The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1918-09-27
Enormous Reserve
 Stocks of Outfits
 and Army Supplies

Tours, Central France, Sept. 25- (Correspondence of The ssociated Press)-The supply of clothing for American soldiers in France is main tained on a prodigious scale, for sol dier service is hard on clothes and shoes, and besides the million outfits always on hand there is the continual renewal and up-keep. This up-keep for a single month for the American force now in France is 300,O00 service coats, 100000 pairs of trousers, 200,- OOO overseas caps, 340,000 pairs of puttees 10000 pairs of socks, and o40,O0O pairs of field shoes, or about three million articles monthly of these six essentials, with long list of lesser articles.
 More is coming all the time," said one of the officers of the Quarter masters Department, ''but if nothing more was sent we would be in good shape to look after all requirements for the next three months"
 considerable part of the big re- serve stock must be kept at the hos pitals, where the calls come sudden WOunQeQ come in with clothing blood-soaked and muddy and most of 1t has to be renewed. So that ot a 10,O00-bed hospital there are 10000 complete outfits, besides a reserve of 10000 | more.
 Sizes and weights also greatly in | crease the requirements. There are some 70 sizes of army shoes carried. ! One soldier called for a 13 1-2 A, which was so beyond anything in the | millions of shoes on hand that he had l to be sent to an orthopedic hospital. It is estimated that about four pairs of | shoes per man are required for year which for an army of a million men means 100000 pairs of shoes. In underclothes, wool and cotton, light and heavy are carried, but the l soldiers seem to prefer wool even for | summer time.
 Looking ahead to the winter, 1t is calculated that 55,000 stoves will be needed to keep the troops warm | though the four or five months of cold weather, and some 10000 wood-cut- | ters will be required to produce the wood for heating. There are already 15,000 foresters at work, but as their l product is being used largely for buildings, more will be put on for the | wood-cutting and the total of enlisted foresters will reach 45,000.
 Wood is the chief dependence fol warming, as the 175, 5,000 tons of coa | brought in from England every month is used chiefly by the railroads ano ] constructive works. French forests are proving the main source of supply but Spain and Switzerland are also furnishing large supplies of lum. i Der.
 Every day a table is made up tc show the exact state of all the supplie: required by this big army. This ta. ble is a sort of barometer which gives warning of any shortage. But there is no shortage, and on the contrary al are articles considerably over-run tht provision for three months stock al
 ways ahead. Flour, for instance, i
 on hand much beyond the three months limit, and so are beans and to-
 bacco.
 It is known each day, too, whethe' the advance zone has it's required min
 imum of fifteen days of reserve stores
 the intermediate thirty days, and thu base ports forty-f1ve days-in all thret
 months of reserve supplies constant,
 on hand and constantly moving for
 ward as they come from America o1 the way to the fighting front.