10. Hannah Snell
It is said by locals that Hannah Snell often pretended to be a soldier when she was a child. She spent her life disguised as a male British soldier named James Gray, who fought bravely in the 1700s. She ended up borrowing a man’s suit from her brother-in-law and assuming his name in order to get to the battlefield.
Hannah was wounded in battle 12 times, including one to the groin. How she was able to recover from her injuries and still keep her identity under wraps remains unknown. It is believed that she may have asked a local woman to extract the bullet instead of seeing a regimental surgeon.
Hannah Snell would eventually reveal her true identity to her shipmates in 1750. Her story “The Female Soldier” was published in London in two different editions. She was honorably discharged and granted a pension, which is a rare occurrence in those days.
In her retirement, Hannah became a pub keeper for The Female Warrior. After her mental and physical health deteriorated, she was placed in an institution and died in 1791.
