The Daily Ardmoreite. [volume] (Ardmore, Okla.) 1893-current, 1915-05-14
WHAT SHALL OUR COUNTRY DO
ABOUT SINKING OF LUsITANlA?

/
ABOUT SINKING OF lOSITAN'A! !
! Editor Ardmoreite-
Naturally this unfortunate and re
grettable horror and disaster has sur
red the entire English-speaking worIc
and especially our own country as II
resulted in loss of some $50 of oul
citizens. But we should all look al
this thing as our own president VIII
do The passengers on this ship knew
and we're warned of the danger II they
went within the war zone. But the
horror of it, was the sinking OF an un
armed passenger ship, wiping out the
lives of innocent women and children
without making any effort or prepara
ton to rescue them--soldiers IN Dattle'
if they wish to surrender, can do SO
and their lives are saved, but THESE
people, who were not soldiers or com
batants were given no possible chance
for their lives. This was not humane
or civilized.
The countries at war naturally
have the right to sink ships of war
Of an enemy, or any transport ship
containing men fighting against them.
The attitude of President Wilson de
string peace in so far that it can be
rightly kept-whether the popular sen
timent of all the people Is against him
| do not know. The only thing and
the right thing for the president to
do. is. demand that such an act be
not repeated for if our country should
declare war. it would mean sending
several million of our men to Europe
and hundreds of thousands of them
would be killed manned for life, and
die of disease for the loss of some
115 lives who went at their own peril.
| wish to remind you of parallel in
our own civil war and the destruction
of Belgium in the present war. Gen
eral John B. Gordon of Georgia when
his southern army invaded Pennsyl'
vania. could have devastated and de-
stroyed the country as the Germans
did Belgium, but he gave explicit or.
ders to his army that nothing was
to be touched, would not permit his
men to rob an apple orchard England
produced another General Gordon OF
Khartum. both of these men descend
ed from the same Scottish family.
The emperor Napoleon with the
most brilliant mind our modern world
has ever seen, made the mistake that
is to blame for the present war. When
he subiugated Germany and Prussia
he gave orders that Germany should
never be permitted to keep over 1900
drilled men at any time. The Germans
played a trick on him. They drilled
1000 men, then sent them home and
got 1000 new men, and kept this up
until the whole nation of abe-bodied
men we're we'll drilled.
History shows us the Germans sent
many thousands of soldiers to the
United States in two of our wars.
They fought with the English against
Washington, and in our Civil War
thousands of them fought with the
North against the South, simply .or
the pay of a soldier; naturally the
feelings of the southern people are
with their mother countries. England
and France, in the present war. Men
of 80 years of age today know nothing
of the horrors of our civil war, only
what their fathers and history tells
them. 1t will be the grandsons of our
Civil War veterans who will risk their
lives if we are plunged into this war
which by comparison with our Civil
War cannot even be dreamed Of,
There is no doubt the present war
will last a long time, perhaps four or
five years, longer even. should the
Italian army of one million new men
get into it, 1t might mean the sub
jugation of Austria, but Germany with
its immense resources. it will take
the entire armies of all the allies a
long time to invade the country to
Berlin. But that they will eventually
do so, unless peace is sooner declared
is now a dead certainty since the sink
ing of the Lusitania.
Likes Ardmoreite Editorial.
Editor rdppp~pitas