davidaulloa/AmericanStories huggingface dataset:
El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1918-02-04
DIVISION ORDNANCE CHIEF,
MAI, WILMINGTON. ARRIVES

MAJ. Winthrop wilmington. a re-
serve officer, reported for duty Non
day at district military headquarters
as division ordnance officer. He Is q
native OF Michigan and came to 81
Paso from Camp Meade. in Maryland.
El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1918-02-04
Grandma Talks
About Babies

HsasaIsrEsCsreleof ListenersvhoProf.
itby Her Wisdom and Experiences.
El Paso herald. (El Paso, Tex.) 1901-1931, 1918-02-04

David Merkin. S19 North Oregon.
left for Camp Bowie. Fort Worth.
Saturday, in accordance with instruc-
tons sent him to report to Maj. 7. J.
McCamant. 141st field hospital
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10

At night he may crawl out to bush
on No Mans Land and there by the
light of the rockets pick off men who
are doing outpost duty.
He is also a specialist in locating
snipers of the enemy and when it is
found that men are being picked off
by the enemy he is sent for to locate
the trouble. Several times it was found
that ambulance men were being killed
by a German sniper and a celebrated
British sharpshooter was sent to To-
cate the man. A number of dead
Germans were seen lying in a nearby
shell crater. Our Britisher became
suspicious of the dead men and after
watching them for some time he
turned his back then suddenly he
wheeled around in time to see a dead
Germans hand move toward the trig-
ger of his rife. The Britisher whipped
out, his service revolver and fired with
unerring aim. The arm dropped and
there was no more sniping from that
section. At another time it was found
that men going along a road were
picked off one by one, the shots com.
ing from field nearby. A sniper spe.
cialist was sent for and he soon 10.
Gated a portion of the field where
there was motion among the turnir
roots. He took aim and fired-the
leaves on the roots no longer moved
On investigation he found that he had
killed the offender Young Saxon
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10

Some of them. as we have seen, grace
Milady's bouquet; mahy more are used
in decorative floral work, while others
form the background for funeral
wreaths.
In localities where the galax is ex-
tensively picked the people are ex-
tremely careful of fires, because after
a forest fire no galax can be picked
for several years. This fact has been
of considerable Importance in many
places, for the people have prevented
and fought forest fires in order to save
the galax from destruction and have
saved the forests from the damage
which fires cause.
In those forests of the Southern APP
palachians where the Government is
purchasing lands, the galax industry
is encouraged because it is a source
of considerable revenue to the noun
taineers, in addition to reducing the
fire hazard. The roads and trails
which are being built by the Forest
Service will doubtless open up many
galax beds which have hitherto been
comparatively inaccessible and will aid
the people to market the leaves much
more easily than has been possible in
| the past
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10
BY JOHN L. COBBs, JR.

HHWHEN MILADY lifts her cor
sage bouquet from the box
AA in which it has been deliV-
wv cred, and exclaims at the
wonder of the flowers of which it is
composed, her admiration is for the
beauty of the blossoms themselves;
seldom does she realize that the effect
of the bouquet as whole is given by
the sheen of the bronze-green leaves,
which form the background for the
delicate blossoms. If the flowers be
violets, the chances are that the heart
shaped leaves against which the pur-
pie petals show are not violet leaves
at all. but those of the galax; and if
Milady could know the story which
those galaX leaves could tell her. she
would regard them with a new inter-
est and see them not merely as beau
tiful bronze-colored bits of green"
but as wood sprites whose days have
been spent in the heart of the noun
tains.
They would tell Milady of the beau
ties of the Southern spring; of the
balmy summer days which followed
and how with the first frost their
color had changed from a light to a
darker green and had taken on the
bronze tint which they now wear
They would tell of the cold winter
winds which swept down the noun
tain, chilled the fog and covered the
upper slopes with rime; of the child
a girl, perhaps-of Miladys own age
but whose clothes were thin and worn
whose body was shrunken and blue
with the cold. who had picked these
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10

