The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1915-07-26
OF POLAND
 GREATEST TRAGEDY
 OF EUROPEAN WAR
Pressed By Hostile Forces on Every Hand, Country
 is Scene of Desolation.

London, July 26-The desperate lighting now going on around War saw and throughout the eastern zone of operations centers attention on the colossal tragedy of Poland, the second that unhappy country has endured, the first having stirred America to it's depths when Kosciuszco went there to tell Poland's own story and left it's memories in the staute of the Polish liberator in one of the public squares of Washington.
 But that first tragedy was as noth- ing compared with what Poland is now undergoing, the entire theatre of eastern fighting being within the territory of the old Kingdom of Po- 1and,- with Russian armies tramping oyerlthe country from the east Aus trian armies from the south, and German armies from the north and west, all compressing Poland as in a double vice from four sides, marching and fighting on a scale of unprece-5 dented magnitude, and leaving a train of wreck and deso1ation even greater than that of Belgium or Serbia. This is the testimony of adisinterested eye witnesses, Polish, English and Amer ican, who have recently traversed the stricken regions, including c. c. Gibson of the Rockefeller Founda- ton, who declared on his return that this was one of the greatest tragedies the world had known, the devastation of Belgium shrinking in comparison.
 Such telegraphic news as trick1es. through from Poland, except the off, ciaI reports of military operations from the three sides, is censored and garbled and gives only the picture of lighting without that of the prostrate country under the heels of the fight CTS pressing from four sides. But rom eye-wftnesses returning, from Polish student refugees from the scourged district, and from letters to those who have sought asylum here, there is mass of information on the real conditions at the scene of these gigantic eastern operations. Much of this information flows into the hands of Miss Laurence Alrna-Tadema, daughter of. the great English artist, who for three months has been work ing day and night as the secretary and diresting genius of the Polish re- ftrons embrace about every name of note in England, peers. cabinet mem bers, ambassadors, artists and authors.
 Think of the magnitude of this ap- palling Polish tragedy said Miss Alma-Tadema to- a representative of The Associated Press. Tt is difhcu1t for us in England or America, with conditions serene, to cast the minds s eye across Europe. and grasp the fact that all the titanic eastern battles are being fought on Polish soil And it is not only gigantic struggle of in- vading armies from without. one fol- lowing another with all their train of ruin and desolation. but it partakes almost of civil Nconflfct with Pole
 fighting against Pole.
 There are,' she went on, about twelve million Russian Poles, and about the same number Of Austrian and Frussian Poles All of them have that intense longing to see Poland rise again as a unified Kingdom. And yet of these tWenty-four million Poles, a million Polish soldiers are fighting in lion are fighting in the Austrian and German ranks literally brother against brother. One of the reports reaching me tells of a body of Polish infantry on the Russian side, charg- ing at a body of the enemy, with bay onets raised and the battle cries ring ing from both sides-only to distin- guish as they came to grips that both were shouting the cry of Poland and on that instant, as if inspired by a common impulse. every bayonet was lowered and every man in the facing ranks fell on his knees and in the common language breathed the Lords prayer That was PoIands s prayer on the battlefield of this terri b1e eastern conflict.
 Heres another thoroughly authen- ticated. case.f' said Miss Alrna-Ta.- dema: "A Polish infa.ntrynaan raised
 his rifle and fired point blank at an advancing foe, only to see his pitch forward and hear his cry out in Po- fish, My God. I leave wife and three children. And this angonizing dy- i ing cry in Polish rang in the ears of
 the brother Pole who had fired the shot torturing him night and day, until he literally went mad and was
 taken from the ranks a raving man. lilac
 Tt was natural that the Russian
 Pole should case his lot with Russia, land this loyalty has been rewarded l by the inspired proclamation of l Grand Duke Nicholas promising free
 dom for Poland, 8 pledge which every
 Russian Pole accepts in good faith as l foreshadowing the reunif1cation of the Polish nation. On the other hand the 1 Galician Poles showed a perfectly
 natural first movement of allegiance to Austria which had given them the fright of their own faith and language land some sembIance of freedom. This and the laws of compulsory military
 service. brought almost a million Poles into the Austro- German ranks to fight
 against their brothers in the Russian l ranks. And yet in both Austria and I Prussia the overw helmfng majority o1 the Poles are at heart solidly with the 1 Kingdom of Poland.s'
 When MT. Gibson of the Rocke-
 feller Foundation returned from Pc land he told Miss Alma-Tade1na of I the terrible scenes he had witnessed in the stricken regions. Together they planned for extensive measures
 of relief, to be sent through Germany l with the approval of the British For Ieign Office Germany consented, but the officials here doubted the good faith of Germany's letting large sup 1 plies of food pass across Germany to 1 Poland. And so the negotiations halted and. now another plan is or foot to get supplies into Poland by l way of SwetzerIand without passing through German hands.
 I One of the scenes MT. Gibson pie tured was a Polish village where he 1 passed a cemetery toward dusk and l saw a crowd collected. On inquiry