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Martha Gellhorn worked as a correspondent for “Collier's Weekly”, in the late 1930s and early 1940s and became famous for her first-person accounts of World War II. Colliers published a notable account of the liberation of Dachau in 1945, while Gellhorn covered the major fronts of World War II. As a war reporter during the Spanish Civil War, Gellhorn went on to cover every major battle of the twentieth century, from World War I to Vietnam. Ms. Gellhorn was a brash, raspy-voiced renegade who regarded herself as a champion of regular people locked in conflicts generated by the affluent and powerful. She was known to many because of her marriage to Ernest Hemingway, from 1940 until 1945 which caused her constant anger, especially when critics tried to establish parallels between her lean writing style and that of her more famed husband. Although there have been women reporters on the front lines of conflicts since the First World War and even before, and their number has increased more and more in subsequent conflicts in the twentieth century. It wasn't until the early nineties, during the first Gulf War and the Bosnian war, that the phenomenon – fostered by the escalating feminization of newsroom personnel in many countries – gained momentum to the point that the presence and visibility of women war correspondents on NBC and other news networks became more prevalent. This paper will attempt to describe how Ms. Gellhorn became eyewitness to war as one of the first female war correspondents who not only witnessed but also reported on numerous critical episodes of World War II.

To show war fields witnessed by American Correspondent Martha Gellhorn through her literary texts.

In The Face of War (1959), from the Spanish Civil War in 1937 through the wars in Central America in the mid-eighties, Gellhorn’s candid reporting reflected her deep empathy for people no matter their political ideology, and the openness and vulnerability of her conscience. “I wrote very fast, as I had to,” she says, “afraid that I would forget the exact sound, smell, words, gestures, which were special to this moment and this place.” Whether in Java, Finland, the Middle East, or Vietnam, she used the same vigorous approach. The Face of War is a collection of articles about several wars on which Martha Gellhorn reported after becoming a war correspondent in Spain in 1937. The book is divided into sections on wars in Spain, Finland, Europe (World War II), Java, Vietnam, the Middle East, and Central America, plus a section called “Interim,” which is about efforts for peace. Each section of the book also comes with its own introduction, usually presenting autobiographical information that explains how Gellhorn came to cover these wars as well as fascinating insights into her attitude toward war, in the course of which she reveals many other aspects of her life and her feelings about writing. Gellhorn thinks of herself as a war correspondent first, not as a woman writer. Inevitably, however, she finds herself in a male-dominated world and must contend with prejudices against allowing women to report at first hand on combat. She explains how she resorted to various stratagems in order to cover the D-Day landing on the beaches of Normandy in World War II and the Allied campaign in Italy in the later stages of that war.

The Face of War is an anthology of her most notable pieces of journalism and here Martha contends: 

These articles are in no way adequate descriptions of the indescribable misery of war. War was always worse than I knew how to say- always. And probably from an instinct of self-preservation, one tried to write most often of what was brave and decent. Perhaps now my articles on Germany and on the behaviour of the Gestapo, the SS and other sections of the German army will seem untimely paeans of hate. I reported what I saw, and hate was the only reaction such sights could produce. (Gellhorn 84)

Facing Armed Conflict citizen, a superpower, was not an easy task, according to Ms. Gellhorn. The embarrassment she feels will make her feel isolated and if she doesn't know that she belongs to a constant minority of the American population. That group of people who refuse to accept that power overcomes morality and who recognise the goal itself is worthless if it is justifiable by the means used to achieve it. In addition to corrupting people in it, she never understood why it also renders them stupid. Eventually, their power schemes fail, and people in power put their silly important heads together and come up with new power schemes that are nearly identical to the prior ones. People were affected by conflict on a one-on-one basis. The vast majority of people treat war as if it were an act of God that could not be halted unless they are directly involved in it. It would be a cruel joke on the cosmos if we were to destroy ourselves because of a lack of imagination. Martha was referred as a "weird war profiteer" in The Face of War because according to her:

As for me, I had seen enough dead bodies, and enough refugees, and enough destroyed villages and could not bear to see any more. It was useless to go on telling people what war was like since they went on obediently accepting war. To feel useless or helpless is the way most people feel, when faced with great public acts, and it is bad way to feel but also an excuse. (Gellhorn 212)

