VISCOUNT MILNER

The new British War Secretary in succession to Lord Derby. He had been a
member of the War Cabinet since its creation in December, 1916
(Central News)

GENERAL SIR W. R. MARSHALL

Commander in Chief of the British forces in Mesopotamia
(Central News)

CURRENT HISTORY

A Monthly Magazine of The New York Times

Published by The New York Times Company, Times Square,
New York, N. Y.

Vol. VIII.
Part I.   

25 Cents a Copy
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} No. 3
June, 1918

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Copyright 1918, by The New York Times Company. All Rights Reserved. Entered at the
Post Offices in New York and in Canada as Second Class Matter.

ROTOGRAVURE ILLUSTRATIONS

CURRENT HISTORY CHRONICLED

[Period Ended May 19, 1918.]

Summary of War Activities

Four weeks of comparative calm on the western front intervened after
the furious fighting that had continued throughout the preceding month.
The Germans made several desperate efforts to smash their way through
the British lines to the channel ports, but they failed. The British and
French lines stood firm as granite, and the enemy suffered frightful
losses. The battle lines remained practically unchanged.

From the English Channel to the Adriatic there was complete union of
the British, French, American, and Italian forces under a single
command; these forces, including reserves, were estimated at 6,000,000
men. No military event of importance occurred on the other fronts,
though the British made some further advances in Palestine and
Mesopotamia.

In political matters the month brought events of more importance,
chief of which was the renewal of an alliance between Germany and
Austria; this was accomplished at a meeting of the Emperors.

The acceleration of troop movements from the United States to France
was a feature of the month, the estimate for the four weeks running as
high as 150,000; it was semi-officially stated that in April, 1918, more
than 500,000 American soldiers were in France, and that by Jan. 1, 1919,
there would be 1,500,000 of our fighting men at the front, with 500,000
more at transportation, supply, and civil work; the speeding up of
shipbuilding and other war work was significant. The Third Liberty Loan
aggregated more than $4,000,000,000, with 17,000,000 subscribers,
proving a brilliant success. The President by proclamation extended
enemy alien restrictions to women also. A bill was passed enabling the
President to consolidate and co-ordinate executive bureaus, thus giving
him extraordinary executive powers. The sedition law was strengthened. A
new commercial agreement was made with Norway.

In Great Britain the chief event was the triumph of the Premier over
a military group that tried to overthrow his Ministry. There was a
recrudescence of the spirit of rebellion in Ireland. In France the
conviction of the Bonnet Rouge editors on a charge of treason deepened
confidence in the stability of the Government. The German penetration of
Russia continued, and all the evidence indicated that the country was
coming under Teutonic control, economically, industrially, and
financially. The humiliating peace forced on Rumania was ratified, and
the country passed practically under German and Austrian domination.

The month’s record of enemy U-boat losses strengthened faith that
this menace was being eliminated and that new allied tonnage would
exceed losses in increasing ratio from May 1, 1918.

The chief naval event was the daring British raid on the German
submarine bases at Zeebrugge and Ostend; the channel at the first named
port was blocked, and the harbor entrance at Ostend, by means of a
second raid, was partially blocked, resulting in a serious hampering of
submarine operations. The Italians penetrated Pola Harbor, May 14, with
a small torpedo boat and sank a 20,000-ton Austrian dreadnought.

Sinn Fein Plot Frustrated

During the night of May 18 the British authorities in Ireland
suddenly arrested at their homes about 500 of the leading Sinn Feiners
on the charge of having treasonable communication with the German enemy.
Among those arrested were the Sinn Fein members of Parliament, also the
conspicuous Irish agitators and irreconcilables, both men and women. A
proclamation was issued by the Lord Lieutenant declaring that a
conspiracy with Germany had been discovered, calling upon all loyal
Irishmen to assist in suppressing it, and urging voluntary enlistments.
It was believed that this prompt action had prevented a

contemplated uprising, which was being aided by German spies.
Comparative calm followed the arrests.

Foch’s Army Comprises All Races of Earth

It seems certain that never in the world’s history were so many
different races, peoples, and tongues united under the command of a
single man as are now gathered together in the army of Generalissimo
Foch. If we divide the human races into White, Yellow, Red, and Black,
all four are largely represented. Among the white races there are
Frenchmen, Italians, Portuguese, English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish,
Canadians, Australians, South Africans, (of both British and Dutch
descent,) New Zealanders; in the American Army, probably every other
European nation is represented, with additional contingents from those
already named, so that every branch of the white race figures in the
ethnological total. There are representatives of many Asiatic races,
including not only the volunteers from the native States of India, but
elements from the French colony in Cochin China, with Annam, Cambodia,
Tonkin, Laos, and Kwang Chau Wan. England and France both contribute
many African tribes, including Arabs from Algeria and Tunis, Senegalese,
Saharans, and many of the South African races. The red races of North
America are represented in the armies of both Canada and the United
States, while the Maoris, Samoans, and other Polynesian races are
likewise represented. And as, in the American Army, there are men of
German, Austrian, and Hungarian descent, and, in all probability,
contingents also of Bulgarian and Turkish blood, it may be said that
Foch commands an army representing the whole human race, united in
defense of the ideals of the Allies. The presence, among Foch’s
strategic reserves, of 250,000 Italian soldiers is peculiarly
interesting, as no Italian force at all comparable to this in numbers
seems ever to have operated on French soil, though French armies have
again and again fought in Italy. During the early wars of Napoleon this
was the case, and again in 1859, when the battles of Magenta and
Solferino gave names to two new shades of red. In 1870 also there were
French troops in Rome; their withdrawal, in the Summer of that year,
opened the way for the final union of Italy.

Meeting of the German and Austrian Emperors

The German and Austrian Emperors held a consultation at German Great
Headquarters on May 12 to discuss future relations between the two
empires. Emperor Karl was accompanied by Foreign Minister Burian, Field
Marshal von Arz, Chief of the General Staff, and Prince Hohenlohe,
Austrian Ambassador at Berlin. Germany was represented by Imperial
Chancellor von Hertling, Field Marshal von Hindenburg, General
Ludendorff, Foreign Secretary von Kuehlmann, and Count von Wedel,
Ambassador at Vienna.

According to an official statement issued in Berlin, all the
fundamental political, economic, and military questions affecting
present and future relations were thoroughly discussed, and “there was
complete accord on all these questions, tending to deepen the existing
alliance.” In many quarters the impression prevailed that the result of
the meeting was to define and recognize formally the subservient
relations of Austria-Hungary toward the German Empire. The State
Department at Washington made public a report based upon indications
given by the Berlin newspapers that the agreement made at the meeting
concerned three points:

1. The duration of the alliance was fixed for twenty-five years.

2. Germany and Austria-Hungary are to sign a military convention
imposing upon each much stricter military obligations than did the
preceding treaty.

3. The economic relations will be regulated so as to realize the plan
of Mitteleuropa.

A solution of the Polish question was also arrived at, according to a
newspaper statement published in Berlin, on the lines of complete union
between Austria-Hungary and Poland. Another message said that the German
and Austrian Emperors

had selected monarchs for Poland, Lithuania, Courland, and Esthonia. It
was officially stated that no actual treaty was signed.

One of the most interesting subsequent revelations was that King
Ludwig of Bavaria and King Frederick August of Saxony were also present
at the meeting at German Great Headquarters. Some of the reports
represented these two monarchs as having been present uninvited.

The Prince Sixtus Letter

Arthur J. Balfour, British Secretary of Foreign Affairs, replying to
inquiries in the House of Commons, May 16, stated that Emperor Karl’s
peace letter to Prince Sixtus, which had been received while Mr. Balfour
was in America, was a private letter written by Emperor Charles
to a relative (Prince Sixtus of Bourbon) and conveyed by him to
President Poincaré and the French Premier under seal of the
strictest secrecy, but with no permission to communicate it to any one
except the Sovereign and Premier of this country, [Great Britain.] The
letter was communicated to the French and English Premiers under these
pledges.

He stated that he had no secrets from President Wilson, and added:
“Every thought I have on the war or on the diplomacy connected with the
war is as open to President Wilson as to any other human being.” He
declared that he regarded the Sixtus letter as not a peace effort, but a
manoeuvre to divide the Allies. He declared that they were not fighting
for “a bigger Alsace-Lorraine than in 1870,” and added:

If any representative of any belligerent country desires seriously to
lay before us any proposals we are ready to listen to them.

Lord Robert Cecil, Minister of Blockade,
in the same debate, after indorsing
the preceding statement of Mr. Balfour,
added this reference to Russia:

We have no quarrel with Russia at all. On the contrary, with the
Russian people we have always desired to be on the closest possible
terms of friendship. We are anxious to do all we can to support and
assist the Russian people to preserve Russia as a great country, not
only now, but in the period after the war.

Lord Robert denied that Great Britain had any quarrel with the
Bolsheviki over their domestic policy, saying:

That is a matter for Russia, and Russia alone; we have no other
desire than to see Russia great, powerful, and non-German.

Attacks on Hospital Ships

The British Admiralty issued an official announcement on May 1,
stating that it was considered proved conclusively that the British
hospital ship Guildford Castle was attacked by a German submarine in
the Bristol Channel, March 10, and narrowly escaped destruction. At
the time the Guildford Castle was carrying 438 wounded soldiers and
flying a Red Cross flag of the largest size with distinguishing marks
distinctly illuminated. The attack occurred at 5:35 P. M., in clear
weather. Two torpedoes were fired. In evidence of attacks on hospital
ships the British Admiralty quotes the following extracts from the
German official message, sent through the German wireless stations on
April 24, 1918:

With respect to the results of the submarine war for the month of
march, the Deutsche Tageszeitung says: “Lloyd George and Geddes falsify
the losses of ships plying in the military service (? ignoring)
so-called naval losses, auxiliary cruisers, guard ships, hospital
ships, and very probably also troop transports and munition
steamers, that is to say, precisely that shipping space which is
particularly exposed to and attacked by the U-boats.

Two More Latin-American Republics Aligned
Against Germany

On April 22, 1918, the National Assembly of Guatemala declared that
that republic occupied the same position toward the European
belligerents as did the United States. Guatemala had broken off
diplomatic relations with Germany in April, 1917. On May 7 Nicaragua
declared war against Germany and her allies. The declaration was in the
form of a recommendation of President Chamorro, which the Nicaraguan
Congress adopted with only four dissenting votes. A further declaration
was adopted of solidarity with the United States and the other American
republics at war with

Germany and Austria-Hungary. Nicaragua was the twentieth nation to
declare war against Germany. Uruguay remains a neutral at this writing.
On April 12 the Government asked Berlin, through Switzerland, whether
Germany considered that a state of war existed with Uruguay, as stated
by the commander of a submarine who had captured a Uruguayan military
commission bound for France. The German Government replied on May 16
that it did not consider that a state of war existed. Chile refused to
ask free passage of Spain for a commission of Chileans who sought to
reach Germany, thereby indicating partiality to the Germans. Argentina
in the President’s message, delivered May 18, 1918, reaffirmed its
neutrality.

France’s Second Treason Trial.

Duval, who was director of the suppressed Germanophile newspaper,
Bonnet Rouge, was condemned to death May 15 by court-martial for
treason, and six other defendants were sentenced to imprisonment:
Marion, assistant manager, for ten years; Landau, a reporter, eight
years; Goldsky, a reporter, eight years; Joucla, a reporter, five years;
Vercasson, two years and $1,000 fine; Leymarie, former director of the
Ministry of the Interior, two years’ imprisonment and $200 fine.

The Bonnet Rouge was an evening paper of decided pacifist tendency,
which lost no occasion of belittling the military and political leaders
and policy, not only of France, but also of England. The attention of
the Government was drawn to it early in 1917, and its editor, Almeyreda,
and its manager, Duval, were under lock and key by August, 1917.

The police investigations showed that the Bonnet Rouge was to a great
extent dependent for its capital upon men whose ardor in the allied
cause had not been notable, and revealed the astonishing fact that M.
Malvy, as Minister of the Interior, had thought fit to subsidize the
paper to the extent of $1,200 a month and to encourage it in other ways.
It also became known to the public that Almeyreda before the war had
been in the closest contact with M. Caillaux and that he had received
from that politician, at the moment when Mme. Caillaux was being tried
for the murder of M. Calmette, the editor of the Figaro, the sum of
$8,000.

Duval, whose journeys to Switzerland had aroused the misgivings of
the Government, was detained at the French frontier station, searched,
and found to be in possession of a check for $32,800 drawn to the order
of a Mannheim banking firm, the business relations of which will appear
in subsequent trials. This check was photographed and was handed back to
Duval by some one of the French military or civil secret service
officials.

Almeyreda had hardly reached prison when he fell seriously ill and
was removed to the infirmary prison at Fresnes. There he died. The
official doctors first of all declared that he had been strangled, and
then gave it as their opinion that he had committed suicide.

Louis J. Malvy, who was at the time Under Secretary of the Interior,
and was Minister of the Interior under Ribot, will be tried by a
parliamentary court on the charge of having been in personal relations
with Duval and of having delivered to the Germans the scheme of the
abruptly ended French offensive in the Champagne in April, 1917.

The City of Amiens.

Amiens, the old capital city of Picardy, goes far back into the
military history of Europe. Probably deriving its name from the Belgic
tribe of Ambiani, it was the centre of Julius Caesar’s campaigns against
those warlike tribes. Several Roman Emperors had military headquarters
there, and it early gained importance as a bishopric. Evrard de
Fouilloy, the forty-fifth Bishop, began the great Gothic cathedral of
Amiens, one of the finest in the world, in the year 1220, the plans
being made by René de Luzarches, while the work was completed by
Thomas de Cormont and his son Renault in the year 1288, though the two
great towers were not finished until a century later. Because it is
intersected by eleven canals Louis XI. called Amiens “the little
Venice.”

Only second to the great cathedral in fame is the Hôtel de
Ville, built between 1660 and 1760, in which, on May 25, 1802, was
signed the famous treaty of Amiens, Napoleon’s brother, Joseph
Bonaparte, being plenipotentiary for France. The parties to the Peace of
Amiens were France, England, Holland, and Spain. To Holland were
restored the Cape of Good Hope, Guiana, and other colonies; France
received Martinique and Guadeloupe; Spain received Minorca; Malta went
to the Knights of Saint John of Jerusalem, while Egypt was restored to
Turkey. England was secured in the control of India, and received
Ceylon, (which had been first Portuguese and later Dutch,) and the
island of Trinidad. But many of these dispositions were greatly modified
thirteen years later, at the close of the Napoleonic wars.

In Amiens there is a famous Napoleonic Museum, which has many fine
paintings by Puvis de Chavannes, including “War,” “Peace,” “Work,” and
“Rest.” When, on Nov. 28, 1876, Amiens was captured by the army of the
Prussians all religious monuments, including the cathedral, were
scrupulously guarded against any possible damage, and the rights of
private property were respected. Another of the titles of Amiens to fame
is the fact that Peter the Hermit, leader of the First Crusade, was born
there in 1050.

The Rumanian Nation

Of the Emperor Hadrian’s colony of Roman veterans at the mouth of the
Danube there remain many architectural monuments, including parts of two
fine bridges across the great river, a
largely Latin in substance, and the name Romania.
The Roman colony spread through the Carpathians along the Roman road
into Transylvania. It was in part submerged by Hun and Magyar waves of
invasion, and the western part of the Rumanian people, west of the
Carpathians, is still under Magyar rule, while a small number of
Rumanians inhabit the Austrian crownland of Bukowina, once Rumanian
soil. The Turks, following in the track of the Huns and Magyars, once
more swept over Rumania and on toward Vienna and Russia, completely
submerging the Balkan Peninsula, with the exception of the Black
Mountain, Montenegro, held by Serbs.

In the nineteenth century the Balkan nations began to extricate
themselves: Greece, with the aid of France, England, and Russia; Serbia,
with the aid of Russia; and the two principalities of Wallachia and
Moldavia, which were later to become Rumania. In the wars of Catherine
the Great and Suvoroff, which Byron has embodied in his comedy epic,
making Don Juan take part in the siege of Ismail, Russia took from
Turkey the Province of Bessarabia, named from an old Rumanian princely
house and largely populated by Rumanians.

The western half of Bessarabia was taken back from Russia and
restored to Turkey after the Crimean War, immediately after which, in
1861, the two principalities were united in the single principality of
Rumania, under Colonel Cuza, a Rumanian, as Hospodar, or Lord, Turkish
suzerainty being acknowledged. In this way the strip of Bessarabia which
had been Russian for half a century became not Turkish, but Rumanian.
When Russia declared war against Turkey in 1877 she announced to Rumania
that she sought the restoration of her strip of Bessarabian land; and,
knowing this, Rumania became Russia’s ally in the war against Turkey,
with Prince Carol as commander of her forces, he being of the Roman
Catholic branch of the Hohenzollerns. In 1881 he took the title of King,
to which his nephew Ferdinand succeeded in 1914.

The Hetman of the Ukraine

Writing in 1818, Byron described Mazeppa as “the Ukraine Hetman, calm
and bold,” and it is to the period of Mazeppa and even earlier that this
title and office goes back. The word Hetman is of uncertain origin, but
is probably derived from the Bohemian Heitman, a modification of
Hauptmann or Headman. When the Ukraine, the “borderland,” was under
Polish suzerainty, in the period from 1592 to 1654, the epoch of “Fire
and Sword,” “Pan Michael,” and “The Deluge,” the Hetman

of the Cossacks, (a Tartar word,
kazak, meaning warrior,) was a semi-independent
viceroy.

After the acceptance of Russian suzerainty
by the Ukraine under the great
Hetman, Khmelnitski, in 1654, the title
and authority of the Hetman were at
first continued, but his power and privileges
were gradually curtailed and
finally abolished. It is not certain
whether the word Ataman is a modification
of Hetman or a Tartar title; at any
rate, we find the title, “Ataman of all
the Cossacks,” coming into use as an
appanage of the Czarevitch, or heir
apparent of Russia, somewhat as the
title of Prince of Wales is an appanage
of the heir apparent of England. The
Czarevitch was represented by Hetmans
by delegation, for each division of the
Cossacks, these divisions being military
colonies westward as far as the Caspian,
like that described by Tolstoy in his
novel, “The Cossacks.”

Writing in 1799, W. Tooke, in his
“View of the Russian Empire,” described
the insignia of the Hetman as
being the truncheon, the national standard,
the horsetail, kettledrums and signet,
a group of emblems strongly suggesting
Tartar influence; the dress of
the Cossacks was, likewise, borrowed
from that of the Caucasus Mohammedan
tribes, and in this Caucasian dress the
new Hetman of the Ukraine, Skoropadski,
took office at Kiev. His name indicates
that he is not a Ruthenian, (Little
Russian,) but a Pole. It has been a consistent
element of Austrian policy to
favor the Poles at the expense of the
Ruthenians, with the result that many
Poles are strongly pro-Austrian, and
hold high office under the Austrian
crown.

Precedents for a Separate Ulster.

When the Dominion of Canada was
formed by the British North America
act of 1867, it included only four
provinces, Upper and Lower Canada,
(Ontario and Quebec,) Nova Scotia and
New Brunswick. Provision was made
in the act for the voluntary admission
of Prince Edward’s Island, the Northwest
Territories and Newfoundland into
the Dominion. While the Northwest
Territories took advantage of this provision,
and are now organized as the
Provinces of Manitoba, British Columbia,
Alberta, Saskatchewan, Yukon and
the Northwest Territories, Newfoundland,
with Labrador, the latter 120,000
square miles in area, preferred to remain
outside the Dominion of Canada,
and has a wholly distinct Constitution
and administration, as independent of
Canada as is that, for example, of British
Guiana. Compulsion was never suggested
to bring Newfoundland and Labrador
within the Dominion of Canada,
though Labrador is geographically a
part of the Canadian mainland.

In Australia likewise the union of the
colonies was entirely voluntary. Five
of these, New South Wales, Victoria,
Queensland, South Australia, and Tasmania,
by legislative enactments, approved
by the direct vote of the electors,
declared their desire for a federal union,
and the Imperial Parliament gave effect
to this by the act of July 9, 1900. This
act provided for the inclusion of Western
Australia in the Australian Commonwealth,
if that colony so desired;
and Western Australia shortly expressed
and carried out that desire.

The population of Ulster in 1911 was
1,581,696, (that of Belfast being 386,947;)
the population of Newfoundland
with Labrador in 1914 was 251,726; the
population of Western Australia when it
exercised the option of inclusion in the
Commonwealth of Australia was 184,114;
it has since nearly doubled. A
similar case of separate treatment, this
time within the United States, is that of
West Virginia, which, in 1862, determined
to remain within the Union when
the rest of Virginia seceded. West Virginia
became a State on Dec. 31, 1862,
and was not re-integrated in the Old
Dominion at the close of the civil war.

Court-Martial in Italy.

Four principal Directors of the Genoese
Electrical Power Company,
named Königsheim, Ampt, Martelli, and
Hess, early in April were sentenced to
death by court-martial at Milan by being
“shot in the spine,” and a decoy girl

was doomed to twenty years’ imprisonment,
while three associates were relegated
to the galleys for life. It was
proved that the condemned men received
from Germany wireless messages, to be
forwarded to North and South America
for the purposes of its underseas campaign,
and incriminating letters of their
treasonable acts were discovered. Ampt
and his three co-Directors received a
decoration from the Imperial Government,
but were so successful in deceiving
the Italian Government that they were
subsequently decorated as Cavalieres of
the Crown of Italy.

American Trade Pact with Norway.

The signing of a general commercial
agreement between the United
States and Norway–the first agreement
of the kind to be entered into by America
with one of the North European neutrals–was
announced by the War Trade
Board on May 3, 1918. It was signed by
Vance McCormick, Chairman of the War
Trade Board, and Dr. Fridtjof Nansen,
the famous explorer, who was sent to the
United States at the head of a special
mission.

Under the agreement Norway is
assured of supplies to cover her estimated
needs so far as they can be furnished
without detriment to the war needs of the
United States and its allies, and Norway,
on her part, agrees to permit the exportation
to America and its allies of all Norwegian
products not needed for home
consumption. It is provided that none
of the supplies imported from the United
States or its allies or forwarded with the
aid of American bunker coal shall go
directly or indirectly to the Central Powers
or be used to replace commodities
exported to those countries. This applies
to anything produced by any auxiliaries
to production obtained under the agreement.
In consequence of the agreement
the War Trade Board announced on May
9 that exports to Norway were about to
be resumed.

Another result of the improved relations
between the two countries was the
chartering by the United States Shipping
Board of 400,000 tons of Norwegian sailing
ships, to be put in non-hazardous
trades, thereby releasing other ships for
traffic in the danger zones. This was
one of the most substantial increases
which the American-controlled merchant
fleet has received since its inception.

British Shipping Losses

In the May issue of the Fortnightly
Review of London appears the following
analysis of the gains and losses
of the British merchant navy since the
outbreak of the war:

During the first three months of 1918
the net losses were 367,296 tons; 320,280
tons were built and 687,576 were lost,
bringing the adverse balance on April 1,
1918, to 3,635,233 tons.

Great Britain’s War Expenses

The British Government has issued a
White Paper estimating the cost of
the war for Great Britain in the year

ending March 31, 1919, at $12,750,000,000, of which $9,305,000,000 is
allocated to navy, army, air service, munition and ordnance factories,
$205,000,000 to pensions, $750,000 to National War Aims Committee;
services not specified, (presumed to include shipping,) $500,000,000;
Treasury loans, $1,750,000,000; Board of Trade, $265,000,000; wheat
supplies, $230,000,000, of which $200,000,000 is the estimated loss on
the sale of the 18-cent loaf of bread. Subsidies toward the sale of
potatoes are estimated at $25,000,000; purchases of wool and other raw
materials are put at $40,000,000, payment to railways at $175,000,000,
and $25,000,000 for timber.

Hatred Between Italians and Austrians

The implacable hatred which has developed between Italians and
Austrians is illustrated by the following Italian
communiqué, issued in Rome on Feb. 11, in reply to the
Austrian Supreme Command’s denial that the Austro-Germans were first to
bombard cities from airplanes. It points out that the Austro-Germans
first bombarded Udine, Treviso, Padua, Verona, Venice, Ravenna, &c.,
massacring defenseless and innocent populations and ruining valuable art
treasures, and adds:

The Italians went to Trieste not to bombard citizens and private
houses, but the hydroplane stations in which are sheltered the assassins
of Venice, and the two vessels of the Monarch type which were kept by
the Imperial and Royal Navy behind the dyke, in the hope that the
Italian elements of the city would help to protect them and afterward
enable them to set out on some heroic enterprise against the defenseless
localities on the Adriatic Coast. Immediately the hydroplanes, yielding
to the indignation of the whole world, ceased bombarding Venice, and
immediately the two vessels of the Monarch type were removed from
Trieste, our aerial raids ceased, since an understanding was
proposed.

We wage war against the enemy’s armed forces, and not against women,
children, monuments, and hospitals. In spite of the most solemn denial
issued by the Austrians of the acts which, after the first bombardments
of Padua, Treviso, and Vicenza at the end of December and the beginning
of January, they declared to be a question of reprisals for
bombardments, carried out by Franco-British aviators on German towns,
the Germans, in substance, gave to be understood what the Austrians
hypocritically wished to hide, that is, that the pretext of reprisals
enabled them to persevere with their nameless atrocities, which had been
imposed upon them by some of their leaders having yielded to the
impulses of a criminal mentality. Thus it happened that the Austrian
Catholic command, bowing to the orders of the German Lutheran pastors,
bombarded Catholic churches in the Italian cities. And so we see the
Austro-Hungarian Government—so solicitous for peace and love
between nations—sowing hatred which nothing can quench.

The Origin of the Irish

Perhaps some light may be shed on the internal divisions which make
the solution of the Irish question so nearly impossible by a realization
of the fact that the population of Ireland consists of an unassimilated
congeries of races, every element of which except one represents foreign
invasion and conquest.

The earliest race, short, round-headed, dark, appears to be akin to
the Ligurian race of the Mediterranean; this race hunted the huge Irish
elks with flint arrows and axes, and may claim to be the real indigenous
stock, still surviving in the west. The second race, tall, dark,
long-headed, was akin to the Iberians (Basques) of Spain, who also
invaded Western France, and who probably built the cromlechs and stone
circles, since these are also found in Iberian Spain and Western France,
as at Carnac in Brittany. The third race, tall, golden-haired,
blue-eyed, came from the Baltic, bringing amber beads, and building
chambered pyramids, such as are also found in Denmark. The fourth race
to arrive included the Gaels, tall, round-headed, with red hair and gray
eyes; they came from Central Europe, probably by way of France.

Each new arrival was followed by wars of conquest, the Gaels finally
making themselves predominant, but not exterminating the older races,
examples of whom may still be found, with unchanged race
characteristics. In 1169 Norman French and Welsh came, as mercenaries in
the army of the King of Leinster. The Burkes are descended from the
Normans, the Fitzgeralds from the Welsh.

Battles in Picardy and Flanders

Military Review of All Fronts from April 17 to May 18, 1918.

In order to obtain a view of the situation of the German offensive on
April 17, which forms a background for the events to be related in this
review, it is necessary to point out a few controlling facts and
conditions—some long obvious, some recently revealed.

Ludendorff’s major plan, based on the assumed shortness of vision on
the part of the Allies, to separate the British from the French and, by
isolating the former in the north and driving the latter toward their
bases in the south, thereby reach the mouth of the Somme, had failed. It
had failed, just as did the plan of Napoleon at Charleroi in 1815 to
separate the English from the Prussians. It failed because the military
genius of the British General Carey and the French General Fayolle on
two separate occasions had closed up gaps in the line of the Allies, and
because the vast masses of German troops were incapable, on account of
their demoralization, of making the fractures permanent.

It is now evident that the demoralization of General Gough’s 5th
Army, which began on March 23, not only threatened his junction with
Byng’s 3d Army, by forming an eight-mile gap between the two—into
which, as has already been related, Carey moved his hastily gathered
nondescript detachment—but as the 5th Army retreated another gap,
gradually lengthening to nearly thirty miles, was opened between its
right wing and the 6th French Army. Here General Fayolle, who had just
appeared on the field from Italy, did with organized divisions what
Carey had done with his scratch volunteers further north.

DIAGRAM SHOWING 8-MILE GAP, MARCH 23, WHICH WAS FILLED BY CAREY’S “SCRATCH DIVISION,” WHO HELD THE BREACH FOR SIX DAYS

From statements made before the Reichstag Main Committee, but more
especially from letters and diaries found on captured German officers,
it appears that both Carey and Fayolle stopped an armed mob, utterly
incapable of taking advantage of the situation it had created as a
disciplined force. Regiments thrown together, officers separated from
their commands, detachments without control, all due to the impetuous
rush forward, could not recover in time to prevent Carey and Fayolle
from completing their work.

But Ludendorff’s major plan, having failed in the first month of his
offensive, could not be repeated in the second. Since April 30 there has
been no French, British, Belgian, Portuguese, or American front in
Flanders or Picardy—only the front of the Allies, with the troops
of their several nations used wherever needed by the supreme commander,
Foch.

