Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1916-05-27
|NOTRE DAME NOT
! GREATLY DAMAGED
Verdun's Cathedral Hit Only
Once in Thousands of Shots
Fired by Germans.
COREY VISITS EDIFICE
AMID RAIN OF SHELLS
Adjoining Buildings Beaten Down,
But Old Church Escapes to
Some Extent.

BY HERBERT COREY.

vERDUN. May 5.-All the way up
the hill we could see the mirror shining
upon the inner wall of the bishops re-
ception room. That afternoon the sun
fell upon it at precisely the right angle.
That point of burning light must. we
thought, inevitably be seen by the Ger
man cannoneers.
We were on the way to see the Cathe-
dral of Notre Dame, through which a
shell crashed the other day. 1t had not
been completely destroyed. the soldiers
told u.s. They spoke almost with an
air of reverence, although reverence
does not come happily to a soldier. II
seemed as though a miracle had hap
pened. That a church should have es-
caped-almost-when a town was being
battered to pieces around il.
THE Cathedral of Notre Dame" says
Baedeker. dates from the eleventh
thirteenth centuries. but has been much
altered in the fourteenth seventeenth.
especially the interior. The
Bishops Palace and the Grand Semi
naire adjoin the cathedral.
We kept step with failing shells all
the way up the hill. The German gun
ners seemed to be enjoying slight
burst of activity. No shell fell near
us. 1t is true. But as we mounted to-
ward the top of this hill in which the
the cathedral crowns we could hear
them detonate in the city below. Now
and then We turned corner and
glanced down a street which led 70
the lower town. Sometimes we could
see a fresh cloud of smoke and dust
rising They fell two minutes apart
Washburn timed them.
Big Shells" said the French officer
with US. Not 3S's. however. The res
/ think
The streets were absolutely empty.
Not even a soldier kept ward Al Lac
corners When the good people of Yer
dun had been driven out Of their ho3ieE
by their military guardians they had
ia ken their pets with them. But usu-
ally one hears birds singing n II.
street-even in the most desolate ana
lonely streets. We had heard them
singing in the shell fire in the forest Of
the Argonne. Here there was nothing.
No sound to break this oppressive ST.
lence. except the periodic crashing OF
shells.
There is that mirror we saw shin
ing" said my companion. ION the wall
Of the bishops reception room
Bishops Palace Wrecked.
We turned an acute corner and came
into the little three-cornered place
where the cathedral and the seminary
and the bishops palace join their walls
Those who have known Nerdun in 9TH
err years said that the bishops palace
had been a jewel fof medieval archi-
lecture They spoke of it in terms of
rapture. We could only see the shells
had riddled it. The roof had gone. the
outer walls were shattered. the whole
front had slipped down into the street.
An inner wall remained, Of what had
apparently been a stately and severe
library on the second floor. In front
of that wall were heaps of white and
battered stone. They had perhaps been
haf ~r-lt
gunpowder On that wall a great gold
framed mirror glistened. neither brok-
en- nor scratched. 1t seemed a frivo-
lous thing. this mirror. 1t was out OF
place in tragedy.
The grand seminary had not suffered
as had the bishops palace. 1t had been
struck perhaps score of times. per-
haps only dozen times by shells.
We only glanced at the holes that had
been torn through these old walls for
we were anxious to enter the cathedral.
Our guides led us through one of the
most charming cloisters to be found
even in this charming land. The
groined and vaulted roof of stone
the worn stone benches on which gem
erations of brothers had read their
breviaries-an old sundial in the warm.
green garden to which the seminarists
escaped from the chill of stone-all
loving care. The cloiser had been de-
stroyed in part. One shell had torn
through a corner of the heavy cathe-
dral clock tower, and through the.
arched stone of the cloister and into
the stone floor beneath.
Not .3S.'' said the officer with mo.
only a go"
1t is difficult to convey an exact i'm
preston of the damage done by that
single she'll 1t seemed that it had
not even been DETECTED by striking
the corner of the cathedral tower. The
wall was perhaps two feet thick at
hat 80 II
had been torn out at the corner 4
ragged tear appeared in the tower. as
though a savage animal had bitten IL.
This may seem absurd smile. but
it occurred to half dozen of our lit
tie party simultaneously. The shell had
then penetrated the stone roof of the
cloister and exploded on the stone floor
below. A hole perhaps twenty feet in
diameter had been torn in the cloister
roof, but SO solidly did those architects
of the middle ages put up their build
ings that the explosion which follow
ed had not injured the remainder. To
destroy such a building as this blow
must follow blow.
One Shell Struck Church.
We were taken into the cathedral Il.
self. Just one shell had struck the
during the bombardment It
is difficult to say why, for it stands
upon the very top of the hill which
makes the heart of Nerdun. Its noble
lines can be seen for miles in any di-
rection from the slopes that hold YER
dun as in cup. 1t had obviously been