dragged out Turkish woman. About
her neck was a string of Identification
dies which she confessed was to be
used to draw head money from the
German officer under whose charge
she worked. Near the same spot the
shots from a British machine gun
brought down two female snipers from
a tree. They were both dead and
when the soldiers climbed the tree to
investigate it was found that the lady
birds had a perfect arsenal of am
munition and enough canned supplies
to feed them for a month.
The Prussian sniper has a way of
picking off a few men and then COM
ing down from his perch and sur
rendering. If the men see him first as
he descends he never has chance to
give himself up. 1t is no easy thing
to permit a man to surrender when
you know that he has deliberately shot
the officers of your company.
Canadians And Australians,
With the Allied armies the Aus
tralian and Canadian snipers have
been a match for the Prussians. Their
aim is unerring and their waiting quail
tiles remarkable. They are subtle in
bushcraft and skilled marksmen. They
are used to hunting and know how to
keep under cover and when to fire.
They perform miracles with the Ross
rifle, and will stalk a German with all
the astuteness of the scalp hunter, and
will always get their man in the end.
Only recently a Canadian sniper
picked off German officer at nine
hundred and fifty yards. He also
pierced the six-inch loopholes of the
German trench five times out of six
shots at two hundred yards. The
Canadian crawls through wheat field
without so much as causing the top
of the wheat to move while the move
ments of the German sniper may be
trailed by the furrow he leaves
| through the wheat. The Australian is
equal to the Canadian and he loves his
work and it is a point of honor with
him never to report a hit unless he is
absolutely certain, and sniping casual
ties are always accepted without fur
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10

officers and killed them by hurting the
stones. Later as new weapons were
invented the sniper took up these new
instruments of death and pursued his
vocation. During the American revo-
luton sniping played an important
part and a number of officers of both
the British and Continental armies fell
victims to the unseen sharpshooter.
During our Civil War the practice
was continued and with great success.
During the first days battle at Gettys-
burg General Reynolds, one of the
ablest of the Union officers, fell a vic
tim to the bullet of Confederate
sharpshooter, who was hidden in a
barn not far from the road over which
the General passed on his way to
headquarters. The gunner was never
caught and it is said came out of the
war unscathed.
During the Spanish-American War
the Spanish sniper did deadly work
especially in the Philippines. These
people were experts in ambush fight
ing and their hiding places were so
well concealed that our army had
great difficulty in locating their lairs.
1t was the Boer War, however,
which brought out the real sniper in
all his perfection for the Afro-Dutch-
man of the veldt proved himself a
past master in the game of man stalk
ing. Day and night the Boer snipers
were at work and hundreds of British
officers and soldiers were picked off
from the bush or from apparently
abandoned farm houses. In one or
two instances high British officers lost
| their nerve and it was only by the
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10

or other distinguishing landmarks. He
then follows the course which the bee
has taken and guides himself by the
objects he has noted.
It may be necessary for the bee
hunter to catch number of bees
before the exact location of the tree
is found. After all his trouble he
may find at the last that the bees he
has been following are from the hive
of some mountain farm, or that an
other hunter has gotten ahead of him
and marked the tree.
When the bee-tree is found, in case
the finder does not wish to cut it at
the time, it is marked by cutting a
! rough x into the bark or with some
other distinctive blaze. In the noun
tain custom, this is equivalent to
Stalking out a claim" and serves as
notice to any person who may find
the tree later that it is claimed by
the first discoverer. This practice is
well known all through the mountain
region and is seldom violated. Some
of the bee-tree hunters have marks
which are widely known and re-
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10
Story of the GaLan Leaves
Their Use In Floral Decorations