During the first month of the offensive two angles had been developed
by Ludendorff: The first, the great one, in the south, from a base of
sixty miles with a forty-mile perpendicular and its vertex near the
Somme; the second in the north, from a base of twenty miles

with a fifteen-mile perpendicular and its vertex on the edge of the
Forest of Nieppe. Between these two angles the original front of Lens,
from Bailleul north to Givenchy, still held, fifteen miles in length.
There had been voluntary or forced changes made by the Allies east of
Ypres and east of Arras.

DIAGRAM OF CRITICAL SITUATION, MARCH 24, 1918, WHERE GENERAL FAYOLLE
SAVED THE DAY BY THROWING HIS DIVISIONS INTO THE THIRTY-MILE GAP LEFT BY
RETIREMENT OF BRITISH 5TH ARMY

The corollary in Flanders, unless it
could be demonstrated, would be as great
a failure as the main proposition in
Picardy. And the still possible successful
issue of the latter depended absolutely,
as we shall see, on a complete
demonstration of the former. Both
have been so far handicapped by the
augmenting mobility of the Allies, their
growing numbers, their centralized command,
and their successful insistence to
control the air.

Such was the situation in Flanders and
Picardy which confronted Ludendorff at
the dawn of the second month of the
German offensive. The whole problem
to be solved was just as apparent to the
Allies as it was to him—to gain the barriers
which threatened his angles of
penetration, in order again to utilize his
preponderant forces of men and guns on
a broad front. To attempt to extend the
vertices without broadening the sides
would mean to court danger, even destruction,
at their weakest points.

His frontal attacks upon Ypres and
Arras, respectively from the Passchendaele
Ridge and against the Vimy Ridge,

having failed, it became necessary to attempt
to flank the Allies by the occupation
of their defensive ridges. This explains
his successful assaults upon Mont
Kemmel, 325 feet high, and his desire
to envelop Mont Rouge, 423 feet high,
and his persistent attacks along the La
Bassée Canal against the heights of
Béthune, 141 feet, all preceded by diversions
between the Somme and Avre, with

concentrations at Villers-Bretonneux,
Hangard, and elsewhere.

PERSPECTIVE MAP SHOWING LOCATION OF OPPOSING FORCES IN PICARDY AND FLANDERS.
THE BLACK ARROW LINE ON THE RIGHT SHOULD NOT BE MISTAKEN FOR THE OLD
BATTLELINE, WHICH IS NOT INDICATED AT ALL. GENERAL SIXT VON ARNIM’S FORCE,
EAST OF YPRES, WAS INADVERTENTLY OMITTED

On April 18 the French made a feint
on both banks of the Avre River south
of Hangard, drove in a mile, and picked
up some prisoners; simultaneously the
Germans, with a force of 137,000, made
a heavy assault upon the allied front lying
across the La Bassée Canal, with a diversion
on the Lys River near St. Venant.

SCENE OF THE MONTH’S HEAVIEST FIGHTING IN FLANDERS, ESPECIALLY ABOUT MOUNT KEMMEL

Before the day was done they had
switched their attack to the Kemmel sector.
In all three places the Germans
suffered repulse, with the loss of a few
hundred prisoners. Four days later the
British advanced their lines on the Lys,
just as the French had on the Avre.
Then on the 24th came the great enemy
diversion at Villers-Bretonneux, nine
miles southeast of Amiens. Here the
Germans used tanks for the first time.
The village, lost to the British on the
first day, was recovered on the second,
when just to the south the French and
American troops were hotly contesting
with the Germans the possession of Hangard.
The sharp salient at this place
made it difficult for the Allies to hold,
while its retention, except as a site from
which losses could be inflicted on the
Germans, was unnecessary. Consequently
it was evacuated, after the attacking
detachment of the Prussian Guards had
been annihilated.

BATTLE FOR MONT KEMMEL

Meanwhile the Germans had been preparing
for a decisive assault against
Mont Kemmel with ever-augmenting
artillery fire and with the concentration
of vast numbers of troops on the sidings
of the railroad between the villages of
Messines and Wytschaete. These troops
numbered nine divisions, or about 120,000
men. From the 24th till the 27th they
incessantly swung around Mont Kemmel
in massed front and flank attacks, until
the French and British were forced to
give up the height, together with the
village of the same name and the village
of Dranoutre, retiring on La Clytte and
Scherpenberg.

The occupation of Mont Kemmel, however,
did not, as Ludendorff had anticipated,
force the British out of the Ypres
salient, for their voluntary retirement
from part of the Passchendaele Ridge on
April 17-19 had strengthened the salient,
which could hold as long as the line of
hills west of Kemmel held—Mont
Rouge, Mont Diviagne, Mont des
Cats, &c.

REGION OF HANGARD AND VILLERS-BRETONNEUX, WHERE GERMANS USED TANKS FOR THE FIRST TIME

The Berlin publicity bureau advertised the fact that a direct thrust
at Ypres had brought the Germans to within three miles of the
town—an achievement of no particular military value—while it
quite ignored the capture of Mont Kemmel, for the simple reason that its
value was now
discovered to repose in their ability to carry their occupation
throughout the entire range.

This they have since been vainly, except for local advances, trying
to do, often employing great forces of men in mass for two or three days
at a time—striving vainly to broaden the salient in three places:
between Dickebusch and Voormezeele, due south from Ypres; by an
envelopment of Mont Rouge to the southwest; on the south by an advance
in the direction of Béthune.

VON ARNIM’S EFFORTS

In the northern part of the salient the attacks reached their climax
on Monday, April 29, when General Sixt von Arnim’s army was hurled in
wave after wave between Voormezeele and Scherpenberg and on the latter
and Mont Rouge, only to end in a repulse, which, on account of the
number of men believed to have been lost by the enemy, may be considered
a disastrous defeat. All this time a heavy bombardment had been going on
in the Béthune region in preparation for an infantry attack
there; yet on account of the defeat further north, it could not be
delivered.

Henceforth, until May 16, von Arnim was obviously placed on the
defensive, whereas the Allies were locally on the offensive, either
recovering lost strategic points or consolidating their lines. On May 5,
between Locre and Dranoutre, the Franco-British forces advanced on a
1,000-yard front to the depth of 500 yards. On the 8th the Germans made
a half-hearted attack on the sector south of Dickebusch Lake and entered
British trenches, only to be repulsed with heavy loss. A similar attack
the next day between La Clytte and Voormezeele not only met with a
similar repulse, but was followed up by a strong British counterattack
which won considerable ground. On the 12th the French captured Hill 44
on the north flank of Kemmel, between La Clytte and Vierstraat.

On May 13 renewed enemy artillery activity on the lines back of
Béthune seemed to presage that an infantry attack was intended
there. Nothing of this nature ensued, however. On the 15th the Germans
made a sudden attack against Hill 44 but were hurled back by the French.
On the 16th-17th they maintained a concentrated fire north of
Kemmel.

GERMAN ATTACKS ON THE LYS

All these operations on the German northern salient, which is
gradually coming to be called the Lys salient, have shown no indication
of being intended to pave the way for a renewal of the general offensive
in Flanders. Their success might, and probably would, have forced the
evacuation of Ypres and affected the Picardy salient with its vertex
near Amiens, forcing the evacuation of Arras. But, as we have seen, the
operations on the Lys salient, meeting with an overwhelming obstruction
on April 29, did not achieve these results. Throughout the next three
weeks the manoeuvres of the enemy in Picardy afforded excellent
opportunities for counterattacks on the part of the Allies, whose object
here has been to punish the enemy as much as possible and to consolidate
every strategic position on a broad front in anticipation of a renewal
of Germany’s original scheme to isolate the allied armies north of the
Somme by a dash to the mouth of that river via Amiens.

In these circumstances, the enemy on April 30 launched heavy attacks
on the French lines in the region of Hangard and Noyon. These fell down,
and on May 2 the French made distinct gains in Hangard Wood and near
Mailly-Raineval. The next day the French advanced

their lines between Hailles and Castel, south of the Avre, and captured
Hill 82. On the 6th the British advanced their lines between the Somme
and the Ancre, southwest of Morlancourt, and in the neighborhood of
Locon and the Lawe River, taking prisoners in both places. On the 11th
skirmishes southwest of Mailly-Raineval, between Hangard and Montdidier,
developed into a pitched battle, in which the French at first lost
ground and then recovered it. On May 14 the Germans, after an intense
local bombardment, delivered a spirited attack on a mile front of the
British southwest of Morlancourt, gaining a footing in their first
trenches. Instantly some Australian troops counterattacked and
completely re-established the British positions. On the 16th and 17th
the enemy showed impressive and portentous artillery activity along the
Avre and at Rollott, on the Abbéville road, south of Montdidier,
similar in character to that observed north of Kemmel, on the Lys
salient.

There are now believed to be over half a million American rifles on
the western front, either at definite places or available as reserves.
On April 20 a battalion of Germans made a raid on our eight-mile sector
south of the Woeuvre, and succeeded in reaching the front-line trenches
and taking the village of Seicheprey. Our losses were between 200 and
300; 300 German dead were counted. A detachment of our army, principally
artillery, holds a sector of five miles with the French infantry east of
Montdidier, on the Picardy front, protecting the Beauvais-Amiens road.
Here their fire is principally employed in breaking up German
concentrations and transport in and around Montdidier.

THE ZEEBRUGGE RAID

The German submarine bases at Zeebrugge and Ostend on the Belgian
coast have been repeatedly bombed from the sea and shelled by British
monitors with indifferent results. With the adding of super-U-boats to
the German submarine fleet and the increased transatlantic traffic of
the Allies the necessity for effectually sealing these bases has long
been apparent. Theoretically the nature of the entrance to the harbors
of both places, resembling the neck of a bottle, about 250 feet wide,
made such a task easy by the sinking of block ships. Practically it was
most difficult, on account of both sea obstructions and the shore
batteries.

On the night of April 22-23 British naval forces, commanded by Vice
Admiral Keyes, with the co-operation of French destroyers, and hidden by
a newly devised smoke-screen, invented and here employed by
Wing-Commander Brock, attempted to seal up the harbors. At Zeebrugge the
enterprise was entirely successful. The Intrepid and Iphigenia were sunk
well within and across the narrow channel, the Thetis at the entrance.
All three were loaded with cement, which became solid concrete after
contact with the water and can be removed only by submarine blasting. A
detachment of troops was also landed on the mole from the Vindictive and
engaged the crews of the German machine gun batteries stationed there.
An old submarine was placed under the bridge of the mole and detonated.
A German destroyer and some small craft were sunk. Before the blockships
were placed a torpedo had been driven against the lock gates which lead
from the channel into the inner harbors. The expedition retired with the
loss of fifty officers and 538 men, of whom sixteen officers and 144 men
had been killed.

At Ostend, the entrance to whose harbor is protected by no mole, the
block ships Sirius and Brilliant were not effectively placed. Against
this port the experiment was, therefore, repeated on the night of May
9-10. The Vindictive, with a cargo of concrete, was planted and sunk at
the entrance to the channel, but not entirely blocking it.

ITALIAN RAID AT POLA

Another naval exploit of the month worthy of record was the sinking
in the Austrian Harbor of Pola of a dreadnought of the Viribus Unitis
class (20,000 tons) by Italian naval forces, in the morning of May 15.
The achievement was similar to that performed by the

Italians on the night of Dec. 9-10, when a destroyer sawed her way
through the steel net protecting the Harbor of Trieste and torpedoed the
predreadnoughts Wien and Monarch, (5,000 tons each,) sinking the former.
The Harbor of Pola, however, is much more difficult to penetrate. It is
three miles deep and entered by a two-mile channel, at certain places
less than half a mile wide, and protected along its entire course by
strong defenses. A mole covers its mouth, making the channel here less
than 1,000 yards wide. Forts Cristo and Musil guard the entrance.

CHARLES M. SCHWAB

Head of the Bethlehem Steel Works, who has been appointed Director
General of the Emergency Fleet Corporation to carry out the Government’s
shipbuilding program
(© Harris &
Ewing)

JOHN D. RYAN

President of the Anaconda Copper Company, who has been appointed
Director of Aircraft Production for the United States Army

MAP OF PALESTINE AND MESOPOTAMIA, WHERE TWO BRITISH ARMIES ARE AIMING AT BAGDAD RAILWAY

TEUTONIZING THE BLACK SEA

Save for the reports which have come to hand denoting the steady
progress of the British forces in Palestine and Mesopotamia, little of
importance has occurred in the Near East. Still the Teutonizing of the
Black Sea goes steadily on. On May 2 it was announced that a German
force had occupied the great Russian fortress of Sebastopol, famous for
its protracted siege by the British and French in 1855, and until then
considered impregnable. On May 12 part of the Russian Black Sea fleet
was taken possession of by the Germans at that place, while the
remainder escaped to Novorossysk. Among the captured vessels only the
battleship Volga and the protected cruiser Pamiat Merkuria were in
serviceable condition. At Odessa a new dreadnought and two protected
cruisers had already been seized by the Germans as they lay in their
slips.

In Macedonia the huge allied forces under the French General,
Guillaumat, are still waiting on events. The Greek Army is still in
process of reconstruction under the Venizelos Administration. The month,
however, has not been barren of engagements on this battleline. On April
28 the Serbians beat back attempts of the Bulgars to capture fortified
positions in the Vetrenik region; the French and British did the same in
regard to German attacks aimed at points west of Makovo and south of
Lake Doiran. So it has been all the month, the monotony only varied on
April 27, when there was intense artillery fire by the allied guns in
the neighborhood of Monastir, on the Cerna, and, in the Vetrenik region,
a Serbian assault annihilated a Bulgar section.

IN THE NEAR EAST

There has been no serious attempt on the part of the Turks during the
month to oppose the expansion of General Allenby’s front beyond
Jerusalem or the triumphant march of General Marshall up the Euphrates
and the Tigris—on the latter river now sixty miles below Mosul,
Marshall’s obvious objective. The objective of Allenby is Aleppo, where
there is said to be a single division of German

troops in addition to the Turks, who have been forced north from
Jerusalem. Allenby and Marshall are advancing along parallel lines with
a desert space of about 400 miles between. The Turks and their ally
still have possession of the caravan trail and the partly built and
entirely surveyed Bagdad Railway, which intersect the prospective
parallel paths of Allenby and Marshall, whose lines of communication
already reach hundreds of miles to the rear. But while Allenby has a
lateral sea communication with Syrian ports, no such advantage is
enjoyed by Marshall, who must get all his supplies from the head of the
Persian Gulf, 450 miles to the south. Whatever be the force at the
disposition of the enemy, it is evident that he will continue to possess
a predominating tactical and strategic advantage until he has been
decisively defeated at both Aleppo and Mosul or a junction has been
established between Allenby and Marshall, or both.

SCENE OF LATEST ITALIAN FIGHTING IN THE ALPS

The former’s line, which is a sixty-mile front, extending from Arsuf
el Haram on the Mediterranean east to the Jordan, took Es-Salt with
thirty-three German and 317 Turkish prisoners on May 1—twenty
miles north of Jerusalem—which was first occupied by Allenby early
in December.

Marshall’s advance has been much more rapid. In the week of May 1 his
cavalry, in pursuit of the fleeing Turks, advanced twenty miles and
captured 1,000 prisoners. On May 7 he was 80 miles from Mosul; on May 10
he was within 60 miles. Allenby is 300 miles from Aleppo and 110 miles
from Damascus.

ON THE ITALIAN FRONT

Without any large movements of troops taking place, several things
have occurred since April 18 to invite attention to the Italian front,
and much speculation by military men has been indulged in as to whether
the resumption of the Teutonic offensive would be from the Piave or
south from the Astico-Piave line lying across the Sette Comuni and the
Brenta, or from the west of the Adige and the Lago di Garda, in an
attempt to reach Brescia and the metallurgic centre of Italy.

And most of the things in question which have occurred have served to
restore and augment the confidence of the Italians in their position. A
new 2d Army has taken the place of the old, annihilated in the
Capporetto campaign. All the lost guns have been replaced and new
heavies added. Revolution is, at any moment, expected to break out in
Austria-Hungary, while the Congress of

Jugoslavs in Rome on April 9-11 has secured the adhesion to the Allies
of the subjects of the Hapsburgs and enabled the Italian Government to
make use of them as a fighting force. There are now believed to be no
German divisions on the Italian front, where the entire enemy strength,
not measurably increased since the snows have disappeared in the north,
consists of 800 Austro-Hungarian battalions, or less than 1,000,000
men.

But what has promoted most satisfaction in the Italian Government and
people was the decree issued by the Interallied Supreme Council of War
at Abbéville on May 3, giving General Foch authority to include
the Italian front under his supreme command, that front thereby becoming
the right wing of the allied battle line in Europe—now “one army,
one front, and one supreme command.”

That is the way Bonaparte fought his victorious battles in the days
of the First Republic, alternately on the Rhine and the Adige. Moreau
could not win without Bonaparte, nor Bonaparte without Moreau, while
Carnot, in the centre, was the vehicle of transit.

Before the snows made manoeuvres impossible the Italians had closed
two gates which threatened the plains of Veneto from the north—one
at the junction of the front with the Piave, one at the angle of the
Frenzela Torrent and the Brenta River.

Gunfire had been steadily augmenting on the front when, on May 10,
they closed another, and on May 15 still another. The first of these was
the capture of Monte Corno, which commanded the part up the Vallarsa,
the second was a partial recovery of Monte Asolone, between the Brenta
and the Piave, sufficient to cover the path up the Val San Lorenzo. Both
mountains are really plateaus of about two square miles area each, whose
irregular summits the enemy had strongly fortified in order to clear the
valleys below. In both places subsequent Austrian counterattacks were
broken up.

Meanwhile, Italian aircraft dominate from above. On May 14 the enemy
lost eleven airplanes with no losses to the Italians and the British,
who were assisting them.

Premier Lloyd George on German Autocracy

Premier Lloyd George wrote the following preface for a volume containing
extracts from speeches he delivered during the war:

I have never believed that the war would be a short war, or that in
some mysterious way, by negotiation or compromise, we would free Europe
from the malignant military autocracy which is endeavoring to trample it
into submission and moral death. I have always believed that the machine
which has established its despotic control over the minds and the bodies
of its victims and then organized and driven them to slaughter in order
to extend that control over the rest of the world, would only be
destroyed if the free peoples proved themselves strong and steadfast
enough to defeat its attempt in arms. The events of the last few weeks
must have made it plain to every thinking man that there is no longer
room for compromise between the ideals for which we and our enemies
stood. Democracy and autocracy have come to death grips. One or the
other will fasten its hold on mankind. It is a clear realization of this
issue which will be our strength in the trials to come. I have no doubt
that freedom will triumph. But whether it will triumph soon or late,
after a final supreme effort in the next few months or a long-drawn
agony, depends on the vigor and self-sacrifice with which the children
of liberty, and especially those behind the lines, dedicate themselves
to the struggle. There is no time for ease or delay or debate. The call
is imperative. The choice is clear. It is for each free citizen to do
his part.

The Greatest Battle of the War

Second Month of the Desperate Fighting in Flanders and Picardy

By Philip Gibbs

Special Correspondent With the British
Armies [Copyrighted in United States of America]

The May issue of Current History Magazine contained Philip Gibbs’s
story of the great German offensive up to April 18, 1918. At that time
the Germans were seeking to break the British lines in front of Ypres,
as part of their drive for Amiens and the British Channel ports,
generally known as the battle of Picardy. The pages here presented are a
continuation of his eyewitness narrative of the most sanguinary battle
in history.

April 18.—The arrival of French troops on our northern front is
the most important act that has happened during the last three or four
days, and it was with deep satisfaction that we met these troops on the
roads and knew that at last our poor, tired men would get support and
help against their overwhelming odds.

Beside the khaki army of the British has grown very quickly an army
in blue, the cornflower blue of the French poilus. They are splendid
men, hard and solid fellows, who have been war-worn and weather-worn
during these three and a half years past, and look the great fighting
men who have gone many times into battle and know all that war can teach
them in endurance and cunning and quick attack.

As they came marching up the roads to the front they were like a
streaming river of blue—blue helmets and coats and blue carts and
blue lorries, all blending into one tone through these April mists as
they went winding over the countryside and through French market towns,
where their own people waved to them, and then through the villages on
the edge of the Flanders battlefields, where they waited to go into
action under shell-broken walls or under hedges above which British
shellfire traveled, or in fields where they made their bivouacs, and
fragrant steams arose to one’s nostrils as cuistots lifted the lids of
stewpans and hungry men gathered around after a long march.

The attack this morning from Robecq, below St. Venant, down to
Givenchy, is a serious effort to gain La Bassée Canal and form a
strong defensive flank for the enemy while he proceeds with his battles
further north and also to get more elbow room from the salient in which
he is narrowly wedged below Merville.

For this purpose he brought up several more divisions, including the
239th, which was in the Somme fighting of March, but not heavily
engaged. This one attacked the British at Robecq and was repulsed with
heavy losses. It was at a place called La Bacquerolles Farm, near
Robecq, where after heavy shelling last night the enemy rushed one of
the outposts at 10 o’clock. In order to facilitate the attack this
morning of German divisions north and south at 4 o’clock the German guns
began a heavy bombardment of the British lines as far down as Givenchy
and maintained it for five hours, using large numbers of gas shells, on
account of the east wind, which was in their favor.

His guns shelled the bridges across the canal in the hope of
preventing the British supports going up. Then his troops came forward in waves
on a wide front. They were in immense numbers as usual, with many mixed
battalions. One of the British units today took prisoners from ten
different regiments. There were some ten German divisions facing four
British ones north of Béthune, and all along the line the troops
were much outnumbered; nevertheless, the enemy was repulsed at all but a
few points of attack and beaten back bloodily.

THE GHASTLY LOSSES

In this battle one regiment of the 42d German Division has lost over
50 per cent. of its strength, and other losses are on a similar scale.
These ghastly casualties have been piling up along this line between
Merville and Béthune since the 13th of this month, when the
Germans made a series of small attacks as a prelude to today’s battle,
owing, it seems, to battalion officers taking the initiative without
orders from the High Command, in order to push forward and break the
British lines if they could find weakness there.

On the 13th and 14th some of the South Country troops were attacked
by strong forces repeatedly, and on the second day for five hours at a
stretch the enemy endeavored to come across from houses and inclosures
west of Merville toward St. Venant. For those five hours the South
Country lads fired with rifles, Lewis guns, and machine guns into solid
bodies of Germans, and their field guns tore gaps in the enemy’s
formations and broke up their assemblies before the attacks could
proceed. One advance in five waves was mown down before it could make
any progress, and others were dealt with in the same way.

Mr. Gibbs describes the German repulse between Robecq and Givenchy
as a “black day for the enemy,” and continues:

April 19.—At the end of the day all the enemy’s efforts ended
in bloody failure, in spite of the daring and courage of his troops, who
sacrificed themselves under the British fire, but were only able to gain
a few bits of trench work and one or two outposts below the fortified
works at Givenchy, which are quite useless to them for immediate or
future use.

It was a big attack, for which they had prepared in a formidable way.
After the shock of their repulse by the Lancashire men of the 55th
Division they increased their strength of heavy artillery by three times
bringing up large numbers of howitzers, including eleven-inch monsters.
They were massed in divisions in front of us and determined to smash
through in the wake of a tremendous bombardment.

BRITISH UNDER FIRE

For five hours, as I said, this storm went on with high explosives
and gas, and the devoted British had to suffer this infernal thing, the
worst ordeal human beings may be called upon to bear, this standing to
while all the earth upheaved and the air was thick with shell
splinters.

But when the bombardment had passed and the German infantry came
forward the British received them with blasts of machine-gun fire,
incessant volleys of rifle fire, and a trench mortar bombardment that
burst with the deadliest effect among the attacking troops.

This trench mortar barrage of the British was one of the most awful
means of slaughter yesterday, especially when the enemy tried to cross
La Bassée Canal further north, and in that sector the infantry
and gunner officers say more Germans were killed yesterday along the
canal bank than on any other day since the fighting in this
neighborhood. One battery of trench mortars did most deadly execution
until their pits were surrounded, and only two of their crews were able
to escape.

The machine gunners fought out in the open after some of their
positions had been wiped out by gunfire, caught the enemy waves at fifty
yards’ range, and mowed them down; but the enemy was not checked for a
long time, despite his losses, and when one body fell another came up to
fill its place and press on into any gap that had been made by their
artillery or their own machine-gun sections.

There was one such momentary gap

between a body of the Black Watch, who had been weakened by shellfire,
and some of their comrades further north, and into this the enemy tried
to force a way. Other Scottish troops were in reserve, and when it
became clear that a portion of the line was endangered by this turning
movement they came forward with grim intent, and by a fierce
counterattack swept through the gap and flung back the enemy, so that
the position was restored.

Further north some Gloucesters were fighting the enemy both ways, as
once before in history, when they fought back to back, thereby winning
the honor of wearing their cap badge back and front, which they do to
this day. The Germans had worked behind them as well as in front of
them, and they were in a tight corner, but did not yield, and finally,
after hard fighting, cleared the ground about them.

Meanwhile further south some Lancashire troops on the canal lost some
parts of their front line under an intense bombardment, but still fought
on in the open, repulsing every effort to drive them back and smashing
the enemy out of their positions, so that only remnants of the German
outposts clung on until late last night, up to which time there was
savage strife on both sides.

FIGHTING FOR THE CANAL

Extraordinary scenes took place on the canal bank when the enemy
tried to cross. In the twilight of early dawn a party came out of a wood
and tried to get across the water, but was seen by the British machine
gunners and shot down.

Then another body of men advanced and carried with them a floating
bridge, but when those who were not hit reached the water’s edge they
found the bridge as fixed did not reach to the other side. Some of them
walked on it, expecting perhaps to jump the gap, but were shot off, and
other men on the bank also were caught under British fire.

A Corporal went down to the canal edge and flung hand grenades at the
Germans still struggling to fix the bridge, and then a Lieutenant and a
few men rushed down and pulled the bridge on to their side of the
bank.

Later this young officer saw one of the British pontoons drifting
down and swam to it and made it fast beyond the enemy’s reach, but in a
position so that some of his men ran across and caught the enemy under
their fire on his side of the canal.

At 7 o’clock yesterday morning, while a handkerchief was hoisted by
the enemy, three hundred of them made signs of surrender. Some of them
changed their minds at the last moment and ran away, but 150 gave
themselves up, and some of them swam the canal in order to reach our
side for this purpose. They were shivering in their wet clothes and in
the northeast wind, which lashed over the battle lines yesterday, and
they were very miserable men.

THE BELGIAN VICTORY

Mr. Gibbs declares that had the Germans been able to pass Givenchy
or cross the canal north of Béthune on the 18th and 19th the
result would have proved disastrous. He gives credit for the repulse to
the British and French combined lines. He thus describes the achievement
of the Belgians on April 17:

The Germans on the 17th pressed the attack in force against the
Belgians. Besides three regiments of the 1st Landwehr Division usually
holding this sector, between the Ypres-Staden railway and Kippe, they
brought up from Dixmude—poor Dixmude, into whose flaming ruins I
went when it was first bombarded in October, 1914—two regiments of
the 6th Bavarian Division, and from the coast the 5th Matrosen Regiment
of the 2d Naval Division, with a regiment of the 58th Saxons. It was a
heavy force, and they hoped to surprise and annihilate the Belgian
resistance by their weight and quickness of attack.

The Belgians were waiting for them, standing, too, in those swampy
fields which they have held against the enemy for three and a half
years, always shelled, always paying daily a toll of life and limb, not
getting much glory or recognition because of the great battles
elsewhere, but patient and enduring as when I knew them on the Yser in
the first dreadful Winter of the war, and their little regular army
fought to a finish.

Even before the battle the German marines,

Saxon troops, and Landwehr suffered misery and lost many men. They lay
out in the flat, wet fields two nights previously, and were very cold,
and scared by the Belgian gunfire which burst among them. They had no
great artillery behind them, and the Saxons and German sailors now
prisoners of the Belgians curse bitterly because they were expected to
get through easily in spite of this.

Germans Cut Off

The enemy’s intention was to take Bixschoote and advance across the
Yser Canal, driving south to Poperinghe. What they did by their massed
attacks was to penetrate to a point near Hoekske, southeast of Merckem,
the main weight of their pressure being directed along the Bixschoote
road. The Belgians delivered a quick counterattack, with wonderful
enthusiasm among officers and men. They had perfect knowledge of the
country, and used this fully by striking up from a place called Luyghem
in such a way that the enemy was driven toward the swamp, where any who
went in sank up to his neck in the ice-cold water.

The Germans were cut off from their own lines and trapped. Seven
hundred of them surrendered, men of all the regiments I have mentioned,
and they seemed to think themselves lucky at getting off so cheaply,
though they quailed when they were brought back through the towns behind
the lines, and the Belgian women, remembering many things, raised a cry
as these men passed. It was not a pleasant sound. I heard it once in
France when a German officer passed through with an escort. It was a cry
which made my blood run cold. But there is gladness among the Belgian
troops, for they had long waited for their chance of striking, and made
good.

Heroism of the Doctors

As heroic a story as anything in all this history of the last four
weeks is that of the medical officers, nurses, orderlies, and ambulance
men belonging to these casualty clearing stations, who were not far
behind the fighting lines when the battle began on March 21.

And then in a few hours they were on the
very edge of the enemy’s advancing tide, so
that they were almost caught by it and had
to make brave efforts to rescue the wounded,
save their equipment, and get away to a
place where for a little while again they
could go on with their noble work until the
red edge of war swept up with its fire again
and they had to retreat still further.

