2nd Lt Flora Sandes (Yudenitch),
4th Company, 2nd Infantry Regiment of
the Moravia Division
Born - 22.1.1876
Died - 25.11.1956 aged 80
Remembered
at Marlesford St Andrew Church, Suffolk.
Flora
Sandes was born in North Yorkshire, the daughter of a Rector. At age 9 the
family moved to Suffolk and from a very early age it was already obvious that
Flora (despite her privileged upbringing) was not your typical refined young
lady.
In
her formative years, Flora became renowned for her ability to ‘smoke, drink and
drive like a man’ and she was often seen buzzing around the village roads of
Suffolk. In 1907/08 Flora Joined the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry – a unit of
female nurses trained to gallop across battlefields to rescue the wounded.
When
The Great War broke out Flora was 38 and already well travelled. She enlisted
as a Red Cross Volunteer and found herself in Serbia with a kindred spirit, an
American called Emily Simmonds. Nicknamed Sandy and Americano, the partners in
crime set about organising the First Reserve Military Hospital, a converted
military barracks housing some 1200 patients. There was no running water or
proper equipment and only two surgeons and eight medical orderlies. Flora and
Emily returned home to launch a fundraising campaign and returned to Sarajevo
with £4000 worth of medical equipment and supplies in 1915. So short of staff
was the hospital that Flora and Emily soon became embroiled in carrying out
surgery themselves.
Flora’s
horsemanship skills were noted by a young Serbian Officer who introduced the
idea of Flora joining a Field Ambulance Unit. In the blink of an eye Flora was
to become the only Western woman to serve in a frontline unit during The Great
War. Being so close to the action brought the obvious risks and in November
1915 Flora was wounded during an attack which saw ‘Volunteer Sergeant Sandes’
receive not only The Order of Karadorde’s Star (Serbia’s highest military
gallantry award) but a promotion to Sergeant Major.
When
the war ended Flora set up rehabilitation centre for Prisoners of War and was
subsequently promoted to a Vodnik (2nd Lieutenant). In1922, after
seven years in the Serbian Army she was discharged back to civilian life which
after all her adventures she found incredibly tough.
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| Flora at home with a 'fag on the go' |
In
1927 Flora married a White Russian Colonel Yurie Yudenitch 13 years her junior
and the couple moved to Belgrade. By 1940 Yurie’s health was failing and the
couple found themselves once more in the midst of another German invasion. In
an 11 day campaign the German Army overran Yugoslavia and the country, along
with its army capitulated. The couple were captured by the Gestapo and although
in captivity for 7 days escaped execution. In the September of 1941 Yurie died
of heart failure leaving Flora destitute.
After
the war, still keen to seek adventure, Flora moved to live with her cousin in
Jerusalem before heading off to Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) aged 70 but it wasn’t long
before she returned to England to take up residence near Wickham Market and
less than a mile away from where she grew up as a child. Failing in health
herself but keen to maintain her independence, Flora bought an electric
wheelchair to whizz about the country lanes – not nearly as quick as her old
automobile but clearly this remarkable woman loved the feel of the wind in her
hair.
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| Interestingly the memorial at Marlesford St Andrew has Flora's date of death as 1955... |
Flora
passed away peacefully aged 80 at Ipswich hospital in 1956 and was cremated at
Ipswich Cemetery. A book, a film and even a street in Belgrade bear testament
to this remarkable ladies life.
