SIDELIGHTS ON THE WAR

New Zealand Tablet, 24 June 1915, Page 15

SIDELIGHTS ON THE WAR

GENERAL. L , f Canon Hanuay (‘George A. Bermingham’), County Mayo, who has just returned from a tour in the U.S.A., in discussing in a London journal the question of American neutrality, says that English apologists, writers, etc., have seldom been able to shake themselves free of a feeling that America is still in some sense an English colony. He says that 80 out of every 100 of the people are in favor of the Allies.

GERMAN METHODS. M. Rene Bazin, the eminent Academician, whose recent visit to Rome has, it is believed, contributed to make his country-better known in Italian ecclesiastical, circles, relates the. following episode of the German atrocities in Belgium (writes a Paris correspondent). Among the towns that were most cruelly treated by the invaders was the little city of Termonde ; it was shelled nine times, three-quarters of its houses were burnt, and out of its nine thousand inhabitants only two thousand remain. For centuries there existed at Termonde a local community of nuns, founded in medieval times, in whose old-world convent a number of poor and infirm old people were cared for till death released them. - Through years of peace and years of war the nuns continued their mission of charity ; it was rudely interrupted by the German invaders in the autumn of 1914, when a German commander summoned the Superioress to leave the house on the spot. 1 I have orders to burn it,’ he added. ‘ I cannot leave my old peopled 'Take them with you.’ ‘Some are bed-ridden and cannot walk.’ ‘Do as you, like, but I am going to burn the house.’ At last it was settled that the nuns should take away the old people who could walk, and that the others should be removed to a place of safety by the soldiers. As she was about to cross the threshold of her convent, the Superioress was stopped by a young Sister. ‘ Mother,’ she said, ‘ our chaplain was dragged away before he had time to remove the Blessed Sacrament : do you think I .might bring It away to save It from profanation ?’ The Superioress bowed her assent, and the young nun ran to the chapel. Half an hour later the convent was in flames. The charitable bequests of generations were thus deliberately and ruthlessly destroyed. Along the road from Termonde to Ghent a strange procession made its way : old men and women, tottering, blind, paralyzed, were carefully led along the dusty and crowded highway by gentle-faced Sisters. Only one young nun walked quite alone and apart, her hands crossed upon her breast; from her sweet countenance radiated happiness. A German officer, a Catholic evidently, stood by the roadside when the little procession passed : he looked curiously at the solitary figure, moving in an atmosphere of holy peace ; then he understood and saluted with his sword !

‘I NEVER HOPE TO SEE A BRAVER ACTION.’ The story of how a Catholic soldier one of three brothers who joined the Army after the outbreak of warmet his death in a heroic act, is told in a letter written by the Commanding Officer to the soldier’s parents. Of Private. Francis Alexander Wood, of the Ist Royal Bucks, the officer says : - t|.; Alt may help to soften your grief if I tell you that he died in the performance of an act of very great

gallantry,- which had he lived would : have earned him great distinction. My company, to which your son belonged, had orders to assault a German trench on the afternoon of March 10 if a gap sufficiently wide could be found in the- barbed wire protecting it. : Just before the time for the assault, while our guns were heavily bombarding the German trench, I sent out two men, of whom your son was one, a: little way in advance so as to gain a clearer view and to find out whether there was a gap in the wire or no. Your boy, to make assurance doubly sure, advanced alone right up to the German trench, looked well round the wire, and then came back with his report. On his way back he was shot twice, but managed to report to his friend that there was no sign of a gap in the German wire and that the trench was full of Germans. His friend returned safely to me with the news, which was of such importance that the assault was countermanded, and the lives of many men were thereby saved, as in those circumstances the assault could not, possibly have succeeded. Your boy was brought in at dusk, but died that night. I shall never hope to see a braver action, and I thank you, as his mother, from the bottom of my heart for the sacrifice, whilst I pray that the memory of his very gallant death may prove In be some slight consolation to you in your great sorrow.’

A SOLDIER STORY OF AN UNDAMAGED CRUCIFIX. A soldier in the Queen’s Westminsters writes to the Universe from France:—* I have read with interest various letters with reference to the way sacred images have escaped from damage, and feel I should like to write and tell you what I have myself seen. We are billeted in the remnants of a large factory in Northern France—the name of the town, I am, of course, forbidden to mention—and one part of the factory has been reduced to ruins by artillery fire. As 1 wandered round the ruins, I noticed hanging on the small part of the wall remaining a wooden case containing a statue of St. Roch surmounted by a Crucifix. The whole was of a fragile nature, but remained completely intact, despite the fact that the whole of the roof and the wall on both sides were completely battered in. I was very pleased to see a case of this sort for myself, for, being but an infant in our Holy Faith, I was inclined to doubt what I had read in the paper, but needless to state I do not now.’

