The times. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1890-1903, 1898-12-15
A NURSE TELLS
A TERRIBLE STORY
Sick Soldiers Suffer In
Speakable Hardshlps
SCORES ARE DYING.
In the Hospitals for Want Of Proper
Nourishment.
MANY GIVE WAY TO DESPAIR
Men Kill Themselves to- Escape tho
Horrors They Know arc IN Store for
Them-No Consideration shown
by Those in Charge--The
Conditions Charged
10 Ignorance.

HONOLULU, Dec :. via san Franciss
CO. Dec. 1.-THE United states transport
Scandia has arrived here from Manila
which place she left Nov. 18th. Sho
brings a number OF officers. q discharged
and fUrloUghed men. and two Red Cross
nurses. She brings the largest mail that
ever left Manila, 2l3 sacks for San Fran
cisco end one for Honolulu. Miss schaef-
fec, Red Cross nurse. who went from
Honolulu 10 Manila. arriving there sep
tember 18th. returned here. She makes
startling charges as TO the way United
States soldiers are taken care OF In Ma
Mia. Miss Schaefer makes the following
statement: Score Of soldier boys are
dying IN the hospitals al Manila. Just for
want Of proper nourishment. They say
the government allows sixty cents a day
for each Eatient. You can save dozeas
OF lives on i've cents a day.
HORRIBLE CONDITIONS.
"oh, the utter woe OF the hospitals;
the helplessness OF them. Men as bright.
as noble, as God ever made. given up t.
death, hoping for It. seeking 1t. taking
poison, doing anything that will end the
DESPAIR that comes upon them.
seeing nothing before them but days
or pain and nights OF wretchedness. with
out proper food. alone. with no one TO
give them sympathy. 10 cheer, TO write
10 friends, % sOJthe the aching b-Ows or
moisten parched lips, II by sheer endur-
ance OF nature or Obstinacy OF vitality
they DO get better. there is before them
nothing but the still more cheerless pc
Rod OF cOnvalescence. With the probabili-
" OF a relapse and the Old weariness Of
despair 70 be suffered again. No wonder
there are six or seven funerals day.
No wonaer the dead-house Is never
empty.
NO CONSIDERATION.
And outside the hospital. and even In
Il. such indifference. Petty consideration
of rank and position. squabbies over pre-
cedence. lack Of consideration I'm pre-
scribing and preparing food while men
are dying not merely OF heart hunger,
but for want OF noarishment.
II have gone through the wards day
after day. and / spoke 20 this one and
that, and they poured out their woes.
men who DO not wear their hearts on
their sleeve. cried for the pure agony OF
the loneliness and despair made poignant
and vivid by their own telling n.
WOFUL fNEXPERIENCE.
II do not mean that attendants OF the
hospitals are careless or Indifferent Many
are trying 10 do their best. But thcre
IS so much inexperience. so many clogs
to those who would do much 70 mink ~
an attendant going through a ward with
a pail of broth ladling n out 70 the nifty
or sixty patients indlscriminateiy by the
cupful In the whole pail there was not
enough nOurishment for one. even II IL
were made OF the best material But
what IL really Is made OF / shut my eyes
and refuse 10 imagine. In whole ward
there is not more than one nurse with
experience. and for helpers only one or
two awkward boys. who perhaps never
saw a sick-roOm before"