FOREIGN LEGION

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVII, 26 November 1927, Page 15

FOREIGN LEGION

“HELL,” SAYS DESERTER. London, October 22. All the glamour of being a member of the French Legion evaporates as soon as the recruit reaches North Africa, according to Frank Waterhouse, an Englishman, who deserted from the legion and escaped hack to England. His life in the legion he described as “a year in Hell.” “The pay,” he continued, “amounted to a little over a shilling a month. The heat was terrific, and the food far from appetising, though, to be fair, I must say there was plenty of it.’’ Waterhouse said that one stage of his career in the legion he was quartered with eighteen men. only two of whom spoke the same language. “Probably the thing that struck me most,” he said, “was the number of men I met in the legion who had at one time held influential positions in the world. One of the men. a Prince do Georges, said that at one time he was a ruler of Georgia and a courier to the late Czar. He said that he had been worth nearly 75,000,000 dollars before he had been driven out of Russia by the Bolsheviks.” Waterhouse joined the legion following the loss of 2500 dollars on the gambling tables at Monte Carlo. This, he said, left him' penniless, and he joined the legion as the only other alternative to starving. About a year after entering the legion Waterhouse won some money at cards, borrowed some additional francs, and used the total to bribe a native io hide him in a curt, which took him to Rusa. I’i’oiii tiKii'i' In* miiiinjied to jret to A’ ■ lie —I his pa 5.,.,„ , to LoHtlOil.