Every evening, Wilmington daily commercial., 1918-11-08
HOW OUR SOLDIERS
LIVE IN FRANCE
General Coleman du Pont De-
scribes Some of the Things he
Saw There Last Month.

General +. Coleman du Pont, VIII" has
returned from France, where ne Ne"' ~
the interests of the Y NJ {. \ IN speak
ing of conditions as he found them SAYS
"Arriving nj Bordeaux and driving
around that country IN an autoi'l"''i''
and watching from railroad trans. one
Is AT once impressed with the magnitude
of our operations We have 4u'Ouo men
at and near Bordeaux No one can
paint the whole picture, neither can one
describe the whole picture IL must ne
seen to he realized like the 'frahd
Canyon of the Colorado rVcr III Arizona,
i i too big to paint. too enormous to
describe. They don { make the canvas hlg
enoucb and the Canvon was undiscov 81
at the time language Was created and
this may be the reason that thaN have
no words to describe It
l.Thc operations over there are II n
measure parallel They are t0o hIg to
write about. too big 10 picture, and
must be seen To hc realized At both
Brcst and Bordeaux the Americans are
building miles and miles OF warehouses;
railroad tracks and switSheS and even
within fifty miles Of the German border.
they have at one point over 200 miles
of railroad and over S35,O00.O00 worth
OF stores They have camps Of various
kinds dotted MI over France recreation
rest. convalcsccnt and training camp
schools in addition Ia the regular Army
Camps The hospitals both Arny and
Red Cross are everywhere and are dong
everything within human possibility to
help the injured and sick soldiers
WORK or y. VI. c. !.
The y. NJ c. \ h.> moro than 1900
huts open III France for serving the
\ T. F The largest nuts taken care ~
5000 soldiers without ta<lnS their capacity
or without taxing tic capaclty y the
energies Cf the secretaries who run them.
This hut construction department nov
has two Of the largest factories Id France
working exclusively for il and cight Ing
contractors giving thcir whole tinc to
the Red Triangle
In August 10 supply the hut~ and
contract points. the cantcCn department
ordered $4,000 600 bars IT chocolate,
5000. 900 packages of biscuits. $500 000
packages Of gum. 600 Nll c4re oi
smoking tobacco and 1Sd0Gl4o
cigarettes. They supply writing paper free
in tremendous Quantities. or tho 1lve
months-Ncvemhcr December. January
February and March tho requirement
were l52. 600 600 sheets VI pap 7 and ILL
000OO0 envelopes and tie r~tuuatrt-
expenditure for writing paper tor ncM
wear is S6.0O0.000
The cantcns handle TWEEN, -t"dr
different brands Of ~o4p and IN three
months Aev handle lNNO,0Oh bars
This goes to show how clean our ssldicrs
arc.
The Entertainment Department which
by TIE Wav. i one 81 the best branches
OF the y IS very much appreciated by
the soldiers and for which the professional
actors and actresses should hc g!Vca tine
greatest thanks. They gave II july Iha3
night performances.
WHAT THE MEN WANT.
s'In questioning over one hundred
soldiers who have been IN and Wcra coming
out Of the trencnee as To the tirSf tLli L
they want the following ori,T MAS
established. Elrst tuty want writing
plper: second. cigarettes thlre, entertain
nlrnt
s"The moving picture department I'M
ported from April to the middle d Sep
ternber. 23400OO fcet of film which ha~
been supple mcnfed by many eet ot
Fren film. During the month Of Au-
gust. they averaged over nine hundred
shows a week, serving something like
100000 men
In the Athletic department ii the
month OF july. there were 5000 baseball
games. 1000 basket halI games 10000
yollev ball games 500 track meets and
l400 boxing outs here were >oO
football games in spite oi the warm Wea-
ther. Cp until August tlrst tins depart
ment had distributed over - 600 haSeb:Il~
1900 yollev balls. 500 basket balls 5000
footballs and 1900 SETS of oxlng gloves.
Base s.lls and bats could not be exported
in sufficient numbers from the States
and orders were placed in France. The