Evening Star Newspaper, November 8, 1931, Page 83

THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C., NOVEMBER 8, 1931." S ' THE FIRST WOUND STRIPER A photograph of Mrs. Bouligny, taken after the tragic shooting. A BY CAPT. PAUL AYRES ROCKWELL (Author of “American Fighters in the Foreign Legion.”) BIRD'S-EYE view of the life of Edgar John Bouligny, the first American citizen wounded in the World War, shows as colorful and stirring a career as any soldier can boast. Bouligny was born in New Orleans January 4, 1888. He lived in Mexico City, where his father was proprietor of a large printing and engravilig establishment, from 1895 to 1898. His father died in the latter year, the family returned to New Orleans, and there Edgar John attended the public schools and led the normal life of an American boy until he was 14 years old. Then his adventures began. He went to San Francisco to visit a relative in the Summer of 1902. He was already a big fellow, almost six feet tall, and developed beyond his years. The San Francisco water front fascinated him, and he spent every hour possible watching the movement of the port. A stranger asked him to take a glass of beer. Edgar John accepted, the beer was drugged, and when he woke up he was far out at sea, shanghaied aboard a China-bound ‘square- Bouligny accepted his lot with fortitude, and when he returned to San Francisco months later hé had become a good sailor. He liked the seaman’s life and signed up on the schooner Manga Reva, which sailed for the Hawalian Islands from San Francisco. CARGO of raw sugar was taken aboard at Kahalui, and the ship started back for Philadelphia. Cape Horn was rounded in July, and Bouligny suffered intensely from the bitter cold. The boat discharged its_cargo at Dela- ware Breakwater on October 10,%1905, and Bou~ ligny was paid off with $35 wages. Then followed a spell as fisherman and oyster dredger in Chesapeake Bay, longshore- man along the Atlantic seaboard, gang boss on a railroad construction job, after which Bouligny enlisted in the 22d United States Infantry, where he served from March 7, 1906, to March 6, 1909. He was stationed at the Presidio in San Francisco when that city was wrecked by earthquake and fire in 1906, and helped guard the smoking ruins against looters during the days that followed. Tired of the Army, Bouligny returned to the sea, and signed aboard a four-masted steel bark, the Edward Sewell, bound for New York from San Francisco. I was an eventful voyage. From the Golden Gate to Sandy Hook, the boat was 120 days without seeing land. Frightful storms were encountered and the crew endured many hard- ships. It was Bouligny’s second trip_around Cape Horn, and when he was paid off in New York on August 30 he decided it should be his last. He re-enlisted in the United States Army in 1909, and the end of his period found him a sergeant in the Philippine Islands. He was discharged on September 21, 1912, and gladly returned to his old haunt, San Francisco. In the Spring of 1913 he signed up as worker for the season in an Alaskan salmon cannery, and set sail late in April for Bering Sea on the three-master Guy C. Goss, a leaky old tub. Once aboard the ship, he found that he was virtually a slave to a Chinaman, who was mas- ter of the contract workers. Tfll ship was a living hell. Most of Bouligny's i comrades were members of the I. W. W. and thugs of the lowest sort. Bouligny fought the bully of the ship, and was beating him badly until the bully drew a knife. Bouligny rushed for a belaying pin, and with it struck the ship's captain, who dashed around the corner at the wrong moment, a crashing blow on the head. The captain was almost killed by the stroke; the bully and his I. W. W. mates swore that Bouligny had attacked the ship’s master pur- posely, and Bouligny was put in irons. He was taken ashore in Alaska and tried for his life before a Federal judge. The latter was favorably impressed by Bouligny’s straightfor- ward story and appearance and acquitted him, Bouligny was taken on up the coast to the Balmon factory, a dismal, desolate place, where he spent a wretched Summer. The contract the workers had signed called for Chinese food, and they were fed solely on rice. When the season ended in September the workers were taken back to Seattle. Bouligny had had enough of adventures for the mo- ment and hastened back to New Orleans. He was spending the Summer of 1914 quietly ot home when war broke out in Europe. On Bouligny rushed for a belaying pin and with it