Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 54, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 13 March 1918 — NO ADDRESSES TO BE GIVEN OF THOSE KILLED IN FRANCE [ARTICLE]

NO ADDRESSES TO BE GIVEN OF THOSE KILLED IN FRANCE

Home addresses of Americans who die in France or who are killed or wounded in action will continue to be withheld, as the war department intends to stand firm on its new ruling. Pointing out that the French published no casualty list at all, but merely notify the relatives, war department officials gave as the explanation of the new move that the enemy, by scanning the compete casualty list as they have been issued previously is enabled to piece out a fair idea of the identity of the troops confronting them. Although, under the new plan, relatives will be notified, and, officials expect publication of names of troops will find their way into the local newspapers, it is felt the publications will be scattered widely and that the task of assembling the names from all the newspapers of the country and consolidating them into military information would be of such a tremendous undertaking that, from the aspect of a spy system it would practically impossible. In promising to send quickly official notification to relatives, however, the war department is careful to warn the public that it must not identify men by their names alone, because there are many similarities of names in the army. Unless a man’s relatives have received official notification concerning him, the department says, they must assume that some other man of the same name is referred to.