leaves as she huddled shivering on
the high mountain side. and had
thrust them into a coarse sack with
thousands of others.
They would tell of the long walk
across the ridges to the log cabin at
the foot of a steep mountain field
which the child called home, a cabin
whose sides were chinked with mud
and moss, and whose floor was of
hewn logs or puncheons, and whose
leaky roof was of hand-riven
Shakes" There in the long winter
nights by the light of the wood fire,
tired children sorted the leaves into
bundles, while the wind howled out
side and drove the snow through the
cracks in the walls of the cabin. When
thousands of these bundles had been
tied they were taken far across the
mountains to the little country store
where they were exchanged for need
ed clothing, food. or kerosene oil.
Here the leaves were packed into
boxes lined with wet moss and were
! hauled to the railroad to be shipped
to the florist who had supplied Milady' S
bouquet And on this night the
climax of the career of these leaves
will be reached when for little while
they will nestle against the silks and
satins of Milady's gown.
Tomorrow, perhaps, when the short
lived violets have faded, the bouquet,
will be dropped thoughtlessly into the
trash basket and find its way event
wagon. But the galax leaves will be
fresh to the end; and should Milady,
by any whim. choose to save them
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10

honey comb. The bees soon recover
from their stupor and at once accus-
tom themselves to their new home
and start work again as though moth
ing had happened.
To most people, honey is honey, but
the mountaineer is something of a
connoisseur in this respect and has
decided tastes in the matter. Honey
from sourwood and Eastwood is high
ly priced. That from chestnut is
stronger and not so good. The fresh
er the honey, the better; but while
the old black honey from the trees
long used by bees may not be as
eagerly sought after as the other kind,
it is not wasted.
In the past it has been the custom
for the man who found a bee-tree
to cut it and give the owner of the
tree one-half, or in some localities,
one-fourth of the honey. On the lands
which the Government has purchased.
the mountaineers are allowed to cut
the trees under free-use permit.
This involves no expense beyond the
time and labor involved in clearing
up the brush resulting from cutting
the tree. The trees are seldom of any
value on account of the hollows and
other defects which they contain and
it is not often that they would ever be
used for anything.
To the mountaineer, however, the
honey is of no little Importance. In
many cases it may be the only
"sweet'ning' a family will have, and
in common with sorghum molasses is
known as long sweet'ning," to dis
tinguish it from sugar, or Short
sweet'ning." Very often the honey is
exchanged at the nearest store for
-four, coffee, salt and matches. or 9TH
er necessities which the mountain
farms do not furnish.
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10

Their checking. The German sniper
has a fondness for hiding in ruined
buildings and moving from room to
room while at his work. When the
Allies locate the building from which
the shots come they notify the men at
the big guns and they at once fire on
the building. This done the debris Is
examined and dead German snf7ers
are usually found under the fallen
masonry.
French Daring.
An extraordinary case of shipping
was reported from the French front
a few weeks ago. 1t was the work of
a French William Tell, who was the
champion shot of a certain French
Regiment. A Bavarian officer was
seen looking through field glasses at
the French trenches and dragging two
terrified French women from a near
by village with him as a protection
against the fire of the French. will
liam Tell" who had just shot lead
pencil out of the hand of a comrade
at some distance happened to catch
sight of the Bavarian. Quick as a flash
he dropped to the ground, adjusted his
sights and 1eveled his rifle. 1t was
delicate problem for the range of
shot was great and there were gusts
of wind. His companions held their
breath while the expert calculated.
Then a shot rang out and the Hun fell
dead with a bullet in his heart. The
women tainted through fright, but
were soon safe in their homes over
whelming the sniper with their
thanks.
Our American soldiers are in train
ing for their task as snipers and some
are already engaged in the daring
business in France. They have always
held high rank as marksmen. for at
nearly every International rifle match
during the past decade the u. S.
Army team has carried off the honors.
They are eager to get at the work
and when the news of their achieve
ments begins to filter through it will be
found that they are the equals if not
the superiors of the Australians and
Canadians in potting the Huns.
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10