Martha Ellis Gellhorn, lived from 1908 to 1998, started writing when she put together a report for the US government about the Great Depression. Her collection of four stories The Trouble I've Seen, was based on this report. In 1937, she went on her first trip to abroad to report for Collier's Weekly on the Spanish Civil War where she began an affair with Ernest Hemingway, whom she eventually married and subsequently divorced. During WWII, she pretended to be a stretcher-bearer and saw the D-Day landings. She then went on to report on things like the Nuremberg trials. Gellhorn became enraged and despondent after witnessing the misery and poverty that she had written about, and ended up losing her job. So, in the introduction of The Trouble I have seen Caroline Moorehead describes:

  As for Martha Gellhorn, angry and despondent about the misery and poverty she had witnessed, she got herself fired for inciting a group of men on work relief, who were exploited by a crooked contractor, to rise up and break the windows of the FERA office in protest. Described as a ‘dangerous communist’, she was summoned back to Washington. (Gellhorn 19)  

Gellhorn reported a wide range of conflicts which can be depicted through her first critical analysis in The War Writer in the Field and in the Text. All of us are profoundly affected by how war is pictured. The actual location of the writer in relation to the conflict and his or her subsequent standing in the text were often ignored in war literature analyses. As a war correspondent, Kate McLoughlin follows Gellhorn's courageous attempts to get into the conflict zone and her construction of the female war correspondent. Unpublished letters offer light on Hemingway's and Gellhorn's wartime rivalry over the Normandy beaches and the resulting Collier's magazine articles. After examining Gellhorn's progressively disparaging images of the glamorous female combat correspondent, McLoughlin makes a case for why such cynicism would have set in. This book serves as a case study for scholars in the representation of conflict in the media.

Comparatively, war reporting has a poor record. Historians see the causes and aftermath of war with an Olympian perspective. Martha Gellhorn called herself a "war reporter". She wasn't a saint and didn't dress like one. She knew about wartime fairy tales, but was fascinated to them. Her divorce from Ernest Hemingway was their first separation. Caroline Moorhead in her first comprehensive biography of Gellhorn: A Twentieth Century Life describes how Gellhorn provides a unique and exhilarating perspective on world history in an unprecedented time period. As a war correspondent, Martha Gellhorn was on the front lines of nearly every major international conflict between the Spanish Civil War and the end of World War II. She pioneered new ground for women in the traditionally male-dominated field of journalism as the preeminent—and sometimes the only—female journalist on the scene. She sent some of the best wartime reports of the twentieth century, characterised by a burning desire to show pain in all its forms and an unmistakable immediacy. This interest in global events was accompanied by a genuine desire to travel. Throughout her life, Gellhorn travelled to Africa, Cuba, China, and the great cities of Europe, writing about her experiences in first-rate travel writing and fiction, which she shared with her readers. Eleanor Roosevelt, Leonard Bernstein, and H. G. Wells were just a few of the luminaries she encountered throughout her life, but she was unable to settle into long-term partnerships, and happiness eluded her despite her success in the business world. The first of her two weddings, to Ernest Hemingway, was a public one, while the second was a private one. Based on in-depth interviews and access to Gellhorn's own documents and correspondence, this definitive biography offers a riveting, up-close look at one of the most important women of our time.

This recounts Gellhorn's experiences as a war correspondent during the Spanish Civil War. How she influenced war reporting is investigated. She writes about normal life, not war. She used 1960s literary conventions to portray the battle's story. The role of war correspondent was mythologized at this period. Examining her Collier's Weekly pieces, letters to literary and political giants, Boston University diaries, and fiction will reveal Gellhorn's involvement in the Spanish conflict. Her professional and political roles in the Spanish Civil War cannot be disregarded. Eleanor Roosevelt had a 30-year connection with Gellhorn. Eleanor Roosevelt's letters portray her as a go-between during and after the Spanish-American War. War reporters were frequently huge, hard-drinking men during the start of WWII. In the early 20th century, English-speaking countries regarded war reporting improper for women. The Allies viewed female journalists as less important during World War II. Because of this, academics have neglected the work of women journalists during World War II. The study of marginalised groups’ history has risen in prominence over the past century, although most research has been limited to one country. Women journalists’ perspectives on World War II must be included. The Soviet Union's exclusion from female war reporters is exceptional. Martha Gellhorn has covered wars since the Spanish Civil War and through the Cold War. Gellhorn's personal letters are as interesting and enlightening as her work. Her true identity was revealed by her interaction with writers like Ernest Hemingway.

