Pine Bluff daily graphic. (Pine Bluff, Ark.) 1893-1942, 1917-06-06
RED CROSS WILL
Be EXPLAINED At
Meeting TONIGHT
W. j. Leppert Of New
Orleans Will BE Principal
Speaker Open Meeting.

speaker open Meeting.
| W. J. Leppert of New Orleans. d.
rector of the Gulf divis. On of the Red
Cross, who was to have spoken to the
! local Red Cross members and all in
| terested parties at the PRESBYTERIAN
church last night, missed train con-
| nection at Meridian, Miss. and will
not arrive in the city until > O'Clock
| THE morning
Mr.. Leppert teloglaphed z. =.
Bloom, secretary Of the chapter,
from Tallulah, La. telling of missing
connections at Meridian, ard later
got in communication with v
Bloom from Monroe, La, and
him to make arrangements toward
the meeting convenient. Just SO he IS
able to reach Wichita, Kan, by
June 9.
Arrangements were made yesterday
for the meeting to be held at 5
o'clock tonight in the Presbyterian
church. Besides Mr.. Leppert's adj
dress, DR.. J. l. Norris will talk and
a musical program has been arranged
by Mrs. J. I. Norris. Several patrj-
otto songs will be rendered and Mrs.
Norris will preside at the organ.
Misses Ernestine and Eunice MOI
ris, Frances Howell and Martha
Whelan, dressed as Red Cross
nurses. will be ushers.
Tells Of German Butchery.
Upon his return from Washington
to New Orleans last week, Mr.. Lep-
pert interviewed by New Orleans
newspaper, from which the following
is taken:
W. J. Leppert, director of the Gulf
division of the American Red Cross,
returned to New Orleans Sunday
morning from WASHINGTON, where he
attended the "war council" held to
consider various matters appertaining
to the work of the society in the pres
ent crisis. 1t was resolved, Mr..
Leppert said, to raise by popular sub
scription the sum of one hundred
million dollars, the greatest amount
ever asked for humanitarian use
since the dawn of civilization. Presi-
dent Wilson has issue; a proclama-
ton designating the period extending
from June IS to June % as Red Cross
week, during which the people of the
United States will be called upon to
give generously and in a spirit of pa
triotic sacrifice for the support and
maintenance of this work of national
need"
"'The speeches of former President
Taft, Secretary of War Baker and Ian
Malcolm, representative of the Brit
ish Red Cross, were masterpieces"
said Mr.. Leppert.
a,1/o III NE
all was the talk delivered by John II,
Gade. who spoke on Beigium's plight.
Mr.. Gade made no attempt at oratory.
He made no gestures. He gripped the
back of schair, looked STRAIT ght ahead
and never relaxed a muscle through
out his speech. His sentences came
short, and sharp-a Verbal flash, il
Illuminating the awful forrers he had
Seems One, could hear q PIN drop as
the audience listened to the story Of
a: national butchery. Stewart Pros
ser, president of the Bankers Trust
company Of New York, was in the
chair. He burst into tears and left
the room, only returning when he was
able to compose himself.
,"Frederick Wolcotr, Well-know.,
writer, spoke on Pollard. He told
how wanton butchery had hurried
babes and wounded men and women
to their deaths. How the German
army had gathered up the large bones
of the dead for conversion into fer
tilizer, leaving the smaller bones to
be picked clean by the millions of
crows that darkened the battlefield.
He told of the cruel use of starvation
to force the Polish noncombattants
into the German fields, and related
tales of atrocity that caused the flesh
to creep and men to yell in eager
anger when he called upon them to
pledge themselves to collect this
mighty relief fund that suffering hui
mainly should no LONGER be ground
down.
"Mr. Taft's impassioned appel was
a remarkable bit of oratory. He in
sisted that the United States is not
yet aware that it is actually at war.
"'We cannot appreciate this yet
he said. 1T has not come home to us
vet. 1t will not come home to us
until we. like the people of Europe,
stand before the bulletin boards with
bated breath and strain our eyes TO
see if the name of our loved one is on
the fatal list, and when it is thus
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