The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1900-01-19
BRITISH WAR CORRESPONDENCE.

BRITISH WAR CORRESPONDENCE.
If the British were unprepared for the
Boer war and somewhat slow to realize
and adapt themselves to the new conditions
in South Africa, no one can deny that the
war correspondence of the London papers
line has never been done than the accounts
which these correspondents are sending
their papers Of recent military operations
and particular events and incidents. Some
of these accounts. reproduced in the Jour-
nails cable dispatches, are models of vivid
descriptive writing and their perfection Of
form might almost be said to mark a new
era In newspaper literature. The war cor
of evolution as are modern weapons and
methods of warfare. The process began
with our civil war. Prior to that such
thing as a correspondent sending dis
patches from the firing line, full accounts
or battles before official reports were re-
ceived, and graphic descriptions of notable
episodes and events was unknown. His.
tory was immensely the loser by this.
What would the world not give for full &C
counts Of the battle of Waterloo written on
the field by 'our special correspondent"
or for such reports of the great naval duels
between British and American ships in the
early part of the century as we had of the
battles In our war with Spain. An account
of the battle of New Orleans written in the
style Of the modern war correspondent
would be great reading. Tradition has pre-
served some Of the incidents of those early
battles. but for the most part the histor-
ical accounts rest upon official reports sup
plemented by the imagination of the his
torian. Commodore Perry showed the in
stinct of a war correspondent after the
battle of Lake Erie when, before the firing
naval cap on his knee, wrote to General
Harrison with a pencil on the back of a
letter, 1--WE have met the enemy and
they are ours" Compared with this his
official dispatch to the Secretary of the
Navy was tame. II there had been a war
correspondent aboard the flagship the
world would have known a good deal more
than 1t does about the details of the bat
tie. The same is true of many other early
fights on land and sea. The evolution of
the war correspondent Of to-day, person
who goes wherever the army does pene-
trates to the firing line and the picket line
and describes all he sees with a wonder
full intelligence and fidelity, began with our
civil war. With a horse a revolver. a
tield-glass. notebook. a pencil, a blanket
and haversack. and with instructions
from his paper to get all the information
he can and forward it with the utmost dis
patch, regardless Of expense, labor or dam
ger, he Is pretty nearly equal to anything.
The pace set by American newspapers and
correspondents during the civil war was
followed and improved upon by the Eng
fish and American press in the Franco-Ger-
man war Of 1870. The official records of the
war OF the rebellion were by far the full
est OF any war of ancient or modern times
but even they are greatly illuminated for
historical purposes by the contemporaneous
newspaper accounts of eye-witnesses. A
British statesman characterized the war
correspondence Of the Franco-German war
as constituting "a war literature, unex-
ampled in ability and interest, putting be-
fore the public all the various astonishing
events which have so rapidly succeeded
each other in this tremendous struggle"
BY as much as journalism has advanced
since 1870. and by as much as London pa
pers are richer and more enterprising now
than they were then. the literature of the
British-Boer war will surpass that of the
Franco-German. The official dispatches
and reports will give cold facts, but the
graphic descriptions and picturesque ac-
counts of the British war correspondents,
the best in the world in their speciality, will
supply material that the future historian
will require to make his narrative throb
with life.