Lawrence cycled hundreds of kilometres through bombed-out towns, sleeping rough in ditches, haystacks and abandoned buildings. The heat of the summer was sweltering but Lawrence had decided it was “either the Front or risk death in the effort!”.

She finally reached the frontline Somme town of Albert and, with the connivance of a friendly soldier, fell in with the 179th Tunnelling Division. Lawrence then spent 10 days alternately hiding out in abandoned buildings, setting up mines and mingling unseen with the parades of marching British soldiers.

She had made it. But, suffering from fainting fits that would surely unmask her, she was forced to give herself up. Interrogated by a band of embarrassed British Army generals, it was decided that the plucky teenager must be prevented from leaking any information to the enemy, and Lawrence was packed off to a nearby convent, where she was forced to sign an affidavit, swearing her to secrecy. She then returned home to the UK.

In 1919, once the war had ended, despite her ill health, Lawrence published Sapper Dorothy, an account of her experience in the trenches. But the book was not a success – The Spectator mocked her efforts as “humorous” and called her “a girlish freak”.

Lawrence’s mental health began to decline. With no family to care for her, the only British woman soldier in WW1 was admitted to an asylum in 1925, where she remained for the next 40 years until her death.

The Forgotten Women series is part of Stylist’s Visible Women campaign, dedicated to raising the profiles of brilliant women past and present. Find out more about the campaign here, and see more Visible Women stories here.

Remembering Dorothy Lawrence, the secret soldier who fought in the Somme