The Butler Weekly Times Newspaper, January 31, 1918, Page 1

Annual Spring Sale a ‘LET THE TRUTH BE KNOWN’ Mary Roberts Rinehart Appesled to Secretary: Baker. . Washington, Jan. 28—The letter that Mary Roberts Rinehart, the au- thor, wrote Secretary Baker concern- ctng- her observations at several army ‘eantonments, particularly as to hos- pitals, and read to the Senate com- eee hearings today, follows in full: ~“Fo the Honorable Newton D. Bak- er, Secretary of War.—My Dear Mr. Secretary: I have just been reading that tragic letter from an unknown father, read by Senator Chamberlain in the present senatorial investiga- tion. Its sincerity cannot be ques- tioned. As a mother, and as the mother of a soldier, I feel, as every- one must, the deepest grief and sym- pathy with the parents of that dead -boy. 2 : “Like évery mother in the country, I want these cases known, I want to be assured that they will be known. I want drastic punishment applied to any man, of no matter what rank, who is found guilty of negligence in the care, physical or moral, of our boys. And I want immediate remedy of con- ditions that require remedy. But I do feel that some step should be tak- en to reassure Our women just now. It is only fair to them. It is cruel to allow every mother i in the country to BUTLER, have such men is more than a_na- tional misfortune, That they have been placed in positions of tfust is a national calamity. But the mothers of the country should know, in fair- ness to themselves, that the number of such inefficients is small, . “We will not rest, we women, un- til: they have all been removed. But that, 1 know, will be at once. It must be at once, “| have a son in an army canton- ment. He enlisted as a private, He would receive, if he became ill, exact- ly the Same treatment as any other enlisted man in our new army, And I should have not only no hesitation in placing him in the cantonment hos- pital, but I should do it with abso- lute confidence. ‘As a matter of fact, he has already spent a few days there with an infected knee, and received the best of care, “T know something about hospitals, I took a nurse’s trainings as a girl. 1 married a member of my _ hospital staff, and ‘I have been for many years. constantly in touch with hospitals. In the first year of the war, I visited the hospitals, of France . and — England. Since we went into war-I have met with the avowed intention of seeing for the women of Americg, that our boys are to be well cared for in every possible way, visited many training camps and camp hospitals. “There are conditions to be rem- centage of seriotis illness centage of mild contagions, which al- ways occur when men are brought to- gether in the mass, and of heavy col.us and bronchitis, has been high. The result of sending men with the heavy colds for a few days into the hospi- tal has resulted in rather higher. fig- ures than the seriousness of the sit- uation would otherwise justify. “Of cruelty and indifference I have found nothing. On the contrary, | have found the medical’ staffs of the When it is remembered that the med- ical men of these national army hos- pitals are volunteers, who have cheer- fully relinquished the results of years of labor to give their services to the country, that they are of.the best we have, as all volunteers are, that they are willing to undergo deprivation and hardship, to take care of our boys, it is wrong that the country at large should so misjudge them. “The best specialists of the coun- try have placed themselves at the dis- posal of the army medical department and ninetyfnine out of a hundred men in the drafted army are receiving better care than they could afford, un- der the best circumstances, to reccive at home. “Nursing is on the same high plane. Again we find volunteers, — a lat will be given her boy while in the service be- cause here and there, in the chaos of our readjustment, men have been | enough women nurses. édied. As I teported to you very re- cently, the failure of supplies’ has been a serious matter, There are not The quarters} given responsibilities they are un-jof both nurses and doctors must be able or unwilling to fulfill That we | enlarged in many cases. The per- ‘skilled and carefully trained women who have taken the small pay and the discomforts of army life that théy hight serve where they are ‘most needed. -Wards are large and airy. 3eds are comiortable. J have found W. A. BAKER & SON’S OF BIG BONE Ts Poland Chinas BUTLER, M Friday, Feb. 15 BIG CHOLERA IMMUNE BRED SOWS &» GILTS: Every Hog Absolutely Immune from Cholera ISSOURI 60 This offering consists of 15 tried sows, 30 fall gilts and 15 spring gilts; including the fall gilts which won second and fourch at the Missouri State Fair at Sedalia in 1917. HERD BQARS Baker's Jumbo Bob 277151 = “SALE TO COMMENCE AT l O'CLOCK Missouri King 276973 a Construction 280879 ‘ MISSOURI, THURSDAY, JANUARY 31, has been low in the cantonments—I am not speaking of the camps—but the per- | hospitals both efficient. and humane.) 