Evening Republican, Volume 19, Number 73, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 March 1915 — Plain Wagon Hero’s Hearse [ARTICLE]

Plain Wagon Hero’s Hearse

Epernay, France.—There hare been many military funerals in France since the beginning of the war, but none other so impresive as one witnessed here. It was about 8 o’clock and the air was cold and foggy. Passing near the railroad station, the correspondent met a procession of slow stepping soldiers, with guns inclined toward the gound, while back of them wore a number of men and women dressed in mourning. Some were weeping. They were accompanied by a plain grocery wagon, the sides of which were covered with large yellow advertisements, and in which the corpse of a French officer was going to its last resting'place. The touch of the grotesque made death more sinister. Upon inquiry the correspondent learned that during the war persons meeting a body at the station to convey it to the teem cemetery not? obliged to employ the communal hearse, which is somewhat expensive, but may use any conveyance they cbofcse. Many families in France are now obliged to economize in such sad ways. The Massachusetts forestry association offers as a prise the planting of fifty acres of white pine to the town which gains first place in a contest tor **s forests.