The Ocala evening star. [volume] (Ocala, Fla.) 1895-1943, 1914-06-02
TURKISH BATH TOWEL
A FLAG OF TRUCE
Keeps the Peace While Refugees
Transfer from Mexican to Ameri-
can Liner Outside Of Vera Cruz

can Liner Outside of Vera Cruz
Vera Cruz, May 7,-(By mail to
New York-'Liberty Path" they call
it now. 1t Is stretch of railroad
track two and half miles long; that
is, it was railroad track before the
Mexicans tore up the track and the
ties, leaving only the grading. It
runs thru a swamp and into a tropi-
cal forest Two trains, under Lieu
tenant Richardson of the 18th infan-
try, run every day from Vera Cruz
out to the end of the gap in the rails
to carry American and other refu-
gees from Mexico into the American
lines at Vera Cruz.
It's an interesting process. The
American train consists of Pullman
car with four or five cars filled with
American sharpsho0ters, for, under
flag of truce the train runs a dis
tance of two miles into the Mexican
lines. One of the cars is fitted with
wireless apparatus. AS you pass
out of the American lines You see
the outmost American pickets. in the
sandhills some distance from the
tracks The train runs along for
mile or so, and you first notice you
are on the inside of the Mexican
lines when you sight Mexican sol
diers standing alongside the track.
Finally the train comes to a stop
within a few feet of the gap in the
rails. Lieut.. Richardson alights
Turkish towel, tied in flag fashion to
a piece of bamboo. This is the flag
of truce. 1t will be an historic old
bit of flag some day, this white Tur-
kish towel, for under its heavy folds
no less than 1000 Americans, in
Guiding O'Shaughnessy himself, have
completed the last stage of their
flight from Mexico City. Americans.
at the Mexican end of the gap, two
and a half miles away, have spotted
its whiteness thru their glasses, and
knowing it was in the hands of Am
erican soldiers. have felt the fears
and alarms of many weeks fall away
from them; the red, white and blue
flag itself, could not have cheered
chem more than their first glimpse of
the white Turkish towel. BY the
way, the towel was taken away from
a man who, in the first days fighting
at Vera Cruz, broke open box in
the custom house, seeking loot and
tried to get away with huge bath
room accessory.
Lieutenant Richardson and the
soldier carrying the flag of truce
started up the railroad grading and
walked third of mile to where a
wooden shanty stands beside the
track, guarded by Mexican senti-
mel A Mexican soldier comes out of
shack with another white flag. The
| Mexican flag of truce seems to have
been made out of bed sheet. Be-
hind Lieutenant Richardson, Next
cans, loaded with their personal be-
longings, struggle. They are fugi-
tives from Vera Cruz.
Perhaps among the Mexicans there
will be an adventuresome foreigner
Or two, who wants to get back to the
capital. The horde of travellers pass
the two white flags, and the mo-
ment they pass the Mexican flag OF
Mexicans. ALI of the railroad tele-
graph lines have been cut and sc
there is one way of knowing whether
there is Mexican train at the Other
end of the gap. The only thing tc
do is to wait If it is there, it is al
a standstill in the heart of tropical
mosquito-infected forest; there may
be Americans on it, though Lieuten
ant Richardson has no way of know.
ing, and the only thing he can do i.
to wait.
With a fieId-glass, you can lool
over the heads of the Mexicans, tt
the pathway thru the forest. If the
Mexican train is there, you couldn'1
see it anyway, for it stops at the
curve, out of sight, at the top of q
grade The heat rising from the ho1
rails simmer and makes it difficul
to see what is happening at the dis
tant end of the gap. But suddenly
someone makes out a group of per
sons, like tiny dots. soon you can SCI
the dust they are stirring, as they
move along the roadbed. They have
a long. hot walk before them; two
and a half miles in a broiling sun
loaded down with as many of theil