Former Army nurse, 99, returns to Normandy to commemorate D-Day

Ellan Levitsky remembers everything about the time she spent working in an Army field hospital in Normandy during World War II — from treating young soldiers to sneaking out to go dancing with another nurse.

The 99-year-old served alongside her older sister, Dorothy Levitsky, at the 164th General Hospital from August 1944 to May 1945. She returned to Normandy this week to mark the 75th anniversary of D-Day, and in an interview with the Los Angeles Times, she reflected on the time she spent there nearly eight decades ago. "I loved the Army, loved everything about it," she said.

The daughters of Russian Jewish immigrants, the Levitsky sisters were inseparable, Ellan said, and that's why Dorothy joined the Army with her. She remembers being so cold during the winter that she used gin to start a fire in a wooden stove, and nearly burned down her tent — twice.

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She also exchanged her uniform shirt with a local farmer for a chicken and once crawled through a hole in barbed wire in order to spend the night dancing. There was an air raid alert, though, and she couldn't return to the base until the next day. Dorothy thought she had died, Ellan told the Times, and when Dorothy saw her sister was alive, "she socked me in the face."

The sisters received the Legion d'Honneur, France's highest honor, in 2012, in recognition of their service. Before Dorothy died in 2015, the sisters made several return trips to Normandy, and made several friends in the region. "In the U.S., nobody even looks at my medal," Ellan told the Times. "Here they come over and shake my hand and say thank you for being in Normandy."