The Chickasha daily express. (Chickasha, Indian Territory [Okla.]) 1899-current, 1914-10-10
FLEUR LAURIE
AT BATTLE
FRONT

By WILLIAM G. SHEPHERD
fEhite1 Press stair Ccrespozdent-l
Loudon. sept By mail 10 New
York;
-Fie.-ry Lanrs Is AZ the front.
And must get there too.
Why % Tou Iet him 90 70 var.
And keep us back with youg
y iza't ssEg; # isnt even a poem
It's chant Of woe that vas iuto1ed
y the var correspondents during GER
tain days Of the present war. Mono
eled English 5ouruaiists. who hadns
worn OrdEnarY street clothes for
weeks. drawIed ii in the var office in
Lundon. to walrus-mussached officers.
WAiskersd French war wrsters who
had thrown away all their every dzy
clothes except their fIoEing b0w ties.
gesticulated It to Eax-ended-mustaeh-
ed officers and the var correspondents.
who have their own ways Of dressing
for warfare. went to the high school
building where the Belgian govern
ment now lives and said II in Flemish
ID the Belgian war lords
In Perograd. too. the war lords
heard the plaint ID Russia. from beard
ed reporters.
Perhaps even German journalists
chanted IT, American var correspond
ents yelled Il in every capital
'FIeury Laure is at the front:
Why cant 90 there toogg
Nobody heard Of FIeury. Laure be-
fore. One day, in London newspa-
per, there appeared an article BY him
On the fall Of Charieroi 1t was n
splendid first-hand story Of the battle
and the entry Of the Germans. The
next day another fIrst-hand story BY
Laure appeared, from another town
which the Germans had seized,
The war correspondents Of Europe
grew worried. A mysterious man, Of
whom they had never before heard,
named Laurie, was at the front. wheth-
er he was at the German or the French
front they couldn't tell. The third
days story from another town OF an
other battle started the var CORE
spondents lament in every capital in
Europe
Who is this Fleury Laurel How did
he get to the front? These we're the
questions asked by every worried ed
itor in every newspaper office in
christendom
I'VE must get that fellow away from
the front" said the war offices. If
they had only known it Fleury Laure
was trying to save them the trouble
And now at last, the truth about
Fleury Laure is out I write it to
praise his luck. his pluck and presence
OF mind. He has been the local cor
respondent of London newspaper in
his home town OF Charleroi.
The war offices Of Europe were keep
ing all the big war correspondents Of
Of the world away from the firing line
but they couldn't keep the firing line
away from this local correspondent
As soon as Laure saw what was hap
pening to him in the way Of gift from
fate he took full advantage Of the op-
portunity. He left CharIeroi at ono
side of the town while the Germans
were coming in at the other.
At the next town he sent his story
to London and waited for the Ger
mans again They came, too
Day after day, being only two jumps
ahead OF the Germans. as you might
say, he got stories Of the German adj
vance through Belgium which the
newspapers Of the world were hungry
FOR.
And so the front, which came to
F'leury Laure, instead Of him going to |
Il, chased him clear down into France |
and, at last, squeezed him into Paris, |
where the great. big, world famous war
correspondents could get look at
him, slap him on the back and say,
ievtyo oT,1.,.1 ..~.. A. <s,,r :, <sy.In v.f1nt Il