Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1917-04-29

special Correspondence of The star
PARIS. April is. 1917.
E1H HE Germans. retreating. have
blown. up Coucy Castle.
Coucy? Noblest relic of the
q middle ages, respected by the
most barbarous wars of the past. whose
donjon (greatest in all Europe) dates
almost from Charlemagne, harmless.
time wrecked. Industrious Coucy.
To give an idea of Coucy's impor-
lance. the French. in their first aston
ishment and sorrow. proposed to make
reprisals on Heidelberg. should it take
ten years. OF course. they will not; it
IL not their way.
Coucy is a mountain of blasted stones.
Any one can see. Trains go regularly
to Scissors; and / might date these
lines Marginal (where few. indeed, stay
over night; but Shaun Kelly is in
Paris. He knows more about Coucy
than any general at the front
Shaun Kelly owned an outer tower of
Coucy.
The whole story is the American an
tithesis of German ravage. Ameri-
cans were always faithful tourists to
Coucy: but among them. one loved
more than all the glorious old ruin and
it's story which began with Enguer-
rand, the sire of Coucy. in the year
1910. This was the late Edmund Kelly
of New York and Paris, international
lawyer and for many years counsel of
the American embassy in Paris. He
meditated on the motto of old Enguer-
rand: Il am not king, nor prince, nor
duke. nor even count; | am the sire of
Coucy." In fact. the sire made rec
ord for standing off local kings.
He was a good American ahead of
his time" said Lawyer Kelly. and he
took to reading up the ancient chron-
icles. how Engerrand's descendants
stood off royalty for some 200 years,
until finally bought out by the wealthy
Louis of Orleans. and all the later
glories of the place. Mazarin disman-
tied coucy. but left it standing in its
beauty: and Lawyer Kelly discovered IT
to be a state museum. impossible TO be
purchased in these latter days even by
a millionaire. Not being one, he pre-
ferred il so. and loving Coucy more
than ever, the cultured American did
the next best thing
The little town, once so rich, had
dwindled since Mazarin. ON the castle
side stood two massive towers of the
inner defense, belonging to the town.
Mr. Kelly asked mayor and department
Legislature to make price on the
nearest AS soon he had bought his
tower he spent loving care restoring it,
He pierced windows through walls six
teen yards thick He built rooms in
three stories, furnishing them in mas
siye antique style. The tower roof was
his shady terrace, covered with a little
grove of century old trees. From il he
dominated Coucy. All it's soul of
beauty lay beneath his view.
All today, has been Systematically
blow up. the town. the towers the
castle, by retreating Germans in their
rage Just masses of crumbled stones
The German papers boast that il took
twenty-eicht tons Of high explosives
and any one can see the plain Of Coucy
covered with white layer Of powdered
limestone, for miles around
What for? To clear battlefield, they
say II is not true. Nothing is cleared
The masses of crumbled stone remained
when they fed their battlefield"
went to see Shaun Kelly son Of
Edmund Kelly. who inherited the tower
Of Kelly, young. tall. slender smooth
shaved. grave. with twinkling eyes.
typical modern American college grad
uate.
you were brought up at Coucy," |
said You know more about it than
ANYBODY What could have possessed
tho Germans TO blow up the Industrious
old ruin, TO risk the odium2''