Albuquerque morning journal. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1903-1926, 1915-05-02
Misery Beyond Words Borne
With CompOSure by StoGd
Men From North Who Shrug
and Say "NitChevO,"
O'D0NNELL BENNETT
TELLS OF CAPTIVES
Sad Men in Dirty BrowniSh-
gray Uniforms Have Lesson
in FOrtitude for Represent
atiyeS of Other Nations.
mY IAMEs onoNNELL nENNErrl

Copyright: 1915. by The Chicago Trlbune.)
Vaals, Holland. April 1.-THE only
happy Russian prisoners | have seen
are the wounded ones who lie in
German hospitals near the front free
from vermin at last. and by their
beds a pot OF ointment which will in
sure their continuance in that blissful
state. 1t takes more to make "a Rus
sian happy than II does a Frenchman.
For the rest the Russian prisoners
are swarthy men in uniforms of dir
~ grayish brown--the least dressy
color imaginable-and always they
are clearing away the debris of bom-
bardment, mending the roads. or
peering out from beneath the bars Of
churchyard gates, the national word
that is forever on Russian lips
"Nitchevo' CIT doesn't matterD in
their patient eyes even when their
tongues do not utter it.
In the morning you see them at the
churehyard gates diekering with Po-
lish women for bread and cigarets
their fur caps emphasizing the sugges-
tion of hungry bears in their appear
ance. They work with a good will
and they are not allowed to stagnate
for lack of work
Prisoners Chop Wood for Officers.
Sometimes you encounter the quiet
groups, an extremely bored German
guarding them, chopping wood In the
court behind an officers quarters. or,
as at Skierniewice, restoring the rail-
way station which their own comrades
had destroyed a few days before.
Thousands of the Russian prisoners
who have been transported to Ger
M tf, fI
Elbe canal. which is being built at
cost of Sf50,000,00 They are well
paid
never saw a Russian prisoner give
n sign of resentment nor heard one
utter a word that sounded like COM
plant. "Nitchevo' tells their whole
story, and the Germans have caught
it up from them, applying it to many
an irksome situation that is most
easily borne by pretending that ''it
doesn't matter"
Thus the sad men in dirty brown
have taught us all a lesson in forti-
tude The plight Of the wounded
prisoners in transit is often so bitter
that only Russian could say Mitch
evo" and mean It.
Condition of Prisoners Pitful.
A sorrier mess l never saw than
that in which Russians had to dwell
during some days at LowicZ before
railway cars could be spared for NOV
ing them into Germany. Their prison
was the abbey church, and the floor
of the abbey church was a kind of
morass of melting snow, sodden straw,
and bloody bandages
The night fires had burned low and
around them lay the silent wounded,
one man in each group who had al
good leg or sound arm occupying
himself in scuffing or throwing snow
and wet straw around the edges of the
fire when it showed signs of spread
ing over the floor.
This is very dangerous" said lie
Der putt" the Munich artist who was
painting with icy fingers in one of
the side chapels. But what was to be
done? The wounded could not be al
lowed to perish for lack of fire and,
other than this huge church, there
was no housing for them IN LoWicZ.
Confessional boxes had been turned
on their sides and some of the wound
ed were sleeping in them. Others lay
along the top of the flight of steps
leading up to the affairs in the side
chapels.
Roof Demolished by Austrian Guns.
The roof over the high altar had
been blown away by the Austrian thir-
ty and thiTty-one centimeter guns
and the snow had drifted in on it. All
the sacred vessels had long since
been removed and either buried or
sent to Warsaw.
Part of the right wall of the cham
Gel was embellished, or at least made
interesting, by an ancient painting
which showed the Holy Mother lying
in a kind of four-poster bed, her head
covered by nightcap and encircled
with halo.
Only the tragedy of the wounded
prisoners of war could have saved
the painting from being ridiculous
But in that atmosphere of wretched-
ness and CRIME and silent suffering
nothing was ridiculous, and the blaze
OF gold leaf, the garish paintings, and
the ponderous effigies of recumbent
bishops of 1928, 1867 and 1866 only
emphasized the utter impotence OF
this vast foundation in the crisis that
had smtten the land.
The enormous extent of the struc- |
ture, which would have done honor
to city of half a million, and IT'S
splendor of a kind stood for ages of
expenditure; but now all was gaunt
and meaningless and could not meet
even the requirements of a comfort |
able barracks. War brings many sad |
sights, but none so hopelessly sad as |
a disfigured and dismantled church.
Stories of Prisoners Naluelcss.
The stories of prisoners of war are
of value, as a rule only as indicating |
a state of mind. AS information they
aunnnt ~ oothipp and a porrpcuOn0- |