Page 6 Advertisements Column 2

Taihape Daily Times, 3 January 1918, Page 6

teutons place girls in war ZONE. According to an authoritative report thalt has reached Washington from an American official with the British Army now operating on the war-front in Belgium, Belgian women and girls are being compelled to build concrete dug-outs under artillery fire. This statement was made in the diary of a German soldier who was recently captured. He belonged to a landwehr division, and was personally in charge of a large number of these unfortunate Belgians, who were daily herded together and taken to a zone near the German lines 'to perform- manual labour of the hardest kind in constant danger of death. The soldier’s diary tells the story as follows: “I am going to give another instance of the efficiency of the German authorities. Since the 18th inst. fifty women and young girls have been working at concerte dug-outs at Leke As Leke is in the zone of fire and was shelled no later than yesterday, this is another case in which we cannot understand the action of the authorities. If this isn’t taken by way of reprisal, then it is a shameful deed on the part of Germany, which cannot be surpassed in imagination even. The civil population of Leke evacuated t-hree or four weeks ago, and now women and children are compelled to work at the concrete dug-outs of the village. I am sure of the facts that I state, for it is my duty ito take a gang of 47 women to Leke every morning and bring them back in the evening.”