 feet away. They see and shoot at every move.”
But the Russians were silent. No shot answered the Austrians. Down below us a long line of field kitchens were trailing toward the firing line.
Another of her articles was titled “How Wounded Are Cared For”. Bly was primarily concerned with the lives of those most vulnerable, and also of the inherent disadvantages suffered by women at this time.
“His words were a sound my ears shall never forget . . . “What does he say?” I cried, unable to stand it . . . “He is asking for his children,” was the low reply. The hollow black eyes turned again to search mine.
“I could not endure their question. I had no answer to give. “Could Emperors and Czars and Kings look on this torturing slaughter and ever sleep again?” I asked the doctor.
“They do not look,” he said gently.”
Dangerous as war reporting certainly is, for both sexes, it seems that some of the comments surrounding the Lara Logan story could have been written in 1914, not 2011. Can women handle conflict reporting? Are they not too vulnerable? Should their editors even send them? What heroes (heroines!) those women Great War journalists were, and how much more difficult must it have been for them. Social and political opinion was greatly against them (see post on post-war attitudes to women), more so than today. The risks they faced were enormous and yet the perspective they brought was essential.
In 1898 Arnold Bennett wrote a handbook called Journalism for Women, which addressed the small but growing number of female writers and editors in British newspapers and journals.
"Of the dwellers in Fleet Street there are, not two sexes, but two species – journalists and women-journalists – and ... the one is about as far removed organically from the other as a dog from a cat."
This last observation is as true today as it was then. It seems clear that eliminating a perspective from something as important as a war, eliminating half the demographic; that would be the most risky journalism because it would end up being one-sided journalism.
A recent article in the Independent caught my eye:
http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/features/women-at-war-the-female-british-artists-who-were-written-out-of-history-2264670.html
It points out that out of the host of artists commissioned by the British government during the Great War, there were only four women compared to 47 men, and of these four, three had their work rejected, while one did not take up the commission, so there was effectively no "official" female representation.
It points out that out of the host of artists commissioned by the British government during the Great War, there were only four women compared to 47 men, and of these four, three had their work rejected, while one did not take up the commission, so there was effectively no "official" female representation.
The Great War was in grave danger of being presented from an entirely male perspective. Had it not been for these courageous female journalists, an entirely different perspective might have been lost.
It is also worth remembering that it was the journalist Clare Hollingworth, who broke the story (to the British government as well as to her readers) of Germany's invasion of Poland in 1939...
It is also worth remembering that it was the journalist Clare Hollingworth, who broke the story (to the British government as well as to her readers) of Germany's invasion of Poland in 1939...
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