struck the shép's captain, who dashed around the corner at the wrong moment. Ldgar Bouligny Led a Charmed Life Through a Thousand and One Fights, but Died From a Toy Pistol Bullet Fired by His French War Bride. August 3 Bouligny induced the French con- sul general to send him to France with a ship- load of French reservists. Upon arrival at Le Havre he enlisted in the Foreign Legion for the duration of the war. OULIGNY was put into the 2d Foreign Regi- ment, and sent to the training camp at Rouen, where I first met him. He had a pleas- ing personality, and I immediately liked him. After a few days at Rouen we were sent to Toulouse and drilled there for a month. ‘The regiment arri in the war zone at Mailly-le-Camp, in Chalpagne, on October 2, 1914. Bouligny was promoted {p corporal, quite a distinction in the Foreign Legion. The regi- ment was first under fire at Verzenay, Cham- pagne, in mid-October, then marched farther north into the Aisne, and occupied trenches near Craonnelle, The first American blood shed on a European battlefield during the great war was on the night of November 14, 1914. Corpl. Bouligny led his squad out shortly after nightfall, to establish an advanced outpost between the lines. A Gerfnan post already was established, but Bouligny and his men drove them away. Bouligny was shot in the knee and went to a hospital. Bouligny’s wound was a clean one, and after a month in a hospital, he returned to the front and was promoted to sergeant. Bouligny was again wounded on June 11, 1915, this time by a stroke with a trench knife, during a brush with a German patrol between the lines near Sillery, Champagne. Bouligny brained his assailant with his rifle butt, had the wound bandaged by his battalion doctor, -and refused to go to the rear. On the opening day of the great French of- fensive in Champagne, on September 25, 1915, Bouligny was gravely wounded by a large shell fragment through the right groin, as he led his section to the conquest of a German trench near Souain. His commander proposed him for the Military Medal, France’s most coveted decoration, but was himself killed later in the offensive, before he could make sure of the medal being awarded. ISCHARGED from the hospital late in Jan- uary, 1916, Bouligny went back to the trenches around Lassigny, in the Aisne, and on up into the muddy Somme. In the trenches at Belloy-en-Santerre, he was wounded for the fourth time, on December 15, 1916. This time it was by a German hand Science Is Reviving Forgotten Native Foods EFORE the advent of the white man’s farm- ing, the North American Indian lived well on the plant life of this country, found bene- ficial herbs and medicines, and even knew of a plant which brought about intoxication. With the spread of the white man, however, with his imported types of food, the native food plants gradually fell into disuse and then almdst into oblivion. Recently, however, the Department of Agriculture, through its Bureau of Chemistry, has been studying these native foods. The results have been interesting and have disclosed one fact, that a food element believed to be of wide value in the prevention of diabetes -has been allowed to go by the boards because none knew of its advantage. Many of the plants once used by the abo- rigines contained a substance known as inulin, a name closely akin to insulin, which has been used sucessfully in the treatment of diabetes. Inulin closely resembles levulose, which for years was considered a sugar that was valu- able in the treatment of diabetes. Modern civilization has made of the human race a race of starch eaters, because most of the cultivated plants store up starch as re- serve material. The starch, of course, is simi- lar to dextrose in its effect on the human sys- tem. ' The study being carried on by the Bureau of Chemistry has revealed more than 1,000 plants indigenous to North America, which are valuable as foods, are not now cultivated. These plants will be made known to the general pub- lic when the work is completed shortly, Among these plants are the prairie potato, possessed of a thick skin, but less susceptible to insect injury than the potatoes now culti- vated. A wild licorice has been found which is a source of the licorice wsed in the manu- facture of candy and various pharmsceutical compounds. Camas, a plart contalnivpg large percentages of inulin, was once the Indian's sugar source, for it produced a sweet sirup. Some of thé modern Indians still use the ¥ mas, An Indian bent upon a spree found that