I used to pass very often the outer ring of
those casualty clearing stations on the right
of the British line beyond Bapaume, in
the Cambrai salient, and away toward St.
Quentin.

They were almost caught on that day of
March 21 when the infernal bombardment
was flung over a wide belt of the British
lines, and the enemy stormed the defenses
and the British fought back in heroic rearguard
actions. It became a question of only
a few hours, sometimes of the last quarter
of an hour, when these brave medical officers
with the nurses and orderlies could get away.

It is always the rule of patients first, and
at Ham there were 1,200 wounded, and many
others in other places. The railways were
choked with military transport or destroyed
by shellfire. On the roads refugees were
mixed up with the transport and guns and
troops. It was a frightful problem, but the
medical staffs did not lose their nerve, and
set about the business of removal with fine
skill and discipline.

Caring for the Wounded

What wounded could walk were gathered
together and sent on to the roads to make
their way back as far as their strength
would carry them. The badly wounded were
packed into all the available ambulances
and sent away. The equipment had sometimes
to be put on any train, regardless of
its destination. It was gathered in afterward
from whatever place it went to.

A casualty clearing station of 1,000 beds
needs 100 lorries to move it, but nine lorries
take a full kit for 200 beds, and always nine
lorries moved off first after the wounded to
take up a new station further back and carry
on. The medical officers looked after the
surgical instruments and trundled them along
the roads on wheeled stretchers. One officer
went twenty-five miles this way and another
seventeen miles. The sisters, after the
wounded had left, were put on any vehicle
going back from the battleline.

During these days I saw them squeezed between
drivers and men on motor lorries, sitting
among the Tommies in transport
wagons, one at least on a gun limber, and
others perched on top of forage, still merry
and bright in spite of all the tragedy about
them, because that is their training and their
faith.

In this retreat one poor sister was killed
and another wounded. Many of them, with
the medical officers, lost their kits. At
Achiet le Grand, on March 21, a shell killed
eight orderlies and blew out the back of the
operating theatre, and at another village on a
second night, three ambulances were smashed
up by bombs. Two drivers, with some of
their patients, were killed, but all the
wounded were brought away from the outer
ring of casualty clearing stations safely, and
then from the second ring through Roye and
Marincourt, Dernacourt, and Aveluy.

At Roye there was no time to spare, owing
to the enemy’s rapid advance, and seventy
patients remained with a medical officer and
twelve orderlies until they could be rescued,
if there was any possible chance. There
seemed at first no chance, but on the way
back to Villers-Bretonneux the medical officer

in command of the first convoy met some
motor ambulances and begged the drivers
to go into Roye and rescue those who had
been left behind. They went bravely and
brought away all the wounded and the staff,
and had no time to spare, because the last
ambulance came under the German rifle fire.

It is a strange and wonderful thing that the
patients do not seem to be harmed in any
way by this excitement and fatigue, and one
of the chiefs who made a tour of inspection
of all his clearing stations at this time tells
us he found all the wounded in good condition
and apparently no worse for their experience.

Fall of Villers-Bretonneux

On April 24 the Germans attacked the important
village of Villers-Bretonneux, near
Amiens; it is on a hill above the Somme, and
was used as a corps headquarters and administrative
office by the British. The attack
was in great force, including tanks, the
first time they had been used by the Germans.

The initial assault was a success and the
Germans took the village and advanced
nearly a mile beyond—but let Mr. Gibbs tell
the rest:

During the night they were driven out by
Australian troops, who, by a most skillful
and daring piece of generalship, were sent
forward in the darkness without preliminary
artillery preparation, and, relying absolutely
on the weapons they carried to regain this
important portion, which gave the enemy full
observation of the British positions on both
sides of the Somme Valley beyond Amiens.

The splendid courage of the Australian
troops, the cunning of their machine gunners,
and the fine leadership of their officers
achieved success, and, in conjunction with
English battalions, they spent the night clearing
out the enemy from the village, where
he made a desperate resistance, and brought
back altogether
something like 700 or 800
prisoners.

It was a complete reversal of fortune for
the enemy, and in this twenty-four hours
of fighting he has lost great numbers of
men, whose bodies lie in heaps between Villers-Bretonneux
and Warfusee and all about
the ruins and fields in that neighborhood.

First German Tanks

The attack on Villers-Bretonneux was made
by four divisions. They were the 4th Guards,
the 77th, quite new to this phase of the war,
the 228th, and the 243d. They were in the
full strength of divisions, twelve regiments
in each, and a great weight of men on such a
narrow front against one British division,
whose men had already been under frightful
fire and had been living in clouds of poison
gas with masks on.

An officer of the Middlesex was in a bit
of a trench when the first German tank attacked
his men on the east side of the village,
and it went right over him as he lay
crouched, and traveled on, accompanied by
bodies of troops.

The Middlesex and West Yorks put up a
great fight but had to give ground to superior
numbers. The East Lancashires, who were
the garrison of Villers-Bretonneux, were also
attacked with great odds, and after a brave
resistance fell back with the general line,
which took up a position toward the end of
this first phase of the battle west of Villers-Bretonneux
and in the edge of Bois Abbé
to the left of it. Into this wood in the course
of the day a German patrol of one officer
and forty men made their way and stayed
there out of touch with their own men, and
were taken prisoners last night.

The Night Battle

The attack by the Australians was made
after 10 o’clock at night. It was difficult to
attack suddenly like this. There was no
artillery preparation. There should have
been a moon, but by bad luck it was veiled
in a thick, wet mist.

It was decided by the Australian General
that his men should go straight into the attack
with bayonet and machine gun, not
waiting for artillery protection which would
tell the enemy what was coming.

The plan of attack was to push forward
in two bodies and to encircle Villers-Bretonneux,
while some Northamptons and others
were in the centre with the order to fight
through the village from the north. This
manoeuvre was carried out owing to the
magnificent courage of each Australian soldier
and the gallantry of the officers.

The Germans fought desperately when they
found themselves in danger of being trapped.
They had nests of machine guns along the
railway embankment below the village, and
these fired fiercely, sweeping the attackers
who tried to advance upon them.

Those who worked around north and east
of the village also came under a burst of
machine-gun fire from weapons hidden among
the ruins and trenches, but they rounded up
the enemy and fought him from one bit of
ruin to another in streets which used to be
filled with civilian life only a few weeks ago
and crowded with staff officers and staff
cars, but now were littered with dead bodies
and raked by bullets.

The Australians captured two light field
guns, which the enemy had brought up in
the morning, according to his present habit
of advancing guns behind his third wave of
men, and several minenwerfer and many
machine guns.

Great Piles of Dead

During the night they and the English
troops seized over 500 men as prisoners and
sent them back, and several hundred seem
to have been routed out. Today, [the 25th,]
judging from these I saw myself, the living
were not so many as the dead.

It was fierce fighting in Villers-Bretonneux

and around it last night and this morning
the enemy fought until put out by bayonet,
rifle bullet, or machine gun. The Australian
officers say that they have never seen such
piles of dead, not even outside of Bullecourt
or Lagnicourt last year, as those who lie
about this village of frightful strife.

The German tanks, which were first seen
in this battle, though heavier than the
British, with bigger guns, have now beaten a
retreat, leaving one of their type in No Man’s
Land. The tank has a high turret and thick
armor plates, and is steered and worked on a
different system from the British. One of
them was “killed” by a tank of the old
British class, and then the British put in
some of the newer, faster, and smaller types,
which can steer almost as easily as a motor
car, as I know, because I have traveled in one
at great pace over rough ground.

These set out to attack bodies of German
infantry of the 77th Division forming up
near Cachy. It was a terrible encounter,
and when they returned this morning their
flanks were red with blood. They slew Germans
not by dozens nor by scores, but by
platoons and companies. They got right
among the masses of men and swept them
with fire, and those they did not kill with
their guns they crushed beneath them,
manoeuvring about and trampling them down
as they fell. It seems to have been as bloody
a slaughter as anything in this war.

Battle for Kemmel Hill

The furious battle for the possession of
Kemmel Hill, an eminence of strategic importance
in the Ypres region, occurred April
25, 26, and 27, and was as sanguinary as any
in Flanders. Although the Germans won the
hill, their victory involved such colossal sacrifices
that this deadly thrust ended their
serious offensive for the time. Mr. Gibbs’s
description of this battle in part follows:

After several attempts against Kemmel
had been frustrated the enemy all went out,
April 25, to capture this position. Four divisions
at least, including the Alpine Corps, the
11th Bavarians, and the 5th, 6th, and 107th,
were moved against Kemmel in the early
morning fog after a tremendous bombardment
of the Franco-British positions. It was a
bombardment that begun before the first
glimmer of dawn, like one of those which
the British used to arrange in the days of
their great Flanders battles last year. It
came down swamping Kemmel Hill so that
it was like a volcano, and stretched away on
to the British lines on the left of the French
by Maedelstede Farm and Grand Bois down
to Vierstraat.

Then the German infantry attacked in
depth, battalion behind battalion, division
behind division, and their mountain troops of
Alpine Corps and Jägers and Bavarians
came on first in the assault of Kemmel Hill,
which was not much more than a hillock,
though it looms large in Flanders, and in
this war. The French had suffered a terrible
ordeal of fire, and the main thrust of
the German strength was against them.

Foe Strikes in Two Directions

The enemy struck in two directions to encircle
the hill and village of Kemmel, one
arrowhead striking to Dranoutre and the
other at the point of junction between the
French and British northward.

In each case they were favored by fog and
the effect of their gunfire. They were able
to drive in a wedge which they pushed forward
until they had caused gaps. The
French on Kemmel Hill became isolated and
there was a gulf between the British and the
French and between the French left and
right.

On the hill the French garrison fought with
splendid heroism. These men, when quite
surrounded, would not yield, but served their
machine guns and rifles for many hours, determined
to hold their positions at all costs,
and to the death. Small parties of them on
the west of the hill held out until midday or
beyond, according to the reports of the airmen,
who flew low over them, but by 9
o’clock this morning, owing to the gaps made
by the enemy, the French main line was
compelled to draw back from Kemmel.

They inflicted severe losses on the enemy
as they fell back and thwarted his efforts
to break their line on the new defensive
positions. Meanwhile a body of Scottish
troops were seriously involved. Some of their
officers whom I saw today tell me the fog
was so thick, as on March 21, that after a
terrific bombardment the first thing known
at some points a little way behind the line
was when the Germans were all around them.

Germans Under Von Arnim

The German army of assault upon Kemmel
and the surrounding country was under command
of General Sixt von Arnim, who was
the leading opponent of the Allies in the
long struggle of the first Somme battles, and
whose clear and ruthless intelligence was
revealed in the famous document summing
up the first phase of that fighting, when he
frankly confessed to many failures of organization
and supply, but with acute criticism
which was not that of a weak or indecisive
man.

Under his command as corps commanders
were Generals Seiger and von Eberhardt,
and they had picked troops, including the
Alpine Corps and strong Bavarian and Prussian
divisions specially trained for assault in
such country as that of Kemmel. Their plan
of attack to strike at the points of junction
between the French and British east of
Kemmel, and also at the French troops south
of it, near Dranoutre, proved for the time
successful, and by driving in wedges they
were able to make the Allies fall back on the
flanks and encircle Kemmel Hill after furious
and heroic fighting by the French and British
troops.

The British now were in weak numbers
compared with the strength brought against
them. Their withdrawal to the new lines of
defense by Vierstraat and the furious attacks
across the Ypres-Comines Canal gave
the enemy some ground in the region of St.
Eloi and the bluff and the spoil bank of the
canal itself. It is villainous ground there,
foul with wreckage of the old fighting.

British troops and Canadian troops were put
to the supreme test of courage to take and
hold these places. The glorious old 3d Division,
commanded in those days of 1915 and
1916 by General Haldane, fought from St.
Eloi to the bluff, month in and month out,
and lost many gallant officers and men there
after acts of courage which belong to history.

German storm troops made three violent
attacks on Locre, which were flung back by
the French, with heavy casualties among the
enemy, and it was only at the fourth attempt
with fresh reserves that they were able to
enter the ruins of the village, from which
the French then fell back in order to reorganize
for a counterattack. This they
launched today at an early hour, and now
Locre is in their hands after close fighting,
in which they slew numbers of the enemy.

After their success on April 25, when they
captured Kemmel, the Germans have made
little progress, and, though there was fierce
fighting all day yesterday, they failed to
gain their objectives, and were raked by fire
hour after hour, so that large numbers of
their dead lie on the field of battle. At 4 in
the afternoon they engaged in fresh assaults
upon the positions near Ridge Wood, to
which the line had fallen back, but English
and Scottish troops repulsed them and scattered
their waves. It was a bad day for
them because of their great losses. The British
have broken the fighting quality of some
of the enemy’s most renowned regiments.

The Country Devastated

All the roads and camps around Ypres are
under a heavy, harassing fire once more,
Ypres itself being savagely bombarded by
high-explosive and gas shells, so that after
some months of respite those poor ruins are
again under that black spell which makes
them the most sinister place in the world.
Suicide Corner has come into its own again,
and the old unhealthy plague spots up by
the canal are under fire.

The enemy’s guns are reaching out to fields
and villages hitherto untouched by fire, and
these harassing shots, intended, perhaps, to
catch traffic on the roads or soldiers’ camps,
often serve the enemy no more than by the
death of innocent women and children. A
day or two ago a monstrous shell fell just
outside a little Flemish cottage tucked away
in an angle of a road which I often pass. It
scooped out a deep pit in the garden without
even scarring the cottage walls, but two
children were playing in the garden and were
laid dead beside a flower bed.

Yesterday a small boy I know went grubbing
about this plot of earth and brought
back a great chunk of shell bigger than his
head. Those are the games children play in
this merry century of ours. They are astoundingly
indifferent to the perils about
them, and sleep o’ nights to the thunder of
gunfire not very far away, or slip their heads
under the bedclothes when bombs fall near.

But older folk find this gradual creeping up
of the war a nervous strain and a mental
agony which keeps them on the rack. It is
pitiful to watch their doubts and perplexities
and their clinging on to their homes and
property. Shells smash outlying cottages to
dust with their people inside them, but still
the people in the village itself stay on, hoping
against hope that the Germans’ guns have
reached their furthest range.

“I shall not go till the first shell falls in
the middle of the square,” said a girl.

Another woman said:

“If I go I lose all I have in life, so I will
risk another day.”

They take extraordinary risks, and our
officers and men find some of them on the
very battlefields and in farmyards where
they unlimber their guns.

Heavy German Losses

The enemy’s losses in this continual fighting
have been severe. We have been able to
get actual figures of some of their casualties,
which are typical of the more general effect
of the British fire. Of one company of the
7th German Division which fought at St.
Eloi on Friday only 40 men remained out
of its full strength of 120.

The 4th Ersatz Division lost most
heavily, and a prisoner of the 279th Pioneer
Company, which relieved the 360th Regiment
of that division, says the average company
strength was fifteen men.

The entire regimental staff was killed by
a direct hit of a British shell on their headquarters
dugout near Cantieux. The same
thing happened to the battalion headquarters
of the 223d Regiment, which is now in a state
of low morale, having been fearfully cut up.

The 1st Guards Reserve Regiment of the
1st Guards Division, which was much weakened
in the fighting on the Somme and afterward
was sent to La Bassée, lost thirty-six
officers, including a regimental commander
and one battalion commander. These
losses are affecting inevitably the outlook
of the German troops on the prospects of
their continued offensive.

Prisoners from divisions which suffered
most confess they have no further enthusiasm
for fighting, and that their regiments can
only be made to attack by stern discipline
and the knowledge that they must fight on
or be shot for desertion.

On the other hand, the best German troops,
especially those now attacking in Flanders,
like the Alpine Corps and 11th Bavarian Division,
are elated and full of warlike spirit.

Even their prisoners profess to believe they

are winning the war and will have a German
peace before the year is out.

Desperate Fighting for Ypres

The Germans vainly launched desperate attacks
of unexampled fury against the British
and French lines in the Ypres region on April
29. Mr. Gibbs in his cable dispatch of that
date thus refers to these assaults:

It becomes clearer every hour that the enemy
suffered a disastrous defeat today. Attack
after attack was smashed up by the
British artillery and infantry, and he has
not made a foot of ground on the British
front.

The Border Regiment this morning repulsed
four heavy assaults on the Kemmel-La Clytte
road, where there was extremely hard fighting,
and destroyed the enemy each time.

One of the enemy’s main thrusts was between
Scherpenberg and Mont Rouge, where
they made a wedge for a time and captured
the crossroads, and it was here that a gallant
French counterattack swept them back.

The British had no more than a post or two
in Voormezeele this morning, and the enemy
was there in greater strength, and sent his
storm troops through this place, but was
never able to advance against the fire of the
British battalions.

His losses began yesterday, when his troops
were seen massing on the road between
Zillebeke and Ypres in a dense fog, through
which he attempted to make a surprise attack.
This was observed by low-flying
planes, and his assembly was shattered by
gunfire. After a fierce shelling all night, so
tremendous along the whole northern front
that the countryside was shaken by its
tumult, German troops again assembled in
the early morning mist, but were caught once
more in the British bombardment.

At 3 o’clock a tremendous barrage was
flung down by the German gunners from
Ypres to Bailleul, and later they began the
battle by launching first an attack between
Zillebeke Lake and Meteren. South of Ypres
they crossed the Yser Canal by Lock 8, near
Voormezeele, which was their direction of
attack against the British, while they tried
to drive up past Locre against the French on
the three hills.

The successful defense has made the day
most bloody for many German regiments.

Enemy’s Attacks Futile

In order to turn them if frontal attacks
failed against the French, German storm
troops—they are now called grosskampf, or
great offensive troops—were to break the
British lines on the French left between
Locre and Voormezeele and on the French
right near Merris and Meteren. That obviously
was the intention of the German High
Command this morning, judging from their
direction of assault.

So far they have failed utterly. They
failed to break or bend the British wings on
the French centre, and they failed to capture
the hills, or any one of them, defended by
the French divisions.

They have attacked again and again since
this morning’s dawn, heavy forces of German
infantry being sent forward after their
first waves against Scherpenberg and Voormezeele,
which lies to the east of Dickebusch
Lake, but these men have been slaughtered
by the French and British fire and made no
important progress at any point.

For a time the situation seemed critical
at one or two points, and it was reported
that the Germans had been storming the
slopes of Mont Rouge and Mont Noir, but
one of the British airmen flew over these
hills at 200 feet above their crests, and could
see no German infantry near them.

Round about Voormezeele, North Country
and other English battalions had to sustain
determined and furious efforts of Alpine and
Bavarian troops to drive through them by
weight of numbers, after hours of intense
bombardment, but the men held their ground
and inflicted severe punishment upon the
enemy.

All through the day the German losses have
been heavy under field-gun and machine-gun
fire, and the British batteries, alongside the
French seventy-fives, swept down the enemy’s
advancing waves and his masses assembled
in support at short range.

There is no doubt that the French guarding
the three hills have fought with extreme
valor and skill. For a brief period the Germans
apparently were able to draw near and
take some of the ground near Locre, but an
immediate counterattack was organized by
the French General, and the line of French
troops swung forward and swept the enemy
back. Further attacks by the Germans north
of Ypres and on the Belgian front were repulsed
easily, and again the enemy lost
many men.

French and British Valor

On April 30 Mr. Gibbs confirmed the details
of the disastrous German defeats on the two
preceding days and gave these further particulars:

It was the valor of Frenchmen as well as
Englishmen which yesterday inflicted defeat
upon many German divisions, and the Allies
fought side by side, and their batteries fired
from the same fields and their wounded
came back along the same roads, and the
khaki and blue lay out upon the same brown
earth.

I have already given an outline of yesterday’s
battle, how, after a colossal bombardment,
the German attack early in the morning
from north of Ypres to south of Voormezeele,
where English battalions held the lines,
and from La Clytte past the three hills of
Scherpenberg, Mont Rouge, and Mont Noir,
which French troops held to the north of
Meteren, where the English joined them;
again, how the English Tommies held firm

against desperate assaults until late in the
evening; how the enemy made a great thrust
against the French, driving in for a time between
Scherpenberg and Mont Noir until
they were flung back by a French counterattack.

In the night the French, who had now regained
all the ground that had been temporarily
in the enemy’s hands, made a general
counterattack and succeeded in advancing
their line to a depth of about fifteen hundred
yards beyond the line of the three hills, which
thereby was made more secure against future
assaults.

Deadly Machine-Gun Work

Meanwhile throughout the day the English
battalions had been sustaining heavy
assaults, breaking the enemy against their
front. The Leicesters, especially, had fierce
fighting about Voormezeele, where, as I told
yesterday, the enemy was in the centre of
the village. German storm troops advanced
against our men here and along other parts
of the line with fixed bayonets, but in most
places, except Voormezeele, where there was
close fighting, they were mowed down by
Lewis-gun fire before they could get near.
Line after line of them came on, but lost
heavily and fell back.

Over the ground east of Dickebusch Lake
some Yorkshire troops saw these groups of
field gray men advancing upon them, and the
glint of their bayonets, wet in the morning
mist, and swept them with bullets from the
Lewis guns and rifles until heaps of bodies
were lying out there on the mud flats in the
old Ypres salient. The most determined
assaults were concentrated upon the 25th
Division, but it held firm and would not
budge, though the men had been under fearful
fire in the night bombardment, and their
machine gunners kept their triggers pressed,
and bullets played upon the advancing Germans
like a stream from a garden hose.

The troops in the whole division yielded no
yard of ground and they hold that they
killed as many Germans as any battalion in
this battle. It was a black day for Germany.
More than ten German divisions, probably
thirteen, seem to have been engaged in this
attempt to smash our lines and encircle the
three hills. They included some of the
enemy’s finest divisions, so they lost quality
as well as quantity in this futile sacrifice of
man-power—man-power which seems to mean
nothing in flesh and blood and heart and soul
to men like Ludendorff, but is treated as a
material force like guns and ammunition and
used as cannon fodder.

Brilliant French Fighters

Referring to the French troops in this battle,
Mr. Gibbs wrote:

Today again I have been among the thousands
of French soldiers. It is splendid to
see them because of their fine bearing. They
are men in the prime of life, not so young as
some of the British and with a graver look
than one sees on British faces, when they
have not yet reached the zone of fire. They
are men who have seen all that war means
during these years of agony and hope and
boredom and death. They have no illusions.
They stare into the face of death unflinchingly
and shrug their shoulders at its worst
menace and still have faith in victory.

So I read them, if any man may read the
thoughts that lie behind those bronzed faces
with the dark eyes and upturned mustaches
under the blue painted helmets or the black
Tam o’ Shanters.

They are not gay or boisterous in their
humor, and they do not sing like the British
as they march, but they seem to have been
born to this war, and its life is their life, and
they are professionals.

The Tricolor passes along the roads of
France and Flanders, and French trumpets
ring out across the flat fields below Scherpenberg,
and all the spirit of the French
fighting men, who have proved themselves
great soldiers in this war, as for thousands
of years of history, is mingled with our own
battalions. Together yesterday they gave
the German Army a hard knock.

The British Guards

In his cable of May 1 Mr. Gibbs gave details
of the extraordinary heroism of the
British Guards. He related incidents which
had occurred April 11 to 14, after the Germans
had broken through the Portuguese in
their efforts to widen the gap between Armentières
and Merville by gaining the crossings
of the Lys.

The Grenadier, Irish, and Coldstream
Guards were sent forward along the Hazebrouck-Estaires
road when the situation was
at its worst, when the men of the 15th Division
and other units had fought themselves
out in continual rearguard and holding actions,
so that some of those still in the line
could hardly walk or stand, and when it was
utterly necessary to keep the Germans in
check until a body of Australian troops had
time to arrive. The Guards were asked to
hold back the enemy until those Australians
came and to fight at all costs for forty-eight
hours against the German tide of men and
guns which was attempting to flow around
the other hard pressed men, and that is what
the Guards did, fighting in separate bodies
with the enemy pressing in on both flanks.

Greatly outnumbered, they beat back attack
after attack, and gained precious hours,
vital hours, by the most noble self-sacrifice.
A party of Grenadiers were so closely surrounded
that their officer sent back a message
saying:

“My men are standing back to back and
shooting on all sides.”

The Germans swung around them, circling
them with machine guns and rifles and pouring
a fire into them until only eighteen men
were left. Those eighteen, standing among

their wounded and their dead, did not surrender.
The army wanted forty-eight hours.
They fixed bayonets and went out against
the enemy and drove through him. A
wounded Corporal of Grenadiers, who afterward
got back to the British lines, lay in a
ditch, and the last he saw of his comrades
was when fourteen men of them were still
fighting in a swarm of Germans.

Fought Back to Back

The Coldstream Guards were surrounded in
the same way and fought in the same way.
The army had asked for forty-eight hours
until the Australians could come, and many
of the Coldstreamers eked out the time with
their lives. The enemy filtered in on their
flanks, came crawling around them with machine
guns, sniped them from short range and
raked them from ditches and upheaved earth.

The Coldstream Guards had to fall back,
but they fought back in small groups, facing
all ways and making gaps in the enemy’s
ranks, not firing wildly, but using every
round of small-arms ammunition to keep a
German back and gain a little more time.

Forty-eight hours is a long time in a war
like this. For two days and nights the Irish
Guards, who had come up to support the
Grenadiers and Coldstreamers, tried to make
a defensive flank, but the enemy worked past
their right and attacked them on two sides.
The Irish Guards were gaining time. They
knew that was all they could do, just drag
out the hours by buying each minute with
their blood. One man fell and then another;
but minutes were gained, and quarters of
hours and hours.

Small parties of them lowered their bayonets
and went out among the gray wolves
swarming around them, and killed a number
of them until they also fell. First one party
and then another of these Irish Guards made
those bayonet charges against men with machine
guns and volleys of rifle fire. They
bought time at a high price, but they did not
stint themselves nor stop their bidding because
of its costliness.

The brigade of Guards here and near Vieux
Berquin held out for those forty-eight hours,
and some of them were fighting still when the
Australians arrived, according to the timetable.

Carnage Near Locre

Mr. Gibbs, in a dispatch dated May 3, gave
these vivid descriptions of the fighting in
the Locre-Dranoutre-Kemmel region:

On April 24 the German bombardment was
intensified and spread over a deep area, destroying
villages, tearing up roads, and making
a black vomit of the harrowed fields.
Dranoutre, Locre, Westoutre, and other
small towns were violently bombarded. That
night the French discovered that the Germans
were preparing an attack for the next
morning, to be preceded by a gas bombardment.
The officers warned all their men,
and they stood on the alert with gas masks
when at 3:30 in the morning thousands of
gas shells fell over them, mixed with high
explosives of all calibres up to the monster
twelve-inch, which burst like volcanic eruptions.

In the intensity of bombardment several
officers who fought at Fleury said: “This
is the most frightful thing we have seen.
Verdun was nothing to it.”

All the French troops jammed on gas
masks, and on one day put them on fifty
times, only removing them when the wind,
which was fairly strong, blew away the
poison fumes until other storms of shells
came. For nearly a week they wore them
constantly, sleeping in them, officers giving
orders in them, and the men fighting and
dying in them and charging with the bayonet
in them. It was worth the trouble and suffering,
for this French regiment between
Locre and Dranoutre had only twelve gas
casualties.

That morning the German attack fell first
on Kemmel Hill, which they turned from
the north, and two hours later, the bombardment
continuing all along the line, they developed
a strong attack against Dranoutre in
the south in order to take Locre and turn
the French right. Until evening the troops
on Kemmel Hill, with a small body of British,
still held out with great devotion in
isolated positions, but by 8 o’clock that
morning Kemmel Hill was entirely cut off.

Other British Units in Danger

This was a severe menace to their comrades
at Locre and southward, because both
their flanks were threatened. They did heroic
things to safeguard their right and left,
which again and again the enemy tried to
pass. I have already told in a previous
message how a gallant French officer and
a small company of men made a counterattack
at Dranoutre and held the post there
against all odds.

Up by Locre the commandant of the left
battalion found machine-gun fire sweeping
his left flank, and his men had to face left
to defend their line. Small parties of Germans
with machine guns kept filtering down
from the north and established themselves
on the railway in order to rake the French
with an enfilade fire.

One French company, led by devoted
officers, counterattacked there five times
with the bayonet into the sweep of those
bullets, and by this sacrifice saved their
flank. Another company advanced to hold
the hospice. There was desperate fighting
day after day, so that its ruins, if any bits
of wall are left, will be as historic as the
château at Vermelles, or other famous houses
of the battlefields.

French and Germans took it turn and turn
about, and although the enemy sent great
numbers of men to garrison this place they
never were able to hold it long, because always
some young French Lieutenant and a

handful of men stormed it again and routed
the enemy. When it was taken last on April
29, the day of the enemy’s severe defeat,
the French captured 100 prisoners in the
cellars there, and they belonged to fourteen
battalions of four regiments of three divisions,
showing the amazing way in which the
enemy’s divisions have been flung into confusion
by the French fire.

Under Constant Shellfire

On the morning of April 26 French companies
made six attacks, and in the afternoon
two more, and though their losses were
heavy, that evening both the village and
hospice of Locre stayed in their hands. That
night, their men being exhausted for a time
after so many hours under fire, they withdrew
their line a little to the Locre-Bailleul
road by the Château of Locre and west of
Dranoutre in order to reorganize a stronger
defense. The German bombardment slackened
on the morning of April 28 owing to fog,
and those few hours on that day and one
other were the only respite these French
troops had from the incessant and infernal
gunfire when, owing to open warfare, “en
rase campagne,” as the French call it, as in
1914, without a complete system of trenches
or dugouts or other artificial cover, they were
much exposed.

