Making Sister Julie

In the fall of 1914, Sister Julie of Gerbéviller became a media heroine. According to the many press accounts and interviews, this sixty-one-year-old nun had confronted the invading German army and defeated it. The French press had begun to report her activities in early September; the story spread quickly, her exploits multiplying in each new iteration. Originally commended for her courage in nursing under bombardment, newspapers soon credited her with saving Gerbéviller from destruction and wounded French soldiers from massacre. ¹ While some images transformed her into a slender young woman, many journalists delighted in describing her short, stout, pugnacious person: “her eyes sparkling, her whole face expressing kindness,” “comely and fresh as an apple,” “a tough, little, resourceful … countrywoman, full of goodness and practicality.” “Lacking very scientific methods, [she] poured out the balm of her spirit, what her good sense told her was best to do.” Everyone’s granny and, according to Maurice Barrès, “all this enhanced by spirituality.” “A soldier, in fact,” a soldier “for God and for France.” ²