The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-02-12
FIRST HAND STORY OF BELGIAN RELIEF
Lucey First Member of Com
 mission to Return
THE GERMANS HELPEI
Would Have Given Food But Neither lands Loaned It in Emergency. Gave Special Engine to Haul
 Food to Liege

New York, February 1l.-A first hand story of activities of the commis | sion for relief in Belgium and of ef forts to get food through famine stricken towns was related today b i Capt. J. F. Lueey, the first membe ef the commission to return to thi country. Captain Lucey, former Uni ted States army officer and widell known in the oil district in the souti and west, arrived on the orduna Tues day.
 The commission not only is feeding Belgium, but is providing assistanc,| for noncombatant suffers in remote dis tricts north of the Argonne region il France the captain said.
 Captain Lucey was in Europe whet1 the distress in Belgium became acut4 and immediately organized a transpor tation system to distribute food. "Whiid I did not have many cargoes of foo,| to distribute at that time, the Job, soon saw, meant that I would have i'd do pioneer transportation work ss il in a new country he said. 'The canali were full of debris and boats were mol running. The railroad systems were out of order and had before me the jod of not only finding ways to distributd food but in many cases even to find food itself.'
 Germans Helped, He Says
 Captain Lucey said the Germans had given valuable assistance.
 "As soon as they understood what wd were trying to do they were very help1 full to us.' he said.
 "On one occasion when we mad nd food to deliver into Belgium and when the plight of the Belgians was oppres sive, I applied to the Germans for food and would probably have gotten 1t had not The Netherlands stepped in and loaned the commission 10000 tons.
 we got word one night that Liege was starving. That very night q ship came in. We hurried enough food to fill 30 cars into Belgium that sams night with Captain Sunderland, United States military attache at The Hague escorting it. He got as far as iieg and then went forward to the Ger man headquarters and was loaned 8 special engine by the German general in command and exactly 24 hours aft CT the call for food was received our train rolled into the Liege station.
 We have had many exciting faces with our food to beat starvation. To- day the commission goes into the mosE remote parts of Belgium. We are de- 1ivering food almost on the firing line particularly at Bruges.
 Luxemburg Needs Help
 "The principality of Luxemburg has e,,;~ e people, through American Minister Nai Dyke at The Hague. We have beer requested by the French to send fooo into remote districts and we are get ting some food by now to Givet r1au- beuge and Lille.
 "When we first began our work ir Belgium" said Captain Lacey, ''the peo rle did not know who We were noI what we wanted They thought we were trying to sell them something Many of them had never heard of the United States and did not know thai there existed class of people wht would send across the seas free ship loads of food to them. Today they un- derstand
 "The commission is feeding 5000 ba bies in Brussels, where there are baby canteens supervised by doctors anc nurses
 Another thing we have done for thu Belgians. We have educated them t, know pork and beans. They are simply crazy in Belgium about American porI and beans. They are also learnins something about American came, goods and of our corn meal.
 "The big impression I carry out o' Belgium is the humanizing effect O. hardship. The Dutch simply won't le anybody help them feed the Belgian refugees in Holland and have lately organized a commission of their owr for cooperation with ours The Bel gians themselves are absolutely un selfish.'