THE Y.M.C.A. AND CANTEENS

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3012, 24 February 1917, Page 10

THE Y.M.C.A. AND CANTEENS

Sir.—l am sorry Mr. C. B. Smith would qualify his first admirable letter explanatory of what the Y.M.O.A. was actually doing at the front for the sons and husbands o.f loving parents and wivos in Now Zealand.

I;i his first letter he stated that "at the request" of the British Govornment the Y.M.O.A. are running canteens at very many .of the fighting centres," in. France. I know this was correct from public and private information-; and Mr. C. It. Smith confirmed' it by quoting an official statement, which 'also appeared in tho London "Times" last year. The British Primo Minister also decided that the Y.M.O.A , in conducting army canteens, should not pay tho rebate to regimental funds as paid by tho ordinary canteen contractor. Why? Because, the Y.M.O.A. has undertaken to submit its canteen accounts to "tho official auditors of tho War Office andl undertaken to pay thp, surpluses cr

I profits to any fund for the benefit of soldiers as the War Office may direct. Now, the army canteens, taken over and being run, as Mr. O. B. Smith says, under the direction and control of the Y.M.C.A., are all wet canteens,, .where, as he put it in his first letter, "every possible comfort" is supplied, and that includes, to ro^' knowledge, beer, wine, mm, and whisky. And why should it not? Sir George Cave, now Homo Secretary in the Imperial Cabinet, a strong advocate of temperance and licensing reform, in replying to suggestions regarding prohibition in the Houso of Commons, said "they could not convince soldiers shivering in .the trenches that the best/ thing to drink was a glass of water." Why .should Mr. C. R. Smith now want to' challenge the statement that tho British army canteens, when taken over and run by the Y.M.C.A., supply every .possible comfort? The only other matter I desire to refer to is the incident 'connected with the late Lieut. H. M. Butterworth, than whom there was no truer Chris--1 tian among officers at the front. It was in the Y.M.C.A.'s Advertisement ■ and its special appeal for funds that i uso of the incident was made. Yet Mr. : . 0. R. Smith says an incident in the life of this good! and Christian soldier, who gave his life for his country's ■ cause, had nothing to do with the Y.M.C.A. Why then did it nse that i incident to solicit funds if it did not ■ wish the community to believe —as I ' believed —that it wa* supplying "every i possible comfort" to our soldiers? i Will'.Mr. Smith say that it w not at ' a Y.M.C.A. canteen run by it in con- > forniity with British army regulations that tho late Lient.Butterworth break- ; fasted on egg, bread, and neat whisky? i . Apart from all this, I want to say i that from correspondence I . have ; from the front, I know that tho i Y.M.O.A. is doing a magnificent work ■ among our soldier boys, and there is : no need for the officials in "New ZeaI' land to bo ashamed of the | fact that ' "every possible comfort," in'its widest i sense, is being supplied by pi agency i through army canteens. Under the i rigours of a dreadful and unaccustomed i winter on the Western front the rum • ration in tho trenches ha 6 saved the ' lives of thousands of our.men., and < the-saving of life in these times is the ' highest form of Christianity.—l air. ; A Y.M.C.