The Brandon news. (Brandon, Miss.) 1892-1961, 1919-05-22

pound of sugar one-half pound Of
dried fruit, bar of ivory soap,
and four packages of union leader
tobacco. For bread there were
from eight to twelve boxes of
army hard tack. From this on,
we suffered little for food.
! Thanks to the excellent service
of the Red Cross, which our
people so ardently and patrioti-
cally supported. When / got the
first box, / was so nearly starved
that nearly killed my self eat
ing, but managed to live through
it all.
There were in camp, according
to the claims of Germans, about
$500 American soldiers, of whom
about $50 were noncommission-
ed officers, who did not have to
work.
The attitude of all the Germans
that we saw was that of despair.
They realized that they were
beaten, and were just holding out
as long as they possibly could.
They endeavored to find out
from us something about our
strength. They asked me how
many men we had. | replied that
we had about twelve million over
there. They asked how many
Indians we had, making TOM
ahawk signs as they inquired. /
told them we were a little short
on them, and had only about two
million. When asked how we got
our men across without the sub
marines sinking the ships, | told
them that we were not afraid of
their submarines but did our
travelling without worrying about
them, except now and then if they
got too annoying, we would stop
and sink half dozen of them.
They soon gave up the hope Of
getting any military information
from me and went about their
work and ceased to question.
The clothing of the German
men was ragged and Of poorest
quality to stand the severe winter
The guards about the camp were
old men. If they had not been
Germans, it would have been pa
thetic to see the old gray headed
men with torn clothing, shoes so
worn that the feet were nearly
bare, as they stood shivering in
the snow, and on guard about the
camp. Here we could read the
fate Of the Germans. The whole
nation was on the verge Of star
walton. They claimed that the in
fluenza which was claiming so
many thousands was nothing but
sickness brought on by
hunger, and the whole nation
wanted war to end. The children
were poor and emaciated, and
the old women would come a.
round the camp and beg us for
biscuit.
While we were in the camp we
had no work to do except the
little details common to the sol
diers' life, and Jared fairly we'll
to be captives. You can imagine
our happiness when the eleventh
day Of November came.
That same day American Off
GERS who had been captured took
charge of our camp, and our
spirits revived. We were allow
ed to go into the nearby villages
and buy what we could. A cigar,
dUOut l1hC du OlO vIIkluld
Cherot, cost us about IS pfennigs
or 19c.
The greatest wealth we had
though was the ivory soap that we
had been issued. A man with
bar of ivory soap was a young
fortune in itself. / took one bar
of ivory soap and got with it
merchandise to the value of 30
marks, and nine marks in change.
the pre-war value of the mark
was 23c. At any time one could
get an iron cross worth 20 marks
for one bar of soap. There was
no soap at all in the German
country. All material has turned
to the manufacture of munitions
of war.
We had the liberty of the camp
until December 8th., on which
Jo4n - 4..o:. f.o,~n +Lo C,.v:rc DaI