Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 190, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 August 1918 — Heroic France Defies the Hun [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Heroic France Defies the Hun

Comtesse de Bryas is a Frenchwoman, who came to America last April to represent the American committee for devastated France, and is now engaged in an extensive tour of the United States, speaking about her experiences in the war-ridden districts. The cothtesse’s father is French, but her mother was ’■ a* Philadelphian who went to Europe when a small child and was brought up there. Her great-grandfathers, George Clymer and Thomas Willing and her granduncle, George Read, were all signers’of the Declaration of Independence, and one of them, George Clymer, was among the six who helped to frame th# Constitution.—Editor’s Note. By COMTESSE MADELEINE DE BRYAS. SOMETIMES meet, in the course of » my travels, people who say: “Ah, poor France! Tragic, invaded country!” But to these people I would J? say: “No, no I You do not know SR your France. It Is not poor France, but noble France. Not tragic xSteßfggy? France, but heroic France!” I can best explain my meaning by I describing an incident which took • 1 place on the occasion of one of the recent air raids on Paris. An air raid is a nerveracking time. The newspaper accounts and the magazine stories do not tell you one-hundredth of the anguish lived through by the people who crouch in their cellars, listing to bombs that explode close by and expecting all the titoe that the next missile will demolish the house over their heads. The favorite gathering places for civilians during air raids is in the cellars. During the raid of which I speak, one of these underground places was crowded with refugees. But they were not moping or trembling. Instead, they were constantly joking and laughing about their predicament. They did not for one second lose their fine courage and stanchness. When the bombs had ceased to fall, they came up to the street level once more. But they did not breathe great sighs of relief and thank their lucky stars for not being hit. Not the# 1 Their eyes glowed with the fire of unquenched spirit, and they shook their fists in the direction of the departing German airplanes. “Those fools!” they shouted. “Those fools! They" think they can break us ! They do not know us! Never shall we yield! Never!” This is not the only splendid exhibition of French devotion that I have seen with my own eyes. The people in the rural regions are no less determined in their ardor. Although nearly onefifth of France has been invaded by a ruthless enemy and some portions Invaded the second time, these country folk would die rather than give themselves up to the foe. • In n village of the devastated district I found a little old woman who was living alone. She was working at washing linen for the -soldiers who were in trenches not far away. Her own house had been burned down by the Germans. She told me her pathetic story. * It seems that a German' officer who had a very bad reputation for molesting the civilians had been quartered in her house. After he had been there for a few .fcpurs he went to the small stove which heated 4be house and opened it to put In some wood. But when he put in the stick of wood he allowed the end to protrude, so that, as soon as it began to burn, the fire blazed outward *Gto the room. He then placed a screen near this blazing wood so that it would catch fire. The old woman saw what he was doing and knew that it was his design to burn down her house. He had already burned a house in the next street to the same manner. Knowing that she was powerless to prevent him, and being filled with despair, she fell on her knees before him. “Spare me!” she entreated of him. “Spare this house and allow me to live here In peace. What have I ever done to you!” But she had hardly uttered these words when shame overcame her because she was abasing herself before a German. In another Instant she had risen to her feet “What am I doing!” she exclaimed. “Je suls perdu! lam disgraced. I have entreated a favor from the foe of my native country.” Then she crossed the room before the astonished officer and took up his gun. Placing it in his hands she told him to kill her. “I deserve no less than death,” she said. “I have disgraced France by kneeling to ask a favor of one of her enemies.* Probably the German officer would have killed the woman, but at that moment one of his brother Officers came into the house. He must have had a more tender heart for he took pity on the old woman and put a stop to the proceedings. So her

