The Washington herald. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1906-1939, 1921-12-04
Starving Russians Abandon
Children When Hope Is Lost
Typhus- Stricken Victims Plagued With Yer
min in Hospitals Lacking Medicines, Beds
And Publications Exhausted.
By SIR PHILIP GIBBS.

and had sown 1901 for next yeafs
harvest They had taken 1900 pcoos
to feed the hungry who ar nov
hungry again.
visits Hospital at Ks.an-
went into a hospital at Kssan~
with an American ofScer-Colenel
Hsskell-who Is organizing work for
famine relief in Russia under the
Hoover agreement
He is man who wastes no time
in words. but gets sharply 70 the
truth and acts on the old Law that
he gives twice who gives quickly.
He Questioned the doctor at IL
hospital about the stock Of medicine
ae we stood in the. dispensary q
what once was a fine, well-eoutp~~A
hospital.
Have you any drussr
Very few"
Any ouininer-'
Amy Aspirin
ANY castor onr-
"A tiny drop"
The hospital had no drus, No
bandages, no gauze. no bedpsn, nc
soap. The reserves had been long
exhausted, as have all reserves in
Russia. "
sleeping -Four 10 BED.
In another hospital there y,r.
more dreadful conditions. ovine
10 lack Of fuel the patients v,r,
| crowded together in unventiist.d
rooms; the stencil into which I on
tered was worse than a bsttIen.td
| or unburieo dead. These wer. lJ,-
ing, suffering from many ois.,,.,
including typhus and dysenterv
but lay close to each Other. so
close they were four 70 a he'd in
some wards. Two were sieepins one
way up, two the other. Few had
blankets or bed covers. but Law N
their old clothes. fever strick.,
wasted.
They were mostly old women
win young children among them.
they seemed to have no confort
Of any kind except IN. fo.ti5
warmth OF the germ-inf.eteJ
rooms. The nurses waiting on tb.m
seemed hardly healthier.
/ ! noticed their wsx.n far. -
look of languor. II wss not sur
prising, for that morning they had
surrounded the American doctor
and said, We ara starving. Helm
Us 10 get bread. Our rstions do not
reach US. We have 70 cat som. Of
the patients food TO keep ourselves
I alive"
Clsmer for Bread.
They were like animals. tn, soc-
tor said afterwards. as he sto,p6
with them in the dark basement
ana saw their hands outstretched
TO him, their fingers crooked a.
though to grasp the bread which
they clamored for
To me these women seemed NOR.
like martyrs than animals. After
twenty minutes in those ward,
wanted TO escape and felt like
vomiting. But these young women
| stay In these pesthouses hungry
cold and comfortable, until thev
/ too or some OF them sicken and
die. II was not in the great hospitsI
at kazan but in a refugee home that
l saw one little nurse dying amonr
/ the patients.
She has caught typhu.." said
the doctor. she is rather bad"
Her face was red and blosted
as she lay on bare boards with
hundreds OF children I'll like her
self or suspected OF having typhus
There was not bed among them
They just lay on the floor without
covering except the rags in whic.
theE were abandoned by their par
ents.
] have already described on. Of
] these homes for deserted children
I Since then ] have seen many other.
! but none worse (though am ,old
/ there are worse) than this large
one at Kazsn. The children arrived
at the gate a NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS.
Two hundred-dsily and though the
director of this home is a man OF
order and sound ideas Of ssnitat io,
SO that the children are washed and
! sorted out for medical inspection
all methods are overwhelmed bv
pressure OF the new arrivals ans
lack of clothes for them. They are
all crawling with lice BY which.
/ typhus is carried.
Two little figures I saw yester-
day typify to me the TRAGEDY %,
Russian childhood on the eor. or
the famine. 1t was a boy and riri.
perhaps and 8 years Of age bv
the size of them. They were truds-
ing along, hand in hand = their
hands like bird claws
Deserted by Psre.ta
i could hardly see their face.
under their fur caps and above tn.
ragged sheepskins that fell in tat
tiers about their wiIened bodies.
but presently / saw that they
looked like an old man and woman.
at the end OF life's tether. They sat
down in a doorway and could 70
no further.
Abandoned children" said a man
by my side. / nodded
There are hundreds OF thousands
of them in Russia today, and Tn.
misery OF the peasant people who
love their little ones may be reck-
oned little by that frightful de-
sertion. 1t is better TO turn them
out in the streets where the Soviet
ofiscisls find them and take them
than to keep them in the cottages.
where there is no food and not
much hope. so far as / can see.
| (Copyrifht 1871