The Cordova daily times., 1918-05-03
GERMANS DEPORT GIRLS FOR HEAVIEST OF LABOR
 IN OCCUPIED TERRITORY
(By Henry Wood, United Press Cor
 respondentl

WITH THE FRENCH ARMIES, l April 2 (by maiD The latest grip of Germany's iron hand on Alsace- Lorrane is to force the women and girls who still remain there to aban- don their homes and perform manual labor in the war zone. The system of deportation and virtual slavery is the same as that inaugurated by Von Bissing in Belgium and northern France.
 According to letters which have just | reached France from the two stricken provinces, many of these women and girls are now being obliged to dig both trenches and tunnels.
 Despite the rigid surveillance which the Germans exercise over the inhab- itants of Alsace-Lorraine, the latter still find means of getting letters to France, usually by way of Switzerland, which give vivid descriptions of the regime which the Germans are now imposing there
 One of these letters from Essv-les- Nancy which succeeded in getting through to Oucy, in Switzerland, reads:
 "In certain villages the young girls are employed in digging trenches and tunnels until we are forced to wonder how these unfortunate ones can keep up their strength" .... Another letter which got through to Epinal deals more at length with the manner in which the Germans are practically enslaving the girls and women of Alsace-Lorraine. This let ter reads:
 "ln Alsace the Boches have inaugu. rated the deportation of numerous women and young girls into the miii- tary zone on the French front, where l they are forced to work. The news papers do not speak about this, but merely reprint the response given by the German government to Deputy l Hauss. The government stated that In the female personnel there are only $ per cent of the young girls who are under 17 years of age. Among these there are some who volunteered. tQuite naturally, because many fac tories are closed, and in order not to starve to death one is forced to ac- | cept whatever presents itself, to say nothing of the other means of persua. slon that the Boches have at their dis posal)
 The government continued it's re- ply by saying that all young girls un- der l7 are now to be sent back to their families; first those who are now working against their will and later all the rest, as fast as circum. stances will permit.
 Tt has now been decided to grant leaves of absence to soldiers from AL sace-Lorraine, the same as to ctlersl Therefore they have not had any up. to-date?
 The foreclosure of French nron. critics continues on every hand. The | Chateau de la Robertson, near Stras- bourg, belonging to the Des Bussieres family has been sold to a Boche emil grant for million and a half marks At Mulhouse and Riedisben tbare IS shortage of coal. At Mulhouse several schools have been closed and the classes in the others doubled in order to save coal. At Haisingue and in all the other villages the Bocbes are tearing up the floors and demol- ishing everything
 ITO speak French, and especially to French prisoner, entails always fine of 20 to 30 marks.
 Leather is becoming scarcer and scarcer' but the dealers in it are do- Ing a great business, The leather factory of Adler & Oppenhiemel at Strassbourg had it's profits increased the first year of the war 7S4 per cent; the second year, 1.213 per cent.
 Up until 1913 Krupp had never employed a single woman. On De- cember Sl, 1915, they were employing lO'95S, According to the "Mulhauser-