“There were ten big shells a second,” one
of these officers told me, “and that lasted,
with only two short pauses, for six days all
through the battle, and other shells were uncountable.”

The enemy had brought up light artillery
and trench mortars almost to his front lines
in Dranoutre Wood and other places and attempted
to take the French in an enfilade
fire from Kemmel, but by this time many
French guns were in position, reinforcing the
British artillery, and on the 28th they opened
up and killed great numbers of the enemy.

Allied aviators saw long columns of Germans
on the roads by Neuve Eglise and in
Dranoutre Wood, and signaled to the guns
to range on these human targets. The guns
answered. Masses of Germans were smashed
by the fire and panicstricken groups were
seen running out of Dranoutre Wood.

Night of Horror for Germans

That night the Germans seemed to be relieving
their troops, and again the French
and British guns flung shells into them, and
for the enemy it was a night of death and
horror; but the next day, the 29th, the enemy
made reply by a prolonged bombardment,
more intense even than before, and then attacked
with new troops all along the line.
But the French also had many fresh troops
in line—not those I met yesterday—who at 2
o’clock in the morning went forward into attack
and took back the village. This defeated
the enemy’s plan of turning the French
left.

All through that day the enemy’s desperate
efforts to break through were shattered, and
that night the French held exactly the same
ground as before and had caused enormous
losses to the German divisions, at least 40
per cent. of their strength, as it is reckoned
on close evidence.

That night even the German guns stopped
their drumfire, as though Sixt von Arnim’s
army was in mourning for its dead. It was
a night of strange and uncanny silence after
the stupendous tumult, but for those French
regiments who had been holding the line for
nearly a week it had been a day of supreme
ordeal.

Preparing for Another Advance

There were no general engagements during
the preceding five days nor up to May 18,
but incessant artillery fire was kept up and
raids were constantly made. On May 5 Mr.
Gibbs described the difficulties encountered
by the Germans in preparing for a new
advance:

The enemy has many divisions, both up in
the Flemish fields and on the Somme, divisions
in line and divisions in reserve—divisions
crowded in reserve—and there are few
roads for them down which to march. There
is not much elbow room for such masses to
assemble, and not much cover in trenches
or dugouts from high explosives or shrapnel.
So we pound them to death, many of them
to death and many of them to stretcher
cases, and relief comes up, gets wildly mixed
with the divisions coming down, and at night
there is mad confusion in the ranks of
marching men and transport columns, which
gallop past dead horses and splintered
wagons and wrecks of transport columns,
and among the regimental and divisional
staffs, trying to keep order in the German
way when things are being smashed into
chaos, while the Red Cross convoys are over-loaded
with wounded and unable to cope
with all the bodies that lie about.

This is what is happening behind the German
lines—I have not overdrawn the picture,
believe me—and it is upsetting somewhat
the plans of the high German officers
who are arranging things from afar through
telephones, down which they shout their
orders.

“The Drums of Death”

In his dispatch of May 9 the following was
written to describe the difficulties of the
Germans in reorganizing their battered
forces:

From many points the British have complete
observation of the enemy’s positions
there, as he has of theirs from the other side
of the way, and, needless to say, they are
making use of this direct view by flinging
over storms of shells whenever his transport
is seen crawling along the tracks of the old
Somme battlefields or his troops are seen
massing among their shell craters.

The town of Albert itself, where once until

recent history the golden Virgin used to
lean downward with her babe outstretched
above the ruins, is now a death trap for the
German garrisons there and for any German
gunners who try to hide their batteries
among the red brick houses. By day and
night their positions are pounded with high
explosives and soaked in asphyxiating gas.

I went within 2,000 yards of it yesterday,
and saw the heaviest work of the British
upon it. It was a wonderful May day, as today
is, and the sun shone through a golden
haze upon the town. As I looked into Albert
and saw the shells smashing through, and then
away up the Albert-Bapaume road, past the
white rim of the great mine crater of La
Boiselle to the treeless slopes of Posières, and
over all that ground of hills and ditches to
the high, wooded distant right, with its few
dead stumps of trees, it was hard to believe
that all this was in the area of the German
Army, that the white, winding lines freshly
marked upon this bleak landscape were new
German trenches, and that the enemy’s outposts
were less than 2,000 yards from where
I stood.

Fritz Having a “Thin Time”

Some siege gunners were lying on their
stomachs and observing the enemy’s lines for
some monsters I had seen on my way up, monsters
that raised their snouts slowly, like elephants’
trunks, before bellowing out with an
earthquake roar, annihilating all one’s
senses for a second. Some of the men passed
the remark to me that “Albert isn’t the
town it was” and that “Fritz must be having
a thin time there.” They also expressed
the opinion that the Albert-Bapaume road
was not a pleasant walk for Germans on a
sunny afternoon.

I did not dispute these points with them,
for they were beyond argument. Big shells
were smashing into Albert and its neighborhood
from many heavy batteries, raising volcanic
explosions there, and shrapnel was
bursting over the tracks in white splashes.

In describing the artillery fire which broke
up a threatened assault on May 5, Mr. Gibbs
wrote:

A new German division, the 52d Reserve,
and the 56th German Division prepared an
assault on Ridge Wood. All these men were
crowded into narrow assembly grounds and
did not have quiet hours before the moment
of attack. They had hours of carnage in the
darkness. British and French guns were
answering back the German bombardment
with their heaviest fire. French howitzers,
long-muzzled fellows, which during recent
weeks I had seen crawling through Flanders
with the cornflowers, as the French soldiers
call themselves, crowded about them on the
gun limbers and transport wagons and
muddy horses, and which had traveled long
kilometers, were now in action from their
emplacements between the ruined villages of
the Flemish war zone, and with their little
brothers, the soixante-quinzes, their blood-thirsty
little brothers, were savage in their
destruction and harassing fire.

I have seen the soixante-quinze at work
and have heard the rafale des tambours de la
mort—the ruffle of the drums of death—as
the sound of their fire is described by all soldier
writers of France. It was that fire, that
slashing and sweeping fire, which helped to
break up any big plan of attack against the
French troops yesterday morning, and from
those assembly places a great part of the
German infantry never moved all day, but
spent their time, it seems, in carrying back
their wounded.

Tragic Desolation of Arras

Mr. Gibbs on May 11 described a visit to
Arras, as follows:

Since the beginning of these great battles in
bleak, cold weather Spring has come, and almost
Summer, changing all the aspect of the
old battlefields and of the woods behind
craterland and of the cities under fire.

I went into one of those cities the other day,
Arras, which to me and to many of us out
here is a queerly enchanted place because of
its beauty, which survives even three years of
bombardment, and because of the many great
memories which it holds in its old houses
and streets and the sense of romance which
lurks in its courtyards and squares, reaching
back to ancient history before its death. For
Arras is dead and but the beautiful corpse
of the city that was once very fair and noble.

During the recent weeks the enemy has
flung many big explosive shells into it, so
that its ruins have become more ruined
and many houses hardly touched before have
now been destroyed. It was sad to see this
change, the fresh mangling of stones that
had already been scarred, the heaps of masonry
that lay piled about these streets that
were utterly deserted. I walked down many
of them and saw no living soul, only a few
lean cats which prowled about, slinking close
to the walls and crouching when a German
shell came over with a rending noise.

Bright sunlight shone down these streets,
putting a lazy glamour upon their broken
frontages and flinging back shadows from
high walls, except where shell holes let in
the light. The cathedral and the great Palace
of the Bishops were unroofed, with tall pillars
broken off below the vaulting and an avalanche
of white masonry about them. They
were clear-cut and dazzling under the blue
sky, and one was hushed by the tragic
grandeur of these ruins.

One of the British airplanes flew low over
the city, and its engine sang loudly with a
vibrant humming, and now and again the
crash of a gun or a shell loosened some stones
or plaster below its wings. Other birds were
singing. Spring birds, who are not out for
war but sweethearting in the gardens of
Arras.

America’s Sacrifice

By Harold Begbie

[By arrangement with The London Chronicle.]

One of the finest moral actions in this
war has been done by America.
It is action on a gigantic scale, and
yet of a directly personal character. Insufficient
publicity, I think, has been
given to this action.

Is it realized by the people of this
country that America has already saved
us from capitulating to the enemy?
Either we should have been forced into
this surrender (with our armies unbroken
and our munitions of war unexhausted)
or we should at this moment be
struggling to live and work and fight on
one-third of our present rations.

America is sending to these islands almost
two-thirds of our food supplies.
Sixty-five per cent. of the essential foodstuffs
eaten by the British citizen comes
to him from the American Continent.
This in itself is something which calls
for our lively gratitude. But there is a
quality in the action of America which
should intensify our gratitude. For
these American supplies, essential to our
health and safety, represent in very large
measure the personal and voluntary self-sacrifice
of the individual American
citizen. They are not crumbs from the
table of Dives. They are not the commandeered
supplies of an autocratic Government.
They represent, rather, the
kindly, difficult, and entirely willing
self-sacrifice of a whole nation, the vast
majority of whom are working people.

There is only one altar for this act of
sacrifice—it is the table of the American
working classes. And the rite is performed
by men, women, and children, at
every meal of the day, day after day,
week after week.

This act of self-sacrifice, let us remember,
is made in the midst of plenty. Well
might the American housewife ask why
she should deprive her children of food,
why she should institute wheatless and
meatless days, when all about her there
is a visible superabundance of these
things. Questions such as this are natural
enough on the other side of the Atlantic,
and on the other side of the American
continent, 5,000 miles away from the
battlefields of France.

But the citizens of America do not ask
such questions. With a cheerfulness and
a courage which are as vigorous as their
industry, and with a moral earnestness
which is by far the greatest demonstration
America has yet given to the world
of American character, these people so
far away from us on the other side of the
Atlantic have willingly and with no
coercion by the State denied themselves
for the sake of the Entente. They are
going short, they are going hungry, for
our sakes. They are practicing an intimate
self-sacrifice in order that we may
hold our own till their sons come to
fight at our side. All over America the
individual American citizen is making
this self-sacrifice, and making it without
a murmur. He is feeding, by his personal
self-sacrifice, not only these islands, but
France, Italy, and many of the neutrals.

This great demonstration of character
has had no other impetus than the simple
declaration of the facts by Herbert
Hoover, the man who fed Belgium.
Hoover has told his countrymen how
things stand. That is all. The Winter
of 1918, he declared to them, will prove
to mankind whether or not the American
Nation “is capable of individual self-sacrifice
to save the world.” His propaganda
has never descended to unworthy
levels. He has appealed always to the
conscience of his countrymen. He has
spoken of “a personal obligation upon
every one of us toward some individual
abroad who will suffer privation to the
extent of our own individual negligence.”

America has answered this appeal in a
manner which marks her out as one of
the greatest moral forces in the world.
It should be known out there, in the
farmhouses and cottages of the American
Continent, that the people of this
country are mindful of America’s self-sacrifice,
and are grateful.

GENERAL STAFF OFFICERS WITH PERSHING

Brig. Gen. Benjamin Alvord, Adjutant
(© Harris & Ewing)

Brig. Gen. Andre W. Brewster,
Inspector
(© Harris & Ewing)

Brig. Gen. Edgar Russell,
Signal Officer (Underwood from Buck)

Brig. Gen. Harry L. Rogers,
Quartermaster
(© Harris & Ewing)

PROMINENT IN WAR ACTIVITIES

Brig. Gen. B. D. Foulois,
Aviation Officer on Pershing’s Staff
(Press Illustrating Service)

Dr. F. P. Keppel,
Recently appointed Assistant Secretary of War
(© Harris & Ewing)

W. C. Potter,
Chief of Equipment Division of
Signal Corps
(© Harris & Ewing)

Brig. Gen. C. B. Wheeler,
Ordnance Officer on Pershing’s Staff
(© Harris & Ewing)

American Soldiers in Battle

How They Repelled an Attack at Seicheprey
and Fought in Picardy

[Month ended May 20, 1918]

Seicheprey, in the Toul sector,
was the scene on April 20, 1918,
of the most determined attack
launched against the American
forces in France up to that time. A
German regiment, reinforced by storm
troops, a total of 1,500, was hurled
against the American positions on a one-mile
front west of Remières Forest,
northwest of Toul, after a severe bombardment
of gas and high explosive
shells. The Germans succeeded in penetrating
the front-line trenches and taking
the village of Seicheprey, but after
furious hand-to-hand fighting the American
troops recaptured the village and
most of the ground lost in the early
fighting.

Next morning, after a brief bombardment,
the Americans attacked and drove
the enemy out of the old outposts, which
they had gained, and thus broke down
an offensive which, it was believed, was
intended as the beginning of a German
plan to separate the Americans and the
French. The French lines also were attacked,
but the Germans were repulsed
and the lines re-established.

The losses were the heaviest sustained
by Americans since they began active
warfare in France. In a dispatch to the
War Department General Pershing indicated
that the losses among his men
were between 200 and 300. According
to the German official statement 183
Americans were taken prisoner, so that
the American casualties apparently came
mostly under the heading of captured.
Official reports of the German losses, according
to a prisoner captured later,
gave 600 killed, wounded, and missing.

IN THE PICARDY BATTLE

“Franco-American positions south of
the Somme and on the Avre” were officially
mentioned for the first time in the
French War Office report of April 24,
indicating that forces of the United
States were there on the battlefront resisting
the great German offensive. The
report stated that an intense bombardment
of the positions all along this front
was followed by an attack directed
against Hangard-en-Santerre, the region
of Hailles, and Senecat Wood. The Germans
were repulsed almost everywhere.

Formal announcement that American
troops sent to reinforce the allied armies
had taken part in the fighting was made
by the War Department in its weekly review
of the situation issued on April 29.
“Our own forces,” the statement read,
“have taken part in the battle. American
units are in the area east of Amiens.
During the engagements which have
raged in this area they have acquitted
themselves well.”

UNDER INTENSE FIRE

Another heavy attack was launched
by the Germans against the Americans
in the vicinity of Villers-Bretonneux on
April 30. It was repulsed with heavy
losses for the enemy. The German bombardment
opened at 5 o’clock in the afternoon
and was directed especially against
the Americans, who were supported on
the north and south by the French. The
fire was intense, and at the end of two
hours the German commander sent forward
three battalions of infantry. There
was hand-to-hand fighting all along the
line, as a result of which the enemy was
thrust back, his dead and wounded lying
on the ground in all directions. The
French troops were full of praise for the
manner in which the Americans conducted
themselves under trying circumstances,
especially in view of the fact
that they are fighting at one of the most
difficult points on the battlefront. The
American losses were rather severe.

The gallantry of the 300 American
engineers who were caught in the

opening of the German offensive on
March 21 was the subject of a dispatch
from General Pershing made public by
the War Department on April 19. The
engineers were among the forces hastily
gathered by Major Gen. Sanderson
Carey, the British commander, who
stopped the gap in the line when General
Gough’s army was driven back. [See
diagram on Page 389.] During the period
of thirteen days covered by General
Pershing’s report, the engineers were
almost continuously in action. They
were in the very thick of the hardest
days of the great German drive in
Picardy.

General Pershing embodied in his report
a communication from General
Rawlinson, commander of the British
5th Army, in which the latter declared
that “it has been largely due to your
assistance that the enemy is checked.”
The report covered the fighting period
from March 21 to April 3. The former
date marked the beginning of the Ludendorff
offensive along the whole front
from La Fère to Croisilles. It showed
that while under shellfire the American
engineers destroyed material dumps at
Chaulnes, that they fell back with the
British forces to Moreuil, where the commands
laid out trench work, and were
then assigned to a sector of the defensive
line at Demuin, and to a position near
Warfusee-Abancourt.

During the period of thirteen days
covered by the report the American engineers
had two officers killed and three
wounded, while twenty men were killed,
fifty-two wounded, and forty-five reported
missing.

STORY OF CAREY EPISODE

A correspondent of The Associated
Press at the front gave this account of
the part played by Americans in the historic
episode under General Carey:

A disastrous-looking gap appeared In
the 5th Army south of Hamel in the
later stages of the opening battle. The
Germans had crossed the Somme at
Hamel and had a clear path for a sweep
southwestward.

No troops were available to throw into
the opening. A certain Brigadier General
was commissioned by Major Gen.
Gough, commander of the 5th Army, to
gather up every man he could find and to
“hold the gap at any cost.” The General
called upon the American and Canadian
engineers, cooks, chauffeurs, road workmen,
anybody he could find; gave them
guns, pistols, any available weapon, and
rushed them into the gap in trucks, on
horseback, or on mule-drawn limbers.

A large number of machine guns from
a machine-gun school near by were confiscated.
Only a few men, however, knew
how to operate the weapons, and they had
to be worked by amateurs with one “instructor”
for every ten or twelve guns.
The Americans did especially well in handling
this arm.

For two days the detachment held the
mile and a half gap. At the end of the
second day the commander, having gone
forty-eight hours without sleep, collapsed.
The situation of the detachment looked
desperate.

While all were wondering what would
happen next, a dusty automobile came
bounding along the road from the north.
It contained Brig. Gen. Carey, who had
been home on leave and who was trying
to find his headquarters.

The General was commandeered by the
detachment and he was found to be just
the commander needed. He is an old
South African soldier of the daredevil
type. He is famous among his men for
the scrapes and escapades of his school-boy
life as well as for his daring exploits
in South Africa.

Carey took the detachment in hand and
led it in a series of attacks and counterattacks
which left no time for sleeping
and little for eating. He gave neither his
men nor the enemy a rest, attacking first
on the north, then in the centre, then on
the south—harassing the enemy unceasingly
with the idea of convincing the Germans
that a large force opposed them.

Whenever the Germans tried to feel him
out with an attack at one point, Carey
parried with a thrust somewhere else,
even if it took his last available man, and
threw the Germans on the defensive.

The spirit of Carey’s troops was wonderful.
The work they did was almost super-natural.
It would have been impossible
with any body of men not physical giants,
but the Americans and Canadians gloried
in it. They crammed every hour of the
day full of fighting. It was a constantly
changing battle, kaleidoscopic, free-for-all,
catch-as-catch-can. The Germans gained
ground. Carey and his men were back at
them, hungry for more punishment. At
the end of the sixth day, dog-tired and
battle-worn, but still full of fight, the
detachment was relieved by a fresh
battalion which had come up from the
rear.

STAFF CHANGES

Major Gen. James W. McAndrew, it
was announced on May 3, was appointed
Chief of Staff of the American expeditionary
force in succession to Brig. Gen.
James G. Harbord, who was assigned to
a command in the field. Other changes
on General Pershing’s staff included the
appointment of Lieut. Col. Robert C.
Davis as Adjutant General, and Colonel
Merritte W. Ireland as Surgeon General.

The General Staff of the American expeditionary
forces in France, as the result
of several changes in personnel, consisted
on May 14, 1918, of the following:

President Wilson on May 4 pardoned
two soldiers of the American expeditionary
force who had been condemned to
death by a military court-martial in
France for sleeping on sentry duty and
commuted to nominal prison terms the
death sentences imposed on two others
for disobeying orders.

HEALTH OF THE SOLDIERS

Major Hugh H. Young, director of the
work of dealing with communicable blood
diseases in our army in France, made
this striking statement on May 12 regarding
the freedom of the American
expeditionary force from such diseases:

In making plans for this department of
medical work in France it had been calculated
by the medical authorities in
Washington to have ten 1,000-bed hospitals,
in which a million men could receive
treatment, but with 500,000 Americans
in France there is not one of the
five allotted Americans in any of the
hospitals now running, and only 500 cases
of this type of disease needing hospital
treatment, instead of the expected 5,000.

In other words, instead of having 1 per
cent. of our soldiers in hospitals from social
diseases, as had been expected, the
actual number is only one-tenth of 1 per
cent. There is no reason to doubt that
this record will be maintained. The hospitals
prepared for this special treatment
are to be used for other cases.

This means that the American Army
is the cleanest in the world. The results,
according to Major Young, have been
achieved by preventive steps taken by
the American medical directors, coupled
with the co-operation of the men.

Overseas Forces More Than Half a Million

Preparing for an Army of 3,000,000

The overseas fighting forces of the
United States have been increasing
at a much more rapid rate than the
public was aware of. Early in May the
number of our men in France was in excess
of 500,000. A great increase in the
ultimate size of the army was further
indicated when the War Department
asked the House Military Affairs Committee
for a new appropriation of $15,000,000,000.

Mr. Baker, Secretary of War, appeared
before the committee on April 23 and,
after describing the results of his inspection
of the army in France, said that
the size of the army that the United
States would send abroad was entirely
dependent upon the shipping situation.
Troops were already moving to France
at an accelerated rate.

President Wilson, through Mr. Baker,
presented the House Military Affairs
Committee on May 2 with proposals for
increasing the army. The President
asked that all limits be removed on the
number of men to be drafted for service.
Mr. Baker said that he declined to discuss
the numbers of the proposed army
“for the double reason that any number
implies a limit, and the only possible
limit is our ability to equip and transport
men, which is constantly on the increase.”

The Administration’s plans were submitted
in detail on May 3, when the committee
began the preparation of the army
appropriation bill carrying $15,000,000,000
to finance the army during the fiscal
year ending June 30, 1919. Mr. Baker
again refused to go into the question of
figures, but it became known at the
Capitol that the estimates he submitted
were based on a force of not fewer than
3,000,000 men and 160,000 officers in the
field by July 1, 1919. The plan contemplated
having 130,000 officers and
2,168,000 men, or a total of 2,298,000, in
the field and in camps by July 1, 1918,
and approximately an additional million
in the field before June 30, 1919.

Mr. Baker said that all the army camps
and cantonments were to be materially
enlarged, to take care of the training of
the men to be raised in the next twelve
months. The General Staff had this question
under careful consideration, and the
idea was to increase the size of existing
training camps rather than to establish
new camps. These camps, it was estimated,
already had facilities for training
close to a million men at one time.

The Secretary of War also made it
clear that the total of $15,000,000,000 involved
in the estimates as revised for the
new army bill did not cover the whole
cost of the army for the next fiscal year.
The $15,000,000,000, he explained, was
in addition to the large sums that would
be carried in the Fortifications Appropriation
bill, which covers the cost of
heavy ordnance both in the United States
and overseas. Nor did it include the Military
Academy bill. It was emphasized
that, although estimates were submitted
on the basis of an army of a certain size,
Congress was being asked for blanket
authority for the President to raise all
the men needed, and the approximate
figures of $15,000,000,000 could be increased
by deficiency appropriations.

It was brought out in the committee
that the transportation service had improved
and that the War Department was
able to send more men to France each
month. It was estimated that if transport
facilities continued to improve, close to
1,500,000 fighting men would be on the
western front by Dec. 31, 1918. The
United States had now in camp and in
the field, it was explained to the committee,
the following enlisted men and
officers:

Provost Marshal General Crowder announced
on May 8 that 1,227,000 Americans
had been called to the colors under
the Selective Draft act, thereby indicating
approximately the strength of the
national army. Additional calls during
May for men to be in camp by June 2
affected something like 366,600 registrants
under the draft law. These men
were largely intended to fill up the camps
at home, replacing the seasoned personnel
from the divisions previously training
there. With the increase of the number
of divisions in France, the flow of replacement
troops was increasing proportionately.

In regard to the number of men in
France, Mr. Baker on May 8 made the
following important announcement:

In January I told the Senate committee
that there was strong likelihood that early
in the present year 500,000 American
troops would be dispatched to France. I
cannot either now or perhaps later discuss
the number of American troops in France,
but I am glad to be able to say that the
forecast I made in January has been surpassed.

This was the first official utterance
indicating even indirectly the number of
men sent abroad. The first force to go
was never described except as a division,
although as a matter of fact it was constituted
into two divisions soon after its
arrival in France.

An Associated Press dispatch dated
May 17 announced that troops of the
new American Army had arrived within
the zone of the British forces in Northern
France and were completing their
training in the area occupied by the
armies which were blocking the path of
the Germans to the Channel ports. The
British officers who were training the
Americans stated that the men from
overseas were of the finest material.
The newcomers were warmly greeted by
the British troops and were reported to
be full of enthusiasm.

American Troops in Central France

By Laurence Jerrold

This friendly British view of our soldiers
in France is from the pen of a noted war
correspondent of The London Morning Post

I have recently visited the miniature
America now installed in France,
and installed in the most French
part of Central France. There is nothing
more French than these ancient
towns with historic castles, moats, dungeons,
and torture chambers, these old
villages, where farms are sometimes still
battlemented like small castles, and this
countryside where living is easy and
pleasant. On to this heart of France has
descended a whole people from across the
ocean, a people that hails from New
England and California, from Virginia
and Illinois. The American Army has
taken over this heart of France, and is
teaching it to “go some”. Townsfolk
and villagers enjoy being taught. The
arrival of the American Army is a revelation
to them.

I was surprised at first to find how
fresh a novelty an allied army was in
this part of France. Then I remembered
that these little towns and villages have
in the last few months for the first time
seen allies of France. The ports where
the American troops land have seen
many other allies; they saw, indeed, in
August, 1914, some of the first British
troops land, whose reception remains in
the recollection of the inhabitants as a
scene of such fervor and loving enthusiasm
as had never been known before
and probably will not be known again.
In fact, to put it brutally, French ports
are blasé. But this Central France for
the first time welcomes allied troops. It
is true they had seen some Russians, but
the least said of them now the better.
Some of the Russians are still there,
hewing wood for three francs a day per
head, and behaving quite peaceably.

These old towns and villages look upon
the American Army in their midst as
the greatest miracle they have ever
known, and a greater one than they ever
could have dreamed of. One motors
through scores of little towns and villages
where the American soldier, in his
khaki, his soft hat, (which I am told is
soon to be abolished,) and his white gaiters,
swarms. The villagers put up bunting,
calico signs, flags, and have stocks
of American “canned goods” to show in
their shop windows. The children, when
bold, play with the American soldiers, and
the children that are more shy just venture
to go up and touch an American soldier’s
leg. Very old peasant ladies put
on their Sunday black and go out walking
and in some mysterious way talking
with American soldiers. The village
Mayor turns out and makes a speech
utterly incomprehensible to the American
soldier, whenever a fresh contingent
of the latter arrives. The 1919 class,
just called up, plays bugles and shouts
“Good morning” when an American car
comes by.

Vice versa, this Central France is perhaps
even more of a miracle to the
American troops than the American
troops are to it. To watch the American
trooper from Arkansas or Chicago being
shown over a castle which is not only
older than the United States, but was in
its prime under Louis XII., and dates
back to a Roman fortress now beneath it,
is a wonderful sight. Here the American
soldier shows himself a charming
child. There is nothing of the “Innocents
Abroad” about him. I heard
scarcely anything (except about telephones
and railways) of any American
brag of modernism in this ancient part
of France. On the contrary, the soldier
is learning with open eyes, and trying to
learn with open ears, all these wonders
of the past among which he has been
suddenly put. The officer, too, even the
educated officer, is beautifully astonished
at all this past, which he had read
about, but which, quite possibly, he didn’t
really believe to exist. The American
officers who speak French—and there
are some of them, coming chiefly from

the Southern States—are, of course, heroes
in every town, and sought after in
cafés at recreation hours by every
French officer and man. Those who do
not know French are learning it, and I
remember a picturesque sight, that of a
very elderly, prim French governess in
black, teaching French to American subalterns
in a Y.M.C.A. canteen.

A great French preacher the other
day, in his sermon in a Paris church,
said that this coming to France of millions
of English troops and future millions
of American troops may mean
eventually one of the greatest changes in
Continental Europe the world has ever
known. His words never seemed to me
so full of meaning as they did when I
was among the Americans in the heart
of France. There, of course, the contrast
is infinitely greater than it can be
in the France which our own troops are
occupying and defending. These young,
fresh, hustling, keen Americans, building
up numerous works of all kinds to
prepare for defending France, have
brought with them Chinese labor and
negro labor; and Chinese and negroes
and German and Austrian prisoners all
work in these American camps under
American officers’ orders. Imagine
what an experience, what a miracle, indeed,
this spectacle seems to the country-folk
of this old French soil, who have always
lived very quietly, who never
wanted to go anywhere else, and who
knew, indeed, that France had allies
fighting and working for her, but had
never seen any of them until these
Americans came across three thousand
miles of ocean.

Something of a miracle, also, is what
our new allies are accomplishing. They
are doing everything on a huge scale. I
saw aviation camps, training camps, aviation
schools, vast tracts where barracks
were being put up, railways built, telegraphs
and telephones installed by Chinese
labor, negro labor, German prisoners’
labor, under the direction of American
skilled workmen, who are in France
by the thousand. There are Y.M.C.A.
canteens, Red Cross canteens, clubs for
officers and for men, theatres and cinemas
for the army, and a prodigious
amount of food—all come from America.
The hams alone I saw strung up in one
canteen would astonish the boches.
American canned goods, meat, fruit, condensed
milk, meal, &c., have arrived in
France in stupendous quantities. No
body of American troops land in France
until what is required for their sustenance
several weeks ahead is already
stored in France. Only the smallest necessaries
are bought on the spot, and
troops passing through England on their
way to France are strictly forbidden,
both officers and men, to buy any article
of food whatsoever in England. As for
the quality, the American has nothing to
complain of, so far as I could see. All
pastry, cakes, sweets are henceforth prohibited
throughout civilian France, but
the American troops rightly have all
these things in plenty. I saw marvelous
cakes and tarts, which would create a
run on any Paris or London teashop, and
the lady who manages one American Red
Cross canteen (by the way, she is an
Englishwoman, and is looked up to by
the American military authorities as one
of the best organizers they have met)
explained to me wonderful recipes they
have for making jam with honey and
preserved fruit. The bread, of course,
they make themselves, and, as is right, it
is pure white flour bread, such as no
civilian knows nowadays.

