The Daily Ardmoreite. [volume] (Ardmore, Okla.) 1893-current, 1916-04-02

of the road by lew peasants anu
ordered to give up their horses ana
their money. II was plain highway
robbery, and they refused The peas
ants ran away and within couple
of minutes more than a thousand
shots were fired out of the bushy |
hillsides, killing most of the Serbs.
The food problem was terrific
even in Albania. A half pound OF
bread was sold at ten dinars, about |
two dollars. AS had little money
at Sturza / bought five pounds 10
Okla beans. Had | not been able to
get these beans | would today be a
dead man. | had just said TO my !
self, I can't go any further, when
| persuaded a peasant woman to sell
me the beans. I ate beans twice a
day, making a sort of soup out OF
them, putting in little salt At that
was far luckier than the fellows
who had to boil harness leather for
five or six hours in order to make the
hot water taste like soup. ] saw men
act like savages, eating pieces OF
brown paper.
There were bt~haps not more
than two thousand women among the
retreating horde with us, and 1t Is
a fact worth recording that they
were kindly treated and given what
ever comforts were available by sol
diers who were otherwise dead to
every feeling. have seen such
men, gaunt, staggering along, halt
naked with a few pieces of cloth
for shoes, unable to speak. with bare
ly enough strength left to stop near
a diving horse and cut stringy steak
from its flank, straighten up for a
moment near one of the wo1nen's
carts and smilingly tender their last
mouthful of food to some of the
women.
THE treatment of the women on
this dreadful retreat was to me the
most wonderful, the most moving, the
most heroic part of the whole retreat.
These Door women in their hight
from their homes had in many cases
been unable to bring enough clothes
TO cover them Often they were With
out stockings or underskirts, or hats
or shawls or cloaks. | have seen
time and time again some freezing
soldier take off his overcoat and
force it upon some one of these wom-
en-. and seem almost ashamed to look
upon her shivering body as he made
the offer. Then he would search
along the road for hours until he was
able to strip some dead man of his
clothes to replace that which he had
so freely given
What Haller regarded as his most
remarkable experience was the sight
of a mad soldier dying from starva-
ton. "Clothed only in a ragged un-
dershirt, he was running barefoot
| IL
straight as an arrow, believing as
he ran" he said. "He ran on ana
on down that road, seeing nothing,
vet wonderfully stumbling over the
bodies of other dead and dying SOL
ders and the meat-stripped carcass
es of the army horses which blocked
the way. Suffering intensely as my
self was, turned and watched this
/ strange figure. At last half mile
down the road he pitched forward
and as | passed him later l saw that
he was stone dead"
"Other than that incident, there is
one other that will stick in my mem
ory so long as | live" said Haller
This was the hanging of a Serb
mother by the Austrian troops be-
fore | was made prisoner. We were
marching across a rough country
near Iochnizter when we stopped
near wayside hut at its spring tc
get a drink. Colonel He'll OF oul
regiment also went to get drink
As he arose from the spring a sho
came from the hut. That shot wa;
fired by a woman. She stood at the
door. an old shotgun in one hand,
baby in the other.
"One of the captains ordered he
hung. There. was nothing else 10 d'
: but execute her. AS a rope was place.
about her neck and she was led t'
I the nearest tree all she said wa
this. in a hard, cold voice; My hus
! band is a soldier. too, die for Ser