The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1872-02-10 00:00:00

THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS AND
THE LATE WAR.

We (Pali Mall Gazette have received from a correspondent,
not a member of the Society of Friends, but intimately
sesociated with their good deeds in France at the close of the
war a long account of their philanthropic exertions, from
which we have only room for the following extract

'1 he War Victims' Fund Committee commenced
their operations immediately after the capitulation of
Metz, amid the famine and pestilence, desolation and
death, that reigned within and far around the city.
Allen, Thionville, Brisy, Belfort, Montbeliard, and
their environs, with all the intervening places that had
suffered -in fact the whole line of country from
the frontier of Luxembourg to that of Switzerland
be, arne at the same time the scene of their
efforts. Many suffered from the prevalent diseases,
and one of their number is now resting there
interred far from her home and kindred. The coin-
niittee succeeded in cultivating and seeding in an in-
credibly ehort space of time all that region by means
of a Fowler's steam apparatus, conveyed from England
amid immense difficulties, and by a system of manual
labour organized with the view of giving to the poor a
means of earning their bread, instead of sustaining
them in idleness. Thus what seemed to many an in-
superable difficulty—the absence of all ordinary means
of labouring the soil—was overcome through the enter-
prise of the committee, a great good accomplished at
the desired moment, and a future benefit secured to
the country, since the steam apparatus, being ceded to
the district at less than half its value, is at this hour
busily occupied, thus inaugurating an improved system
of agriculture.
The succour of various kinds afforded by the War
Viztims' Fund Committee to Metz and its neighbour-
hood alone is estimated by the local committee, at
more than half a million of francs. So soon as the
armistice was concluded, other delegates of the society
hastened to Paris, where their labours were princi-
pally devoted, and with great success, to relieving the
inhabitants of the ruined towns and villages surround-
ing that city. When in consequence of the Com-
munist insurrection they were removed for a time from
the capital, the committee devoted itself more especi-
ally to aiding the different departments and districts
I devastated by the war—notably those in the east,
where the work of relief bad already for some months
been in fall operation, and cetitral France. Another
band of volunteers had already gone thither, prepared
to commence the great work of reparation that there
lay before them, seeing that the seed-time was already
far advanced before the enemy left them a free field of
action.
From the first the Government had testified its
grateful recognition of the Society's efforts by granting
them free transport and securing them every possible
facility of transit for their supplies to the interior, even
during the critical period to which I have alluded, and
still more by conceding them exemption from Cus-
toms and all expenses incurred in the conveying of
waggons of seeds and herds of cattle for several hun-
dreds of miles over Spanish railways before reaching
the Pyrenees. Peace once restored, the Government
sought to manifest in =other form its gratitude and
esteem for the Society's services, in conferring on three
members of the French auxiliary committees desig-
nated by one of the Society's delegates for their pat-
riotic devotednese, that much coveted distinction—the
decoration of the Legion of Honour— a distinction
which he nought not for himself out of respect for the
Society's principles. And both in various ways, and
on numerous occasions since that (I cannot here take
space to record), have the Ministry both individually
and collectively testified their high appreciation not
only of the material aid afforded by the Society of
Friends, but of the wisdom and care with which that
aid haa been administered, and of the self-denying

means

labours of the meinbers of that Society who both at
home and abroad have devoted themselves so assidu•
may •

tothe task.
I may here remark that not until the autumn did the
" Socisitd des Agriculteurs de France," with their
amiable and excellent President. Monsieur Is Viscomte
Drouyn de Lbuys, at their head, become aware of the
important aid afforded by the War Victims' Fund
Committee to the agricultural population of their
country. I must add, however, that ever since they
became aware of the fact, they have certainly been
endeavouring to make up, as it were, for their being
so late in discovering the Society's merits. Not only
has article after article from their President's pen in
praise of the self-denying and general efforts of the
Sochlt6 Anglaise des Arnie appeared in the Bulletin
Mensuel de In Societe des Agri &toes de France, but
aLso in the Journal Officiel de la Republique Franeaise.
Further, at his nomination, the Soci6t6 des Agricul-
teurs has unanimously conferred on the president of
the Society of Friends the title of honorary member,
and on two of the executive committee and one of the
, delegates the medal of the Society.
I This brings me to notice, finally, the grateful re-
cognition of the Society's labours by the great body of
' the people, whose gratitude has found expression in a
multitude of addresses, emanating from municipal
councils, agricultural societies, auxiliary local com-
mittees, prefects of departments, and maims of com-
munes, besides in innumerable letters from landed pro.
prietors and individuals of all ranks; while the press
has been lavish in its congratulations and thanks to
the same effect. Nor have expressions of admiration
and thankfulness been confined to mere words. They
have assumed a tangible form in numerous medals both
of gold and silver, conferred upon the Society of Friends
in commemoration of the great and good work that
they have accomplished —a work the fruits of which
are not to bereekoned by the material aid afforded, nor
by its immediate effects, but a work which will live
for generations in the grateful memory of the French
people.