The Bridgeport evening farmer. [volume] (Bridgeport, Conn.) 1866-1917, 1916-01-26
MISERY RElGNS IN
DISMAL CAMP OF
SERBIAN REFUGEES
Women, Children and Old
Men Sleep on Ground and
Torn Tents


sa1oniki. Greece. Jan 2s-The
Temporary Serbian refugee camp lies
In the vacant lot back of the Russian
hospital For only short time ago
Salonik was a Turkish city, and as
man Empire. each nation with any
Important colony had its own hos
pitaI its own schools, It's own post
effice, as it had its own consulate
So there is Russian hospital at Sa-
1onilxA
building in an elaborate setting of
formal gardens-such as might SUR
round the railway station of any pros.
porous American suburban town. In
contrast the vacant lot behind the
hospital grounds is barren. "a dump
ing ground, fun OF mud holes, un-s
drained and norose.
Here are pitched some twenty-five
tents that shelter over twelve hum
dred men, women and children whose
whole stock of worldly Possessions is
what they carried with them on their
flight from war f1ayed Serbia Some
came by train, before it was9too late.
They have beds, a trunk or two of
clothing to family possibly an
American sewing machine. But most
fled afoot IN the last hours of Serhia'ss
agony, tearing their peasant hearts
They have the clothes they stand in
Perhaps there is a homespun blanket
between two or three.
From the inside, the canvas OF
the oval tents shows yellow and, opa-
que, under the rain of every day The
ground is wet with the continual
coming and going of muddy feet, shod
only with flimsy sandals Badly gut
tered around the edges the canvas
walls of the tents let tiny rivulets
frickIe across the floor In some, the
women haunting the Allies docks
and camps. have salvageed a few
planks, torn from box tops These
nailed together serve TO raise sleeping
Blankets an inch or two above the
ground Luxury The greater part
have spread their wet blankets on the
wet earth.
The men IN the camp by day are.
old-those too old to fight Or they
are the MANNED relics Of battle. The
Serbs who can fight did not flee They
are with what is left Of their co1n-
tryss army, still fighting in the noun
tafos of Albania somewhere, or on the
borderIand of Greece. The women do
not know. where they are They do
not even know if they live And if
they be dead, they will never know
where they died-nor where they lie
buried.
one tent after another reveals mis-
IN the pouring rain. feeble old men
clad in patched rags seek to dam the
torrents that continually break
through the earth dykes and seep in
to the tents Others lie on the ground
within, wrapped in blankets. too
full of the more seriously aiiing44-
there is no room for those who are
simply slightly i'll, or weary.
At one end Of a tent, seated on a
petroleum box as if enthroned, is a
young woman, a shawl drawn over
her head She is roFekingato and fro,
meaning. From time to- time she
btiries her face in the torn rag OF
what was once pillow slip, held
cIutched in her lap. He shoulders
shake with the rythm of expressed
grief Old women. squatting on the
ground about her in semi-circIe at
little distance tumble at inconseauent
tasks. chattering like Greek chorus
No one speaks to her. Occasionally
the children come and stand staring
with the cruel curiosity of youth,
whispering among themselves
Her baby was Ill when she left
Ghevgheli q week ago. There was no
food for him on the journey afoot.
The bitter wind of the Vardar Valley
bit through the inadequate shawl. The
boy died at last in her arms. She
had to bury him there, in a shallow
grave hastily dug by French soldier.
Such fairly ab1e-bodied men as
there are among the refugees are en-
pfoyed by the allied armies in con-
struction work on the Notifications
now hurrfed1y building around Sa-
loniki. The French pay them four
francs a day, the British three
prfncely wages, that help the. little
colony vastly. Meanwhile the Rus
sian relief committee has been busily
at work. A hundred fifteen thousand
drachmaes have been collected
large part Of the sum in Macedonia.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS to feed and cIothe
the more destitute. Princess Derni-
doff the wife of the Russian Minister
at Athens. is head Of the work. her