Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1918-06-05
GRAVES OF AMERICAN SOLDIERS
i: 70 BE DECORATED AS LONG
AS. FLOWERS BLOOM.
IOWA BOY WRITES OF
MEMORIAL DAY INCIDENTS
Rural France One Great Flower Gar
den and French Peasants Spend
Days Gathering Blossoms With
Which to Mar Graves Of Fallen
Yankees.


lBy C. c. Lyon, former Waterloo
Times Tribune Reuorter Now Witt
General Pershing's Army in France. J
With the American Army in France
Only few days ago l got letter
from America enclosing money order
for 81.
1t was signed by a mother whose 20
year-old boy was among the first to
die in battle on the American front in
France.
It am very poor and this is all I can
send but l do want my boy to have
some flowers on his grave this coming
Memorial Day" the letter ran. Would
it be asking too much of you. Mr.. Lyon,
to take this small sum and buy bou-
quet and place it on his grave?
IT pray that after this terrible war
is over that the body of my boy, as well
as that Of every mothers boy who
has given his life for his country, will
be brought back to America. l think
that is the least our government can
do in return for the sacrifices they
have made"
She gave me the name OF a regi-
mental chaplain. HE knows where NY
Robert IS buried and he will, 1 am
sure, take you to the spot"
The chaplain and rode out to the
iiiittiey cemetery where cests the body
not. only OF Roberts but OF scores of
other American boys who have done
their 'sbit" Our machine was full Of
howers-fowers for the most part
picked by the French peasants in the
fields and on the hillsides but two or
three miles back from the trenches.
~ One Great Flower Garden.
Rural France Is one great flower gar
den just now and the French peasants,
having been told of the significance Of
Memorial Day for American soldiers,
for days in advance could be seen
everywhere all thru the countryside
with their big baskets gathering the
wild flowers that grow in such abund-
ance.
ST want the finest and the largest
bunch can get for this poor boy whose
mother has written me-" told the chap
lain. II don't care what it costs; TIL
make up the difference out of my own
pocket"
The chay1a4n toft the story OF the
American mother and the money order
Cor 81 10 the French officer attached to
the regiment as an interpreter.
4 THE morning we started for the little
cemetery the latter came to us. accom-
panied by a Frefch woman bent with
infmnfttes Of age but the I'ossessor of
one az the most angelic faces I have
ever seem.
This old woman wants to furnish
the flowers for the grave OF the boy you
told me about" said the French off,
Ger. t.She knows the story"
The old lady placed the basketful of
flowers IN our machine and as she
did 10 she said to US thru the inter-
prefer:
MY heart bleeds for the dear moth
efs Of America whose boys have died
lie under our sod, SO many thousands
OF miles from their homes.
II can syurpathize with American
mothers because I too have suffered
Three Of my four sons and one Of my
two daughters have given their lives
in this war and my fourth son Is now
In a sector where the fighting is heavi-
est. My daughter was a Red Cross
nurse. and she was killed when the
Germans one day bombed the hospital
in which she was working.
MY children, too, are all buried far
from home. That Is one Of the cruelest
things about war. One Of my boys lies
in Flanders, another along the Somne
and the third in Serbia, my daughter
in northern France. I, too, hope and
pray that the day will come when
they'll rest here near the little church
in their native village"
The old woman was crying like a
child when she finished this brief
speech.
"As Long as Flowers Grow"
I offered to pay her for the flowers
hurt. that should have suggested such
a thing.
Send It back to his mother in Amer
ica,". she said. "and tell her and all
other American mothers that as long as
flowers grow in our beautiful fields
there will always be many willing
hands to pluck them for the graves OF
their boys.
France can never repay America for
the help She Is giving us in this war.
If flowers from French fields can In
any way make America understand the
depth of our appreciation there will al
ways be plenty Of them for American
graves"
After the chaplain and I had thanked
her and had driven on he said to me:
You've got to get out among the
peasant folks Of France to find out the
real esteem in which we Americans are
held In this country. The city folks
like us, to be sure, but they don't show
their feelings like these simple country
:cik out here in the war zone.
Il predict that the day VIII come
when France viii observe an American
Memorial day for the American dead.
the same as we do back home. OF all
ga A Cudcua Soap