Junior officers ordering sudden attacks
on the spot from which the shots
came that saved companies who were
being picked off after the fashion of
man knocking down ten pins. The
British Army remembered this expert
ence and when the present war began
they at once set about to copy the
work of the Beers and many German
officers are dead as the result. The
Germans were not slow in observing
the results of the British sniper and
they too began to send out prowling
riflemen who hid in haystacks, ruined
chateaus and in the bushes along the
sides of the roads. Often these men
sally forth at night. Sometimes they
will fire at shadows but usually they
get their man when they single out a
victim.
OF Every Nationality.
AS the war progressed sniping be-
came common with all the nations en-
gagged in the conflict and today the
Turk and the Bulgarian are as expert
in this line as the Briton and German.
| The sniper carries match rifle with
elaborate sights but far more depends
on his own daring and cunning re-
source. He is usually a man without
fear and one who has perfect control
of his nerves. He rarely touches the
| trigger without accounting for a hui
man life. He is such a valuable asset
to the army that when he is stationed
in a trench he is treated like an East.
| ern sultan, If the trench is flooded
he stands in tub of straw heated by
braziers while his trench mates stand
ready to wait upon him at any time
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10

and keep them in water, in spite of
their long journey they will remain
for weeks as soberly gay as they are
now, and will bring to Milady's
boudoir a breath of the far away
forests and mountains.
This durability, coupled with their
beautiful bronze-green color and their
attractive heart shape has brought
galax leaves into wide favor for use in
floral decorations, as we'll as to fur
nish the green which sets off the
flowers of Milady's bouquet. AS a
result, in many parts of the Southern
Appalachians, where the mountaineer
must miss no chance to augment his
uncertain income, and particularly in
Western North Carolina, where the
best galaX is said to be found, hun
dreds of the mountain people have
come to depend largely upon the
money from the galax picking to
carry them through the winter
months.
| The leaves are gathered only in the
fall and winter and early spring. Dur
| ing the late spring and summer they
are soft and easily broken and conse-
quently perishable, but for the rest of
the year they are tough and leathery.
The color changes from green to a
deep bronze in the late fall or winter
and it is then that the leaves are
most highly priced. Some of the
densely shaded leaves do not change
their color and remain green the wear
round.
! Though the leaves are gathered by
the women and children, sometimes
| the whole family takes part in the
work, and the pickers leave their
cabins early in the morning not to
return until dark. Very often the
galax beds are considerable distances
from the mountaineer's cabin, and aft
er the long walk the pickers must
spend the day on the mountain in the
cold.
The leaves are pulled and not cut,
and care is taken not to break the
| stem, since leaves whose petioles are
broken soon wilt. Each picker car.
ries a large cloth sack into which the
leaves are put IS they are pulled. TIC
the ordinary person the speed with
|
remarkable. Some of them gather as
many as 1900 leaves in day, while
the inexperienced novices can hardly
pull thousand.
At night and on stormy days the
leaves are assorted as to size anG
color and tied into punches of q
leaves each. Forty of these bunche:
count as a thousand. the extra two
leaves to each bunch being required
by the dealers to cover any loss from
damage, since only perfect specimen.
are salable. The sorting is done a!
carefully as possible and takes almos
as much time as the gathering.
The usual price delivered at tn,
country stores which handle thu
leaves is twenty-five cents per thou
sand in trade, or twenty-three cent
per thousand in cash. Here at the stor,
the leaves are packed in crates o.
cases, holding ten thousand leave.
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10
5I2LOe~1 .C<xE22S I(
Z<5SZ~ [IS5>ZS/

