AIRMEN ATTACK WOMEN.

Taranaki Daily News, 28 September 1918, Page 3

AIRMEN ATTACK WOMEN.

TWELVE "W.A.A.C.S" KILLED IN FRANCE. BRUTAL AND DELIBERATE ATTACK. In a military hospital in the middle of London is a ward full of wounded soldier-girls, fresh home from France—-bright-faced cheery Waacs, who have lost none of the womanly characteristics, while they have been proving their heroism in the land where big deeds are done. "We were, of course, far behind the lines when we were damaged," said one of them, a red-haired girl, with a shrapnel wound in her side. "We all got our wounds at the same time in an air raid just a week ago; we were together in a town which for three weeks was raided night after night by enemy aeroplanes for some reason, possibly because Fritz knew it was a rest camp. Anyhow, they never let us alone, if there was the least bit of moonlight, and the alarm used to be given us by means of a whistle every night at about ten o'clock. Then we collected our mattresses and blankets and marched out of the town about a mile away, where our trenches were dug specially to'give us protection in these times.

'•'When the raids first began to take place we used to go to some woods out aide the town, but the Huns seemed to see us every time against the chalky ground as we went up, and would come down over the trees and fire their machine guns through after dropping their bombs. For nine days I never had my clothes off at all. Last Wednesday the warning came as \isual at ten o'clock, and we trooped down to the trendies laden with blankets and mattresses, and then we heard the aeroplanes buzzing in the distance and the bombs dropping. They seemed to fall so thickly that we believed the aeroplanes would' discharge all their cargo before they passed over the town, but the noise got nearer and nearer, and we heard the bombs raining on the town, and then the machines came overhead, about a dozen I should say, and we saw them faintly in the moonlight against the sky as we crouched down. "A bomb fell on the edge of the trench, and only one girl I have ever seen unnerved in these raids ran along to me crying like a little child and flung her arms around my neck. There didn't seem to be anything to do for her, so I simply held her while the 'planes came on, and then one of the machine's-, had trouble with its engines and came down within 20 feet of the ground, saw us, and released a bomb. It fell on the edge of the trench, dropping on to a loaded petrol lorry. The lorry blazed up and revealed us all to the Huns, who then showered down bombs. I think about ten girls were killed. I felt a piece of shrapnel in my side, but didn't say anything for fear of frightning the girl who was with me still more, nut she found her arm' covered with blood, and instantly she seemed to lose all fear and did what she could, while I got a little faint. "Then bombs fitted with some kind of gas fell. The 'planes disappeared after releasing all their cargo en us, and the unwounded girls were trying to help those who were hurt when the nurses and ambulances arrived. Soldiers from the camp rushed up, and swore that when they were back in the line the Huns should pay for bombing women. I was not really badly wounded, and was sitting on top of the trench, the last one, waiting for an ambulance to come along. "A Tommy wandered along and said, "Don't you know they are having rollcall? Gool lord! are you wounded?" and lie bound up my arm which we both thought was injured. He fetched his officer, who had me carried to the Waac's hospital, to save time waiting for the ambulance, and the next night we heard the raid from the underground hospital in the town. "When we left for England, French children crowded round us, anx'iously inquiring if we were very much hurt, and smiling at us —just like mothers smiling at us. The nurses were wonderful to us—just like mothers, and we can't say how much we think of them. Of course an air raid is bad, but don't we have them in England? And anyway, it's a pity you can't stand a little for your country when the boys have done so much. I have come back from France with a deeper appreciation than | ever before of the splendidness of men and women."