White Pine news weekly mining review. [volume] (East Ely, Nev.) 1910-1920, 1918-08-18

The following is Il statement by +.
{. Walcott. who served as an assist
ant 10 Mr.. Hoover during the time
America was doing all that vas pos
sihle to feed the starving millions of
Belgium and Poland and northern
France. In this work he was brought
IN direct contact with German military
officials. and saw the conditions which
The German invasion had created
among the civilian population:
7 Went TO Poland TO learn the facts
concerning the remnant of a people
hat I'D been deeimated by war. The
sou, ~ had been twice devastated.
Fl the Russian army swept through
and then the Germans. Along the
roadside from Warsaw to Pinsk. the
present firing line, go niles. nearly
aalf a million people had died OF hun
ger and cold. The way was strewn
with their bones picked clean by the
crows. With their usual thrift, the
Germans were collecting the larger
bones TO be milled into fertilizer, but
finger and toe bones lay on the ground
With the Undiscovered and rain-soaked
.lothing
Wicker baskets We're scattered along
he way-the basket in which the baby
swings from the rafter In every peus-
ant home. Every mile there were
scores of them, each one telling a
death. I started TO count. but after a
little I had to give.it up. there were
20 many.
That is the desolation one saw along
he great road from Warsaw to Pinsk.
nile after mile. more than two hum
ired miles. They told me a million
people were made homeless in six
weeks of the German drive in August
md September, 1916. They told me
four hundred thousand died on the
way, The rest, scarcely half alive,
got through with the Russian army.
Many of these have been sent to ST.
seria ii is these people whom the
Paderewski committee Is trying to re-
ieve.
In the refugee camps. 100000 sur
7ivors of the fight were gathered by
he Germans. members of broken fam
lies. They were lodged in jerry-built
barracks. scarcely waterproof. I'M
lighted. unwarmed in the dead of win
'er. Their clothes. where the buttons
we're lost, were sewed on. There were
30 conyeniences, they had not even
1een able TO wash for weeks. Filth
md infection from vermin were
spreading. They were famished, their
daily ration a cup of soup and a piece
Of bread as big as my fist.
In Warsaw. which had not been de-
stroyed, a city of one million inhab-
ltants. Of the most prosperous cit
ies of Europe before the war, the
streets were lined with people in the
bangs of starvation. Famished and
~rain-soaked. they squatted there, with
their elbows on their knees or lean
Ing against the buildings, too feeble
10 lift a hand for a bit of money or a
morsel Of bread II n offered 1t, per-
ishlng of hunger and cold. Charity
did what 1t could. The rich gave all
that they had. the poor shared their
last crust. Hundreds Of thousands
we're perishing. Day and night the
pictures is before my eyes-a people
starving, a nation dying.
The above statement by Mr.. Wal
colt Is a terrible arraignment Of the
Hun. but no more terrible than he
deserves. What has happened in
Poland. in Belgium, in northern
France and every other country that
has been blighted by the Huns pres
ence would happen in America should
the allies, by any chance, fall to win
this war. 1t would mean the enslave-
ment of American men, the starving
and death of American women and chill
dren. Either the Hun or humanity
must perish.