HELP THE CHILDREN

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 4, Issue 153, 10 September 1941, Page 4

HELP THE CHILDREN

Sir, —This letter comes to yon from the heart of London. Whatever your own difficulties at the moment —and I know they must be many—• [ want you please to spare just a few minutes to read about a tragedy that has befallen the greatest hospital for Sick Children in the world. You maj' have read in the papers that a Children's tral London has been bombed. That hospital was the hospital for Sick Children at Great Orinoind Street. For years men and women have toiled devotedly and unceasingly tci rebuild this famous Children's Host pital. The greater part of a beauti* ful modern building had been corn* pleted at a cost of over £350,000. Then, in the night, came the bombs* Doctors and Nurses and the Hospi* t'al staff fought a fire the flames of which roared into the air. They battled through' the roaring floods shoulder deep from the burst water mains. Every baby i.n the hospital was saved. By a miracle not a sing]o litle life was lost. The Wreckage remains—and amid that wreckage the hospital that has nev--2r closed its doors since the day it was first opened in 1852, carries on.

I am sending you with this letter a little of the rubble that was once part of the magnificent building thatvHitler has bombed. I ara sending, too, a few photographs that will give you some idea of this: act of wanton destruction against innc-

cent little children. On behalf of the children who have been so outrageously wronged—cm behalf, too, of those wonderful men and women of the hospital staff, through flame and flood and fury carried their little charges to safety—l appeal to fou for help. In your position I know only too well that you have many appeals that may seem to make a more immediate claim upon you. Far be it from me to ask for your help at the expense of any local -charity—but [ do ask you to look upon this "-very urgent appeal as something quite apart. For children—sick and suffering children—are in a special sense the responsibility of every one of as. They are, too, the coming generation—the men and women of the future to whom, when victory comes, we must look to build a better and safer world. When I tell you that hospital is £375,000 on the wrong side and that war ov no war this debt must be paid off, you will appreciate the tremendously difficult task with which I am faced. The work of the hospital for sick children is worldwide—our tiny patients come to it frr-Ti every corner of the Empire ind the doctors and nurses who are trained here gc forth on their missions of healing all over our own country and to countries beyond the seas. Many of the little ones who come to us are the children of those grand men who are fighting to defend our Empire and our liberty. To help now is to earn their undying gratitude. Your assistance now will give us the assurance that one day—and may that day come soon —the Angel of Mercy shall once flgain beckon little children where the destroying angel has just been. Please do this for us—your kftiditess in this dark hour will never be forgotten,. Yours etc., SOUTH WOOD. (In response to this appeal from Lord Southwood the Beacon will Le pleased to receive, donations in connection with the above which will 1 be acknowledged and forwarded on for the purpose of restoring the famous child hospital. Ed.)