Who Was Joan of Arc [Paperback]

Joan of Arc was born in a small French village during the worst period of the Hundred Years' War. For generations, France had been besieged by the British. At age 11, Joan began to see religious visions telling her to join forces with the King of France. By the time she was a teenager, she was leading troops into battle in the name of her country. Though she was captured and executed for her beliefs, Joan of Arc became a Catholic saint and has since captured the world's imagination.Pamela Pollack and Meg Belviso are authors of several books in this series, includingWho Is George Lucas?,Who Was Alfred Hitchcock?andWho Was Susan B. Anthony?Who Was Joan of Arc?
 
English soldiers surrounded the great walls of Orléans (say: OR-lee-on), France. The people had been trapped inside the town without food for seven months. The English hoped that if they closed off the city long enough, the French citizens would open their gates and surrender.
 
France and England had been at war for as long as the people of Orléans could remember. The Duke of Orléans, the town’s leader, had already been captured by the English. His half brother, John de Dunois, did his best to defend the town. But he couldn’t drive the English away. The people of Orléans were beginning to lose hope. They were hungry. They thought of another siege ten years before in another French town. It had lasted a full year. The people of that city had been forced to eat cats, horses, and rats to survive. Eventually that city had surrendered. The people of Orléans didn’t want to surrender, but what else could they do? “We need a miracle,” they said to one another.
 
And maybe a miracle was coming! People who managed to sneak inside the gate of Orléans brought news of a very special peasant girl. She saw visions. She spoke to angels and saints. Her name was Joan of Arc. On April 29, 1429, thl3#