1918. juisite cleanliness everywhere, Moreover, | have found cheerfulness. Food is good and plentiful. I have examined yrerooms and ‘kitchens, d the diets being served r the virection of a woman dict- € oa not like the orderly system. e should he more’ trained nurses, At present the wards where there are Jonus cases are manazed. by a ster,-an enlisted man, And with the best intentions in the worl |. he is not always efficient. The la°k of nurses is a serious one, and could be remedied probably by an appeal to]. aurses to volunteer, But here agaia is the serious question of the ill at home. the same*which faces the me 'i- cal profession and on ‘civilian hospi- ta : “One hospital I know well, It is typical of other cantonment hospitals, partment direction as the others, and it is only right to assume that condi- tions there are representatives. The same rules govern all these hospitals, The same sums are spent on them, The same system is followed. The food is the same, the . supplies, the bets s : medical staff, the nurses. Rnd i have} Washington, D. C., Jan, 23—Sec- never seen a better War hospital than retary of War Baker consumed four the one at Camp Sherman. I will go and one-half hours today in reciting further and say that in its operating|'° the Senate Committee on Military lrooms, its X-ray department, its exe Affairs what the military establish- and car department, its nose and| ment of the Government has accom- ment, in short, in its facilities for car-| tered the wan against Germany. ing for every emergency and every Had’ the Secretary attempted to re- weakness, it will bear comparison veal in detail all that had been done with any civilian hospital. he would be talking yet, judged by “And what is true of the base hos-| the mass of data before him, to which pital at Camp Sherman is true of ‘the| #¢ continually referred. In his state- others. I have watched the develop-| ment, however, necessarily general, he ment of the war hospital system from the beginning, when I saw it first oa paper in the office of the’ surgeon general up to two weeks ago. If watched because it was a vital mat- ter to me. T had a husband and 4 son in the service. I am like the oth- er women of this country. I would be . content with nothing less than the irman of the committee that the best. And [ feel that we are on the} War Department had “iallen down,” way to the best. . and the Oregon Senator was graciotis “It as not come yet, although at| enough to confess at the conclusion the present moment I woyld willing- of the Sceretary’s statement that he aration, and when he finished the en- the stupendousness of the task. Secretary Baker, impartiat hearers admitted, successfully refuted the charge of ‘y entrast any member of my family} and his colleagues had been “very n such emergency, to any one of our/'™ ich impressed, : We necd more sup-| Mr. Baker began his statement in base hospitals. plies, we need more nurses and en- larged, quarters for them.-_Sixty or even eighty nurses, divided into shifts of eight hours each, is totally insuf- ficient for a thousand men. We even need more physicians and surgeons. Although the staffs are very large, the | medical department in each’ medical hospital is working to its maximum. “vut what we need, as a nation, 1s something more than this. We need There is an atmosphere anything but friendly, tie closed with practicaily everyone in the room ready to applaud the ef- ficiency of the organization under his | direction. He was surrounded by! Senators, Representatives and spec- tators as he started to depart, and! was told that lie had “made good.” Members of the. Military Committee were among those who pressed fore ward to shake his hand, Senator Reed 4 of Missouri being the first to offer: the doctors, the ward masters, And let them tell exactly what they find. “The women of the country must knéw the facts. They have the right to know them, It is not fair to let them believe, as many of them now do, that.the great and humane Amer- ican people is not caring for the men who are to fight to save them. We are preparing against the inevitable losses of war, It is not fair to let any of us believe that there is useless death, that we are wasting lives we would die to save. “Andit is not true. ‘ “Faithfully yours, = “Mary Roberts Rinchart.” mand “early this year,” and a half before the end of the year, ready democracy, he said, “Now let me be frank with you, and Has any army in history since the be- cared for as this army has? Can the picture be duplicated?” There were none present, appar- ently, who would venture to say that it could. He told how the plan of the ‘Gen-| eral Staff had been not to attempt to how this plan had been altered after Harvey Cone Again in Trouble. last summer, and who deserted from} America to give immediate aid. Camp Doniphan and was captured in} “Jt is no secret that Joffree asked Rich Hill and returned to Campus to send men to France before we Doniphan, has again deserted, accord-| were ready,” he said. “He told how ing to the Rich Hill Review. It|/the French people had been disheart- seems that while Cone was under: ar-| ened hy the great offensive of 1917, rest awaiting trial for his desertion] and said it would ‘cheer us up if you he escaped and is still-at liberty. The] send over some of your troops.’” authorities at Camp Doniphan noti-} He told how officers and men were fied Marshal Bankson that Cone had] trained here, and while this process said that he “intended to return to} of mobilization was going on, bow Rich Hill and get tRe sheriff,” pre- regiment after regiment of trained sumably meaning Marshal Bankson.