 Martha Gellhorn witnessed the Great Depression and Spanish Civil War as a teenager and wrote extensively about both. She was a well-known battle correspondent, but her personal life was not. She was steadfast in Java, Finland, the Middle East, and Vietnam. During World War II, "Interim" was utilised between hostilities in Spain, Finland, Europe, Java, Vietnam, and the Middle East. As she records these fights, Gellhorn's preludes show her unique viewpoint on war and literature. Martha's life story reveals her passion for fighting injustice and uncovering human truth. Gellhorn's honest reporting on the Spanish Civil War in 1937 and the Central American hostilities of the mid-1980s showed her empathy for people of all political affiliations as well as her openness and sensitivity. She feared forgetting the unique sounds, smells, words, and gestures of this moment. So, in The Face of War Martha says:

If you can do nothing to change events or rescue your fellow men, you are free to live your own life, and living one’s own life is always more pleasant than exhausted scrabbling role of a responsible citizen. (Gellhorn 212)

 Gellhorn never considered herself a female author in combat reporting. She rather overcame male-dominated attitudes that prohibit women from reporting on disputes. She describes how she documented World War II in Normandy and Italy. In A Stricken Field, a popular novel by Martha Gellhorn where she herself plays a character of fearless Mary Douglas, who holds back the dissemination of journalist accounts on mistreatment in detention camps. Leaning back and shutting her eyes, Gellhorn tried to organise all she had just witnessed, heard, and learned. When it came time to write, she wanted to break up her information into manageable chunks. Although she could not see the information, it was straightforward and uncomplicated, bright but devoid of passion on a page. Mary recounts how she became engaged and emotionally invested in the subject through a journalistic lens. Despite being increasingly engrossed in the circumstances, she won't fully understand the people she meets. Here, the journalist and citizen have great clout. Her Czech and Sudeten German neighbours don't affect her. Mary values her identity, race, and job. She doesn't comprehend despite her best efforts. As the game progresses, even a little power becomes crucial. Gellhorn's tragic and genuine picture of refugees heightens Mary's emotional and active involvement. This well-written fiction about combat may not be the greatest reporting.  Indomitable human spirit makes us all, the human race, survivors in the big scheme of things as she says in A Stricken Field:

I have seen enough in the last five years, Mary thought, to make anyone despair. But disaster doesn’t harm the really good ones: thy carry their goodness through, untouched, and nothing that happens can make them cowardly or calculating. I have seen some fine people in these disaster years. I have seen one tonight. There’s that to remember too, when despair sets in. (Gellhorn 186)

The Trouble I've Seen, a 1936 anthology, comprises four Depression-era stories. In fiction fashioned with documentary precision, these stories demonstrate how basic, domestic sufficiency in American life eventually breaks down. Her book shows the true impact of pervasive poverty. Hope and relief can coexist. Early cadences can be heard. Gellhorn's first published story was in 1936. She wrote four novels about an average person and his family during the Great Depression. Gellhorn's work left an unforgettable imprint on her readers. She and 16 other authors travelled around the country during the Great Depression to present Harry Hopkins first-hand accounts of what people were going through to evaluate the effectiveness of "Relief." As a young writer, she wrote four short pieces about the Great Depression based on letters to FDR. She's empathetic despite her unvarnished view of famine and disease. Martha Gellhorn's View from the Ground contains "peace-time reporting". The author visits Cuba and London's impoverished after 41 years away. Martha Gellhorn's 60 years of writing have allowed her to articulate grace and justice.