One motors through scores of villages
and more, and every little old French
spot swarms with American Tommies
billeted in cottages and farmhouses.
Many of them marched straight to their
billets from their landing port, and the
experience is as wonderful for them, just
spirited over from the wilds of America,
as it is for the villagers who welcome
these almost fabulous allies. But it is
the engineering, building, and machinery
works the Americans are putting up
which are the most astonishing. Gangs
of workers have come over in thousands.
Many of these young chaps are college
men, Harvard or Princeton graduates.
They dig and toil as efficiently as any
laborer, and perhaps with more zeal. One
American Major told me with glee how
a party of these young workers arrived
straight from America at 3:30 P. M.,

and started digging at 5 A. M. next
morning. “And they liked it; it tickled
them to death.” Many of these drafts,
in fact, were sick and tired of inaction
in ports before their departure from
America, and they welcomed work in
France as if it were some great game.

Perhaps the biggest work of all the
Americans are doing is a certain aviation
camp and school. In a few months it has
neared completion, and when it is finished
it will, I believe, be the biggest of
its kind in the world. There pilots are
trained, and trained in numbers which I
may not say, but which are comforting.
The number of airplanes they use merely
for training, which also I must not state,
is in itself remarkable. “Training pilots
is the one essential thing,” I was told by
the C.O. These flying men—or boys—who
have, of course, already been broken
in in America, do an additional course in
France, and when they leave the aviation
camp I saw they are absolutely ready for
air fighting at the front. This is the
finishing school. The aviators go
through eight distinct courses in this
school. They are perfected in flying, in
observation, in bombing, in machine-gun
firing. On even a cloudy and windy day
the air overhead buzzes with these young
American fliers, all getting into the pink
of condition to do their stunts at the
front. They seemed to me as keen as
our own flying men, and as well disciplined.
They live in the camp, and it requires
moving heaven and earth for one
of them to get leave to go even to the
nearest little quiet old town.

The impression is the same of the
American bases in France as of the
American front in France. I found there
and here one distinctive characteristic,
the total absence of bluff. I was never
once told that we were going to be shown
how to win the war. I was never once
told that America is going to win the
war. I never heard that American men
and machines are better than ours, but I
did hear almost apologies from American
soldiers because they had not come into
the war sooner. They are, I believe,
spending now more money than we are—indeed,
the pay of their officers is about
double that of ours. I said something
about the cost. “Yes, but you see we
must make up for lost time,” was all the
American General said. And he told me
about the splendid training work that is
being done now in the States by British
and French officers who have gone out
there knowing what war is, and who
teach American officers and men from
first-hand experience. This particular
General hoped that by this means in a
very short time American troops arriving
in France may be sent much more
quickly to the front than is now the
case.

An impression of complete, businesslike
determination is what one gets when
visiting the Americans in France. A discipline
even stricter than that which applies
in British and French troops is enforced.
In towns, officers, for instance,
are not allowed out after 9 P. M. Some
towns where subalterns discovered the
wine of the country have instantly been
put “out of bounds.” No officer, on any
pretext whatsoever, is allowed to go to
Paris, except on official business. From
the camps they are not even allowed to
go to the neighboring towns. They have,
to put it quite frankly, a reputation of
wild Americanism to live down, and they
sometimes surprise the French by their
seriousness. It is a striking sight to see
American officers and men flocking into
tiny little French Protestant churches on
Sundays in this Catholic heart of France.
The congregation is a handful of old
French Huguenots, and the ancient, rigid
French pasteur never in his life preached
to so many, and certainly never to soldiers
from so far. They come from so
far, and from such various parts, these
Americans, and for France, as well as
for themselves, it is a wonderful experience.
I was told that the postal censors
who read the letters of the American expeditionary
force are required to know
forty-seven languages. Of these languages
the two least used are Chinese
and German.

American Shipbuilders Break All Records

Charles M. Schwab Speeds the Work

[Month Ended May 15, 1918]

All shipbuilding records have been
broken by American builders in
the last month. On May 14 it
was announced that the first million tons
of ships had been completed and delivered
to the United States Government under
the direction of the Shipping Board.
The actual figures on May 11 showed the
number of ships to be 159, aggregating
1,108,621 tons. More than half of this
tonnage was delivered since Jan. 1, 1918.
Most of these ships were requisitioned on
the ways or in contract form when the
United States entered the war. This result
had been anticipated in the monthly
records, which showed a steady increase
in the tonnage launched:

The rapidity with which ships are
being produced was shown by the breaking
of the world’s record on April 20 and
in turn the breaking of this record on
May 5. On the former date the 8,800-ton
steel steamship West Lianga was
launched at Seattle, Wash., fifty-five
working days from the date the keel was
laid. This was then the world’s record.
But on May 5 at Camden, N. J., the steel
freight steamship Tuckahoe, of 5,548
tons, was launched twenty-seven days
after the keel was laid.

Ten days after this extraordinary
achievement the Tuckahoe was finished
and furnished and ready for sea—another
record feat.

Charles M. Schwab, Chairman of the
Board of Directors of the Bethlehem
Steel Corporation, was on April 16, 1918,
appointed Director General of the
Emergency Fleet Corporation to speed up
the Government’s shipbuilding program.
He was invested with practically unlimited
powers over all construction work
in shipyards producing vessels for the
Emergency Fleet Corporation. Charles
Piez in consequence ceased to be General
Manager of the Corporation, remaining,
however, as Vice President to supervise
administrative details of construction and
placing contracts.

Mr. Schwab, who was the fifth man to
be put in charge of the shipbuilding
program, was not desirous of accepting
the position when first approached because
he considered his work in producing
steel of first importance in the carrying
out of the nation’s war program. But
after a conference with President Wilson,
Edward N. Hurley, Chairman of the
Shipping Board; Bainbridge Colby,
another member of the board, and
Charles Piez, he decided to accept the
new position.

Almost the first thing Mr. Schwab did
was to move his headquarters to Philadelphia
as the centre of the steel-shipbuilding
region, taking with him all the
division chiefs of the Fleet Corporation
directly connected with construction work
and about 2,000 employes. The Shipping
Board and Mr. Piez retained their offices
in Washington with 1,500 subordinates
and employes. As a further step toward
decentralization it was arranged to move
the operating department, including
agencies such as the Interallied Ship Control
Committee, headed by P. A. S. Franklin,
to New York City.

The original “cost-plus” contract
under which the Submarine Boat Corporation
of Newark was to build 160
ships of 5,000 tons for the Government
was canceled by Mr. Schwab as an experiment
to determine whether shipyards
operating under lump-sum contracts and
accepting all responsibility for providing
materials could make greater speed in
construction than those operating with
Government money, such as the Hog
Island yards. The result was to increase
the cost of each of the 160 ships from
$787,500 to $960,000.

A request for an appropriation of
$2,223,835,000 for the 1919 program was
presented by Mr. Hurley and Mr. Schwab
to the House Appropriations Committee
on May 8.

Of this total $1,386,100,000 was for
construction of ships and $652,000,000
for the purchasing and requisitioning of
plants and material in connection with
the building program.

Third Liberty Loan Oversubscribed

Approximately 17,000,000 Buyers

When the Third Liberty Loan,
raised to finance America’s
war needs, closed on May 4,
1918, the subscriptions were
well over $4,000,000,000, a billion in excess
of the amount called for. The total
was announced on May 17 as $4,170,019,650.
Secretary McAdoo stated that he
would allot bonds in full on all subscriptions.

The loan was regarded as the most
successful ever floated by any nation,
not so much because of the volume of
sales, but because of the wide distribution
of the loan. Approximately 17,000,000
individuals subscribed, that is, about
one person in every six in the United
States. The number of buyers in the
Third Loan exceeded those in the Second
by 7,000,000 and those in the First by
12,500,000.

The campaign throughout the country
was conducted with all the thoroughness
of a great political struggle, with the
difference that there were no contending
parties and all forces were marshaled
to make the loan a success. Nor was the
campaign merely a display of efficient
organization and vigorous propaganda.
It had many features of dramatic and
picturesque interest, not only in the large
cities, but in almost every smaller centre
of the nation. A noonday rally of
50,000 men and women in Wall Street,
New York, on the closing day, was typical.
An eyewitness described it thus:

The Police Department Band appeared
and the band of the 15th Coast Artillery
from Fort Hamilton. Taking advantage
of the occasion, James Montgomery Flagg
now appeared in his studio van on the
southern fringe of the Broad Street crowd.
A girl with him played something on the
cornet. It was a good deal like a show
on the Midway at a Western county fair.
But this was no faker—one of the most
famous artists in America, throwing in
a signed sketch of whoever bought Liberty
bonds. Those near him began pushing
and crowding to take advantage of
the offer.

And now, suddenly, a tremendous racket
up the street toward Broadway. Who
comes?

Cheer on cheer, now. It is the “Anzacs.”
Twelve long, rangy fellows, officers all,
six or seven of them with the little brass
“A” on the shoulder, which signifies
service at Gallipoli and in Flanders. They
are members of the contingent of 500
which arrived here yesterday on its way
to the battlefields of France. They run
lightly up the Sub-Treasury steps and
take their stand in a group beside the
soldier band.

And now they all come—all the actors
in the drama of the day. Governor Whitman,
bareheaded, solemn-faced; Rabbi
Stephen Wise, with his rugged face and
his shock of blue-black hair; Mme. Schumann-Heink,
panting a little with excitement;
Auguste Bouilliz, baritone of the
Royal Opera of Brussels, who later is to
thrill them all with his singing of the
“Marseillaise”; Cecil Arden, in a shining
helmet and draped in the Union Jack,
come to sing “God Save the King,” while
the sunburned Australian officers stand
like statues at salute; Oscar Straus, and
then—

“Yee-ee-ee-eee.”

Oh, how they cheered! For the “Blue
Devils” of France had poured out of the
door of the Sub-Treasury and, with the
fitful sun shining once more and gleaming
on their bayonets, were running down
the steps in two lines, past the “Anzacs,”
past the soldier band, to draw up in ranks
at the bottom.

Lieutenant de Moal speaks. What does
he say? Who knows? But he is widely
cheered, just the same, as he gives way
to Governor Whitman.

“There are gatherings like this, though
not so large, all over our land today,”
cries the Governor. “In every town and

city we Americans are gathered together
at this moment to demonstrate that we
are behind our army, behind our navy,
behind our President.”

The cheers that acclaimed his mention
of the President drowned his voice for
several moments.

“Here are the Australians,” he cries,
pointing to the “Anzac” officers. “They
have brought us a message, but we are
going to give them a message, too.”

As the Governor stepped back to cheers
that rocked the street, Lieutenant de Moal
barked a sharp order, and the “Blue
Devils” shouldered their guns with fixed
bayonets, the six trumpeters ta-ra-ta-raed,
and the soldiers of France moved
off up the sidewalk lane to the side door
of the Stock Exchange, where all business
was suspended during the fifteen minutes
of their visit on the floor.

Four of the “Anzacs” meanwhile were
taken from their ranks on the steps of
the building up to the pedestal of the
statue of Washington, which was used as
speaker’s platform, and Captain Frank
McCallam made a brief address.

“We haven’t many men left,” he said
simply. “And it is up to you people to
help us out to the best of your ability.”

More cheers, and then Cecil Arden sang
“God Save the King.” The American
regular fired a blank volley over
the heads of the crowd, and the kids
scrambled for the empty shells.

Following Wise and Straus, Bouilliz, the
Belgian baritone, sang the “Marseillaise,”
and then, after the soldier band had
played “Where Do We Go from Here,
Boys?” Mme. Schumann-Heink advanced
and sang the national anthem, following
it up with an appeal that was the climax
to the play.

Less exciting but more impressive was
the parade on April 26, when thousands
of mothers who had sent their sons to
the front marched in a column of 35,000
men and women in the Liberty Day
parade in New York City. This day had
been proclaimed as such by President
Wilson for “the people of the United
States to assemble in their respective
communities and liberally pledge anew
their financial support to sustain the
nation’s cause, and to hold patriotic demonstrations
in every city, town, and
hamlet throughout the land.”

The challenge of the mothers was inscribed
on one of the banners they carried:
“We give our sons—they give their
lives—what do you give?”

Remarkable as was the appearance of
these mothers with the little service
flags over their shoulders, many of them
so old that they marched with difficulty,
the spectators who flanked the line of
march along Fifth Avenue from Washington
Square to Fifty-ninth Street
found it even more thrilling to note that
so very many of them, whether they
were mothers or young wives, or just
young girls proud of the brothers that
had gone forth to service—so very many
of them carried service flags with three
and four and five and even six stars, and
occasionally a glint of the sun would even
carry the eye to a gold star, which meant,
whenever it appeared, a veil of mourning
for a wooden cross somewhere in France.

Among the minor but ingenious forms
of publicity was the Liberty Loan ball
which was rolled from Buffalo to New
York, a distance of 470 miles, and which
ended its journey of three weeks on May
4 at the City Hall. The ball was a large
steel shell covered with canvas.

Every community that reached or exceeded
its quota to the loan was entitled
to raise a flag of honor specially designed
for the purpose. At least 32,000 communities
gained the honor and raised the
flag.

To strengthen the financial basis of
the nation’s war industries and use
monetary resources to the best advantage
the War Finance Corporation bill
was passed by Congress and approved
by President Wilson on April 5, 1918.
The two main purposes of the act are to
provide credits for industries and enterprises
necessary or contributory to the
prosecution of the war and to supervise
new issues of capital. The act creates
the War Finance Corporation, consisting
of the Secretary and four additional persons,
with $500,000,000 capital stock, all
subscribed by the United States. Banks
and trust companies financing war industries
or enterprises may receive advances
from the corporation.

Former War Loans of the United States

A Historical Retrospect

The United States Government asked for $2,000,000,000 on the First Liberty Loan
in the Spring of 1917, and $3,034,000,000 was subscribed by over 4,000,000 subscribers.
For the Second Loan, near the end of 1917, $3,000,000,000 was sought, and
$4,617,532,300 was subscribed by 9,420,000 subscribers.

The Guaranty Trust Company of New York in a recent brochure reviewed the
history of the various war loans of the United States, beginning with the Revolutionary
loans, as follows:

When the patriots at Lexington
“fired the shot heard ’round the
world,” the thirteen Colonies found
themselves suddenly in the midst of war,
but with practically no funds in their
Treasuries. The Continental Congress
was without power to raise money by
taxation, and had to depend upon credit
bills and requisitions drawn against the
several Colonies. France was the first
foreign country to come to the aid of
struggling America, the King of France
himself advancing us our first loan. All
told, France’s loan was $6,352,500; Holland
loaned us $1,304,000; and Spain
assisted us with $174,017. Our loan from
France was repaid between 1791 and 1795
to the Revolutionary Government of
France; the Holland loan during the
same period in five annual installments,
and the Spanish loan in 1792-3.

Our first domestic war loan of £6,000
was made in 1775, and the loan was taken
at par. A year and a half later found
Congress laboring under unusual difficulties.
Boston and New York were held
by the enemy, the patriot forces were
retreating, and the people were as little
inclined to submit to domestic taxation
as they had formerly been to “taxation
without representation.” To raise funds
even a lottery was attempted. In
October, 1776, Congress authorized a
second loan for $5,000,000. It was not a
pronounced success, only $3,787,000 being
raised in twelve months. In 1778 fourteen
issues of paper money were authorized
as the only way to meet the expenses
of the army. By the end of the year 1779
Congress had issued $200,000,000 in paper
money, while a like amount had been
issued by the several States. In 1781, as
a result of this financing and of the
general situation, Continental bills of
credit had fallen 99 per cent.

Then came Robert Morris, that genius
of finance, who found ways to raise the
money which assured the triumph of the
American cause. By straining his personal
credit, which was higher than that
of the Government, he borrowed upon
his own individual security on every
hand. On one occasion he borrowed from
the commander of the French fleet,
securing the latter with his personal
obligation. If Morris and other patriotic
citizens had not rendered such assistance
to the Government, some of the most
important campaigns of the Revolutionary
War would have been impossible. Following
came the Bank of Pennsylvania,
which issued its notes—in effect, loans—to
provide rations and equipment for
Washington’s army at Valley Forge.
These notes were secured by bills of exchange
drawn against our envoys abroad,
but it was never seriously intended that
they should be presented for payment.
The bank was a tremendous success in
securing the money necessary to carry
out its patriotic purposes, and was practically
the first bank of issue in this country.

With the actual establishment of the
United States and the adoption of the
Constitution, Alexander Hamilton came
forward with a funding scheme by which
the various debts owed to foreign countries,
to private creditors, and to the
several States were combined. In 1791,
on a specie basis, our total debt was
$75,000,000. The paper dollar was practically
valueless and the people were
forced to give the Government adequate
powers to raise money and to impose
taxes. Between that date and 1812

thirteen tariff bills were passed to raise
money to meet public expenditures and
pay off the national debt.

THE WAR OF 1812.

For some time previous to the actual
outbreak of the War of 1812 hostilities
had been predicted. In a measure, this
enabled Congress to prepare for it. And
although the war did not begin until
June of 1812, as early as March of that
year a loan of $11,000,000, bearing 6 per
cent. at par, to be paid off within 12
years from the beginning of 1813, was
authorized. Of this, however, only $2,150,000
was issued, and all was redeemed
by 1817. The next year a loan of $16,000,000
was authorized and subscribed.
This was followed, in August, by a loan
of $7,500,000 which sold at 88-1/4 per
cent.

At the end of the war the total loans
negotiated by the Government aggregated
$88,000,000. The nation’s public debt, as
a result of this war, was increased to
$127,334,933 in 1816. By 1835, either by
redemptions or maturity, it was all paid.

MEXICAN WAR LOANS

The Mexican War net debt incurred
by the United States was approximately
$49,000,000 and was financed by loans
in the form of Treasury notes and Government
stock. The Treasury notes, under
the act of 1846, totaled $7,687,800 and
the stock $4,999,149. The latter paid 6
per cent. interest. By act of 1847 Treasury
notes to the amount of $26,122,100
were issued, bearing interest in the discretion
of the Secretary of the Treasury,
reimbursable one and two years
after date, and convertible into United
States stock at 6 per cent. They were
redeemable after Dec. 31, 1867. Economic
developments following this war
led to a period of extraordinary industrial
prosperity which lasted for several years.
A change in the fiscal policy of the Government,
with overexpansion of industry,
however, resulted in a panic in 1857 and
a Treasury deficit in 1858. The debt
contracted in consequence of the Mexican
War was redeemed in full by 1874.

The situation had not improved to any
great extent when Lincoln took office
on March 4, 1861, and by mid-November
of that year a panic was in full swing.
The outbreak of the civil war found the
Treasury empty and the financial machinery
of the Government seriously disorganized.
Public credit was low, the
public mind was disturbed, and raising
money was difficult. In 1862 the Legal
Tender act was passed, authorizing an
issue of $150,000,000 of legal-tender
notes, and an issue of bonds in the
amount of $500,000,000 was authorized.

This proved to be a most popular loan.
The bonds were subject to redemption
after five years and were payable in
twenty years. They bore interest at 6
per cent., payable semi-annually, and
were issued in denominations of $50, $100,
$500, and $1,000. Through one agent,
Jay Cooke, a genius at distribution, who
employed 2,850 sub-agents and advertised
extensively, this loan was placed directly
with the people at par in currency. Altogether
the aggregate of this loan was
$514,771,600. Later in that year Congress
authorized a second issue of Treasury
notes in the amount of $150,000,000 at
par, with interest at 6 per cent.; in January,
1863, a third issue of $100,000,000
was authorized, which was increased in
March to $150,000,000, at 5 per cent.
interest. These issues were referred to
as the “one and two year issues of
1863.”

DEFICIT IN 1862

In December, 1862, Congress had to
face a deficit of $277,000,000 and unpaid
requisitions amounting to $47,000,000.
By the close of 1863 nearly $400,000,000
had been raised by bond sales. A further
loan act, passed March 3, 1864, provided
for an issue of $200,000,000 of 5 per
cent. bonds known as “ten-fortys,” but
of this total only $73,337,000 was disposed
of. Subsequently, on June 30, 1864,
a great public loan of $200,000,000 was
authorized. This was an issue of Treasury
notes, payable at any time not exceeding
three years, and bearing interest
at 7-3/10 per cent. Notes amounting to
$828,800,000 were sold. The aggregate
of Government loans during the civil war
footed up a total of $2,600,700,000; and
on Sept. 1, 1865, the public debt closely

approached $3,000,000,000, less than one-half
of which was funded.

Civil war loans, with one exception,
which sold at 89-3/10, were all placed at
par in currency, subject to commissions
ranging from an eighth to one per cent.
to distributing bankers. The average
interest nominally paid by the Government
on its bonds during the war was
slightly under 6 per cent. Owing to payment
being made in currency, however,
the rate was, in reality, much higher.
With the conclusion of the war, the reduction
of the public debt was undertaken,
and it has continued with but
two interruptions to date.

Heavy tax receipts for several years
after the close of the war potentially
enabled the Government to reduce its
debt. Indeed, from 1866 to 1891, each
year’s ordinary receipts exceeded disbursements,
and enabled the Government
to lighten its financial burdens. In 1866
the decrease in the net debt was $120,395,408;
in 1867, $127,884,952; in 1868,
$27,297,798; in 1869, $48,081,540; in 1870,
$101,601,917; in 1871, $84,175,888; in
1872, $97,213,538, and in 1873, $44,318,470.

Through refunding operations—in addition
to bonds and short-time obligations
redeemed with surplus revenues—the
Government paid off, up to 1879, $535,000,000
bonds bearing interest at from
5 to 6 per cent. In this year the credit
of the Government was on a 4 per cent.
basis, and a year later on a 3-1/4 per
cent. basis, against a maximum basis of
15-1/2 per cent. in 1864.

Between 1881 and 1887 the Government
paid off, either with surplus revenues
or by conversion, $618,000,000 of
interest-bearing debt. In 1891 all bonds
then redeemable were retired, and on
July 1, 1893, the public debt amounted
to less than one-third of the maximum
outstanding in 1865. In 1900 the Government
converted $445,900,000 bonds out of
an aggregate of $839,000,000 convertible
under the refunding act passed by Congress
in that year. And further conversions
in 1903, 1905, and 1907 brought
the grand total up to $647,250,150—a
result which earned for the Government
a net annual saving in interest account
of $16,551,037.

SPANISH WAR LOANS

The United States is a debt-paying
nation. Hence, America’s credit, despite
occasional fluctuations, has steadily risen,
and our national debt has sold on a lower
income basis than that of any other
nation in the world.

Following the sinking of the Maine
in Havana Harbor, in 1898, Congress
authorized an issue of $200,000,000 3
per cent. ten-twenty-year bonds. Of this
aggregate $198,792,660 were sold by the
Government at par. So popular was this
loan, it was oversubscribed seven times.
During the year 1898, following the allotment
to the public, this issue sold at
a premium, the price going to 107-3/4,
and, during the next year, to 110-3/4.
After the war ended, the Government,
in accordance with its unvarying custom,
began to pay off this debt; but, despite
the Secretary of the Treasury’s offer to
buy these bonds, he succeeded in purchasing
only about $20,000,000 of them.

American Labor Mission in Europe

War Aims of Organized Workers Conveyed to
English and French Labor Unions

An American Labor Mission visited
England and France in April,
1918, to present the views of
American workingmen regarding
the war. The delegation numbered
eighteen, headed by James Wilson, President
of the Patternmakers’ League of
North America. In his first address at
London, April 28, before the British and
Foreign Press Association, Mr. Wilson
said:

We recognize as a fundamental truth
that there can be no democracy with the
triumph of the Imperial German Government.
The principle of democracy or the
principle of Prussian military autocracy
will prevail as a result of the world war.
There can be no middle course nor compromise.
The contest must be carried on
to its finality.

The Central Powers have staked everything
on the result of this struggle. Their
defeat means the destruction of a machine
which has been built with remarkable
efficiency and embodies the very life of
the German race.

On the other hand, every free man instinctively
appreciates that if we are to
maintain the standard of civilization as
worked out by the free men of the world,
and if posterity is to be guaranteed political
and industrial freedom, the war must
be won by the allied countries. Peace now
would be the fulfillment of the Prussian
dream, for they have within their grasp
the very heart of Continental Europe and
resources which would make sure further
conquest upon the other nations of the
world.

The American labor movement, in whose
behalf my colleagues and myself have
been authorized to speak, declare most
emphatically that they will not agree to
a peace conference with the enemies of
civilization, irrespective of what cloak
they wear, until Prussian militarism has
withdrawn within its own boundaries, and
then not until the Germans have, through
proper representatives, proved to our satisfaction
that they recognize the right of
peoples and civilized nations to determine
for themselves what shall be their
standard.

Unless reconstruction shall soon come
from the German workers within that
country, it is now plain that the opportunity
to uproot the agencies of force will
only come when democracy has defeated
autocracy in the military field and wins
the right to reconstruct the relations between
nations and men.

German freedom is ultimately the problem
of the German people, but the defeat
of Prussian autocracy in the field will
bring the opportunity for German liberty
at home.

BRITISH SEAMEN’S ATTITUDE

J. Havelock Wilson, President of the
British Seamen’s Union, conferred with
the American Mission at London, April
30, and informed it of the decision of his
union to transport no pacifists to any
peace conference. He made the following
statement:

On Sept. 21, 1917, we formed what we
called a Merchant Seamen’s League, and
declared that if German terrorism on the
sea continued we would enforce a boycott
against Germany for two years after
the war, and that for every new crime
from that time on we would add one
month to the length of the boycott. The
length of the boycott now stands at five
years seven months. We have reliable
information that this action is making a
very profound impression on German
manufacturers and shippers.

The British seamen got their first intimation
of German treachery when the
international transport strike was first
proposed by German delegates ostensibly
to pledge support. But the British learned
later that the German delegates had in
their pockets as they talked contracts
signed with employers.

After that we watched the German Social
Democrats in the Socialists’ international.
But we never could get the
Germans to face the issue. Always they
had excuses and evasions. We never had
confidence in them. When war came we
felt it our duty to take care of the men
on our ships who could no longer sail,
and also to set a good example.

Here were Germans on our ships who
had been in England so long that they
had forgotten their language. On Aug.
20, 1914—you see we acted quickly—we
bought an estate of thirty-nine acres and
built the model internment camp of Great
Britain. We asked the Government to
give us charge of all interned German
sailors, and, let it be known to the credit
of Great Britain, that was done. The

Government allowed us all 10s. per week
per man for upkeep. The camp became
a great success. There were 1,000 German
sailors interned in it.

Until May, 1915, all went well. On May
1 the interned men celebrated May Day,
their international revolutionary holiday.
They had their banners, “Workers of the
World, Unite,” “World Brotherhood,”
and so on. We had planned a great fête
to be held later and I had secured the consent
of several well-known persons to attend
and help make it a success. On May
7 the Lusitania was sunk. I called the
Germans in camp together and told them
the terrible thing that had happened. I
told them they were not to blame, but that
the celebration could not be held. And
they made no protest to me.

Now here were 1,000 Germans not under
control of the Kaiser. Some of them had
been among us twenty or thirty years.
As soon as I had got out of the place
they sang and cheered and rejoiced over
the Lusitania disaster. They kept this up
for four hours. They made me conclude
that the camp must be handed over to the
military as soon as possible, and this was
done. Six months after that came the
U-boat campaign, and, what made that
worse, the fact that the U-boats always
turned their guns on open boats.

I have got hundreds of cases of boys
whose arms and legs have been blown off
by U-boat guns while trying to get away
from sinking ships in open boats. I wrote
the Secretary of the International Transport
Workers’ Union protesting against
these crimes. His reply attempted to
justify every crime. That showed us that
not only was the Kaiser responsible, but
that the organized trade union movement
of Germany was also responsible.

On June 1, 1917, a Socialist congress
was convened at Leeds. It was advertised
as the greatest conference ever held.
We sent two men there to tell our story.
Our men found that small bodies of only
a handful of members had been delegated,
who got the floor easily for the pacifist
cause. Our men could not secure anything
like a fair chance.

In this conference MacDonald, Fairchild,
and Jowett were elected delegates to
Stockholm. We at once resolved that no
delegates should leave this country. And
none did.

That is the history of the seamen’s determination
to bottle up such British pacifists
as may desire to go abroad spreading
their doctrine. Mingled with it is the
grim, sad story of 12,000 members of the
Seamen’s Union who have lost their lives
on merchant ships through Germany’s
criminal conduct on the seas.

And while there is here and there one
in England who resembles a leader of
labor who is a pacifist, the determination
of the British seamen to go through with
the war to the finish is scarcely more
than a reflection of the rank-and-file
spirit that is to be found throughout the
whole of British labor.