| artisans, engineers and troops of a It is'a safe bet that if Uncle Sam} technical character were sent abroad again gets hold of Mr. Cone he will/to prepare for the reception of the make him very sorry for the trouble] men yet to come. that he has caused. He revealed what has never been ro to!d, that cantonments had to be built “i The rereagg rae 8 haa in France, just as they had to be built z City. here; that foresters from America ¥ cut the trees and prepared the lumber. Phillip Sidney Griffith, mayor oi| for the.camps over there, instead. of, Greenfield and—editor of the Green-|as in this country, relying upon the field Vedette, died of heart failure| lumber industry to furnish the neces- at the Baltimore hotel in Kansas City | sary camp materials. rice Bight. Every task undertaken here, he was prominent in republican] said, was undertaken over there, with polite in this district, being at the/the difference that the difficulties time of his death republican state} were multiplied in France. He told co! A few years ago he| how a railroad 602 mites lonz had for_congtess agzinst| been taken over to carry products Dickinson, : U.S. TO HAVE 1,500,000 IN FRANGE BY END OF 1918 500,000 Will be There Early in Year, Baker Tells Inves- tigators. CHAMBERLAIN’S CHARGES REFUTED IN DETAIL throaytepartiient, its dentat depart-}Ptished- sinee the United States” en- ; covered every phase of the war prep-, dire membership of the committee and | the roomful of spectators marveled at! Senator » Chamberlain, | and a million} d willing to fight for world} let your judgment be frank with me. ; ginning of timie been ‘so raised and! pyt a man in France until 1918, and} Marshal Joffre of France and Foreign | Minister Balfour of England had} Harvey Cone, who was dPafted in-}come to the United States and re- to the National army from Rich Hill] vealed how necessary it was for it is under the same army medical de-| Entire War Preparations of Country ‘Reviewed and Explanations Made of Gun and Rifle De- cisions—Men Sent Abroad Earlier Than In- tended on Urgent Plea by Joffre. | France to the general base of opera- tion, miles of docks built and gigantic cranes put AD place unload the ships. He related tow experts from France and England came and worked, out problems with ex- perts of the American Army, and told of the decision that France would furnish Pershing with ht and heavy artillery if the United ‘States Would furnish the raw. material, thus saving cargo space in the 3,090-mile journey between the two countries, to | Rifle for Every Man at Front. | | He recurring military problems methods sketched the changes in the plans of the Fexperts, revealed how new at the front demanded new ever of attack, told ot the close co-opera- tion between 1 Pershing and War Department officials here and recited’ how men and supplies were being sent abroad in ever increasing numb- ers with every urance that Ameri- ca would be a deciding: factor in the war. He conceded there had been mis- takes, byt asserted thet they were corrected -as soon as discovered and declared that moral troops at home* and attention welfare and = an- nounced with confidence that a better or finer army had never been raised anywhere. At the very outset he took up Sena- tor Cham! larges, item by item, and em all, dwelling never’ repeated, welfare of the abroad was given as close jas their physical i knowledge and reassurance. r , ! particularly 1 the complaint that no need in this country for discon-] his felicitations. imen in hospitals had been inhumanly tented resignation. 1 would suggest | ‘A Feat Never Duplicated, | treated, He that met more than that a cominittee of representative fa dozen cases ah this character bad and unprejudiced citizens from’ the} 3 After he had related how greaticome to his notice and h had nearest city visit each of these base problems had been mastered, how the | been immediately es ted and hospitals and thoroughly — inspect presence of American troops in | the rer ap He told of them. And that they publish in’ their] France had heightened the courage of punishing inhumane officers and local papers the exact results of their] the almost-spent French, and had told} said he would not be — satisfied ‘investigations, Let then | go alone,| that more than half a million fighting with their mere dismissal from \.o talk with the patients, ‘the nurses.| men would be under Pershing’s co n-| the army, but had ordered that such offenders be tried as criminals and imprisoned if found guilty of transgressing military law. | We said that every man who would luse a rifle on the battle front now had a rifle, whether he was in Europe for the United States, and assertd that there are enough machine guns for training purposes and that thous- jands of others would soon be forth- coming from the factories in quanti- ties sufficiently large to meet all | demands, As he went on his story grew more | fascinating with each succeeding sen- tence, the Secretary's eyes flashed with enthusiasm and h snapped to emphasize his firth conviction that America was equal to the great job it had been asked to perform. He disputed the belief of Senator Chamberlain that the Germans knew how many men we had in France, said all of his confidential reports in- dicated otherwise, and he read from German official reports to show while they outwardly said we were bluffing, inwardly they knew we would do all we had set out to do, and more. | (Secretary Baker's statement will be found’ on page 2.) ee ports 2 disembarkation ta |e comes. & net. For Horse Meat Inspection. New York, Jan. 26—A_ resolution requesting Congress “to appropriate immediately $100,090 to re-establish the inspection of horse meat,” so that it may be made salable, was adopted by veterinary surgeons from Eastern states at a conference here today. The sale of horse meat, the conference determined, wi!l be of in- valuable aid in preventing a ‘food shortage and reducing the high cost of living. If it is restored, it was said, thousands of horses from the Western ranges, unsuited fér draught work because of their. light . weight, can be placed on the dinner table, bringing. the price of meat down to~ to Washington 3 “