Eight minutes, two heroines.
- Feb 28
- 2 min read
Near the village of Ver-sur-Mer in France, one can find the British Normandy Memorial. Inscribed on it are 22,442 names of those who lost their lives under British command during the invasion of Normandy in June of 1944. Two of those names are of women: Dorothy Field and Mollie Evershed.
Dorothy and Molly were serving with Queen Alexandra's Imperial Nursing Auxiliary on the ship, SS Amsterdam. The Amsterdam had carried U.S. Rangers to Omaha Beach on D-Day and then converted to a hospital ship ferrying injured soldiers back to England. It made two trips safely home, laden with the wounded who received the highest levels of care onboard from overwhelmed and exhausted doctors and nurses.
And then came the morning of August 7, 1944. Just before 7:00, the Amsterdam, making her third trip home, struck a mine off Juno Beach. It took only eight minutes for her to sink beneath the surface with 106 souls aboard. Eight minutes in which Dorothy and Mollie made trip after frantic trip below decks, helping the wounded up to waiting lifeboats. Eight minutes in which they saved the lives of 70 men. Eight critical minutes. In the end, they themselves were trapped and Mollie was last seen at a porthole as the ship went down. Neither of their bodies were ever found.
In the following months, the survivors wrote testimonials to the bravery and heroism of the young nurses and wrote to their parents as well. Perhaps it was a comfort to Dorothy’s parents who were already grieving the loss of their pilot son just months before.
Look at the young smiling faces of the Queen Alexandra Imperial Nursing Auxiliary. None of them are identified, but we know that one foggy morning in August of 1944, two of them lived a lifetime in just eight minutes.
In blessed memory of Dorothy Field and Mollie Evershed with the greatest admiration and respect.