NO PARLEYS WITH ENEMY LABOR

The American delegates met the representatives
of labor in London and in
Paris. In England they found the sentiment
almost unanimous in approval of
their decision to favor no conferences
with German labor representatives until
a victory had been achieved. In France,
however, they encountered a group that
favored contact with the German and
Austrian Socialists. On May 6 there
was a conference in Paris between the
American labor delegates and the members
of the Confederation Générale de
Travail, the great French revolutionary
labor organization. M. Jouhaux, General
Secretary of the confederation, made
the proposed international conference
practically the sole note of his speech.
France, he asserted, had no hatred for
the German workers themselves, and he
pointed out that if the conference took
place it could have only one of two results.
Either the workers in the enemy
countries would refuse to join in the efforts
of the workers of the allied countries
for the liberation of the world’s peoples,
in which case the war must continue,
or they would accept the allied
view of what was right and would act
with the allied peoples for the good of
humanity.

The American reply was in these definite
words:

“We don’t hate the German workers
any more than you do, but to give them
our hand now would be looked upon by
them only as a sign of weakness.”

After reminding the congress of the
hypocritical professions of the German
Socialist Party before the war, the delegation
declared itself in entire agreement
with Samuel Gompers that American
labor men would refuse to meet the German
delegates under any circumstances
so long as Germany was ruled by an Imperialistic
Government. This declaration
left Albert Thomas, former Cabinet officer
and leader of the group, practically

without a word to say. M. Thomas
urged the same arguments as Jouhaux,
but all the satisfaction the French labor
men got was a promise from James Wilson,
President of the American delegation,
to report the matter to the American
workers when he returned home.

Chairman Wilson reaffirmed at a
luncheon given at the Foreign Office
May 10 that American labor would not
discuss the war with representatives of
German labor until victory was won, because
German labor, which was permitting
the war, must do something itself
in its own country toward ending
the conflict justly before it could debate
with labor representatives of the allied
countries on what ought to be.

The luncheon was given by Stephen
Pichon, Foreign Minister, on behalf of
the French Government. With the exception
of Premier Clemenceau, all the
members of the Cabinet were present as
well as other men notable in French
public life. Ambassador Sharp was also
in attendance.

The mission visited the fighting front
and returned to London May 11 to hold
mass meetings at English industrial centres.
The members were received by the
King and dined by the London Chamber
of Commerce May 15.

Progress of the War

Recording Campaigns on All Fronts and Collateral Events From
April 18, 1918, Up to and Including May 17, 1918

UNITED STATES

The campaign for the Third Liberty Loan of
$3,000,000,000 ended on May 4. The total
subscription was $4,170,019,650, as announced
by the Treasury Department on
May 17.

On April 20 President Wilson issued a proclamation
extending to women enemy aliens
the restrictions imposed on men.

The Overman bill, giving the President power
to consolidate and co-ordinate executive
bureaus and agencies as a war emergency
measure, was passed by the Senate on
April 28 and by the House on May 14.

The War Trade Board announced on May 3
that a general commercial agreement with
Norway had been signed. On May 12 it
announced that in order to conserve materials
and labor and to add tonnage to
the fleet carrying men and munitions to
Europe, arrangements had been made to
have Great Britain, France, Italy, and
Belgium pass upon the advisability of releasing
proposed exports before granting
licenses to shippers. On May 14 an agreement
was reached between the United
States and the allied nations providing
that all imports to the United States
should be forbidden unless sanctioned by
the War Trade Board.

A conference report on the Sedition bill,
giving the Government broad new powers
to punish disloyal acts and utterances,
was adopted by the Senate on May 4,
and by the House of Representatives on
May 7, and sent to the President for his
signature.

As a result of charges of graft, inefficiency,
and pro-German tendencies directed
against the military aircraft administration
by Gutzon Borglum, President
Wilson, on May 15, asked Charles
Evans Hughes to aid Attorney General
Gregory in making a thorough investigation.
Mr. Hughes accepted the invitation.
The President also wrote a letter
to Senator Martin denouncing the Chamberlain
resolution for an investigation of
the conduct of the war by the Committee
on Military Affairs of the Senate, and on
the same day the Senate Committee on
Audit and Expenses, to which the resolution
had been referred, ordered a favorable
report on it, modifying it so as to
provide for a limited inquiry.

SUBMARINE BLOCKADE

The American steamship Lake Moor was reported
sunk on April 11.

Forty-four Americans were killed when the
Old Dominion liner Tyler was sunk off
the French coast on May 2.

The British liner Oronsa was sunk on April
28. All on board except three members of
the crew were saved. The British sloop
Cowslip was torpedoed on April 25. Five
officers and one man were missing.

The British Admiralty announced on April
24 the cessation of the weekly return of
shipping losses and the substitution of a
monthly report.

In a statement made in the Chamber of Deputies
on May 11, Georges Leygues, the
French Minister of Marine, declared that
the total of allied tonnage sunk by German

submarines in five months was 1,648,622,
less than half the amount alleged
by Germany to have been destroyed. He
announced that the number of submarines
sunk by the Allies was greater than Germany’s
output.

BARON STEPHAN BURIAN

Austro-Hungarian Foreign Minister in succession to Czernin

LEADERS IN THE IRISH CONTROVERSY

John Dillon, M. P.,
Leader of the Nationalist Party
(Press Illustrating Service)

Joseph Devlin,
Nationalist M. P. for West Belfast
(Press Illustrating Service)

Sir Edward Carson, M. P.,
Leader of the Ulster Unionists
(Central News)

Sir Horace Plunkett,
Chairman of the Irish Convention
(Bain News Service)

Twelve German submarines were officially
reported captured or sunk in British
waters by American or British destroyers
during the month of April, and two others
were known to have been destroyed.

Ten passengers were killed when the French
steamship Atlantique was torpedoed in the
Mediterranean early in May. The ship
managed to reach port.

CAMPAIGN IN WESTERN EUROPE

April 18—French advance on both banks of
the Avre River between Thanne and
Mailly-Raineval; Germans deliver terrific
assaults upon the British front from Givenchy
to the neighborhood of St. Venant.

April 19—Italian troops reach France; British
beat off assaults on Mont Kemmel
and recover ground west of Robecq; bombardment
of Paris resumed.

April 20—Germans hurl force against
American and French troops at Seicheprey
and get a grip on the town, but are
driven out; Belgians give ground temporarily
near the Passchendaele Canal, but
regain it; British re-establish their positions
in Givenchy-Festubert region.

April 21—British drive Germans from some
of their advanced positions near Robecq;
Americans retake Seicheprey outposts.

April 23—British gain ground east of Robecq
and in the neighborhood of Meteren.

April 24—Germans take Villers-Bretonneux,
but are repulsed at other places south of
the Somme; Franco-American positions at
Hangard shelled.

April 25—British recover Villers-Bretonneux;
French and British lose ground in
the Lys salient before terrific German assaults
from Wytschaete to Bailleul, aiming
at Mont Kemmel; Germans take Hangard.

April 26—Germans take Mont Kemmel and
the villages of Kemmel and Dranoutre and
push on to St. Eloi; French recover part
of Hangard.

April 27—British and French troops recover
some of the ground lost in the Bailleul-Wytschaete
sector; Germans repulsed at
Voormezeele after hard fight.

April 28—Germans take Voormezeele, but are
driven out by counterattack; Locre
changes hands five times.

April 29—Germans make heavy attacks upon
the entire Franco-British front from Zillebeke
Lake to Meteren; British hold their
line intact; French yield some ground
around Scherpenberg and Mont Rouge,
but later regain it; Belgians repulse attacks
north of Ypres; Americans take
over a sector of the French line at the
tip of the Somme salient.

April 30—French recover ground on the slope
of Scherpenberg and advance their line
astride the Dranoutre road; positions of
the allied forces push forward between La
Clytte and Kemmel.

May 1—Americans repulse attacks in the
Villers-Bretonneux region; Béthune region
bombarded.

May 3—French and British improve their
positions along the Somme River southward
to below the Avre; French take
Hill 82, near Castel, and the wood near by.

May 4—Germans repulsed at Locon; French
make progress near Locre, and British
advance near Meteren; Americans in the
Lorraine sector raid German positions
south of Halloville and penetrate to third
line; French shell disables last of German
guns that have been bombarding Paris.

May 5—Franco-British forces, in operation
between Locre and Dranoutre, advance
their positions on a 1,000-yard front to
an average depth of 500 yards; Germans
foiled in attempt to occupy former American
trenches in the Bois Brûlé.

May 6—Germans launch heavy gas attacks
against American troops on the Picardy
front.

May 8—Germans gain a foothold at several
points midway between La Clytte and
Voormezeele, but are repulsed at other
points along the line; Australians advance
500 yards near Sailly and 300 yards west
of Morlancourt.

May 9—British re-establish their lines and
drive Germans out of British trenches
between La Clytte and Voormezeele;
Germans occupy British advanced positions
at Albert on a front of about 150
yards.

May 10—British restore their line at Albert;
German artillery fire active in the Vimy
and Robecq sectors of the British front,
and south of Dickebusch.

May 11—Berlin reports heavy losses inflicted
on American troops southwest of Apremont;
Germans gain small portion of territory
southwest of Mailly-Raineval, but
are driven out by French; French gain
ground in Mareuil Wood.

May 12—French troops north of Kemmel capture
Hill 44 and an adjoining farm; Germans
bombard Albert, Loos, and Ypres
sectors, and lines southeast of Amiens,
but are repulsed by the French near
Orvillers-Sorel.

May 13—Americans blow up enemy ammunition
dump and start fires in Cantigny,
with explosions; Germans resume
firing north of Kemmel.

May 14—Hill 44, north of Kemmel, changes
hands several times; French advance in
Hangard region; British carry out successful
raid near Robecq.

May 15—Germans repulsed by the British
southwest of Morlancourt and by the
French north of Kemmel.

May 16—Heavy gunfire in the Lys and Avre
areas.

May 17—Official announcement that American
troops have taken their place in the
British war zone in Northern France;
German gunfire increases in the Lys and
Hailles region.

ITALIAN CAMPAIGN.

May 3—Heavy fighting reported along the
entire front between the Adriatic and the
Giudicaria Valley.

May 5—Increase in artillery fire, notably in
the Lagarina and Astico Valleys.

May 11—Italians penetrate advanced Austrian
positions on Monte Carno.

May 12—Italians wipe out a Coll dell’ Orso
garrison.

May 14—Austrian attempts to renew attacks
on Monte Carno and to approach Italian
lines at Dosso Casina and in the Balcino
and Ornic Valleys fail.

May 16—Italians enter Austrian lines at two
points on Monte Asolone; British make
successful raid at Canove.

CAMPAIGN IN ASIA MINOR.

April 21—Armenians retake Van.

April 27—British in Mesopotamia advance
north of Bagdad and Kifra.

April 28—British cavalry forces a passage of
the Aqsu at a point southwest of Tuzhurmatl.

April 29—British take Tuzhurmatl.

April 30—British advance as far as the Tauk
River, and occupy Mezreh.

May 1—Es-Salt taken by the British.

May 7—British enter Kerkuk.

May 12—Arabs of Hedjaz raid Jadi Jerdun
station and a post on the Hedjaz Railway,
taking many prisoners and destroying
tracks and bridges.

AERIAL RECORD.

Trent, Trieste, and Pola were raided by Italian
scouts on May 10.

Carlshutte, Germany, was bombed by the
British May 3. Saarbrucken was bombed
on May 16, and five German machines
were brought down.

British aviators raided the aviation grounds
at Campo Maggiore on May 4 and
brought down fourteen Austrian planes.

German airmen attacked Dutch fishing vessels
in the North Sea May 5.

Ostend, Westende, and Zeebrugge were attacked
by British seaplanes on May 6.

Many notable air battles occurred on the
western front in connection with the fighting
in Picardy and Flanders. In one
day, May 15, fifty-five German airplanes
were brought down by British and French
aviators, and on May 16 forty-six German
machines were brought down by the British.

NAVAL RECORD.

Early in the morning of April 23 British
naval forces, in co-operation with French
destroyers, carried out a raid against Zeebrugge
and Ostend, with the object of bottling
up German submarine bases. Five
obsolete British cruisers, which had been
filled with concrete, were run aground,
blown up, and abandoned by their crews,
and two old submarines were loaded with
explosives for the destruction of the Zeebrugge
mole. A German destroyer was
sunk and other ships were shelled. Twenty
yards of the Zeebrugge mole were blown
up, and the harbor was blocked completely.
On May 10 the obsolete cruiser
Vindictive was sunk at the entrance to
Ostend Harbor, practically completing the
work.

An Austrian dreadnought of the Viribus
Unitis type was torpedoed by Italian
naval forces in Pola Harbor on the morning
of May 14.

RUSSIA.

On April 20, Japan ordered reinforcements
sent to Vladivostok, as the Bolsheviki had
directed the removal of munitions westward.
On the same day diplomatic representatives
of the allied powers were formally
informed by the Siberian Provincial
Duma of the formation—by representatives
of the Zemstvos and other public
organizations—of the Government of
Autonomous Siberia.

The Bolshevist Foreign Minister, George
Tchitcherin, on April 26, addressed representatives
in Moscow of the United States,
England, and France, requesting the
speedy recall of their Consuls from Vladivostok
and the investigation of their alleged
participation in negotiations said
to have been conducted between their
Peking embassies and the Siberian Autonomous
Government. He also asked them
to explain their attitude toward the Soviet
Government and the alleged attempts of
their representatives to interfere with the
internal life of Russia. Japan was asked
to explain the participation of Japanese
officials in the counter-revolutionary
movement. An official report of the demand
for the removal of John K. Caldwell,
the American Consul at Vladivostok,
was received by the American State Department
on May 6, from Ambassador
Francis. The State Department announced
that Mr. Caldwell had done
nothing wrong and that he would not
be removed. On the same day a report
was received that the Russian authorities
at Irkutsk had arrested the Japanese
Vice Consul and the President of the
Japanese Association on the charge of being
military spies.

At a meeting of several thousand peasants
of the Ukraine, held on April 29, a resolution
was passed calling for the overthrow
of the Government, the closing of the
Central Rada, the cancellation of the
Constituent Assembly convoked for May
12, and the abandonment of land socialization.
General Skoropauski was proclaimed

Hetman and was recognized by
Germany.

The German advance into the Ukraine continued,
military rule was established in
Kiev, and several members of the Government,
including the Minister of War, were
removed on the ground that the Government
had proved too weak to maintain
law and order. Vice Chancellor von
Payer, speaking before the Main Committee
of the German Reichstag on May 4,
attempted to justify Germany’s use of the
iron hand by declaring that grain had
been withheld and that prominent Ukrainians,
members of the Committee of
Safety, had been caught planning the assassination
of German officers.

Rostov-on-the-Don was occupied by Germans
on May 9, but was recaptured by
the Russians the next day.

M. Tchitcherin, on May 12, sent a wireless
message to Ambassador Joffe, at Berlin,
instructing him to try to obtain from
Berlin cessation of every kind of hostility,
and declared that captures of Russian
territory violated the terms of the treaty
of peace. He also gave assurances that
the Black Sea Fleet would not attack
the port of Novorossysk, which the Germans
threatened to capture. In an
evasive reply the Commander in Chief of
the German troops in the East said he
could only agree to the cessation of naval
operations against the Black Sea Fleet,
provided that all ships returned to Sebastopol
and were retained there, thus leaving
the port of Novorossysk free for navigation.

A Swedish report of May 14 told of a German
ultimatum to the Bolshevist Government
demanding the occupation of Moscow
and other Russian cities, the abolishment
of armaments, and the effecting of
certain financial measures which would
practically make Russia a German colony.

Professor H. C. Emery, the American who
was seized when the Germans landed in
the Aland Islands, was freed from prison,
but was still detained in Germany, according
to a report received on May 5.

The British Foreign Minister, A. J. Balfour,
announced in Commons on May 5 that
Great Britain was ready to grant temporary
recognition to the Esthonian National
Council.

Transcaucasia proclaimed its independence
on April 26, and a conservative Government
was formed, headed by M. Chkemkeli.

Ciscaucasia proclaimed itself an independent
State on May 14.

The Caucasus proposed peace negotiations
with Turkey May 10.

Russian Bolshevist troops crossed the Caspian
Sea in gunboats and recaptured
Baku from the Mussulmans May 17.

Emperor William issued a proclamation,
May 14, recognizing the independence of
Lithuania, allied with the German Empire,
and saying that it was assumed that
Lithuania would participate in the war
burdens of Germany.

FINLAND.

Hostilities between the Finnish White Guards
and the Germans and the Red Guards continued.
Germany protested to the Bolshevist
Foreign Minister on April 23
against the landing of allied troops at
Murmansk, declaring that such landing
was a violation of the Brest-Litovsk
treaty. Germany also denied that Germans
had participated in the raid of the
Finnish White Guards upon Kem.

The White Guards, on April 26, demanded the
surrender of a fort on the Finnish coast
ceded to Russia by the Finnish Bolshevist
Government, constituting part of the
Kronstadt defenses. The Kronstadt Council
of Workmen’s and Soldiers’ Delegates
refused to comply with the demand, and
organized resistance.

Viborg was taken by the White Guards on
April 30. On May 3, the Germans in the
southwest defeated the Red Guards after
a five days’ battle near Lakhti and
Tevastus. The Finnish flag was raised on
the fortress of Sveaborg on May 13. On
May 15 the White Guards entered Helsingfors,
and on May 17 they seized Boris-Gleb
on the Norwegian border from the
Russian troops, thus gaining access to the
Arctic Ocean.

RUMANIA.

A peace treaty between Rumania and the
Central Powers was signed May 6, and
supplementary legal, economic, and
political treaties were later concluded.

The Rumanian Parliament was dissolved on
May 10 by royal decree and new elections
were ordered.

POLAND.

The Lausanne Gazette announced on May 12
that Poland was handed over to Germany
economically, politically, and militarily,
according to a secret treaty arranged at
Brest-Litovsk between a Russian delegation,
headed by Trotzky, and German representatives.
At a conference between the
Emperors of Germany and Austria-Hungary,
Germany agreed to the solution of
the Polish question desired by Austria,
in return for certain concessions from
Austria.

MISCELLANEOUS.

The Guatemalan Assembly, on April 22, declared
the country to be in the same position
as the United States in the war, and
the following day the Guatemalan Minister
at Washington announced that the
declaration was meant as a declaration
of war against Germany and her allies.

In response to a request from Uruguay for
a definition of the relations between the
two countries, Germany replied, according

to an announcement made public May
16, that she did not consider that a state
of war existed.

Nicaragua declared war on Germany and her
allies on May 7.

Royal assent to the British man-power bill,
providing for conscription in Ireland, was
given on April 18. An Order in Council
was issued on May 1 postponing the Conscription
act.

Lord Wimborne, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland,
and Henry E. Duke, Chief Secretary, resigned
on April 24. Edward Shortt was
appointed Chief Secretary and Viscount
French succeeded Lord Wimborne as
Lord Lieutenant.

James Ian MacPherson announced in the
House of Commons on May 9 that a German
submarine had recently landed an
associate of Sir Roger Casement on the
Irish coast, where he was arrested by
Government officials, and that he was
now in the Tower of London and would
be tried by court-martial. A dispatch
dated May 15 revealed that two Germans
accompanied him, and that all three were
imprisoned.

All the Sinn Fein leaders, including De Valera
and the Countess Markievicz, were arrested
in Belfast, Dublin, and other cities,
on May 17, as the result of the discovery
of treasonable relations with Germany.
Lord Lieutenant French issued a proclamation
dealing with the situation, calling
on all loyalists to aid in blocking
the German plans and asking for volunteers
to provide Ireland’s share of the
army.

Sir Arthur Roberts, financial adviser to the
British Air Minister, resigned on April
24 as a result of a disagreement with Lord
Rothermere. The next day Lord Rothermere
resigned. He was succeeded by Sir
William Weir. Baron Rhondda resigned
as Food Controller and Lord Northcliffe
resigned as Chairman of London headquarters
of the British Mission to the
United States and Director of Propaganda
in Enemy Countries.

Representatives of the allied nations met at
Versailles on May 1 and May 2.

On May 6 Major Gen. Frederick Barton
Maurice, formerly Director General of British
Military Operations, addressed a letter
to The London Daily Chronicle challenging
the statements made in the House of
Commons by Premier Lloyd George and
Andrew Bonar Law with regard to the
military situation and demanding a Parliamentary
investigation. On May 7 ex-Premier
Asquith moved for an inquiry in
Commons. After a speech by Lloyd
George in Commons in his own defense,
May 9, the House, by a vote of 293 to 106,
upheld him and the Government and rejected
Mr. Asquith’s motion.

The Austrian Premier was empowered by
Emperor Charles, on May 4, to adjourn
Parliament and to inaugurate measures to
render impossible the resumption of its
activities.

A growing resentment against the domination
of Austria-Hungary by Germany was
manifested by Austria’s Slavic peoples. A
dispatch from Switzerland dated May 8
told of serious disturbances in the fleet,
caused by seamen of Slavic and Italian
stock, which resulted in several changes
in the high command. A new Hungarian
Cabinet, headed by Dr. Wekerle, was
formed on May 10. On May 13 Vienna
papers published a declaration by the
Czech members of the Austrian House of
Lords in which an independent State was
demanded.

As a result of a conference between Emperor
William and Emperor Charles at German
Headquarters on May 10, Austria-Hungary
concluded a new convention with Germany.

M. Duval, manager of the Bonnet Rouge, and
his associates, Leymarie and Marion,
directors of the paper; Goldsky and Landau,
journalists, and two minor men
named Joucla and Vercasson, were placed
on trial in Paris on charges of treason
and espionage, on April 29. On May 15,
Duval was sentenced to death for treason,
and the six other defendants were sentenced
to imprisonment for terms ranging
from two to ten years.

The British Government replied to the note
of the Netherlands Government concerning
the taking over of Dutch ships on
May 1, and asserted the full legality of
the seizure.

A London dispatch, dated April 24, announced
that Germany had sent an ultimatum
to Holland demanding the right
of transit for civilian supplies and sand
and gravel. Holland yielded to these
demands on April 28, with the stipulation
that the sand and gravel should not be
used for war purposes. On May 5, Foreign
Minister Loudon announced in the
Dutch Chamber that Germany had promised
to transport no troops or military
supplies and to limit the amount of sand
and gravel.

Persia informed Holland, on May 3, that it
regarded as null and void all treaties
imposed upon Persia in recent years, and
especially the Russo-British treaty of
1907 regarding the spheres of influence.

German Losses On All Fronts

One Estimate Reaches 5,600,000

Karl Bleibtreu, the German
military statistician, writing in
Das Neue Europa of April 22,
gives the German losses from Aug. 2,
1914, to Jan. 31, 1918, as 4,456,961 men.
His figures deal exclusively with those
killed in action or taken prisoner. They
are official from Aug. 2, 1914, till July
31, 1917, and are then estimated to Jan.
31, 1918. His figures and comment read:

WESTERN FRONT

These figures give, on the western front,
from Aug. 2, 1914, to July 31, 1917, an aggregate
of 2,604,961 casualties.

This gives a total from Aug. 2, 1914, to
July 31, 1917, of 1,484,550, and for the two
fronts combined of 4,089,511.

From Aug. 1, 1917, to Jan. 31, 1918,
Herr Bleibtreu estimates the total losses
on both fronts at 367,450, making in all
4,456,961 men.

In adding those who died from illness
or wounds, the losses resulting from the
colonial and maritime fighting, as well as
in the noncombatant and auxiliary services,
not comprised in the preceding
enumeration, the grand total considerably
exceeds 5,000,000.

Estimates of German losses from Jan.
31, 1918, to May 20, 1918, range from
400,000 to 600,000. If the above figures
are correct, the total German loss in the
forty-six months of the war exceeds
5,600,000. The London Telegraph, in
analyzing these figures, said:

With regard to the figures given by
Herr Bleibtreu, it may be remarked that
they are enormously in excess over those
compiled in well-informed quarters from
the official casualty lists published by the
German Government, and issued periodically.
Down to July 31, 1918, these lists
had contained a grand total of 4,624,256
names, but did not include naval or
Colonial troop losses. Of the above figure
the following are the permanent losses:

These statistics are merely the names
published down to July 31, 1917, and are
not to be taken as the actual total casualties,
as the lists are always at least
several weeks behindhand. But even allowing
for this fact, Bleibtreu’s estimate
for the killed in action and prisoners
alone is considerably more than double
those officially acknowledged by Berlin,
and nearly equal to the total casualties
admitted in the official lists from all
causes. Of this remarkable discrepancy
there can be only two possible explanations.
Either the German Government
has throughout the war systematically
falsified its casualty lists—and there is
good reason to believe that this is the
case—or else Bleibtreu has been put up
by the German Staff to publish a set of
statistics intended deliberately to mislead
the Allies.

Great Britain’s Finances

Heavy War Taxes Levied

The new British budget for 1918-19
was introduced in the House of
Commons April 23. It included
some sweeping changes in taxes
and gave important data of expenses.
The estimate for 1918 in round numbers
is $15,000,000,000; the estimated revenue
is $4,200,000,000, leaving a balance to be
covered by loans of $10,800,000,000. The
actual expenditures in 1917-18 were
$13,481,105,000; the revenue was $3,536,175,000;
the deficit met by loans was
$9,944,930,000.

Under the new budget the tax on incomes
is increased from $1.25 in $5 to
$1.50 in $5. Under the new rate the
increased tax begins at an income of
$2,500 a year. On an income that is
wholly earned—such as a salary—the
tax is as follows:

Where the income is wholly unearned
the tax is as follows:

TAXES ON UNEARNED INCOME

The super tax in the new law begins at
an income of $13,750, and the total taxes
paid on the following incomes, including
income tax and super tax, are as follows:

TOTAL INCOME AND SUPER TAX

The tax on $500,000 incomes is a little
over 50 per cent. In the case of a tax-payer
whose total income does not exceed
$4,000 an allowance of $125 is granted
in respect of his wife and an allowance
of a like amount in respect of any dependent
relatives whom he maintains;
also an allowance of $125 in respect of
children under 16 years of age.

TAXES ON COMMODITIES

Checks require a stamp of 4 cents, also
promissory notes. The excess-profit
rate remains at 80 per cent. The tax on
spirits is raised to $7.50 a gallon; on
beer to $12.50 a barrel; on tobacco to
$2.04 a pound, the effect of which will
increase the price 4 cents an ounce,
while the cheapest cigarette, now 6 cents
for ten, will be 7 cents for ten. The tax
on matches is increased so that they will
be sold at 2 cents a box instead of 1-1/2
cents. An additional duty of $3 a hundredweight
is levied on sugar, so that
sugar heretofore selling at 11-1/2 cents a
pound will now have to be sold at 14
cents a pound.

A tax of 16-2/3 per cent, is levied on
the sale of luxuries, including jewelry,
and of articles above a certain price when
they become articles of luxury; also on
hotel and restaurant bills. This tax will
be collected by means of stamps. The
new postage rate is raised to 3 cents an
ounce; on book packages exceeding one
ounce an extra charge of 1 cent will be
levied. Letters to the United States will
cost 3 cents instead of 2 cents. Post-cards
in England will be 2 cents instead
of 1 cent, and the parcel rate, under
seven pounds, 18 cents, and between
seven and eleven pounds, 25 cents.

LUXURIES HEAVILY TAXED

The tax on luxuries is a new tax in
England, and is following the method
adopted in France Dec. 31, 1917. The
tax on luxuries in France is levied at
the rate of 10 per cent. on the retail
selling price of the scheduled articles.

All payments of less than 20 cents are
exempted. The schedule consists of two
lists, one comprising articles taxed irrespective
of price at 10 per cent., and the
other, articles taxed when the retail
price exceeds certain specified amounts,
as follows:

Taxed Irrespective of Price.—Photographic
appliances, gold or platinum
jewelry, billiard tables, silk hosiery and
underwear, artistic bronze and iron work,
horses and ponies for pleasure purposes,
curiosities and antiques, sporting guns,
books, servants’ liveries, gold watches,
perfumery, soaps and dentifrices, paintings
and sculpture, pianos, (other than
cottage pianos,) tapestry, truffles, pleasure
boats, and yachts.

Taxed Above Specified Prices, (approximately
shown in U.S. money.)—Pet
dogs, $8; other pets, $2; smokers’ requisites,
$2; bicycles, $50; silver jewelry, $2;
picture frames, $2; walking sticks, $2;
chinaware table service, $40; single pieces,
39c to $3; men’s headwear, $4; women’s
hats, $8; women’s footwear, $8; men’s
footwear, $10; chocolates, 75c per pound;
corsets, $10; men’s suits, $35; women’s
costumes or mantles, $50; scissors, $2;
lace and embroidery machine made, 35c
per yard; handmade, $1.83 per yard;
artificial flowers, $2; furs, $20; gloves,
$1.58; furniture, $300 per suite; mirrors,
$4; motor cycles, $400; watches, $10; handkerchiefs,
$3.66 per dozen; umbrellas, $5;
feathers, $5; clocks, $20; photographs, $8
per dozen; cottage pianos, $240; curtains,
$20; carpets, $3.62 per yard; pajamas and
dressing gowns, $16; horse carriages,
$200; bird cages, $2.

Payments for goods bought before
Jan. 1, 1918, are exempt from the tax.

