Women Serving behind the Front Women served as secretarial staff and catering personnel in the rear area and occupation zone, in order to release soldiers for frontline duty. More than 20,000 women auxiliaries worked behind the frontline in the German Army between April 1917 and November 1918, the majority of them on the Western Front. From 1917, women were also employed in the field in the armies of Great Britain (approx. 10,000), Austria-Hungary (approx. 36,000), and the United States (approx. 6,00…