Gellhorn visited Prague in 1939, a year before the Munich accord, and watched it become a Nazi stronghold. A writer returns to Prague after the communist takeover and finds her efforts to help refugees and illustrate the horrific conditions frustrating and ineffectual. Bruised Field "Sick Place" Martha Gellhorn's best-known essay was The Final Solution.   Mary Douglas and other writers gather in a hotel cocoon, protected by Western passports like Hemingway's "movable feast". Douglas gets information from migrants, but she knows it will be dismissed as propaganda. Douglas visits refugee camps despite his panellists' bickering and pontificating. As a journalist, you're simply another worker, she says. Too much attention on one thing might lead to neglect. In her imaginary world, orphaned children living with adults are carefree and happy. The children sing a folk song about a bird carrying Mother's message. Douglas feels powerless to save Rita and Peter, two German activists who are always near to death due to their political activism. Gellhorn's wartime and journalistic experiences are well-documented and her representation relies on army beliefs and feelings. A Stricken Field unfolds over a week in Prague. Despite Edvard Benes's command, Hitler's soldiers marched into Sudetenland without firing a shot due to Chamberlain's appeasement. So, Caroline Moorehead in its foreword says:

She referred to Britain’s foreign policy at the time as a “kid glove fascism” and Chamberlain as “one of the most hateful figures in modern times.” Having delivered her article which she called “Obituary of a Democracy,” Gellhorn made her way slowly back to the United States, convinced that there would soon be war in Europe and that she wanted no part in it. (Gellhorn viii)

Ms. Gellhorn utilises her writing to motivate people. She uses sardonic, caustic dark humour no matter the theme. Her View from the Ground included peacetime reporting. It's an example of peace-time reporting as Martha Gellhorn notes in the foreword. Gellhorn said the world lacked peace. These artists draw on historical and modern sources to portray stories of overcoming tragedy and survival. From the lynching of an African-American man in the South to his latest journey to Cuba, Gellhorn has examined what's changed and what hasn't. Documentary clarity depicts the steady decline of American affluence amid unemployment and destitution.

Most of her essays’ report on tranquil moments. She wrote about peaceful countries and non-peaceful eras and places. She writes of orphans forced to leave their homes and start new lives in Rome and those in El Salvador who were tortured. This collection comprises six decades of Gellhorn's contemporary writings. During this time, lynching occurred in Mississippi, the Soviet Union dissolved, and many Italian war orphans were abused. Israel rose to prominence and the problem of Palestine formed. Her recent reporting assignments include anti-nuclear protests at Greenham Common and the Salvadoran genocide trial. She used to conceive of writing as "paying for the chance to observe and learn" Gellhorn's obscurity is unacceptable as a writer and woman. 

Researchers have not paid enough attention to women journalists during World War II. Few texts have examined 20th-century women and minority history, and those that have largely focused on America. Martha Gellhorn, a war correspondent for the English-speaking Allies, inspired this paper about women's Second World War reporting. Women's suffrage advocates, military officials, and major media outlets discuss WWII women. Institutional misogyny has marginalised and denied women war reporter’s equal access to information. Few women resisted the odds and kept expressing their stories. Many journalists published first-person battle reports, giving readers a direct view at the action, amongst them was the famous Martha Gellhorn. Her writing was vivid and descriptive. Her story recalled the sights, sounds, and even smelt of combat, together with military techniques and effects. Gellhorn was one of the few women to fly combat missions. It was impossible to overstate the significance of what Martha Gellhorn saw and reported as one of the first female wartime correspondents during World War II and beyond. Only a few, such as Martha Gellhorn, have been recognised over time. In spite of the fact that she is best known as Ernest Hemingway's third wife, she was a journalist for over 50 years and witnessed many of the most important events of World War II and subsequent conflicts.

1.Gellhorn, Martha, & Caroline Moorehead. A Stricken Field. University of Chicago Press, 2011. 2. The Face of War: Writings from the Frontline, 1937-85. Eland, 2016. 3. The Trouble I've Seen. Eland, 2012. 4. The View from the Ground: Peacetime Dispatches, 1936-87. Eland, 2016. 5 .McLoughlin, Kate, & Catherine Mary McLoughlin. Martha Gellhorn: The War Writer in the Field and in the Text. Manchester University Press, 2007. 6. Moorehead, Caroline. Foreword. A Stricken Field, Gellhorn, Martha. University of Chicago Press, 2011, pp. vii-xi. 7. Gellhorn: A Twentieth-Century Life. Picador, 2003. 8. Introduction. The Trouble I have seen: Four Stories from the Great Depression, Gellhorn, Martha. Eland, 2012, pp. 1-19.