BRITISH SOLDIER’S KNAPSACK. A British ‘Tommy’s’ knapsack— invariably refers to it as his ‘ pack,’ by the waycontains a larger assortment of things than most people, judging by its size and general appearance, are apt to imagine. It is his suit-case, wardrobe, and many other things combined. Besides a complete change of underclothing, including a couple of pairs of socks and a pair of * ammunition ’ boots, there is stowed therein a reserve pair of trousers, brushes, and a tin of blacking, a brass button-stick and brush for polishing his tunic buttons, and a hold-all containing, amongst other things, a knife, fork, spoon, razor, shaving-brush, and comb. There is also a spare towel and a cake of soap, a Bible and prayer-book, and his pocket ledgerknown to ‘Tommy’ as his ‘ small book—in which are entered up his pay and allowances, war services, decorations, wounds, etc. Herein also he stows away his emergency ration; and a broad flannel bandage or belt, to be worn next the skin in cold, wet weather, and which is dubbed by him a * cholera belt.’

MEN FROM A CATHOLIC PARISH. The Rev. Michael Maher, S.J., M.A., Lit.D., preaching in the Sacred Heart Church, Lauriston, Edinburgh, on the occasion of the 'Royal Scot' Sunday, stated that out of a parish of 4000, 400 men were engaged in the service of their country. That, he thought, was a very large percentage of the Sacred Heart congregation. Their parish had made great sacrifices. They- one and all recognised that the great war in .which

they Avere engaged, the greatest the * world s had e*er known, was.a noble war pursued in a just cause. 'Those men had gone forth to defend the .fidelity of sacred Treaties, to defend the liberty of small nations that had been assailed. They had "gone forth in a cause which would appeal to the noblest feelings within the heart. In addition they had gone forth to defend their homes. The enemy opposed to them was determined that if they landed on these shores they would deal with this country as they dealt with the ruined vilages and towns in Belgium and Poland; These young men had gone forth in a war of liberty and right; the grandest cause for which any man could give his life. Uy

THE BENEDICTINES AND THE FORCES. Dom Laurence Mann, 0.5.8., who has received his commission as chaplain to the Second Battle Squadron in the North Sea, is the third member of the Benedictine Community at Fort Augustus to receive a similar appointment (says the . Glasgow Observer). Dom., Adrian Weld Blundell, who was attached during the winter to the First Battle Cruiser Squadron, is now on the East Mediterranean Fleet and Dom Odo Blundell has since the outbreak of war held the chaplaincy to the First Battle Squadron, and is at present on IT.M.S. Colossus, which is commanded by a well-known Catholic officer, Captain the Hon. Edward Fitzherbert, R.N. The Abbot of Fort Augustus also supplies a weekly chaplain for the Catholic forces at Invergorden and Nigg, in the district of which his brother, Major-General Hunter-Blair, R.N., is in command. Another member of the Community, Dom John Lane Cox, has been acting for some months as chaplain to one of the London Territorial divisions, and is now serving with them at the front in France.

EXILES IN SWITZERLAND. The sight of these unfortunate people, who were generously assisted by the Swiss, has done much to make the latter more sympathetic to the cause of the Allies. They were horrified at this example of German methods. A Swiss lady, who personally assisted the civilians imprisoned since the month of August, tells me (writes a Paris correspondent) that the sights she saw baffle description. . These prisoners were old men, women, and little children. At the beginning of the war they were forcibly removed from their villages in Lorraine, and they arrived in Switzerland wearing the summer clothes they had on when they, were carried off. No German Red Cross or charitable society of any kind proffered the slightest assistance to these helpless civilians during their six months’ captivity. Women gave birth to children, alone and uncared for two ladies from the neighborhood of Soissons had not changed their linen since August; they were allowed neither to carry away a change of clothes nor to buy any in Germany. ' In no other country would these unoffending people, old and helpless, whose only crime was their nationality, have been treated with such deliberate cruelty. The old men, my friend added, had a scared, dazed look ; if spoken to kindly, they burst into tears. Some of the women seemed ‘off their heads, and all were miserably thin and pale. Only after some days were they able to give an account of all they had undergone. At first they seemed afraid to speak, and it needed a certain time to make them realise that they were among friends, out of the enemy reach.

CATHOLIC OFFICERS UNDER ARREST. The following Catholics are among the officers placed under arrest by the Germans by way of reprisal for the treatment of German submarine crews iu England; —(1) Lieutenant T. F. O’Malley, Royal Munster Fusiliers, son of the late Middleton Moore O’Malley, J.P., Ross Ho, Westport, County Mayo. He was educated at St. George’s College, Weybridge, Stonyhnrst, and Sandhurst, whence he joined the Munsters in 1905. He was taken prisoner last August. (2) Lieutenant J. C. Rogerson, 18th Hussars, son of Mr. and Mrs. Rogersoxx, Mount Oswald, Durham. He was educated at Eton

and Sandhurst. joined the 18th .Hussars in’ January, 1914, ’' and was 5 taken prisoner in October ’- last. (3) Captain Henry Jump, Ist Royal Dragoons, son of the late Henry Jump, K.S.G., J.P. - He was educated at ; Stony hurst, promoted Captain in 1914, and wounded and : taken prisoner in November last. (4) Lieutenant Edward Bernard Trafford, Scots Guards, son of the late Edward Southwell Trafford, and the Hon. Eleanor Mary, daughter of the 12th Lord' Petr©, of Wroxham Hall, Norwich. He was taken prisoner in November last. ‘ , ...- ' ’