Ready to start filming Nellie movie

Filming is due to start in the city this month for a movie about heroine Wakefield nurse, Nellie Spindler.
Nurse Nellie SpindlerNurse Nellie Spindler
Nurse Nellie Spindler

The 26-year-old is the only woman to be buried among 10,000 soldiers in Belgium having been killed while tending to wounded soldiers in the trenches at Passchendaele in the First World War.

Members of Welsh-based Just Druid Enterprises Ltd have been travelling to Wakefield to prepare for the movie which will star three Yorkshire-based actresses.

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They have visited Nellie’s old school, Pinders Primary, and spoken with her remaining relatives, who still live in the Wakefield area.

Nellie volunteered for the frontline and was killed when a German shell hit her hospital tent in August 1917.

She died in the arms of her superior and friend, Minnie Wood, who was also from Wakefield.

Daniel Ready, who is directing, said: “We want to put nurses on the map in terms of what they did, and put Yorkshire on the map.

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“They were unsung heroes, pretty much like they are now, they are taken for granted.

“We’ve got a good team with us and we’re confident we can do the story justice.”

The movie will be around 20 minutes long and will be premiered at Wakefield’s Theatre Royal on July 3.

It will then be released on DVD in November to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the end of the war.

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Wakefield Civic Society’s chairman Kevin Trickett, who last year helped erect a blue plaque on Stanley Road to mark where Nellie lived as a youngster, has consulted closely with the film company.

He said: “I’m delighted to be involved, I thought putting the plaque up was the end of the story.

“When I was told about the possibility of a film I jumped at the chance.

“When the film is ready we will make a bid thing of it - anything that can bring Wakefield’s history to life is fantastic.”