THE WORTH OF THE IRON CROSS

Taihape Daily Times, 22 December 1917, Page 5

THE WORTH OF THE IRON CROSS

Some of the entries in diaries found on captured German soldiers are immensely entertaining. A man of the 4th Guard Division burns with wrath when, he tells of the distributions of Iron Crosses, a certain number of which come periodically to each regiment. “All that is necessary,” says the diarist naively, “is that the sergeantmajor should be well disposed towards you.” He then goes on to tell how in a recent distribution among the recipients were the battalion cook and the battalion carpenter, “who makes the cases for the officers, which they send homo filled,” the battalion clerk, who has never been near the trenches, any more than the cook and the carpenter, and finally, “the company gardener, because he grows such good lettuces.”