“She was presented to Mr. Kerensky for her bravery, and after hearing
all her experiences, the Minister of War asked what wish she would
like to have granted. She straightway said: ‘I want to form a woman’s
volunteer battalion, which is to lead men into battle if they will not
go of themselves.’ The idea was approved by Kerensky, and, with the
sanction of the commander-in-chief, the battalion was formed.”
There were 300 girls, most of them being recruits from the higher
educational academies and secondary schools, with a few peasants,
factory girls and servants. There were a few married women, but none
with children were accepted. They ranged from 18 to 28 years in age and
were of good physique, most of them pretty and of refined appearance.
They wore their hair short, or their heads entirely shaved. They wore
as uniform a soldier’s khaki blouse, short breeches, stockings, heavy
soled shoes and forage cap. It was a mixed battalion in the matter of
class; with the peasant and the factory girl marched the daughters
of noble families, society women, writers, etc., for it was in the
universities and schools that the Russian revolution found its most
earnest advocates.
These were the women who in action near Vilna that terrible July day
exhibited great courage and coolness, and did such heroic service
in the midst of a wavering and weakening, cowardly, panic-stricken
body of troops that they have hardly a parallel in all history. Marie
Golokbyova, a member of the battalion but eighteen years old, who
enlisted from the high school, has told of the first engagement of the
fighting girls.