Forest City press. (Forest City, Potter County, D.T. [S.D.]) 1883-19??, 1917-03-16
WHAT A FRENCH WOMAN
HAD TO SAY OF PEACE


Paris. France-Spccial-Gustave Herve
thinks the following answer as adequate
as any which could be sent to those neu-
trails who never found a word to say in
protest Of the violation of Belgium and
who now are trying to stop the course
of justice. The letter was written by tho
wife OF a French workman two days be-
fore Christmas, to the editor OF La Vic
toire. who found it in his mail bag:
Monsieur: 1 do not know if ! dare send
you this letter. but il you should get it.
read il. ven though 1 am a stranger to
YOU. 1t relates to the articles you nave
written on the subject OF peace. Why
certainly Monsieur, this is not the time
for peace. You say that II the laborers
are at home were asked, they would say
that they want peace. 1t only proves that
you have asked those who nave no chill
dren. l have lost my brother, who was
IS, my husband has been gone since the
mobilization, and he is on the front. on
the fighting front; since he left we have
not always had enough coal, or enough
to eat, but though peace would mean more
money in the home we do not want it.
We have our children to think of and
though we are working people we do not
want them in 10 or 15 years to have to
go and fight: as they assuredly would
have to. And my husband who has had
enough war will go on fighting as long
as necessary to give Germany a good
beating SO that q peace nay be imposed
upon her that will make US feel easy
about the future Of the children. And my
husband is not the only one to think like
this, he says that all the others think
the same. There are times when one
grumbles, when one feels disconnected,
but. Monsieur. it must not be thought be-
cause OF that that we want peace: GER
tainly not. When 1t was seen in the pa
pers that peace was being talked OF, a
reighbor who has three children said to
me: Why those Germans, they are max
ing fun of u.s. And since then we don't
even talk of it, it's too silly. And here
are men with an education like Monsieur
Sembat n NJ. Alb. Thomas who seem to
take it seriously, they can't v any
children, or else they can't love them, if
they would rather have their children do
the fighting than themselves. Monsieur,
you can set your min at ease. the 'poilus'
who have little ones. the women at home
who are working go as to fill a father's
place. they will hold out as long as neces-
sary-a year or even two so that the chill
dren may not have to go through it later
on"
Are you not of opinion that this letter
is worth all our newspaper articles. says
M. Herve. Here We are, a whole lot of
Journalists, trying to answer these bleat-
ing pacifists. We ak of guarantees, of
Alsace-Lorraine, OF Trente and Trieste,
and here is this working woman who
probably does not know where Alsace-
Lorraine, or Trente and Trieste are, and
who gives the right reply, the reply die
tated by common sense and by common
humanity. This French mother has I'M
derstood what our bleating p~aciists never
~have-what the neutrals of America and
of Switzerland never will-that if the
fathers in this hour of depression were to
hurry into a peace which would save Ger
many from the punishment which she de-
nrync IL would ha NV r1,i16ror vrhN a., IN
10 IS years, or perhaps before, would have
to fight for them and to pay with their
lives for the weakness of an hour. What
Z debt of gratitude the country will owe
those women who have shown such resig-
patton and such heroism in their suffer
tnCSi