Evening Star Newspaper, November 10, 1929, Page 92

THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C, NOVEMBER 10, 1929, the whole length of the trench.’ Welll down at the"very end, “WHere~this chaplain s#tid he'd burfed the Anferlcan, I'dug a:little and found the feet without any trouble. They had Ger- man boots on ’em, just like all the others in the trench. It struck me, though, that maybe I'd better look a little closer and I uncovered everything. The body had a German overcoat on it. too—but inside was the American soldier the chaplain wrote about. I suppose all the others only vent as far as his boots * * * it was natural snough in a trench filled with Ger- man boots to conclude this body must be a Ger- man also. It just happened I'd so many cases where Americans had been buried in German shoes or German uniforms that I didn't take it for granted. “Yes, lots of unknowns was eaused by Ger- mans swapping shoes or uniforms, cr maybe taking them altogether. You see, when the Heinles began running short of good shoes, why, of course, they appreciated &« good pair of American ones. Whenever we find American bodids without shoes weé know it's ten to one they were buried by Germans.” both sides of the Atlantic the search goes on. In France investigators such as this man, men born to be detectives, take the slenderest of threads and follow through a maze of Mcertainties, over trails .now more than 11 years old, until success has come or the last lead has been exhausted. One day recently I was reading over some of the A. G. R. 8. files in the little cement office building at Suresnes Cemetery outside Paris, when I chanced upon these three letters in succession. The first was written in the Spring of May, 1925. “I saw Corp,- Masterson,” it reads, “on the afternoon of October 2, 1918, after being slightly wounded by a high explosive shell. He was sent back to the first aid station, where he was. killed instantly by a high explosive shell:" "He “was ‘buried October 6 on a hill 1% kilometers north of Montfaucon, France. I am inclosing a map of Montfaucon. Master- son was hit the first time about 3 p.m. and killed at the first aid station about 5 pm. (Signed) Leo M. Wilkes, first sergeant Com- pany G, 7th Infantry, Adel, Ga.” The second letter, dated May 25, 1925, was written by Pvt. Benjamin D. Champlin of the same company, now living in Canton, Kans. He said:’ “Robert .A. Mastérson and myself were wounded by the same shell about 4 p.m. October 2, 1918, near ‘Montfaucon.. We ;/were sent to the first aid.station, and it was at this place, while waiting our turn to have our wounds dressed, that Corp. Masterson was hit and killed. “(a) He was badly hit, “(b) He did not carry any other article by which he might be identified other than tags, to my knowledge. “(c) I do not know the objective of that day, as we had been stationed in the woods all day. “(d) Do not recall name of other town, but think it was Neuilly. “(e) Do not recall name of woods. “(f) .Don’t know names of soldiers buried near. “(g) Chaplain Elliott assisted in burial.” Here is evidenced all the care and painstak- ing effort with which our - Government has solicited information from former company mates, buddies and officers in the hope that another missing soldier may be brought back to a marked resting place. Every possible question regarding location, time, place and events is asked. 'HE first letter was from Georgia; the sec- ond was from Kansas. The third was from Plymouth, Pa., written to Q. M. G. in Wash- ington on July 11, 1925. It is by Dr. W. C. Stiff, formerly a major in the Red Cross: “I was acting battalion surgeon the day Corp. Masterson was killed. I discovered his body with that of my orderly, Pvt. Earl Shaner of the Medical Corps, 7th Infantry, in the Beau de Beuge, southeast of Montfaucon, the eve- ning of October 3, 1918. “About midnight the battalion Medical De- tachment moved with the 2d Battalion to a point outside the town of Cierges. But on October 6 I took a detail back to Beau de Beuge, located the hodies of Pvt. Shaner and Corp. Masterson and buried both in a common grave. “This grave was located about 8 or 10 feet from the entrance to a hut the Germans had constructed at the crossing of two pathways and at a point that commanded a splendid observation of Montfaucon. This hut had been used by the Germans as a machine gun nest. I buried one identification tag with Shaner’s body and one with Masterson's body and the duplicates I attached to a rude cross which 1 erected gver the graves.. My Teport of their death anél burial location I sent in through the regular channels.” In these three letters were contained virtually all the information that the Government had been able to secure since Corpl. Masterson was marked “K. I. A.—body unlocated” in the Army records. Every missing or unknown American soldier of the World War has a file book with his name on it and all the available facts relating thereto in it—one such book in Wash- ington and a similar one with the American Graves Registration Service in France. In the few months immediately after these letters were written the bodies of soldiers taken from the locality where Masterson was said to have been buried were examined and checked’ with his dental chart. Each time there was insufficient data for identification, Therefore Col. F. W. Van Duyne, who until recently was in charge of the American Graves Registration Service in France and who di- rected its organization for years, ordered field investigators to search the vicinity where Pvt. Shaner was shown to have been buried. On June 9, 1926, the chief investigator in the Meuse-Argonne sector reported as follows: “The body of Corpl. Robert A. Masterson, Company G, 7th Infantry, has been found in an isolated grave in the Beau de Beuge, near Nantillois. It has been identified by