The Lubbock avalanche. (Lubbock, Tex.) 1909-1922, 1919-03-06
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FOOD line IN England.

hands Of an enemy so cruel that throughout
the great war information was denied concern
ing the identity of prisoners in their clutches.
Appalling as il is the list of the killed and
of the wounded the number of those returned
as missing is still more terrible. According
to figures compiled by the Under Secretary OF
State for War in Paris and presented to the
Legislature of France the other day, that
country has $4,000 officers and men missing.
Great Britain's missing are still more numer-
Gus, amounting to 359, Ids The United States
has 1861 missing, that is to say, soldiers
and officers who have vanished from sight IN
the fighting.
That some of these 1861 missing doughboys
may still be living and may vet eventually
be restored to their homes is a possibility and
the Government may be relied upon to do
everything in its power to seek clues as to
their fate The British authorities, in defer
ence to vigorous demands in Parliament have
inaugurated most exhaustive search through
cut every corner and nook of Germany and
Austria-H Hungary, of Bulgaria and Of Turkey,
TO find out what has become of her missing
warriors. Our foes have shown such slnis-
ter ingenuity in devising horrible methods
Of warfare that they may be relied upon to
have invented all sorts Of equally resourceful
ways Of hiding prisoners.
A thousand chances may have beset the
paths of men reported missing lhey may
have lost their memory and be numbered
nameless, on the muster roll Of prison camps.
Over a million of Russian soldiers are known
to have succumbed to disease and maltreat-
ment in German prison camps, hundreds OF
thousands of them without being identified.
Again there may be hundreds of American,
British and French prisoners who as yet know
nothing of the safety that the armistice Of
fers them A host of possibilities will occur
10 the least ingenious mind.
Fifteen years after the German-Franco war,
of 1870 French soldiers who had been taken
prisoners at Sedan when Napoleon Ill. surren-
dered reached home like Rip Van Wrinkle, hav
ing been first of all reported missing and then
given up for dead Brought before court of
inquiry in Paris it was ascertained that they
had made themselves guilty Of trivial trans
gression of rules in the Teuton prison camps
while the war of 1870 was still in progress,
had been sentenced to fifteen years penal SER
vitude and had been kept at hard labor in Ger
man penitentiaries Yet at the treaty Of
Frankfort the German Government had SOL
EMMY pledged itself that every French pris-
cner had been released and a commission Of
French officers had been invited to visit Ger
many TO secure confirmation of these assur-
ances that bore the sign manual of Old Emper-
or William |, and of his Chancellor, Prince
Bismarck If | recall this it is in order to
show how utterly worthless and unreliable
are any pledges given by the Germans in the
matter and how much it is to be hoped that
the United States authorities will Join the
English and the French Governments in the
most relentless and indefatigible search of
every nook and Granny of Germany, Austria
Hungary. Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire
for those near 500 900 officers and soldier boys
over $4,000 of them Americans-who are
still recorded, missing.