Buchanan County bulletin. [volume] (Independence, Iowa) 1869-1891, 1871-03-10
Picture Of the Ruin in France.

Mr.. Capper, one of the English
Commissioners for the distribution
of the "War Victims Fund.-" writes
to the London Times, from Thion-
vile, France:
have just returned from three
days tour among the villages
between Metz and Briey, with a
brother delegate, DR.. Nicholson, and
everywhere we found the same tale
of ruin.
Most of these villages to the
northwest of Metz are entirely agri-
cultural. They were inhabited in
many case by substantial farmers,
and in some cases, rich peasant
proprietors, but their riches were
all upon the ground.
In August last their granaries
were full of corn, their stables were
full of horses and oxen, and a more
prosperous neighborhood it would
have been difficult to find.
BY the end of October all their
horses had been requisitioned, their
cattle taken and killed, their
granaries were emptied, and their
seed corn had been eaten even if
the movements of fcontending armies
had not prevented them from SOW
ing their fields.
When their own stores were quite
exhausted, the Prussian soldiers
shared their rations with them, and
in many eases they had nothing
whatever besides to depend upon.
Even their stores of tirewood had
been burned; and thus, stripped and
destitute, they had to face a winter
Of tremendous severity.
This was the state Of things when
our society commenced its operations
and now we have about fifty villages,
the Mayors of which supply us with
lists of the most necessitous of their
inhabitants, to whom we supply
regular rations of potatoes, flour
and bacon.
If any one is afiiicthcd with love
of military glory, let him visit the
ncighborhood of Metz; let him see
the wasted cnvirons, with the
stumps of thousands of what were
choice fruit trees; let him enter the
half-burnt, desolate, famine, fever
and smallpox stricken villages, and
as he drives along the chaussce, now
lined by rows of stumps Of what
were once trees giving graceful
shade, and notice here and there
great mounds on the bleak plain
mound under the frozen surface Of
which lie the remains of hundreds
of brave men, let him think at how
great cost the glory is purchased.
Most of these mounds have no name
or sign, but occasionally is to be
seen rough wooden cross, tc tell
you that beneath lie such and such
a son of the Fatherland, who rests
in God, having found hero's death
in one or other of the great fights.
AT Ste. Marie aux-Chenes, around
which ragged the battle of the 18th
of August, nearly 1000 bodies lie
buried under few inches Of soil.
Often has the ploughman to turn
his share on one side. Measures
are, believe, being taken for their
re-interment.
Thionville, where l now write
from, was nearly wrecked by the
bombardmcnt. Twenty thousand
shells fell in the town, and there
was hardly a house but was struck.
Strange to say, but one inhabitant
was killed. The fortress is Of i'm
mense strength, and every precau-
ton was taken to render it impregna-
bic. Thousands of beautiful trees
were cut down that they might not
interfere with the range ofthe guns,
yet the tortifications have hardly
been touched; they are as strong as
they ever were. The Prussian
shells went right'over them, and by
the devastation they wrought in the
town compelled the commandant to
yield.
. - .