Joan of Arc

Joan had never known anything but war. The same could be said of her parents and her grandparents too. The struggle between France and England had gone on so long it is would be called the Hundred Year’s War. Some wondered if it would ever end.

At the age of thirteen, Joan began to hear the voices of saints. They commanded her to leave her village, take up arms, and go to the aid of the young dauphin, or prince, of France.  At seventeen she answered that call.  Dressed in armor, carrying a miraculous sword, she inspired the French army and turned the tide of a seemingly endless war.  When at last she escorted the timid dauphin to Reims and stood by his side as she was crowned king, Joan was proclaimed the savior of France.  But by nineteen she was dead—burned at the stake as a heretic.  Five hundred years later she was declared a saint.