T. O. B. (tag on body).” The report adds that the grave was found about 10 feet in front of what had been a first-aid station, as many medical supplies were found in the vicinity. “Burial had been made at a depth of half a foot and the tag for the body was found on a piece of telegraph wire which had been wound around the body. Alongside Corpl. Masterson's grave wase an empty grave, from which no doubt Pvt. Shaner’s remains had been exhumed.” Thus the Red Cross major's information, written from memory seven years later, proved correct in every detail, even to the fact that the grave was about 10 feet from the temporary first-aid station. Corpl. Masterson’s case covers a relatively short space of time, chiefly because of the good memories of those whose leads contributed to the recovery of his body. Dozens of other cases might be cited where recollections, natu- rally enough, were hazy or so general as to necessitate a search extending over six or eight P reasmm——" | years. Frequently buddies have submitted rough sketches of the particular battlefield con- cerned as they remembered it. IT is difficult to overestimate or overappreciate the vast service which the Government has rendered to hundreds of families of missing soldiers through the recovery work of the American Graves Registration Service. From January 1, 1924, when the American Graves Registration Service became fully organized, until October 1, 1929, 562 bodies of American soldiers, either missing or unknown, have been recovered or identified. Perhaps it would seem that the work should be entirely finished with the war’s end now 11 years removed, But the records belie that supposition. The most fecent figures in the American Graves Registration Service’s un- relenting search for the legion of the missing show that no less than 56 missing Americans were found from July, 1928, to October, 1929, ‘The list of those remaining to be found is still large. There weré 1,294 American soldiers whose bodies had not been recovered on October 1, 1928. On the same date there were 1,616 bodies of American soldiers that had not been identified—a total of 2,910 unlocated or un=- known soldiers. The quest, then, is far from being finished. There are still nearly 3,000 cases—some of them an inch or more thick in documents—which remain as a challenge to earnest investigators who refuse ta accept the words “missing” and “unknown” on their face value. But in the last few years the task of the American Graves Registration Service has, of necessity, been cur- tailed. Where formerly four or five sectors were being worked, there are now only two—Chateau= Thierry and the Meuse-Argonne. The only way to avoid abandoning many cases which still might be solved is for more funds to be forth- coming from Washington. The men in the field have followed apparently hopeless trails and turned them into successful conclusions for too many years to admit that all those missing and unknown need remain so on the official records. They say that, given the necessary appropriation, they can yet tear aside the veil of mystery and uncertainty from many an American doughboy’'s fate. And for every one “brought back” there is a cross of glistening white marble waiting in one of the several most beautifully kept war cemeteries in the world—-the American cemeteries in France. MARYLAND AND VIRGINIA RAISING MANY TURKEYS FOR MARKET BY C. MORAN ARYLAND and Virginia are regaining their former place in the Nation's turkey industry. Improved farm management practices, declare State hgricultural college poultry experts, are making possible the production of turkeys free from the deadly “black head” disease which has threatened to wipe out the entire turkey in- dustry. Time was when wild turkeys ranged freely over the Atlantic seaboard. A man shouldered a gun or fashioned a net and caught his ‘Thanksgiving or Christmas dinner on the fly. In New England, in earlier days, turkeys were a nuisance, roosting on doorsteps and in back yards. The earlier Piigrim descendants were put to it te chase the birds away. Now turkeys pre worth almost their weight in gold. The development of thickly settled com- munities drove the birds away until it became difficult to catch a.wild turkey, and efforts were begun at domesticating the bird. These ef- JSorts ‘were unsuccessful because the birds did not thrive in captivity, and contracted diseases from chickens in barn yards. “Black head” introduced into a turkey flock quickly destroyed the flock, and commercial production became too hazardous, The next development was the growing of huge flocks, in some cases numbering 5,000 birds, on the open ranges of the Southwest, where they were herded like sheep. Texas be- came the Nation’s leading turkey-producing State. The birds practically fed themselves on almost free range, cost of production was low and returns were large, even though in some seasons of drought many young poults were Jost through falling into the wide cracks which developed in a parched soil. More recently the Northwestern States have become increasingly interested in turkey pro- duction under more closely confined condi- tions, experiments being conducted by several of the State agricultural colleges. The Federal Department of Agriculture also established ex- perimental turkey farms in an effort to combat effectively the diseases which are peculiar to ‘turkeys, These efforts have resulted in the develop- ‘ment of artificial methods of incubation and brooding in ‘the production of turkeys practi- ‘cally free fron. parasitic diseases. They have ‘shown that by the use of proper sanitary pre- ‘cautions and proper feeding methods turkeys ‘can be made to thrive in confinement. This system of turkey raising is more costly than ‘the free range, but it puts on greater growth :and produces a better product, the investigators $ay. Artificial incubation and brooding of young ‘Poults now is fast being adopted by leading ‘turkey producers. The system requires less ‘work, prevents the spread of disease from old ‘to young, and produces a flock more uniform in ‘size and age. Experiments at th: Minnesota ‘Agricultural Experiment Station show that the ‘poults thrive under close confinement on good, clean soi), and a dry mash of equal parts by “weight of yellow corn ‘meal, wheat middlings, ‘wheat bran and oat flour, and ‘changed to ground oats as the birds grow older. These methods have dealt with the preven- tion of “black head” in turkey flocks, but re- search at the Missourl College of Agriculture has been directed at arresting the disease once -3t is introduced into a fiock. A slight surgical ©peration is made. upon birds suspected of ace The Two States Are Regaining Their Former Place as Leaders in Producing the Great - Thanksgiving Bird. On a Virginia turkey farm. quiring the malady, consisting of a one-inch slit between the last two ribs, and the tying of the “blind” or floating pouches that are attached near one end of the intestines. Thus the food, accompanied by the blackhead parasite, cannot stop in these pouches. Federal turkey experts became so alarmed recently of the steady decline in turkey pro- duction in the United States that they sought other species of wild turkeys in South America and Mexico for introduction into this country. These species of birds have been reared with more or less success on’Sapeloe Island, Ga., but many years of research will be required be- fore the birds are definitely established in large numbers. . There is a great deal of misinformation as to the origin of turkeys. The birds at one time were supposed to be natives of Turkey in Asia. The fact is that turkeys are natives of North and Central America, and formerly all of them were, wild“birds. They were introduced into Europe by the Spanish conquistadores upon their return from America early in the sixteenth century. This return chanced to be concurrent with the return to western Europe of soldiers from the Crusades, and many people developed the notion that the birds were Turkish trophies brought back from the land of the Turks. Wild turkeys are still found in Mexico, Texas and Arizona, and other scattered parts of the West and South. They are scarce east of the Mississippi and north of Virginia or: Kentacky. The wild turkey nests on the ground, commonly laying about 12 eggs of creamy-white color, The young are at the mercy of many enemies, and -the adults that survive have become nearly exterminated in America. . " The turkey crop this year has been estimated by the Department of Agriculture at ap- proximately 4 per cent larger than last year's crop. The larger increases are in the Western States, particylarly Washington, Oregon, Cali- ' fornia, ‘'Nevada, Utah'and Tdaho. The Norfhi Central States also show an increase in produce tion, while the Southern States have a notice- able reduction due to excessive rains and cool weather in June, ‘ Side-Line Farm Incomes. A SIDE-LINE income, one of those desirable sources of revenue which seem to provide the needed cash for emergencies arising unex- pectedly, is provided for farmers in the produce tion of sour cream. y This type of dairying is particularly adaptable $o farms which centrate on some other prod- uct, but which fild ample pasture land to keep from 6 to 12 cows. The handling of this nume ber of cows requires comparatively little labor, and yet yields an income well worth the effort. A survey of 40 farms in Southern Georgia and Southeastern Alabama was carried on by the Department of Agriculture, and the figures ine dicated an average income from the dozen or less cattle of $805 per year. The farms studied carried on cotton, tobacco, truck and peanut crops as the main source of income. Naturally, the family of the farmer needed dairy products, and it was found little more effort to provide for several cows than for one, These cows produced not only the revenue cited, but gave to each family, for home consumption, $220 in dairy products and left over $70 worth of skim milk for pig and other stock feeding. This made the yield per farm approximately $1,100, a sum not to be sneezed at as a side-line income. . The sour cream produced was sold for butter purposes and could be handled with much less effort than milk for the fluid milk trade, where a low lactic acids bacterial count is vital. Cultivation of Phlox. HLOX, one of the most popular and satise factory of the Summer-flowering perennials, is native to the eastern sections of the United States, although in its present form it is a product of the European horticulturists. The Summer phlox thrives best in a sandy, mbist soil, and its propogation is simpie. Some varieties spread by means of stolons, which pro- duce large bunches, while others are propagated by means of cuttings set out in the Fall. All varieties, however, may be made to yield larger plantings by digging and cutting the roots into small sections, an inch or two in length, scate tering them over the surface of light soil and cgvering them with a quarter of an inch or so of soil. - New Type of Terrapin. TERRAPXN, the delight of epicures in the past ‘and now their great despair, because of the dwindling stocks, soon may become plen- tiful again, if the public taste warrants. Through the efforts of the Bureau of Fishe eries, a- new type terrapin, one which repro- duces much faster than the original type, has been obtained through the cross of the Chesae peake and North Carolina varieties. Not only does the new type terrapin increase twice as rapidly, but it is found to be of much superior quality. The only fly in the ointment is found in the fact that it will take terrapin farmers eight years before they are ready to sh‘lp to market.. - - : b dEa-