Free trader-journal. (Ottawa, Ill.) 1916-1920, 1919-02-27
SAYS PERSH|NG IS.
MIS|NF 0RMED ON
BREST CONDITIONS
LIEUTENANT JUST HOME TAKES
ISSUE WITH AMERICAN COM
WANDER ON CONDITIONS AT
A., FRENCH EMBARkATIoN POINT.

Springfield, H., 27.-General Per
shing is all wrong if he says the
American debarkation port at Brest,
France, is o. X, according to Lieut..
Ridgley Hudson, Springfield, recently
returned from France.
Hudson characterizes Brest as an
insult to the American people.
81 cannot believe that General Per
shing is correctly quoted as having
said that he personally visited the
camps at Brest and found them in
conditions good" said Lieut.. Hud-
son.
81 sailed from the port of Brest for
the United States on January 13,
1919. While in Brest | was quartered
at Camp Port Foye, which is a bar
racks for American officers. 1t is
built in hole about twenty feet be-
low the street level which looks like
an excavation for the basement Of
building and is largely filed with wa
ter. I went down the rickety stair
way leading down to this barracks
from the street level and in attempt
ing to enter the door of the building
stepped into a hole nearly two feet
deep filled with water, directly under
the sill of the door.
THE building is light frame
structure with no heating plant, no
plumbing and filled with cots on
which there are unspeakably dirty |
blankets. In the morning after the |
might of my arrival there, another |
officer came to me and told me that |
if | would convince the medical Of
ticer in charge that | was not in per
feet health he would give me special |
permission to stay in this barracks.
/ replied, What do you mean? Lie
t othe doctor, in order to stay in this
hole?'
He replied, Well, guess you have
not seen the other camps here. They
are so much worse than this there is
NO comparison
1.-THE two principal camps at Brest
aside from Porte Foye are Forte
Bougogne and Pontanazian Barracks.
The troops in these two camps are
quartered partly in old French bar
racks and to very large extent in
canvas tents with no floors and with
from four to eight inches of mud in
side of them as well as outside.
ut rains practically every day in
Brest and a great many men are
forced to sleep in these tents when
they are in very low physical condi-
tion, due to being convalescent from
and wounds.
For three months | was one of
thirty officers, who with $50 enlisted
men, formed the force of the base :
censor's office at Paris. 1t is the
business of this force to read the mail
coming from 100000 American sol
diers in France and to read 1t intelli-
gently. There is not department
Of this force which has not handled
thousands of letters complaining most !,
bitterly Of conditions of the camps at ,
Brest, and these conditions have ex-
listed since the first American soldier 4
arrived in France. !
IF General Pershing made the
statement that conditions at Brest
are anything but atrocious, he is the
first officer or man of the American
Expeditionary Forces who, to my
knowledge, has said or written such
a statement. The conditions of these
camps are a disgrace and an insult
to the American army and to the
American people, and all the state.
ments to the contrary which can be
made will not alter my opinion on
this subject, nor the opinion of any
one else who has ever actually been
In Brest."
/