TRAGIC FRANCE

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 3, Issue 7, 2 September 1940, Page 7

TRAGIC FRANCE

PARISIANS SLEEP IN THE WOODS Eric Slatter, of the Continental Daily Mail staff, who reached England l'rom Bordeaux in July, tells of the tragic plight of the refugees there. Parisian women who have lived all their lives in luxury are now sleeping on benches in the parks of Bordeaux, eating canned food from the tin and drinking straight from the wine bottle. One of the most famous Paris dressmakers is now sleeping on the hay in a barn near Biarritz. T saw one of the most noted playwrights in France queuing up to get a slice of bread and butter from a free food distribution centre. These are typical examples of the misery and chaos prevailing to-/dlay in thai corner of France around Bordeaux. Fifteen million people— mostly mothers, children, and old folk-r-are crammed into the territory which normally supports a popu latum of 5,000,000. For ten days I have lived in the midst of this tidal wave of human misery as it swept down toward Bor deaux. I talked to hundreds of the refugees. Hundreds of mothers among them, with their children, are now camping amid the vines and sharing what little bread they can obtain. Meat is beyond the purses of most of the xefugees, who had to content themselves with sausages and rice. Outside the city refugees in their millions arc encamped in the woods, the vineyards, and by the roadlsides. How long it will be before they see their homes again nobody knows. Thousands say they will refuse to £?o back into German-occupied territory. Thousands more will go back northwards to find their homes in ruins.