Harrisburg telegraph. [volume] (Harrisburg, Pa.) 1879-1948, 1918-11-15
FRENCH REFUGEES
RETURN TO THEIR
RAVAGED HOMES
Live in Cellars and in Shelter
Tottering Walls of Their
Once Pretty Homes

Paris,-Carrying their little bun
dles OF household possessions, the
French refugees are returning to
their homes in Chateau 11hierry and
the little French villages around 1t,
to Vaux, Lucy, Belleau and the rest,
places now part of American his
tory,
They are coming back to ruins of
villages and houses demolished by
German or American artillery, to
live in cellars and in the shelter of
tottering walls until they can rebuild
pitiful spectacle,
Sometimes they find no home at
all, Never do they find any furnl-
turc, Often they find no food, and
then the American Red Cross steps
in and helps them, The woman who
can dig out her stove from n heap
of dirt and plaster and patch II up
again so that it will burn counts
herself inordlnately lucky, One wom-
an found remaining of all her house
hold goods Just one big salt-cellar,
Forks are worth their weight in gold,
and u feather bed Is priced above
rubies, Five thousand five hundred
blankets the Red Cross shipped out
to returning refugees In a single
week.
Aisne Villages Ruined
The people In the Aisne will not
be able to spend the winter In their
own villages. The villages on the
banks of the little Marne are too ut
terly battered by shells to afford
human habitatlon during the winter
weather, Now, while days are warm
and skies are blue. their owners can
find some tiny corner or other TO
live in. but tho rain and mud and
chilly damp of n French winter will
drive them-or if 1t does not Il pa
ternal government will send them
back to their temporary homes in
the uninvaded provinces to wait for
spring.
One purpose In sending them
home so quickly was to harvest the
wheat crops, but there was no food,
so the Red Cross established can
teens in many villages, and served
two meals q day free to those too
poor to pay, while others paid small
sums. Forty carloads Of food We're
sent to the Marne and the Aisne in
a single month. A grocery store has
been opened in Chateau Thterry,
which already is a busy town again,
though the walls of it's houses have
been shattered d and torn by shells.
To keep intruders out, tho residents
schawl on their homes in chalk, Pro
prietor returned" or House occu-
pied"
Rolling stores on trucks tour
through the villages in the valleys
of the Oise and Aisne to supply the
returning refugees with food, cloth
ing and household utensils. De-
mands come for coffee mills, scrub
bing brushes pals, knives, forks,
spoons and pots for the people taxi
ing up housekeeping again, as liter
when they fled has been destroyed
or carried away to Germany.
Refugees Return TO Amiens
To Amiens the refugees are just
beginning to return. but they will
come soon in large numbers, and
they will find the Red Cross ready
to receive them. There is big build
ing in Amiens that was a boys
school in those half-forgotten days
when the city was not under shell
fire. 1t belongs to the Red Cross
now, and its classrooms are turned
to strange uses. There is big
"Salle de reception" where the re-
turning refugees are sorted out and
their needs ascertained. There is q
canteen that serves two hot, nour-
ishing meals a day. There is a long
dormitory, with beds for the weary
ones who come back to find empty
rooms and roofless houses. There
are two dispensaries, and dispensary
doctors find much to do in n country
where people live precarious. hand
to-mouth eXistences.
The Red Cross workers furnish
clothing to the shivering. shabby
people. warm flannel shirts and un-
derwear, stockings and shoes and
sabots. Twelve thousand garments
went out from Paris in a single day.
And they furnish work for people,
who must have little money if they
are to live.
They have an extraordinary way.
those Picardy peasants, of accepting
facts. They go back to live under
impossible conditions as if it were
the most natural thing in the world.
1t never occurs to them to do any,
thing else. There may be only one
wall of a house left, but 1t is home.
There are few days in which Ameri-
can resources and energy can be
better employed than in strengthen
ing n philosophy and courage like
that" says one Red Cross worker.