AMERICA’S ASSISTANCE

In presenting the budget the Chancellor
of the Exchequer stated that the expenditures
in the past year exceeded the
estimate by $2,030,000,000. He referred
to America’s assistance as follows:

The extent of the assistance of the
United States and our advances to the
Allies last year amounted to $2,525,000,000.
In addition to this the United States have
advanced to all the Allies no less a sum
during the year than $4,750,000,000. Of
this sum approximately $2,500,000,000 was
advanced to us and $2,250,000,000 to the
Allies.

The House will see, therefore, that,
whereas this year we advanced to the
Allies approximately the same amount as
last year, $2,525,000,000 as against $2,700,000,000,
the United States advanced in addition
$2,250,000,000; that is to say, the
total advances by us and by the Government
of the United States are $4,775,000,000,
as against $2,700,000,000 by us alone
last year.

The House would notice that our advances
to the Allies are approximately the
same amount as the advances made to us
by the Government of the United States.
This is satisfactory. It means that it is
only necessary for us to lean on the
United States to the extent that the other
Allies lean upon us, or that, in other
words, after nearly four years of war we
are self-supporting.

But it is almost absurd that we should
be borrowing with one hand while we are
lending with the other. The result is that
our accounts are inflated apparently, and
in fact to that extent our credit is weakened.
I have therefore been in communication
with Mr. McAdoo, the Financial
Minister of America, and Mr. Crossley,
the head of the United States Financial
Mission, and I suggested as regards
advances to the Allies a course which, if
adopted, will have the effect of lessening
to a considerable extent our burden, while
in no way increasing the total obligations
of the United States.

THE TOTAL BRITISH DEBT

In referring to the total debt the Chancellor
of the Exchequer made the following
statement:

The national debt, on the estimates
which I have submitted to the House,
will at the end of the present year, (March
31, 1919,) amount to $39,900,000,000. Previously,
in counting our liabilities, I have
deducted altogether advances to Allies
and Dominions. I do not propose to adopt
that course today. We cannot ignore
what is happening in Russia; though,
even yet, I do not admit—I do not believe—that
we should regard the debt of
Russia as a bad debt, because, sooner or
later, in spite of what is happening now,
there will be an ordered Government in
that country.

By the end of this year the total amount
due by the Allies to us will be $8,110,000,000,
and I should hope that we should
be able to deduct Dominion and obligation
debts, making a total of $5,920,000,000.
The amount of our national debt at the
end of last year was $29,250,000,000. The
amount of our liability on the basis I
have stated is $34,280,000,000, and, taking
5 per cent. on this amount as the rate of
interest, the total comes to $1,900,000,000.
This, added to the normal expenditure,
makes a total amount of $3,400,000,000.

Now, how is that to be met? Taking the
Inland Revenue taxation alone, it amounts
to $2,700,000,000. The Inland Revenue
officials have assured me that they have
made a very careful and a very conservative
estimate. Taking this estimate, there

remains a deficit on the full year of
$550,000,000.

To make good this $550,000,000 I shall
impose new taxation which, on the full
year, will bring in $570,000,000. The Inland
Revenue, in their estimate of result
of existing taxation, take no account
whatever of the excess profits duty, but
that duty, as I have pointed out, is expected
to yield $1,500,000,000.

Assuming—an assumption that may last
for half an hour [laughter]—that the
income tax remains at 5s, that should
reach $375,000,000. Of course, that must
be supplemented. It depends upon the
state of trade and credit, but I think I am
quite safe in saying that this amount,
which they have left out of their reckoning,
is more than sufficient to counter-balance
any error made with regard to
existing taxation.

GERMANY’S WAR DEBT

He followed this with a statement contrasting
the financial condition of Great
Britain with that of Germany, as follows:

Up to June, 1916, according to the statement
of the German Financial Minister,
the monthly German expenditure was
$500,000,000; it is now admitted to be
$937,500,000, which means a daily expenditure
of $31,250,000, which is almost the
same as ours. But it does not include
such matters as separation allowances.
As to the war debt, the German votes of
credit up to July amounted to $31,000,000,000.
Up to 1916 they imposed no new
taxation at all, and in that year they proposed
a war increment levy. Assuming
that their estimates were realized, the
total amount of taxation levied by the
German Government was $1,825,000,000,
as against our own amount.

This amount is not enough to pay the
interest of the war debt which Germany
has accumulated up to the end of the
year. The German balance sheet, reckoned
on the same basis as ours, will, with interest,
sinking fund, pensions, and pre-war
expenditures, be a year hence $3,600,000,000;
and with additional permanent
imperial revenue of $600,000,000 they
will make their total additional revenue
$925,000,000 per annum, and this amount,
added to the pre-war revenue, makes a
total of $1,675,000,000, showing a deficit
at the end of the year of $1,925,000,000.

If that were our position I should say
that bankruptcy was not far from the
British Nation.

The German taxes have been almost exclusively
indirect, imposed on commodities
paid for by the mass of the people and
not upon the wealthier classes, who control
the Government and on whom the
Government is afraid to put extra taxation.

Trade After the War

Important Report by a Commission of British Experts
and Economists

Great Britain’s policy with reference
to future trade is outlined
in the final report of the Committee
on Commercial and Industrial
Policy After the War, of which
Lord Balfour of Burleigh was Chairman,
and which included in its membership
Arthur Balfour, (ex-Master Cutler
of Sheffield,) also the heads of the various
Boards of Trade, the textile
trades, with representatives of the shipping
and shipbuilding industries, finance,
engineering, metal trades, coal,
electrical, iron and steel associations, national
transport workers, and distinguished
economists.

Shipping policy after the war is not
dealt with in the report, but, in view of
the world shortage of tonnage, the committee
express the opinion that, while
it may be desirable to impose for a limited
period some restriction on the use
of British ports by enemy vessels, any
policy which might tend to check the
use of English ports by foreign shipping
generally would be inexpedient. They,
however, urge that, in accordance with
the Paris Conference resolutions, the exaction
of reparation in kind from enemy
countries should, in the interests of the
reconstruction of industry and the mercantile
marine, be carried out as fully as
may be practicable.

In a general survey of the position of
British industry and overseas trade in
1913, prior to the war, the committee
found that the United Kingdom had
taken only a limited share in the more

modern branches of industrial production,
and that certain branches had come
to be entirely, or very largely, under
German control, and in numerous
branches foreign manufacturers had secured
a “strong, or even predominant,
position.” They found that British merchants
and manufacturers had also been
encountering successful competition in
overseas trade. They believe that the
knowledge gained during the war will be
a valuable asset in the development of
British industry.

As to the measures which should be
adopted during the transitional period,
the committee reaffirm the main recommendations
of their interim report,
namely:

Transition Period

(a) The prohibition of the importation of
goods from enemy origin should be continued,
subject to license in exceptional
cases, for at least twelve months after
the conclusion of the war, and subsequently
for such further period as may be
deemed expedient.

(b) The Paris resolutions relating to the
supply of the Allies for the restoration of
their industries can be carried into effect
if a policy of joint control of certain important
commodities can be agreed upon
between the British Empire and the Allies.
Any measures should aim at securing to
the British Empire and the allied countries
priority for their requirements, and
should be applied only to materials which
are mainly derived from those countries
and will be required by them. This policy
should be applied as regards the
United Kingdom by legislation empowering
the Government to prohibit the export,
except under license, of such articles as
may be deemed expedient, and, as regards
the British Empire and the allied countries,
the Government should, without
delay, enter into negotiations with the
various Governments concerned, with a
view to the adoption of suitable joint
measures in the case of selected commodities
of importance.

The Government should consider, in
consultation with the Allies, the expediency
of establishing after the war a joint
organization on the lines of Commission
Internationale de Ravitaillement for dealing
with the orders of the allied Governments
for reconstruction purposes, and
with such private orders as they may find
it expedient to centralize.

It is pointed out that the prolongation
of the war and the entry into it of the
United States have increased the importance
of a considered policy directed
toward assuring to the British Empire
and the Allies adequate supplies of
essential raw materials during the
period immediately following the conclusion
of peace, and that the extent to
which the Paris resolutions which bear
upon this vital question can be carried
into effect depends upon the co-operation
of the Governments concerned.

PROBLEM OF RAW MATERIALS

The committee reports that it will be
necessary to continue for a considerable
period after the war some portion of the
control of home and foreign trade in
order to secure adequate supplies of foodstuffs
and raw material. It does not
regard it as practical to attempt to
make the empire self-supporting in respect
of numerous raw materials. It
notes that the Board of Trade already
has set up a committee to investigate
the question of the supply of cotton and
it recommends special inquiries as regards
each commodity. “The object to
be kept in view should be that the empire
may be capable in an emergency
of being independent in respect of the
supply of every essential commodity of
any single foreign country.”

The committee advises against the exclusion
of foreign (other than present
enemy) capital from sharing in the development
of the empire’s resources, but
recommends:

(a) Complete disclosure, as far as is
practicable, of the extent of foreign holdings
in any particular case.

(b) That mineral and other properties
are not secured by foreign concerns in
order to prevent the development of those
properties, and to check competition in
supply; and

(c) That in the case of commodities of
great imperial importance, the local Government
concerned should have some
measure of control over the working of
the properties.

These principles, if accepted, should be
brought to the notice of the Governments
of other parts of the empire, with a view
to the adoption of a uniform policy.

ALIENS IN BUSINESS

The committee expresses the opinion
that it would not be desirable to impose
special restrictions against the participation
of aliens in commercial and industrial

occupations. It recommends,
however, that such occupations as pilot
and patent agent should be confined to
British-born subjects, and suggests that
foreign commercial travelers operating
in the United Kingdom should be registered
and hold licenses, that the registration
of title to property should be compulsory,
and that such registration
should involve a declaration of the nationality
of the owner.

The committee deems it unwise to restrain
the establishment or the continuance
of agencies or branches of foreign
banks or insurance companies in the
United Kingdom, but foreign insurance
companies should be required to make a
deposit proportionate to the business
done. Foreign banks should be required
to pay the income tax.

The committee considers it necessary
to impose special restrictions on the subjects
of enemy countries, and that this
can best be done by means of stringent
permit and police regulations, but it does
not believe that attempts should be made
to prevent enemy subjects from establishing
agencies or holding interests in
commercial or industrial undertakings.

A plan for the maintenance and development
of industries essential to national
safety, called “Key Industries,” is
proposed, as follows:

Synthetic dyes, spelter, tungsten, magnetos,
optical and chemical glass, hosiery
needles, thorium nitrate, limit and screw
gauges, and certain drugs.

SPECIAL INDUSTRIES BOARD

The committee recommends the creation
of a permanent special industries
board, charged with the duty of watching
the course of industrial development
and recommending plans for the promotion
and assistance of the industries enumerated
above. With reference to industries
generally the committee thinks
that the individualist methods hitherto
adopted should be supplemented by co-operation
and co-ordination of effort in
respect of

1. The securing of supplies of materials.

2. Production, in which we include
standardization and scientific and industrial
research; and

3. Marketing.

The report recommends the formation
of combinations of manufacturers, strong,
well organized associations and combinations,
to secure supplies of materials,
especially the control of mineral deposits
in foreign countries. In order to facilitate
increased production it recommends:

That an authority should be set up
which should have the right, after inquiry,
to grant compulsory powers for
the acquisition of land for industrial purposes
and the diversion or abolition of
roads or footpaths.

That there should be a judicial body
with compulsory powers to deal with the
question of wayleaves required for the development
of mineral royalties and the
economical working of collieries and
mines.

The committee believes in the formation
of organizations for marketing the
manufactured products of the country
and deems it inexpedient for the Government
to enter into any policy aiming
at positive control of combinations
(trusts) in the United Kingdom. It
recommends that combinations be legalized,
so as to be enforceable between
members. It welcomes the establishment
of the British Trade Corporation to co-ordinate
and supplement existing financial
facilities for trading purposes. As
a general rule the members think it
would be undesirable that the State
should attempt to provide capital for
industrial purposes, but as the re-establishment
of industry on a peace basis
will be profoundly affected by taxation,
currency, and foreign exchanges, they
recommend that these matters be taken
up by the Treasury, in consultation with
the banking and commercial interests.

TARIFF REGULATIONS

With reference to tariff the committee
recommends a protective tariff only on
industries “which can show that, in
spite of the adoption of the most efficient
technical methods and business organization,
they cannot maintain themselves
against foreign competition, or
that they are hindered from adopting
these methods by such competition.”

The general fiscal policy as finally
adopted by the committee is as follows:

1. The producers of this country are
entitled to require from the Government
that they should be protected in their

home market against “dumping” and
against the introduction of “sweated”
goods, by which term we understand
goods produced by labor which is not
paid at trade union rates of wages, where
such rates exist in the country of origin
of the goods, or the current rates of that
country where there are no trade union
rates. We recommend that action be
taken in regard to “dumping” on the
lines (though not necessarily in the precise
form) adopted in Canada.

2. Those industries which we have described
as “key” or “pivotal” should
be maintained in this country at all hazards
and at any expense.

3. As regards other industries, protection
by means of customs duties or Government
assistance in other forms should
be afforded only to carefully selected
branches of industry, which must be
maintained either for reasons of national
safety or on the general ground that it is
undesirable that any industry of real importance
to our economic strength and
well-being should be allowed to be weakened
by foreign competition or brought
to any serious extent under alien domination
or control.

4. Preferential treatment should be accorded
to the British oversea dominions
and possessions in respect of any customs
duties now or hereafter to be imposed in
the United Kingdom, and consideration
should be given to other forms of imperial
preference.

5. As regards our commercial relations
with our present allies and neutrals,
the denunciation of existing commercial
treaties is unnecessary and inexpedient,
but the present opportunity should be
taken to endeavor to promote our trade
with our allies, and consideration should
be given to the possibility of utilizing for
purposes of negotiation with them and
present neutrals any duties which may be
imposed in accordance with the principles
laid down above.

LIMITING PROTECTIVE PRINCIPLES

In view of the danger that the admission
of the principle of protection,
even to a limited extent, may give rise
to a widespread demand for similar assistance
from other industries, and consequently
to an amount of political pressure
which it may be very difficult to
resist, the committee further recommends:

That a strong and competent board,
with an independent status, should be established
to examine into all applications
from industries for State assistance, to
advise his Majesty’s Government upon
such applications, and, where a case is
made out, to frame proposals as to the
precise nature and extent of the assistance
to be given.

Before recommending tariff protection
for any particular industry it should be
the duty of the board to consider forms
of State assistance other than, or concurrent
with, protective duties, such as
bounties on production, preferential treatment
(subject to an adequate standard
of quality and security against price
rings) in respect of Government and other
public authority contracts, State financial
assistance, and also whether the position
of the industry could not be improved
by internal reorganization.

The board should also have constantly
in mind the safeguarding of the interests
of consumers and of labor, and should
make recommendations as to the conditions
which for these purposes should be
attached to any form of Government assistance,
whether by means of a tariff or
otherwise.

The committee reports adversely on
the changing of weights, measures, and
coinage to the metric system.

BANK OF FINLAND, AT HELSINGFORS, WHERE THE RED GUARDS, ATTEMPTING TO BREAK INTO THE BUILDING, WERE REPULSED BY THE WHITE GUARDS

Finland Under German Control

Events of the Period of Chaos and Foreign
Invasion Preceding the Fall of Viborg

Civil war, later complicated by the
German invasion, has been the
central fact in the history of Finland
since the declaration of its
independence in December, 1917. The
internecine strife was precipitated by the
coup d’état which the Finnish Socialists
effected in January, 1918. It so happened
that the representatives of the
propertied classes had the majority in
the Diet which severed the century-old
connection between Finland and Russia.
As for the Government which this Diet
has set up to rule the independent republic,
all its members belong to middle-class
parties. Headed by Mr. Svinhufud,
a Young-Finn leader, it includes one
Svekoman, two Agrarians, three Old-Finns,
and six Young-Finns.

The dissatisfaction of the Socialist elements,
which are very strong in Finland,
with this régime soon grew so intense
that they decided to overthrow it by
armed force. The Red Guard, that is, detachments
of armed workmen organized
by the Finnish Labor Party, seized Helsingfors,
dissolved the “bourgeois” Government,
and formed a Socialist Cabinet
under the leadership of Senator Kullervo
Manner. The revolutionists did not, however,
succeed in capturing Mr. Svinhufud
and his associates. These fled north and
established their headquarters at Vasa,
(Nikolaystadt,) on the Gulf of Bothnia.
Since then the half-starved country has
been the arena of bloody clashes between
the Red troops and the forces supporting
the Vasa Government, which consist
largely of middle-class elements and are
known as the White Guards.

It is an open secret that Russia rendered
substantial assistance to the Finnish
revolutionists. Most of the weapons
in their possession are from Russian
arsenals, and Russian soldiers who lingered
on in Finland even after the Bolsheviki
had agreed to withdraw the Russian
troops stationed there have been
fighting shoulder to shoulder with the
Finnish Red Guards. It is reported that

on several occasions the Finnish Red
Guards were reinforced by Red Guards
from Petrograd. Moreover, in its organization
the Finnish Socialist Workmen’s
Republic is a copy of the Russian
Soviet Republic. The Red Finns have
the same hierarchy of Soviets, and they
affect the administrative terminology of
the Bolsheviki.

RED FINLAND

The Finnish Socialists should not,
however, be treated as identical with the
Russian Bolsheviki. The difference between
them is probably due to a difference
of civilization, for culturally the
dissimilarity between a Russian and a
Finn is as great as it is linguistically
and ethnically. It is noteworthy that
unlike the Bolsheviki they regard their
own rule as a transitional, provisional
régime. Speaking on Feb. 14, 1918, at
the first meeting of the Finnish Central
Soviet, Kullervo Manner, President of
the Commissariat of the People of Finland,
said among other things:

One of the foremost aims of the great
revolution of Finland’s workers is to build
the proud edifice of a political democracy
on the ruins of the fallen power of the
Junkers. * * * As soon as the enemy
of the people has been defeated throughout
the country shall the people of Finland
be given an opportunity through
referendum to accept a new Constitution.
The People’s Commissariat intends shortly
to put before the Central Soviet a proposal
for a fundamental law through
which will be laid the ground for a real
representation by the people and a firm
foundation for the future of the working
class.

Although the Finnish Socialists are
united with Russia by co-operation and
common aspirations, they do not desire
to join the Russian Federation. Finnish
socialism identifies itself with the cause
of Finnish nationalism. It was the Socialists
that were the stanchest advocates
of Finland’s secession from Russia,
and it was they that, by calling a general
strike, forced the Diet to adopt immediately
the Independence bill in November,
1917.

SKETCH MAP SHOWING FINLAND’S RELATION
TO SWEDEN, NORWAY, AND RUSSIA

The notion of Finland’s complete sovereignty
forms the basis of the peace concluded
early in March, 1918, between the
Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic
and the Finnish Socialist Workmen’s
Republic, “in order to strengthen
the friendship and fraternity between
the above-mentioned free republics.”
According to this pact, published on
March 10, Russia hands over to the Independent
Finnish Socialist Republic all
its possessions in Finland, including real
estate, telegraphs, railways, fortresses,
lighthouses, and also Finnish ships which
had been requisitioned by the Russian
Government before or during the war.
Article IX. provides for “free and unimpeded
access for the merchant ships of
the Russian and Finnish Socialist Republics
to all seas, lakes and rivers, harbors,
anchoring places, and channels” within
their territories. The next article establishes
uninterrupted communication,
without trans-shipment, between the Russian
and Finnish railways. Article XIII.
contains the provision that “Finnish citizens
in Russia as well as Russian citizens
in Finland shall enjoy the same
rights as the citizens of the respective
countries.”

GERMAN HAND IN FINLAND

If “Red” Finland has had the support
of the Russian Bolsheviki, “White” Finland
has found a most enterprising ally
in Germany. The Vasa Government has

been working in direct and now open
contact with Berlin. It is overwhelmingly
pro-German. The relation between
the two Governments early assumed the
character of vassalage on the part of the
Finns. This is evidenced by the peace
agreement which official Finland concluded
with Germany on March 7. Its
full text will be found elsewhere in this
issue.

THE OLD CASTLE OF VIBORG, FINLAND, WHICH THE WHITE GUARDS
USED AS A FORT

Since the beginning of the war the
Germans have been conducting in Finland
an active campaign of espionage
and propaganda through a host of
agents and sympathizers. The propaganda
found a favorable soil among the
propertied classes, and especially among
the landed gentry of Swedish extraction.
On the other hand, the persecutions
which the Czar’s bureaucracy inflicted
upon the nation, and against which
neither the French nor the British press
uttered any adequate protest, drove
some of the patriotic Finns into the arms
of Russia’s enemies. A number of Finnish
youths escaped to Germany and entered
the ranks of the German Army. The
University of Helsingfors played a
prominent part in this movement. In
1915 an entire battalion made up exclusively
of Finns fought under the German
colors, while no Finns served in the
Russian Army, exemption from military
service being one of the ancient Finnish
privileges respected by the Imperial Russian
Government.

After the March revolution, and especially
after the fall of Riga, the efforts
of the German agents, with whom Finland
now fairly swarmed, were directed
toward fomenting Finnish separatism. In
fact, the Swedish press asserted that
from the very beginning of the war the
Germans had spent large sums of money
in trying to fan the Finns’ smoldering
discontent with Russia. At the same time
Germany endeavored to enlist the sympathies
of the White Guards, (skudshär,)
which the middle classes were hastily organizing,
ostensibly for the purpose of
assisting the militia and protecting the
population from robbers. Berlin was so
successful in its task that as early as
October, 1917, the head of the Russian
Bureau of Counterespionage in Finland
spoke of the skudshär as “the vanguard
of the German Army.” The Finns who
served in Wilhelm’s army and were thoroughly

indoctrinated with German military
science and German ideals were returned
to their native country, and it was
they that took upon themselves to officer
the White Guards. Some of the weapons
and munitions used by the latter were
secured from Sweden, but most of them
came from Germany and were probably
a part of the Russian booty. The above-mentioned
Russian official declared, in
an interview published in a Petrograd
daily in October, 1917, that German submarines
appeared regularly off the Finnish
coast and delivered arms and ammunition
to Finnish vessels.

ATROCITIES ON BOTH SIDES

The White Guards, commanded by
General Mannerheim, fought the revolutionists
with varying success but without
achieving a decisive victory. Several
towns in the south were the scene
of prolonged battles in which many lives
were lost, notably Tammerfors, the important
industrial centre, where fierce
fighting raged throughout the second
half of March. The factory districts in
the north were also the scene of stubborn
fighting. A number of women were
seen in the ranks of the Red Guards.

The two warring factions created a
reign of “Red” and “White” terror in
the country. Both committed frightful
atrocities. On April 17, Oskari Tokoi,
the Commissionary for Foreign Affairs
in the Socialist Cabinet, protested to all
the powers against the manner in which
General Mannerheim treated his Red
Guard prisoners. He pointed out that,
while the Red Guards regarded the captured
White Guards as prisoners of war,
the Government troops, having taken a
number of prisoners, shot all the officers
and every fifteenth man of the rank and
file. On the other hand, the corpses of
many White Guards were found unspeakably
mutilated.

Immediately after the outbreak of the
Socialist rebellion, the official Government
conceived the idea of appealing for
foreign military aid against the revolutionists.
On Jan. 30 such an appeal
was reported to have been sent to Sweden.
The cause of White Finland had
many sympathizers in that country. The
Finnish White Guards had a recruiting
office in Stockholm, and a number of
Swedish volunteers fought in their ranks.
A considerable portion (12 per cent.)
of the Finnish population are Swedes,
mostly members of the higher classes.
In addition, the two countries have common
historical memories, for Finland
was a Swedish province for six centuries,
from the time of Erik VIII., King of
Sweden, till the Russian annexation in
1809.

The Swedish Government did not, however,
elect to intervene. It is not certain
whether Stockholm refused its assistance
because Finland refused to cede the Aland
Islands to the Swedes as a compensation
for their services, or because, as Mr.
Branting asserts, Sweden was to intervene
“as the creature and ally of Germany.”
The only step the Swedes took
was to send a military expedition to the
Aland Islands, in response to several appeals
from their population, which is
mostly Swedish. This measure was decided
upon by the Swedish Parliament on
Feb. 16 and was effected two or three
days later.

The Aland Archipelago, consisting of
about ninety inhabited islets and situated
between Abo on the Finnish coast and
Stockholm, belongs to Finland. Its
strategic importance for Sweden is aptly
characterized by an old phrase which
describes it as “a revolver aimed at the
heart of Sweden.” The mission of
Sweden’s troops was to clear the islands,
by moral suasion if possible, from the
bands of Russian soldiers and Finnish
White and Red Guards which for some
time had been terrorizing the population.
The Bolshevist garrison offered stubborn
resistance to the landing of the
Swedish forces.

THE GERMAN INVASION

At noon on March 2 a German detachment
occupied the Aland Islands. The
next day the German Minister at Stockholm
informed the Swedish Government
that Germany intended to use these
islands as a halting place for the German
military expedition into Finland, undertaken
at the request of the Finnish Government
for the purpose of suppressing

the revolution. He gave assurances that
Germany sought no territorial gains in
effecting the occupation and would not
hinder the humanitarian work of the
Swedish Supervision Corps in the islands.
On March 22 the Main Committee of the
Reichstag rejected, by 12 votes against
10, the motion of the Independent Social
Democrats to evacuate the Aland Islands
and cease interfering with the internal
affairs of Finland.

VIEW OF ULEABORG, WHERE THE WHITE GUARDS FOUGHT A SANGUINARY ENGAGEMENT WITH THE BOLSHEVIST RED GUARDS

Mr. Branting, the Swedish political
leader, denounced the talk that Finland,
deserted by Sweden, turned to Germany
in despair, as “gross hypocrisy.” He is
convinced that a secret agreement existed
between Finland and Germany long
before the outbreak of the civil war, and
that Finland wants to be a dependency
under Germany rather than a member
of a Scandinavian federation of States.
Some members of the Diplomatic Corps
in Washington were also reported to believe
that the civil war was merely a
specious pretext for inviting Germany to
restore order in the country, and that the
negotiations which brought about the
German intervention had been going on
secretly for months.

March passed in preparations for the
expedition. On the morning of April 3
the Russian icebreaker Volinetz, which
had been captured by the White Guards,
piloted a German naval squadron, consisting
of thirty-six ships, into the Finnish
waters of Hangö, which is the extreme
southwestern point of the Finnish
coast, within a few hours of Helsingfors.
During the afternoon the Germans landed
on the peninsula of Hangö a force which,
according to an official German statement,
comprised 40,000 men under General
Sasnitz, 300 guns, and 2,000 machine
guns. The next day the Berlin
War Office issued the following statement:
“Eastern Theatre—In agreement
with the Finnish Government, German
troops have landed on the Finnish mainland.”
Later more German detachments
were landed at Abo.

According to one report, the Germans,
upon their landing, opened negotiations
with the Finnish Socialists, but their
overtures were apparently rejected. The
Russian Government immediately protested
to Germany against the landing in
Finland. The German Government replied
by demanding that the Russian war
vessels in Finnish territorial waters
should either leave for Russian ports or
disarm, according to Article 5 of the
Brest-Litovsk treaty, on or before midday,
April 12. The Bolsheviki ordered
the commander of the Baltic fleet to

carry out this demand. Four Russian
submarines were fired upon and sunk by
the Germans at Hangö during the landing
and several other Russian warships
were blown up by their own crews for
fear of being captured by the Germans.

VIEW OF FINNISH LAKE REGION NEAR FAVASTELLIUS

On April 13 the Finnish Official News
Bureau gave out a statement to the
effect that all German troops landed in
Finland had been dispatched at the request
of the Finnish Government. On
April 17 the Germans landed 40,000 men
at Helsingfors. Their naval squadron
stationed in the harbor of the Finnish
capital consisted of twelve vessels.

FALL OF VIBORG

The Red Guards offered a stubborn
resistance to the invaders, but it soon
became apparent that their cause was
lost. Upon the landing of the Germans,
the Socialist Government escaped from
Helsingfors and established itself at Viborg,
seventy-five miles northwest of
Petrograd. On April 13 the German
troops, aided by naval detachments, entered
Helsingfors, “after a vigorous encounter
with armed bands,” as the German
official announcements read. According
to a Reuter dispatch, a three
days’ battle preceded the capture of the
Finnish capital. It was taken by storm
after fierce fighting in the streets. About
the same time the City of Abo was taken
by the White Guards. The Germans
then proceeded to move on Viborg. On
April 23 the Finnish Socialist Government
protested to the allied representatives,
including the American Ambassador
to Russia, against the German interference.
It declared that the Finnish
Socialists would continue for the cause
of freedom, with “a profound hatred
and contempt for the executioners of nations
and of the labor movement.”

Viborg fell into the hands of the White
Guards on April 30, after nearly all its
defenders, 6,000 in all, were slaughtered.
Among the prisoners taken was Kullerwo
Manner, the President of the Socialist
Government. On May 4 Berlin was able
to announce complete victory in Finland.
The official report follows:

Finland has been cleared of the enemy.
German troops, in co-operation with Finnish
battalions, attacked the enemy between
Lakhti and Tevasthus in an encircling
movement, and in a five days’
battle, in spite of a bitter defense and
desperate attempts to break through, we
have overwhelmingly defeated him. The
Finnish forces cut off his retreat in a
northerly direction. The enemy is closed
in on every side, and, after the heaviest
losses, is laying down his arms. We
took 20,000 prisoners. Thousands of
vehicles and horses were captured.

