TaÌˆgliche Omaha tribuÌˆne. [volume] (Omaha, Nebr.) 1912-1926, 1917-01-01
A PLEA FOR
HUMANITY.

to President Wilson on peace
was filed at The Hague, cable
tolls prepaid, by William Bayard
Hale, international News Sery-
ice correspondent at Berlin. The
message was stopped by the
British censor in England and
wholly suppressed, although the
tolls had been prepaid to New
York. This copy reached the
International News Service, by
messenger from The Hague;
BY William Bayard Hale. ).
Author of Biography Of Wood.
row Wilson.
On the Somme Battlefield,
Oct. 10.
Mr.. President: In other days
you have sometimes been pleas
ed to use my eyes as your own
You have expressed confidence
in the fidelity Of my observation
as a reporter.
Mr.. President, / wish / migh1
tell you a little Of what | have
seen within the circuit of these
smoking hills, from which for
DAYS l have watched the epic
struggle which since time be
can has never been approached
One knows that men die in
battle, but to see them die, and
in numbers like these, such
deaths as these, and with such
utter futility-if you were here,
Mr. President, you would ind
that hard.
For men are dying here, Ger
mans, Frenchmen, Englishmen,
dying in holes in the ground,
diving under the trees; dying in
stables, dying in railroads cars
sidetracked in long trains, dy
ing in motor trucks, laborious
" seeking the way back to
peace, dying by scores in cot
tages, school houses dying by
hundreds in churches transform
ed into crowded hospitals, dying
living in the dirt, their sightless
ewes rolled up toward a heaven
Of brass, flies on their lips and
in their gaping wounds.
Men Shot Dismenbered.
It is quite true, Mr.. President,
it is no newspaper sensation
no romantic invention, in con
sequence Of the new methods
Of warfare, the character Of the
wounds and the nature Of the
deaths are very often indeed too
chastity to describe and quite
impossible to imagine undescrlb-
ed.
On both sides me are being
shot into pieces Of palpitating
meat; blown into separate parts
Of what was once a human bo-
DIV: being stifled by poisonou:
gases; in~cinerated by liquid fire
By thousands on the dread,
full landscape which spreads It
self before my eyes as ! write
these lines, human beings arr
yielding up the flame Of life
and leaving widows and or
phans to wonder whether there
is a God above.
One knows that men ar,
wounded in battle, but actually
to see these spectres of men
Germans, Frenchmen, English
men-crippled, blinded, SCARED
deformed famed MANNED multi
ated that is hard, Mr.. President
If YOU could hear what fill
my ears as / write these word
ii might perhaps carry yol
back to still summer evening
ON the porch at Sea Grit whe'
an easterly wind brought acros
the meadows the sound Q
breakers, except that this sui
len roar of iron anger woul
deafen your ears to everythin
but its own horror; this thur
der would stop the very pulsa
ton of your heart with its sens
Of the pillows Of agony beatin
. upon the shores of existence.
Misery Rules Old World.
! If you could see what | So
I as | write-this woeful desol;
I lion, this IsmaeIitish vast
these stretching miles Of lanc
! scape stricken, smitten, forgo
!, ten by God and accused B
, men if you could hear the tale
!. old by French and Englis
prisoners Of the miseries whic
exactly repeat what we see {
! this side Of the fatal line.
: think, Mr.. President, the
4 would be no question OF yoI
'reacting' TO the greatest tr
!. redv in the history of men.