PERHAPS the most incredible character ever to be born in Worcester returned to the Faithful City as a celebrity this week exactly 250 years ago.

The Worcester Journal reported in 1751: "On Monday last arrived in this city (the place of her nativity), the famous Hannah Snell or "Female Soldier" who served His Majesty in the late wars and went by the name of James Grey, and whose sex was not discovered while she was in her military capacity.

"Every evening the greatest numbers of persons in this city resort to see her on stage, before whom she sings and performs exercises very expertly."

The story of Hannah Snell is one of the most remarkable of all time. She was born in Worcester's Friar Street in 1723, one of the nine children of a city haberdasher. At 20, she fell in love with a young sailor but he abandoned her seven months later when she was expecting their child.

However, the baby died at only six months and Hannah borrowed some military clothes, bound her breasts and went off in search of her husband. She trudged to Coventry and joined up as "James Grey" in the Regiment of Foot.

Medicals were minimal and she got away with the deception, then marching with other recruits for 22 days to Carlisle where the regiment guarded Scottish survivors of Culloden and policed the harsh border region.

However, for helping a young girl to escape the clutches of a lecherous sergeant, she became victim of a trumped-up charge and was sentenced to 600 lashes. Tied to a barrack gate, she endured 500 of these severe strokes without a murmur and was let off the remaining 100 lashes for showing "fortitude".

Smarting from the injustice, she deserted the regiment and found her way to Portsmouth where, again, she found no difficulty in joining the Marines.

Sailing to various parts of the world, she was several times commended for her calm and courage under fire and, during an assault on a French post near Madras, suffered multiple gunshot wounds.

Murder

''Miraculously, she survived and returned with the Marines to England, where she discovered, quite by chance, that the husband who had deserted her had been hanged for murder at Genoa.

With no purpose left to her masquerade, she left the forces and went to live in London, returning to womanly attire again. Somehow her story leaked out and she became famous overnight, known throughout the land as "The Female Soldier" or "Heroic Marine".

She became a stage celebrity, even appearing at the Sadler's Wells Theatre singing lively songs. Clearly, it was as a stage performer that she returned to Worcester in 1751, when she would still have been only 28 years old!

Hannah Snell was to marry twice more before going insane and dying in 1792 at the age of 69.