A dispatch dated May 8 reported, however,
that the country was far from
pacified, and that the Red Guards continued
to offer resistance at many points.

Speaking before the Main Committee
of the Reichstag, on May 8, Friedrich
von Payer, the German Imperial Vice
Chancellor, defended Germany’s intervention
in Finland. The fundamental

aim of this step was “to create in North
Finland a final condition of peace, both
military and political.” He stated that
the entire staff of the 43d Russian Army
Corps was recently captured in Finland.
He denied that Germany intended further
to interfere in the inner affairs of
Finland, and added that Germany had
concluded economic and political treaties
with Finland whereby both parties would
profit.

UNDER GERMAN DOMINATION

While these military operations were
being carried on, Finland was becoming a
German province. Late in March an
American and an English officer, visiting
General Mannerheim at Vasa upon orders
from their legations, were threatened by
Finnish White Guard officers with personal
violence and turned out of the dining
room of the chief hotel. This incident
was described as characteristic of the
feeling existing among the majority of
Finns. On April 1 Vasabladet, the chief
Vasa newspaper, wrote: “No military
or other similar persons from any of
the countries at war with Germany
ought to be allowed to stay within the
borders of our country so long as we,
with the help of God and Germany, are
fighting our hard fight for liberty,
order, and justice against the barbarous
ally of the western powers.” It appears
from a case reported on April 26
that the viséing of foreign passports by
Finnish officials depends now upon the
consent of the Berlin authorities.

Finland was proclaimed a republic in
December, 1917. It has always been one
of the most democratic countries in
Europe. It is asserted, nevertheless, that
the experiences through which the former
grand duchy has passed in the last six
months have converted many classes of
the population to monarchism. A Stockholm
dispatch dated May 8 declared that
a monarchy would probably be proclaimed
in Finland, and that Duke Adolph
Frederick of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, uncle
of the Crown Princess of Germany, would
be appointed King.

GREATER FINLAND

In the middle of April it became known
that the Finnish statesmen had an ambitious
plan for the territorial aggrandizement
and political expansion of their
country at the expense of Russia, and
possibly also of Norway. A Stockholm
paper published a statement that Germany
had agreed to the establishment
of a Greater Finland, to include the territory
of the Petrograd-Murman railway
to the arctic. The newspaper added
that the Finnish railway system was to
be enlarged with a view to establishing
direct connection from North Cape to
Budapest and Constantinople. Thus Finland
would become the cornerstone of a
“Mitteleuropa” stretching from the
arctic coast to Asia Minor and beyond.
A well-known Finnish painter stated in
an interview that the Finnish troops, co-operating
with the Germans, would take
Petrograd as well as the south coast of
the Gulf of Finland, which is ethnically
Finnish. An announcement was made
on May 8, before the Main Committee of
the Reichstag, that no Germans were
participating or would participate in the
advance of Finnish troops on Petrograd.

A movement has been set afoot among
Karelians, presumably by Finns, in
favor of the Finnish annexation of Russian
Karelia, on the basis of the principle
of self-determination. Karelia includes
parts of the Governments of Petrograd,
Olonetz, and Archangel; its
aboriginal population belongs to the Finnish
race.

Peace Treaty Between Finland and Germany

Full Text of the Document

The Imperial Government of Berlin
announced on March 7, 1918, that a
treaty of peace between Germany
and Finland had been signed. Two days
later the full text was transmitted from
Berlin to London through the wireless
stations of the German Government.
This treaty with Germany was made by
the element in the Republic of Finland
represented in a military way by the
White Guards, who were pro-German
and co-operated with the German army
sent immediately afterward to make war
in Finland against the Red Guards, who
represented the Bolshevist element of the
Finnish population. During April an
armed conflict between the Reds and the
Germans raged around Helsingfors,
where the Bolshevist forces fought to
annul this treaty, though with steadily
diminishing prospects of success.

The full text of the treaty follows:

The Royal German Government and the
Finnish Government, inspired by the wish,
after the declaration of the independence of
Finland and its recognition through Germany,
to bring about a condition of peace
and friendship between both countries on a
lasting basis, have resolved to conclude a
peace, and for this purpose they have appointed
the following plenipotentiaries: For
the Royal German Government, the Chancellor
of the German Empire, Dr. Count von
Hertling; for the Finnish Government, Dr.
Phil Edvard Immanuel Hjelt, State Adviser,
Vice Councilor of the University of Helsingfors,
and Rafael Waldemar Erich, LL.D.,
Professor of State Law and of the Law
of Nations at the University of Helsingfors,
who, after the mutual setting forth in good
order and form of their plenipotentiary powers,
have come to an agreement on the following
provisions:

CHAPTER I.—Friendship Between Germany
and Finland and the Assuring
of the Independence of Finland

Article 1. The contracting parties declare
that between Germany and Finland
no state of war exists and that they are
resolved henceforth to live in peace and
friendship with each other. Germany will do
what she can to bring about the recognition
of the independence of Finland by all the
powers. On the other hand, Finland will not
cede any part of her possessions to any foreign
power nor constitute a charge on her
sovereign territory to any such power before
first having come to an understanding with
Germany on the matter.

Article 2. Diplomatic and consular relations
between the contracting
parties will be resumed immediately after the
confirmation of the peace treaty. The freest
possible admission of Consuls on both sides is
to be provided for by arrangements in special
treaties.

Article 3. Each of the contracting parties
will replace the damage which
has been caused in its own territory by the
war, or which the States or populations have
brought about by actions contrary to international
law, or which has been caused by
the consular officials of the other party either
to life, liberty, health, or property.

CHAPTER II.—War Indemnities

Article 4. The contracting parties renounce
mutually the making good of
war costs; that is to say, State expenses for
the carrying on of the war as well as the
payment of war indemnities; that is to say,
of those prejudices which have arisen for
them and their subjects in the war zones by
reason of the military measures connected
with all the requisitions undertaken in enemy
country.

CHAPTER III.—The Re-entry Into
Force of State Treaties

Article 5. The treaties which lapsed as
a consequence of the war between
Germany and Russia shall be replaced
as soon as possible by new treaties
for relations between the contracting parties,
and they shall be made to correspond
to the new outlook and conditions which
have now arisen. Especially the contracting
parties shall at once enter into negotiations
in order to draw up a treaty for the settlement
of trade and shipping relations between
the two countries, to be signed at
the same time as the peace treaty.

Article 6. Treaties in which, apart from
Germany and Russia, also a
third power takes part, and in which Finland
appears together with Russia or in
the place of the latter, come into force between
the contracting parties on the ratification
of peace treaty or, in case the entry
takes place later, at that moment. In
connection with collective treaties of political
contents, in which other belligerent powers
are also involved, the two parties reserve
their attitude until after the conclusion
of a general peace.

CHAPTER IV.—Re-establishment of
Private Rights

Article 7. All stipulations existing in the
territory of either of the contracting
parties, according to which, in
view of the state of war, subjects of the
other party are subjected to any special
regulation whatever in the observation of
their private rights, cease to be of force on
the confirmation of this treaty. Subjects
of either of the contracting parties are such
legal persons and societies as have their
domicile in the respective territories. Furthermore,
subjects of either of the parties,
legal persons and societies which do not
have their domicile in the territory, must
be regarded as on the same level in so far
as in the territory of the other party they
were submitted to the stipulations applying
to such subjects.

Article 8. With regard to the civil debt
conditions which have been influenced
by war laws, the following has been
agreed:

1. The debt conditions will be re-established
in so far as the stipulations in Articles 8 to
12 do not decide otherwise.

2. The stipulation in Paragraph 1 does not
prejudice the question as to what extent the
conditions created by the war (especially
the impossibility of settlement of debt owing
to the obstacles in traffic or commercial
prohibitions in the territory of either of the
contracting parties) shall be taken into account
in the determination of claims of
subjects of either party in accordance with
the laws applying thereto in the respective
territories. In this connection subjects of
the other party who have been prevented by
the measures of that party, are not to be
dealt with more unfavorably than the subjects
of their own State, who have been prevented
by the measures of that State.

A person who by the war has been prevented
from carrying out in good time a payment
shall not be obliged to make good the damage
which has occurred owing thereto.

3. Demands of money, whose payment
could be refused during the war on the
strength of war laws, need not be paid until
after the expiration of three months after
the confirmation of the peace treaty. In so
far as nothing else has been stipulated in
the supplementary treaty, an interest of 5
per cent. per annum must be paid on such
debts from the original date on which they
were due, for the duration of the war and
the further three months, regardless of
moratoriums. Up to the day on which they
were originally due, the interests agreed
upon, if any, must be paid. In the case of
bills or checks submission for payment as
well as protests against nonpayment must
take place within the fourth month after the
confirmation of this treaty.

4. For the settlement of outstanding affairs
and other civil obligations, officially
recognized unions for the protection of debtors
and for the examination of claims of lay
and legal persons belonging to the union, as
well as their plenipotentiaries, are to be
mutually recognized and permitted.

Article 9. Each contracting party will
immediately after the confirmation
of the peace treaty resume payment
of its obligations, especially the public debt
duties to subjects of the other party. The
obligations which became due before the confirmation
of the treaty will be paid within
three months after the confirmation.

Article 10. Copyrights, trade protective
rights, concessions and privileges,
as well as similar claims on public
legal foundations, which have been influenced
by war laws, shall be re-established,
in so far as nothing else has been stipulated
in Article 12.

Each contracting party will grant subjects
of the other party who on account of the
war have neglected the legal period in which
to undertake an action necessary for the
establishment or maintenance of a trade
protective right, without prejudice to the
justly obtained rights of third parties, a
period of at least one year in which to recover
the action. Trade protective rights
of subjects of one party which were in force
on the outbreak of war, shall not expire in
the territory of the other party, owing to
their non-application, till after the termination
of four years from the confirmation of
this treaty. If in the territory of one of
the contracting parties a trade protective
right, which in accordance with the war
laws could not be applied for, is applied for
by an agent who during the war has taken
protective measures in the territory of the
other party in accordance with the rules,
such right, if claimed within six months
after the confirmation of the treaty, shall,
with the reservation of the rights of third
parties, have priority over all applications
submitted in the meantime, and cannot be
made ineffective by facts which have arisen
in the meantime.

Article 11. Periods for the superannuation
of rights shall, in the territory
of each of the contracting parties, toward
subjects of the other party, expire at
the earliest one year after the confirmation
of the peace treaty in so far as they had
not expired at the time of the outbreak of
war. The same applies to periods for the
submission of dividend-warrants or warrants
for shares in profit, as well as to bills
which have become redeemable or have become
otherwise payable.

Article 12. The activities of authorities
who on the strength of war
laws have become occupied with the supervision,
custody, administration, or liquidation
of property or with the receiving of payments,
are without prejudice to the stipulations

of Article 13, to be wound up in accordance
with the following principles:

1. Properties under supervision, in custody
or under administration, are to be set free
immediately on the demand of the parties
entitled to them. Until the moment of transfer
to the entitled party care must be taken
for the safeguarding of his interests.

2. The provisions of Paragraph 1 shall not
modify the properly acquired right of a third
party. Payments and other obligations of a
debtor which, as mentioned at the beginning
of the article, have been received or caused
to be received at the places mentioned, shall,
in the territories of the contracting parties,
have the same effect as if the creditor himself
had received them.

Civil dispositions which have been made at
the places mentioned at the instigation of
the parties or by them will have full effect
and are to be maintained by the parties.

3. Regarding the operations of the places
mentioned at the beginning of this article,
especially those for receipts and payments,
details shall at once be given to the authorized
parties immediately upon demand.
Claims which have been lodged to be dealt
with at these places can only be dealt with
in accordance with the stipulations of Article
14.

Article 13. Land or rights in land or in
mines as well as rights in the
use or exploitation of lands, or undertakings,
or claims for participation in an undertaking,
especially those represented by
shares, which have been forcibly alienated
from the persons entitled to them by reason
of war laws, shall be transferred to the
former owner within a period of one year
after the confirmation of the peace treaty,
and there shall be returned to him any profits
which have accrued on such property during
the alienation or deprivation, and this shall
be done free from all rights of third parties
which may have arisen in the meantime.

CHAPTER VI.—Indemnity for Civil
Damages

Article 14. Subjects of one of the contracting
parties resident in the territory
of the other contracting party who, by
reason of war laws, have suffered damage
either by the temporary or lasting privation
of concessions, privileges, and similar claims,
or by the supervision, trusteeship, administration
or alienation of property, are to be
appropriately indemnified so far as the damage
by the war cannot be replaced by the
actual re-establishment of their former conditions.
This also applies to shareholders
who, on account of their character as foreign
enemies, are excluded from certain
rights.

Article 15. Each of the contracting parties
will indemnify the civilian subjects
of the other party for damages which
have been caused to them in its territory
during the war by the State officials or the
population there through breaches of international
law and acts of violence against
life, health, or property.

Article 16. Each of the contracting parties
will at once pay to the
subjects of the other party their just claims
so far as this has not already been done.

Article 17. For the fixing of the damages,
according to Articles 14 and
15, there shall meet in Berlin a commission
immediately after the confirmation of this
treaty which shall consist of one-third of
each of the contracting parties and one-third
of neutrals. The President of the Swiss
Bundesrat shall be asked to nominate the
neutral members, from whom the Chairman
shall be chosen. The commission shall
fix the principles, on which it is to work,
and it shall decide as to what procedure it
shall follow. Its decisions shall be carried
out by sub-commissions, which shall consist
of one representative from each of the contracting
parties and a neutral umpire. The
amounts fixed by the sub-commissions are
to be paid within one month of the decision
being made.

CHAPTER VII.—The Exchange of Prisoners
of War and Interned Civilians

Article 18. Finnish prisoners of war in
Germany and German prisoners
of war in Finland shall, as soon as practicable,
be exchanged within the times fixed
by a German-Finnish Commission, and subject
to the payment of the costs entailed in
such exchange in so far as those prisoners
do not wish to stay in the country where
they happen to be, with its consent, or to go
to another country. The commission will
also have to settle the further details of
such exchange and to supervise their execution.

Article 19. The deported or interned civilians
on both sides will be
sent home as soon as practicable free of
charge so far as, subject to the consent of
the country on whose territory they are
staying, they do not wish to remain there
or wish to go to another country. The
settlement of the details and the supervision
of their execution shall be carried out
by the commission mentioned in Article 18.
The Finnish Government will endeavor to
obtain from the Russian Government the
release of those Germans who were captured
in Finnish territory and who at the
present time are outside Finnish on Russian
territory.

Article 20. Subjects of one party who at
the outbreak of war had their
domicile or commercial establishments in
the territory of the other party and who
did not remain in that territory may return
there as soon as the other party is not in
a state of war. Their return can only be
refused on the ground of the endangering
of the internal or foreign safety of the

State. It would suffice that a pass be made
out by the authorities of the home Government
in which it is to be stated that the
bearer is one of those persons as stipulated
in Item 1. No visé is to be necessary on
these passes.

Article 21. Each of the Contracting Parties
undertakes to respect and
to tend the several burial places of subjects
of the other party who fell in the war as
well as those who died during internment
or deportation and the persons intrusted by
each party with care and proper decoration
of the burial places may attend to these
duties in accord with the authorities of each
country. Questions connected with the care
of such burial places are reserved for
further agreements.

CHAPTER VIII.—Amnesty.

Article 22. Each of the contracting parties
concedes amnesty from penalties
to the subjects of the other party who
are prisoners of war for all criminal acts
committed by them and further to all civilian
interned or deported subjects of the other
party for all punishable acts committed by
them during their internment or deportation
period, and lastly to all subjects of the other
party for crimes against all exceptional laws
made to the disadvantage of enemy foreigners.
The amnesty will not apply to actions
committed after the confirmation of the
peace treaty.

Article 23. Each party concedes complete
amnesty to all its own subjects
in view of the work which they have
done in the territory of the other party as
prisoners of war, interned civilians, or deported
civilians.

Article 24. The contracting parties reserve
to themselves the right to make
further agreements according to which each
party may grant an amnesty of penalties
decreed on account of actions committed to
its disadvantage.

CHAPTER IX.—The Treatment of Mercantile
Vessels and Cargoes Which
Have Fallen Into the Hands
of the Enemy.

Article 25. Mercantile ships of one contracting
party which lay in the
ports of the other contracting party on the
outbreak of the war, as well as their cargoes,
are to be given back to their owners, or in
so far as this is not possible they are to be
paid for in money. For the use of such embargoed
vessels during the war the usual
daily freight is to be paid.

Article 26. German mercantile ships and
their cargoes which are in the
power of Finland, except in cases foreseen in
Article 25 at the signing of this treaty or
which may arrive there later, are to be given
back if on the outbreak of war they were in
an enemy port or were interned in neutral
waters by enemy forces.

Article 27. The mercantile vessels of
either of the contracting parties
captured as prizes in the zone of power
of the other party shall be regarded as definitely
confiscated if they have been legally
condemned as prizes, and if they do not
come under the provisions of Articles 25 and
26. Otherwise they are to be given back, or,
in so far as they are no longer available,
they are to be paid for. The provisions of
Paragraph 1 are to apply also to ships’ cargoes
taken as prizes belonging to subjects
of the contracting parties, but goods belonging
to subjects of one of the contracting
parties on board ships flying enemy flags
which have fallen into the hands of the other
contracting party are in all cases to be
handed over to their rightful owners, or, so
far as this is not possible, they are to be
paid for.

Article 28. The carrying out of the provisions
contained in Articles
25 to 27, especially the fixing of the damages
to be paid, shall be decided by a mixed commission,
which shall consist of one representative
from each of the contracting parties
with a neutral umpire, and shall sit in
Stettin within three months after the date
of confirmation of the peace treaty. The
President of the Swiss Bundesrat shall be
requested to nominate the umpire.

Article 29. The contracting parties will
do all in their power to facilitate
the free return of the mercantile
ships and their cargoes to their homes as
set forth in Articles 25 to 27. The contracting
parties will also give their support to
each other in the re-establishment of the
mutual commercial intercourse, after the
assuring of safe shipping routes, which had
been disturbed by the war.

CHAPTER X.—Adjustment of the
Aland Question.

Article 30. The contracting parties are
agreed that the Forts put
upon the Aland Islands are to be removed
as soon as possible, and that the lasting
non-fortified character of these Islands and
also their treatment in a military and technical
sense for purposes of shipping, shall
be settled by agreement between Germany,
Finland, Russia and Sweden; and to these
agreements, at the wish of Germany, the
other States lying in the Baltic Sea shall
be invited to assent.

CHAPTER XI.—Final Provisions.

Article 31. The Peace Treaty shall be
confirmed. The confirmatory
documents shall be exchanged as soon as
practicable in Berlin.

Article 32. The Peace Treaty, so far as
is not otherwise stipulated,
shall come into force with its confirmation.
For the making of supplementary additions
to the Treaty the representatives of the
contracting parties shall meet in Berlin
within four months of its confirmation.

German Aggression in Russia

Record of Events Placing Finland and the
Ukraine More Fully Under Teutonic Control

During the month ended May 15,
1918, the German advance in the
territory of the former Russian
Empire continued uninterruptedly.
While minor military operations
were conducted in the Province of Kursk,
in Russia proper, the main body of the
invading army occupied the Crimea and
penetrated into the Donetz coal basin. On
April 24 the German troops, under General
Kosch, reached the City of Simferopol,
in the Crimea. A week later they
occupied Sebastopol, the great military
and commercial seaport, famous in Russian
history. A portion of the Russian
Black Sea fleet fell into the hands of
the Germans. On May 3 the invaders
seized Taganrog, on the Sea of Azov. On
May 9 they took Rostov, at the mouth
of the River Don, but two days later the
city was again in Russian hands. The
Germans are apparently intent on occupying
the seacoast from Bessarabia,
on the west, to the Caucasus, on the east.

The Bolshevist régime gave signs of
undergoing a process of reorganization.
It sought to enlist the services of officials
who had served under the Provisional
Government and of Generals of
the old army. A new War Department
was formed. Trotzky, the Minister of
War and Marine, advocated universal
conscription of labor. The Central Executive
Committee, at his suggestion, decreed
compulsory military service. Workmen
and peasants from 18 to 40 years
old were to be trained for eight consecutive
weeks, for a weekly minimum of
eight hours. Women were accepted into
the army as volunteers.

The Bolshevist authorities made several
attempts to suppress rioting and
street looting. Early in May the Red
Guards fought a pitched battle with the
Moscow anarchists, who refused to surrender
their munitions, and stamped out
their organization. The Soviets passed
resolutions and took measures against
the anti-Jewish massacres which occurred
in numerous cities. Disorder and
mob rule, however, continued to prevail
in Russia, while hunger and unemployment
were daily increasing.

INDUSTRY CRIPPLED

On April 16 M. Gukovsky, the Commissary
for Finance, reported to the Central
Executive Committee of the Soviets
on Russia’s financial and industrial condition.
He said that the semi-yearly expenditure
would amount to 4,000,000,000
rubles, while the income expected was
only 3,300,000,000 rubles. The railroads
had lost 70 per cent. of their freight
capacity, and the cost of operation had
increased ten times, (120,000 against
11,600 rubles per versta.) The Central
Government, he stated, derived no revenue
from taxes, as the local Soviets used the
sums they collected for their own purposes.
To illustrate the industrial conditions
the Commissary cited the example of
the Sormov locomotive works, whose daily
output is two locomotives, instead of
eighteen as formerly. M. Gukovsky
recommended strict economy in expenditures
and urged the necessity of securing
the services of financial and industrial
experts for the purpose of organizing
an efficient State machinery.

Among the recent legislative measures
of the Moscow Government must be mentioned
the nationalization of foreign
trade, which is a part of the general Bolshevist
scheme of Socialist reforms. A
special board has been created to regulate
the prices of all exports and imports.

In the middle of April hostilities were
reopened between the newly collected
troops of General Korniloff, former Russian
Commander in Chief, and the Bolshevist
forces. It was reported that the
Bolsheviki heavily defeated the anti-Soviet
troops, capturing Novocherkask and

wounding the Cossack General. It
was also stated that General Dutoff, another
anti-Bolshevist leader, was captured
by the Soviet troops, and that General
Semyonov, the leader of the Cossack
movement against the Bolsheviki in Siberia,
was killed.

The incident of the Japanese landing at
Vladivostok was near closing, when
further interest in the Far Eastern situation
was aroused in Russia by a number
of documents seized on the person of a
member of the anti-Soviet “Siberian
Government.” According to a note addressed
on April 26 by M. Chicherin to
diplomatic representatives in Moscow,
these documents proved that the Consuls
of Great Britain, France, and America—and
the diplomatic representatives of
these powers in Peking—sought to interfere
in the internal affairs of Russia by
participating in the counter-revolutionary
movement for an autonomous Government
in Siberia. A similar charge was
laid to the Japanese officials. The Russian
Government, therefore, demanded
the recall of the allied Consular officers
at Vladivostok, also asking the Allies to
define their attitude toward the Soviet
Government. Neither Ambassador Francis
nor the French Ambassador, M.
Noulens, made any official reply to the
Russian charges. M. Noulens had previously
drawn upon himself the wrath of
the Bolsheviki by declaring that the
armed intervention of the Allies in Russia
would be an act of friendly assistance.
Mr. Francis informally notified the Moscow
Government that, in his opinion, the
documents failed to involve the American
officials. On May 9 Secretary Lansing
instructed him to present informally to
the Russian Foreign Office a denial of
its charge against the American Consul
at Vladivostok.

ENEMY PROPAGANDA

In a speech on April 27 Baron Shimpei
Goto, the new Japanese Foreign Minister,
referred to the malevolent propaganda
which is being conducted in Russia with
a view to creating an estrangement between
Japan and Russia. He expressed
the view that “Russia is a power endeavoring
to reorganize a machine temporarily
out of order,” adding: “Japan
must give encouragement, assistance,
and support to the work of reorganization
in Russia. We trust the sound
sense of the Russian people will not be
misled by reports calculated to keep the
two neighbors apart.”

Shortly after the capture of Sebastopol
the Russian Government protested to
Germany against the seizure of the Black
Sea fleet and the invasion of the Crimea.
The Russian note pointed out that these
acts were in contravention of the Brest
treaty and that they might endanger the
peaceful relations between the two countries.
The Germans did not seem to be
concerned to maintain these relations.
They treated the population of the occupied
territories with harshness. Starving
refugees were not admitted into the
regions under their domination. It was
reported that in the Government of Minsk
able-bodied persons were seized in the
streets and sent to Germany in locked
cars. Constant food requisitioning was
another feature of the German rule in
Russia.

RUSSIA’S PROTEST

On April 15 M. Chicherin, Russian
Commissary for Foreign Affairs, protested
to Berlin against the outrages committed
by the German troops in Russia.
The text of the note follows:

The Central Soviet institutions receive
many complaints with regard to German
troops burning Russian villages and using
violence against Russian inhabitants.
An eyewitness well known to us and absolutely
trustworthy states that at Lepel,
northwest of Mogileff, German soldiers
killed a whole family, not sparing women
and children, on the plea that one of the
family belonged to a partisan detachment.
The local military authorities state that
at the village of Novoselki, Mogileff, on
April 5, there appeared an officer and
soldiers of the 346th Regiment and took
oats from the inhabitants by force. The
officer was killed by the peasants, and the
soldiers fled. After this the village was
surrounded by the soldiers, fired on by
machine guns, and burned.

The following day the German commander
sent a notice to the Russian military
authorities at Orsha saying that the
inhabitants of Novoselki had been ejected,
and the village burned owing to a German
officer’s being killed.

MAP OF THE UKRAINE AND OTHER REGIONS OF RUSSIA NOW UNDER GERMAN DOMINATION

Observers of Russian life agree that

feelings of resentment and animosity on
the part of the Russian population for
the German oppressor are steadily growing
throughout the country. At the same
time good feeling between the Russians
and the Allies, especially the Americans,
is on the increase. British and French
troops are co-operating with Bolshevist
forces in defending against Finns and
Germans the Murman seacoast and the
railway from the interior of Russia to
the arctic ports of Alexandrovsk and
Archangel, where large supplies of valuable
war materials are stored up. The
War Council attached to the Murman
local Soviet consists of one Russian, one
Englishman, and one Frenchman. The
landing of the allied troops at Alexandrovsk
the Germans regarded as a violation
of the Brest treaty, which provides
for peace with Finland, and protested to
the Moscow Government against the act.

The constant exchange of protests between
Berlin and Moscow is partly caused
by the ambiguous wording of the Brest
treaty. On April 24 Adolf Joffe, the
Bolshevist Ambassador in Berlin, telegraphed
to Moscow that the Russian
translation of the treaty was considered
by the German authorities incorrect, and
that the publication of the final draft of
the document was postponed until the receipt
of an authentic version.

DISMEMBERING RUSSIA

It appears that Germany has been making
further attempts to encourage the
separatist tendency in Russia, in contravention

of the Brest treaty. The German
Government is reported to have inquired
of the local Crimean authorities
concerning the nationalization of their
flag. The Bolsheviki interpreted this
step as indicative of the German desire to
separate the Taurida Republic from the
Russian Federation.

According to a communication issued
by the Rumanian Chargé d’Affaires, the
National Assembly of Bessarabia voted,
on April 9, the union of the province to
Rumania by 86 against 3. Thereupon,
the Rumanian Premier, amid enthusiastic
acclamation, proclaimed the union to
be “definitive and indissoluble,” and a
delegation was sent to Jassy to present
the homage of the people of Bessarabia
to the King. Rumania seems to have
acted at the suggestion of Germany. It
is known that the latter proposed to
Rumania to annex a part of Bessarabia
and thus compensate herself for Rumanian
territory taken by Austria-Hungary
and Bulgaria. It is also known
that (on March 22?) Russia signed a
treaty with Rumania regarding Bessarabia.
The province was to be evacuated
by the Rumanian troops, which had occupied
it at the request of the population,
and the guarding of Bessarabia was to
pass into the hands of local militia, while
all evacuated places were to be immediately
occupied by Russian troops. Russia
undertook to leave Rumania the surplus
of Bessarabian grain remaining
after the local population and Russian
troops had been provided for. The
Ukrainian Government refused to recognize
the step taken by Bessarabia.

According to the terms of the Brest
treaty the Baltic Provinces Esthonia and
Livonia were to remain under Russian
sovereignty, but three weeks later Germany
began intriguing for a union of
these countries with the Kingdom of Russia.
The falsity of the assertion that the
people of Esthonia favored a Baltic
monarchy was exposed by the following
protest of the Esthonian Provisional Government,
published April 22:

Regarding the communication from Berlin
that the joint Landtag of Esthonia,
Livonia, Riga, and Oesel has decided upon
the separation of Baltic provinces from
Russia and the creation of a Baltic monarchy
in personal union with Prussia, I
declare, as representative of the Esthonian
Republic, that this resolution does
not constitute an expression of opinion
of the Esthonian people, but only that of
a German nobility minority and its adherents.

On May 5 the British Government informally
recognized the Esthonian Provisional
Government and, in the words of
Mr. Balfour’s communication, reaffirmed
their readiness to grant provisional
recognition to the Esthonian National
Council as a de facto independent body
until the peace conference, when the
future status of Esthonia ought to be
settled as far as possible in accordance
with the wishes of the population.”