officer who was lying prone among
the growing roots and with tufted
turnips stuck in the spike of his
helmet.
Extraordinary Hiding Place.
Often the sniper chooses unusual
places for his hiding place as was the
case of a German during the Gallopoli
campaign. This sniper did shocking
execution every evening and the Brit
ish were unable to discover his hiding
place. His bullets were examined and
were found to be from the German
service Mauser with probably a silence
attachment for each report was curl
ousIy faint. There were several or
ganized hunts for the man but with
no success. Finally a party of sol
diers laying telephone wires came
upon his LARA tomb in a cemetery
a grave with a hinged lid over it, an
inscribed cross and wreaths of flowers
fixed so that the most inquisitive eyes
could see nothing out of the ordinary.
The man was captured and his
grave" examined. 1t was found that
he had some two thousand rounds of
ammunition and over one hundred
identification discs taken from men he
had killed.
The art of camouf1age plays its part
in the sniper's work and many times
they are dressed in green from head
to foot even their faces being painted
with that color. This was first dis
covered by a French officer who
! thought the leaves on a tree were
unduly thick. He fired at the tree
when a Turkish sniper entirely clothed
in green tumbled down at his feet
Other Turkish snipers have been killed
who were clothed in straw or leaves
to harmonic with the hillside deserts
Turkish Women Expert.
Even the Turkish women have been
taught to play the game" and they
soon became experts. At one place
the British soldiers declared that an
evil spirit roamed about at night as
men who went out to draw water in
camp after dark never came back and
finally the we'll became known as 'the
well of DEATH" and the men were
panic stricken. The situation grew
intolerable and the officers decided
that a thorough investigation must be
made. While the men were hunting
there was flash from the dense
bush. They rushed the place anc
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10

ing for the trees in which the wild
bees make their hives. In doing this
they make use of the well-known fact
that a bee always flies home in di-
rect or "bee line"
The usual procedure is to find the
place where the bees come to water.
Sometimes the brush is cleared away
in order to open up a spot where the
bees can be watched. Occasionally
bait of honey or molasses is placed
nearby to attract the insects. Many
hunters watch bee and stick tiny
tuft of white rabbits hair on to it's
body in order that it may be clearly
seen. Other bee hunters rely on fol-
lowing the bees flight without this
assistance.
When the bee has drunk its fill it
rises into the air, and after circling
once or twice flies off on a straight
line for it's hive. The hunter notes
the course which the bee takes and
marks it with reference to high trees
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10

Spected.
The bee-trees are usually cut in the
spring or summer when the bees as
well as the honey can be saved. If
robbed in the fall or winter the bees
die of starvation. The mountaineer
makes "smudge" of damp bark and
wood which gives out a dense smoke.
This is placed so that the smoke
reaches the bees in the tree and tenn
porarily stupefies them. The tree is
then cut and the honey is gathered
into the various buckets, lard pals
and gourds which have been brought
along for the purpose. The bees are
scraped off into a covered receptacle
of some sort before they recover from
the effects of the smoke. After the
mountaineer's cabin is reached, they
are placed in an empty "bee-gum," or
hive. This is usually of the crudest
sort, and more often than not con-
sists of a hollow log in which small
sticks are inserted to support the
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10

leaves is packed in case. Oiled pa
per and damp moss are packed around
the leaves to prevent them from dry
ing out and the crate is started on its
journey to the distant city. Very
often the leaves must be hauled fif-
teen or twenty miles over the rough
est of mountain roads to the nearest
railroad.
Once at their far-away destination,
they are put to variety of uses.
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10
The Man Stalker of the
Army owHeHidesa and
Watches His Chance To
Pick Off Certain Officers
and Men Like the Scor-
pionHis Sting Invariably
Means Death.
Copyright, 1918, by The International
Syndicate.

MN THE ORGANIZATION of a well
n trained and well disciplined army
there are a number of men who
are especially skilled marksmen
and are known as sharpshooters or
snipers. Their duty is to secret them
selves and watch for opportunities to
kill the officers of the enemy and the
task is fraught with more danger than
that to which the ordinary soldier is
exposed. 1t is not long before the
locality from which the shots come is
discovered and then the sniper has
small chances for his life unless he
can manage to change his hiding place
after each shot. This is a difficult
thing to do when a thousand skilled
eyes and all kinds of mechanical con-
trivances are playing upon nearly
every spot on the battlefield.
Ancient SHIPPER.
Shipping is as old as war itself and
was practiced by the ancients who
had men who were experts with sling
shots hidden in trees, etc, during
wars. These men watched for the
The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-04-10
As 1t Appears To Us.

o woman, with new life athrob,
What is poor man to do?
You've got his ways. you've got his
job,
You've got his pleasures, too;
You've got his clothes, you've got his
club,
You've got his right to vote,
You've got him working as a sub.
In short-you'Ve got his goat.