The Small Woman

Gladys Aylward was a parlourmaid from Edmonton in North London who paid her own way to China in 1932 because the China Inland Mission had rejected her as unsuitable. She became a missionary in the mountain town of Yangcheng, was appointed foot inspector by the local Mandarin (her job was to enforce the abolition of foot-binding), and in 1940 led a hundred children over the mountains to safety during the Japanese invasion. Filmed in 1958 as The Inn of the Sixth Happiness with Ingrid Bergman in the lead role.