A HERO SPY

Gisborne Times, Volume XLV, Issue 3976, 8 July 1915, Page 3

A HERO SPY

WHAT AX ALSATIAN DID

An extraordinary story of an Alsatian who crossed the frontier at the beginning of the war to enlist in the French army is vouched i'or hv an officer in the French Medical Corps stationed at Billy-sur-Aisne. The Alsatian served four years with the Uhlans, and his mother received a pension from the German Government, conditionally on the younger son also engaging himself for four years in the German army. On the day the decree mobilising the army was published, the Alsatian said good-bye to his wife and returned to Franco. Since then his courage has won for him the Legion of Honor, a decoration lie received on the battlefield.

The officer commanding his company discovered that fie was a crack shot, and made him a sharpshooter. One day his rifle broke, and he crawled out and took a German rifle and ammunition from a dead soldier and cbnti.nuoif picking off the enemy until lie was relieved.

On one occasion lie approached too near the German lines, and was challenged by a sentry. He replied m German, saying he was a Uhlan officer •‘on special duty in disguise,” anti asking the soldier how many of the enemy were in the neighborhood and the. names of the officers.

He'crowned his audacity by declaring that he was in danger, and vas compelled 1 to hide himself for three ot -four hours, The sentry, at his request, took him to an inn where the officers were staying, and they welcom ed him .as a “daring spy”—-which he was, hut not in the sense they imagined. Many bottles of wine were emptied in drinking success to the German arms, and the only man who kept Ins head was the Alsatian, who in the end found himself involved in a fight with the officers, and shot them all. He returned to his own officer, tofu him what he had done, and by thaid of the details lie was able to give them the From h captured the German position- the same evening. [To received the Cross of the .Legion of Honor two months ago, and a commission as second lieutenant, arid h»s since been made adjutant.