MERCY SHIPS

Evening Post, Volume CXXX, Issue 84, 5 October 1940, Page 17

MERCY SHIPS

AMERICAN WOMEN

ORGANISED

HELP FOR CHILDREN IN

DANGER

The American Women's Committee for Mercy Ships for European Children called fifty volunteer workers to its headquarters in the Murray Hill Hotel recently to mail out petition forms to every State in the Union, in preparation for the introduction in the Senate of the Hennings Enabling Bill which was passed by the House recently, states the "New York Times." The Bill would permit United States ships to go to Great Britain for refugee children. Senator Carter Glass, of Virginia, was to sponsor it in the Senate.

Mrs. Augusta Richard, Mrs. Harold T. Pulsifer, and Mrs. John Sise, officers of the Women's Committee, remained in Washington next day to urge Senators to support the Bill, while Mrs. Marian Sanders and Mrs. Raymond Gram Swing returned to direct efforts at the New York headquarters.

"We spoke to as many Senators as we could and not one of them was opposed to this amendment," said Mrs. Sanders. "However, we must not take chances. We want every one who approves saving innocent children from the terrors of war to get behind us and give us their support." Mrs. Swing said she had encountered considerable misunderstanding about the purpose of the legislation. MISTAKEN IMPRESSION. "Many people, including some of the Senators, were under the impression that the Women's Mercy Ships Committee is interested only in rescuing British children," Mrs. Swing said. "That is distinctly not the case. We want American ships to rescue children who are in danger, without regard for race, creed, or nationality. • We want these ships to go to ports in the war zones in which they are assured of safety. We want to do a rescue job which is no less important than the work of the Red Cross or any other humanitarian agency."

Meanwhile an appeal from a mother hi Yorkshire, England, to hurry the evacuation of British children before it was too late came in a letter to Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt, forwarded to the United States Committee for the Care of European Children, of which she is honorary president. AN ENGLISH MOTHER'S LETTER. "Hearing your name mentioned on the wireless in connection with the refugees, I feel I must write and ask you to hurry and get the children on their way as soon as possible," the letter said. "We are willing to stand any suffering, bombing, starvation, anything so long as our children are safe. "You, yourself, being a mother, will know how hard it is for us to part from our children—like taking our hearts from out of our body. "As night falls we pray to God to" keep them safe until another day dawns. Each night .we put our few personal belongings together in bags with enough food to last for two days to take with us into shelter, which in our case, means the cellar. "But we can stick this, we will live in cellars before giving in so long as our children are out of the way, because we mean to win this war for justice and freedom for all.

"To all American mothers who take our children in at this terrible time I want to say, 'Thank you, and may God bless you.'"