Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 306, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 December 1914 — WHISPERING THROUGH the AIR of the ENEMY [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

WHISPERING THROUGH the AIR of the ENEMY

HE war correspondents of 1898 I wrote columns of matter about the S heroes of Santiago who climbed on / ■ y the embankments in front of the k ) fighting men and wigwagged sig- | i nals to the fleet on the other side \ of the enemy. Wigwag went the flags by day spelling out orders and informaC/S \ tion, and wigwag went the lanterns by night spelling out more information and orders. In fact, wigwagging was about the only method of communication with the friends on the other side of the enemy. Homing pigeons have been used from time immemorial, and they also were used at Santiago. Today a different condition exists. As the Germans were sweeping down on Paris the operator In Eiffel tower whispered through the very air the Germans were breathing to convey information to St Petersburg or Petrograd. The swish of the wireless was unstoppable. The Spaniards shot down the American signal men on the embankments in front of Santiago, but the rifle bullets from the Germans could not interfere with the wireless message as it went on its way. One of the most wonderful developments of the ■wireless telegraphy came at the opening of the Euiropean war when it became possible to talk all jthe way from Berlin to Long island. Germany talked across the British fleet to her own ships •wfling the Atlantic and warned them of the sudden tremor. The only way to stop the wireless was to destroy the operator and he was thousands of miles away. In our last war wires were stretched all over the fields back of the fighting men. Dispatchers carried word from colonel to general where there had not been time to string the wires. * In this war wires, too, have been stretched on the fields, pigeons still have carried messages, dispatchers have galloped back and forth, but in addition to all these messengers of war the fighters all depended more on the invention of Marconi, the great wireless telegraph. The wireless telegraph has proved its value .Tight on the field of battle. The man in the front ranks, or the outpost miles from the headquarters, could place himself in instant communication with his Chief. The wireless telegraph made it possible for a German soldier fighting his way through Belgium to talk to a German soldier defending Alsace It made it possible for a soldier at Brussels to shout news of victory back to Berlin without an instant’s delay. It made it possible for the French and British to keep in communication with each other and map out a new line of defense when the Germans were hurling their mighty hosts against them. Marconi had already made himself famous before the war broke out His invention was one of the greatest boons to humanity because it saved lives aboard ship in time of sea horror. It brought rescue to the distressed and expedited shipping. From an instrument of humanity and peace it sprang to an instrument of war and terror. Jjfce the pigeon or dove, the personification of peace, it became an instrument of war. Perhaps next to the wireless stations, the most efficient messengers of war are the homing pigeons. These birds, the wisest of their kind, are employed to great advantage In English, French, German, Austrian, Italian, Russian and Japanese armies. Military authorities hold there is no betiter means for small detachments to communicate with their headquarters nor could they want better. '' On the fields of Europe the flights of the birds are* in most instances so short that they do not have to stop for a rest, thud preventing the messages from falling into the hands of the enemy. A pigeon in its flight soars so high it is almost Invisible to the naked eye, thus it necessitates the use of high power guns to bring it to the ground. And any man who ever makes such a shot can well call it a miracle. The king of England and the emperor of Germany, as well as other rulers of European nations, jtmve their own flying kits, and in time of peace (they enter their birds in races with birds belonging to their subjects. The crowned heads deem this royal sport A bird equipped for flying with a message is encased in a bottlelike tube, the shape of its MrA spy puts his message in his pocket, proceeds bn hie mission, quickly writes his discoveries on pmali bits of paper and places them in a tube-

bound tight to the bird’s legs. Releasing the bird, his message is started to its destination with a speed that only wireless or telegraph can rival. Messages can be fastened to birds in various ways, around the tail feathers, under a wing, about the leg or secretly marked by plucking a certain feather, the painting of certain feathers and manv

other equally ingenious contrivances. Messages are often reproduced by photography upon films reduced to the smallest possible size which the birds carry and which weigh the mere fraction of an ounce. ” . • ' Recently there appeared an account of the capture of a German spy. He was riding on a train in Belgium. The spy noticed that he was under surveillance and hurriedly wrote the information he had in his possession and released his winged messenger from -the window of the train. The spy was captured, but the message could not be stopped. These messengers of war sometimes are called carrier pigeohs. They are not Carrier pigeons lack the instinct that enables the homers to return to their cote. Carrier pigeons are only, for the purpose of display at pet stock shows. Many nations have established pigeon posts, where birds are trained to fly from one city to another, or from one island to another. They are much faster than train or steamboats and a message is much safer in their care. They are numbered today as one of the fnost: deadly messengers of war. . The first news of the siege of Ladysmith, during the Boer war, was carried by homing pigeons. The pigeons used at Ladysmith were taken from

the lofts at Durban »nd Pietermaritzburg and In view of the great service which they performed it is of more than passing notice. The dumb mes- . sengers were used in the signal service of this country during the war with Spain. In the French army are more than three hundred thousand trained pigeons and more than six hundred thousand in the postal service which can be utilized in time of war. Germany has more than two hundred and fifty thousand well trained fliers and it, too, has its pigeon posts that can be utilized by the government. During the Russo-Japanqse war an automatic camera was fastened about the breast of a pigeon and accurately timed to make photographs in the air. When a homer is released, it rises rapidly into the air, flying in large circles, apparently getting its bearings. After rising several hundred feet it will circle to a point directly above the, place whence it was released, then dart in a straight line toward its home, bearing the important documents to its government A pigeon cannot be

trained to fly to any point hut it can be trained to be taken hundreds of miles from Its home, released on battlefields and return to its original home with great haste. •The pigeons were almost displaced by the invention of wireless telegraphy, but a bird can be carried easily where a wireless outfit would prove too bulky and could never be taken. A spy can release a pigeon in the face of the enemy when

he could not dare to try wireless, with little risk to the bird. The messengers are truly birds of war, not peace.