The Telegraph Book of Readers' Letters from the Great War (29 page)

Today I counted twenty-one women and children in one of our waiting rooms mostly lying on the floor from sheer exhaustion, one child moribund, two others nearly so, and half the rest of the group quite likely to die in a few days if they are allowed to remain where they are in the camp. Many of the villagers are mountaineers, and lying out in the hot dusty plain by day and exposed to the cold of night they
quickly succumb. Today I took a little girl into the hospital who had been perfectly well until four days ago, when everything was stolen from the mother and she had no place to lay her except on the ground, so that she quickly got up a dysentery and died a few hours after admission to the ward. The family were respectable Protestant people from V. Hardly had the little girl died and the sheets been changed than another child, this time a boy, was put into the same bed; his leg had been cut off by a railroad car, apparently there was nobody to take care of him. We found that the mother had been forcibly separated from her children further back on the road.

These people are being deliberately done to death at a sufficiently slow pace to allow their oppressors the opportunity of choosing out such of their women and their goods as they care for and getting all their money away from them before they die. Dr and Mrs A. went through the massacres of 1894 and 1896, and they and Miss B and I have been through two revolutions, one massacre and two wars
since then: but we all agree that we have never seen anything like this. Another outrageous side of it is that many of the fathers and brothers of these women and children are in the army fighting the country's battles: such was the case of the dying child that was brought to the clinic this afternoon, and another who will probably be in the same condition soon.

1. A Lady; the drawing having the following written on it: ‘A Sketch for Arthur's dug-out. – L.H.'

2. A Child; the drawing bears the signature: ‘Doris Hocknell'.

Both are enclosed in celluloid facings.

Being desirous of returning them to the owner I should be pleased if you will assist me by making it known through the medium of your paper.

I am, &c.,

W.J. Norburn, Major, AOD
Havre

How many have asked themselves the question recently, ‘What can I do to serve best the Empire at the most critical stage of its history?' The number of people unable to enrol themselves in the fighting forces, or to take part in the work of munition making, is extremely high. Whether it is one hundred thousand, half a million, or a million, it must cause deep concern to the Government if the energies of this mass are misapplied, or are not applied to uses which build up the national wealth. In the last few weeks the public have frequently been told how important it is that production at home should be increased, and now that the Army strength has been raised to four million men the economic problem of keeping the nation's trade going at high pressure is rendered more difficult of solution than ever it was. So acute must it become that the nation is bound to look for new sources of
labour supply, and to expect production from classes which hitherto have not entered the fields of industry.

The war has brought home to us that we had been too hesitating in the employment of women in many industries. Institutions which before the war scorned the idea that women could do the work then performed by men have availed themselves of women's help, and speak in the highest terms of the performance of their duties, of punctuality, good temper and steady application to their tasks. In factories of all descriptions women have taken the place of men who have patriotically gone to the colours. If it be true that there are hundreds of thousands of women earning honourable wages today who had never sought employment before the war, it is clear the nation must be
the richer for their services. It may be a labour problem will be created after the war, for, these women, having entered fields of enterprise for which they have proved their fitness, will not readily give up their employment. But that is a matter for after-war settlement. The point is that a great army of women is, in the time of the country's need, helping in a marvellous way to keep industry going, and what they are doing ought to prompt an enormous number of their sisters who are doing nothing for the country to come out and assist for the national good.

The people who could be employed, and – there is no doubt about it – who wish to be employed, if there was some organisation to direct their energies into appropriate channels, are waiting a lead. Cannot some method be devised for utilising the services of the mass of people who, if not idle, are not doing all they can to promote the national welfare, and whose inactivity, owing to the weakness of national organisation, constitutes a national waste? Would it not be possible for some practical men to consider how all the available material in men and women could be passed into spheres of usefulness, where each person, while profiting by the output of honourable labour, will get an even greater return in the knowledge that he or she has done some part in helping the country to win the war, and to prepare for the struggle for industrial supremacy when peace comes?

The central bureau could inquire what lines of employment would be useful, collect the personnel for such employment, and develop schemes for the employment of all possible workers outside the existing lines of public service. What the labour exchanges do for skilled and unskilled labour, the central bureau, or by whatever title it was known, could do for the large class which is not doing, but is anxious to do, all it can for the good of the country. This body might have a small beginning, but it would work for a class which is as patriotic as any in the country, and if its labours were well directed there are possibilities of effecting great and far-reaching benefits for the Empire.