Margarethe "Grethe" Cammermeyer (born Born in Oslo, Norway, March 24, 1942) is a former colonel in the Washington National Guard and a gay rights activist. Margarethe Cammermeyer family grew up in Oslo Norway while the country was under occupation of the Nazi army. Her parents sheltered resistance fighters and smuggled weapons to fight off the Nazis. She credits their actions with her wanting to fight for the freedom in the United States military.

In 1951, Margarethe Cammermeyer's family moved to Boston for her father's job. Margarethe was nine. She attended college in the U.S. for nursing and became a U.S. citizen in 1960. In 1961, she joined the U.S. Army's Student Nurse Program.


She met her partner, Diane Divelbess, in 1988, when she was 46 — after she had ended a 15-year marriage to a man and had four sons.

In 1989, in response to a question during a routine security clearance interview, she disclosed that she is a lesbian. The "don't ask, don't tell" policy was not yet in effect at the time, and the National Guard began military discharge proceedings against her. On June 11, 1992, she was honorably discharged from the military. Cammermeyer filed a lawsuit against the decision in civil court. In June 1994, Judge Thomas Zilly of the federal district court in Seattle ruled her discharge, and the ban on gays and lesbians serving in the military, unconstitutional. She returned to the National Guard and served as one of the few officially accepted openly gay or lesbian people in the military until her retirement in 1997.

In 1989 during a review for security clearance, when she was asked a question about homosexuality, Margarethe admitted she was a lesbian. Discharge proceeding began.
Margarethe's discharge hearing did not take place until 1992, prior to that she had been serving in the military as an open lesbian. She was honorably discharged, but filed a suit to challenge the decision. In 1994 a judge ruled that it was unconstitutional to ban gays and lesbians from serving in the military. Cammermeyer was reinstated. She retired in 1997 with full military privileges.

In June 2010, she was appointed to the Defense Advisory Committee on Women in the Services, a committee which is appointed by the United States Secretary of Defense and which reports to the United States Department of Defense.The Point Foundation announced that it will honor Cammermeyer with its Point Legend Award in April 2011.

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