Highly decorated member of the Navy Nurse Corps Laura Mae Cobb served as a military nurse for almost thirty years. She is best known for her leadership of the nurses, immortalized as the “Angels of Bataan,” who were held captive in the Philippines by the Japanese from just after Pearl Harbor until their liberation in February 1945. Throughout her time as a prisoner of war, Cobb and other Navy and Army nurses tended to those needing care while subtly resisting their captors, even mislabeling bottles to prevent looting. Under Cobb’s leadership, the nurses performed heroically and exemplarily, for which they were eventually recognized. Finally, on February 23, 1945, after four years in captivity and with almost all the nurses bordering on starvation, an American rescue team liberated them.
Learn about more Women In History with these encyclopedia from Dr. Rosanne Welch and Dr. Peg Lamphier
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