house escaped for the time being. But later on it was burned by other Germans. When I found this woman she was working 18 hours each day , washing for the soldiers. I asked her why she worked so hafd, and she told me that it was because she had nothing left to her in the wide world, and the only way to keep herself from heartbreak was to. be always occupied. The conditions under which most of these people have been living are horrifying. Their houses are heaps Of ruins. You can hardly believe the systematic way in which the Germans proceeded to destroy their dwellings. A bomb was thrown into every house along the line of march. The furniture was all broken up or burned, fruit trees were cut'down, and the wells polluted. Yet, when the invading tide was swept back these villagers came back at once ■to their former homes. This devotion of the French peasant to his little home is something which Americans can hardly appreciate. He loves it ardently; it is almost a part of hint; he cannot bear to leave it. During the time w’hen they were struggling to rebuild their shattered homes, these peasants had to live in cellars and dugouts. Of course these places were most unhealthy and not fit to remain in. I once ■ went down into a cellar in which an old couple was living. The roof of the cellar was so low that when I was seated op a little plank talking to the old people-1 had to stoop. The floor was entirely mud, and the water seeped in through the walls and trickled down in tiny streamlets. In the corner'was the straw bed which had been furnished the old couple seven months before. It was indescribably filthy and so damp that one could twist it and wring water out of it. Yet the chief desire of the old woman was for a plate to eat off. The Germans had destroyed their crockery and .. household utensils and they had only one old metal skillet, in which they cooked and from which they ate. > In one village I saw a mother who had gone back to live in a little shelter which she had built for herself in the corner formed by the only two remaining walls of her dwelling. Over the top of this place she placed planks. One Side was open to the weather. The cold, raw weather made it difficult to exist in such a place. I myself have lived in a little wooden building' near the front, similar to the barracks in which the soldiers live, and I know the cruel winter weather of these parts of France. The hardship has been greatest on the little children. Oh, the poor children! They no longer play. They have forgotten all their games. They do not know what it means to run and laugh and be gay. As they walk along the streets you will see them start suddenly and look over their shoulders in a frightened way. So great has been the terror instilled into them by the Germans. An officer told me of seeing two little children standing against a wall in the town of Maissln, in the north of France, one day in August, 1914. Across the road was a burning house. When the French officer asked them why . they were waiting so patiently, they replied that a German had shut their father and mother up’ In that house and had told them to wait there until they came back to fetch them.

The treatment of children during the German occupation was very terrible. Little tots of four and five, and children on up to the ages of thirteen and fourteen, were forced to work all day for their enslAvers. They were taken Into tne fields at five In the morning and were not allowed to come back until seven In the evening. During all that time they were given only ope meal Their tasks were to dig potatoes, cu away the barbed-wije entanglements and pickup finexploded shells. After the Germans went a «y. there was no milk to be got because all had been either killed, or driven away. In one district there were 500 children who existed tor . Shs without a single drop of milk. I met one little girl who had been kept for 20 days on a diet “X of notMng hot brood and .soup Jo latter being watery.and scarcely at all nourish The destruction of the schoolhouses has made It impossible for the young children to gain_ a y education. It is no, strange thing to encounter a boy or girl of eleven who can neither ™ad write. In their hideous thoroughness, the Ger mans destroyed books, pencils, desks and all. Not a thing was left. After the American relief work ers came into, the devastated regions they ( * fished schools and built little wooden buildings in which to carry on the work. At one school they told a story of a Uttg r girl who was brought* In with the other children to learn to read. As soon as she discovered old chair in one of the comers she got into it and curled up in utter enjoyment and relaxation. She could nbt be persuaded to get out of that chair. The teacher inquired why she was so pleased with the chair and learned that the household in which the child lived had not boasted a single chair since the first Invasion of the Germans. The separation of the children from their parents is another very tragic occurrence. In the months and years before they are reunited the children grow and change so that they ar recognizable to their, parents when they meet again. Some of them, .to be on a chain about i their necks little gold baptismal gifts on which their names are Inscribed. But this is exceptional; It Is one of the confessed schemes of the Germans- to divide and scatter families as much as possible. ' My heart bleeds for the children of France! Oh, that they should suffer this unmerited abuse and tribulation! The deportation of yotjng girls has been systematically practiced. A German officer comes to the front door of a house and orders the entire familv to assemble outside on the door step. Then he picks at random a number of the younger women of the family. ”1 will take you . . . and vou .I and you!” he says, indicating the chosen ones with his .forefinger. At. this summons they must leave their homes at once. T ey are not allowed to pack their belongings nor to carry much baggage. They are permitted only so much as they can carry wrapped in a handkerchief. i After they are takensjpto Germany they* are put to work cultivating the fields* doing the hardest and most menial kind of labor. They are forced to live with the soldiers, and are rudely treated by them. They can send no word to their families, and It Is almost as though they were d£R€*. The relief work in the Invaded districts has been tireless. Great credit is due to the American committee for devastated, France, organized by Miss Anne Morgan. Over 1,000 children have been turned over to this committee to be cared for. One of its .most useful works has been in . assisting the stricken people to leave their homes so long as there Is danger from the; Germans in theMdnlty. Pitiful stories are told of the flight of these people. One old woman refused to be separated from her goat in transit, and would only consent to go when she could be assured that another goat could be got in case her own was lost. France has been hard-tried, but she is not broken. Never has the- morale of the French people been more Unshaken ■< than it is . today. France halls with joy the arrival of the Americans. It is most fitting that these great sister republics should'be fighting side by side in this hour of stress. Victory will be won; it is inevitable! But ah. the pain, the woe and the un- . necessary degradation that have followed in the wake of the invaders! Will the world ever forget these?. Can the bitter - memory ever be effaced? . , I