he could become highly intoxicated on an infusion made from a small plant of the cactus family known commonly as “dry whisky.” This plant provided an alkaloid which was as effective as alcohol in producing intoxication. In many sections of the country plants com- monly comdidered weeds are eaten and found to be delicious. As an example, the common milkweed provides a real delicacy. The shoots which come up overnight, much as asparagus, are picked when from five to seven leaves are showing. These are cooked in the same man- ner as asparagus and are truly delicious. Pig- weed or lambs’ quarters is another weed which serves as a green vegetable in the menus of the “weed-wise.” The use of dandelion greens, of course, is general. The research now being carried out is ex- pected to be of value in pointing out delicious and nourishing foods now going to waste be- cause of lack of appreciation of their value. The announcement of the bureau’s findings, when it is made, is expected to be of great interest. . Petroleum Industry Gains in Efficiency HE petroleum industry, which for a time appeared to abound in wasteful practices, is in reality far along the road of efficiency. One of the latest steps is in the development of methads for recovering the vapors from the stills which has been lost heretofore. 'This vapor upon recovery and processing has pro- duced an appreciable amount of gasoline, and gasoline of considerable volatility. The residue of the vapors recovered after the removal of the gasoline has been used for providing fuel for the stills. Much efficlency has resulted from this method, and its use is being fairly widespread. America’s first wound striper, Edgar John Bouligny, as he looked in the uni- form of the French Foreign Legion. A ygloéograph made in the trenches in 16. grenade, thrown during an enemy raid. -A plece of the grenade lodged in the American’s leg, but he would not have the wound bandaged until the attackers had been driven off. Bouligny’s wound was slow in healing. When he left the hospital, on May 5, 1917, he was detached to the French aviation corps. He got his pilot’s license the following July 13 and volunteered for service over the Macedonian front, where he served for about a year. He was ordered back to France at the end of July, 1918, and was transferred to the U. 8. Army Aviation Corps on October 24 as a second lleutenant. The armistice was signed before he was sent back to the front in U. 8. uniform, He sailed for America on December 15 and was mustered out of the U. 8. Army on January 7, 1919. Edgar Bouligny had met in 1917, while in Paris on leave, a'French girl, Odile Hubeau, an orphan of humble origin. Returning to France after demobilization, he married her and they went to New Orleans to live. In 1921 Bouligny bought two mules and a covered wagon, of the old prairie schooner type, and with his wife set out across the country, taking photographs and giving illus- trated lectures as he went, and arriving at Long Beach, Calif,, late in 1922. & A LITTLE later he drove north to San Frane cisco, gave up his covered wagon, and bought a battered old Ford for $40. Withe out spending one cent for repairs, he drove,the ancient car across the United States, and in November, 1923, sold the vehicle in Hoboken, N. J., for $35. N\ After several years, in which he moved reste lessly from place to place, Bouligny and his wife returned to New Orleans, settling in the old French quarter of the city, and Edgar started work as a photographer. He fell ill in April, entered a hospital, and upon recomse mendation by U. 8. army doctors, was awarded a pension, At the same time, he learned that he was soon to receive the French Military Medal, for which he had been proposed so often, and that France had granted him a small pension. His stay in the hospital was short; he began to feel better, and life smiled upon him. He wrote me on May 11, 1931: “I am being treated like a king down here.” A week later, on May 18, Bouligny was treated as kings often have been; he was muse dered. His wife shot him, with a little revolver she had purchased in Paris. She stated that there was a violent quarrel, and that Edgar advanced upon her with his fists clenchéd, and she became afraid. She reached under the bufe fet for a revolver and shot him. Both the authorities and Bouligny's relatives were satisfied that her story of shooting in self- defense was true. The district attorney dropped all charges against her the next day, and she was cared for by her dead husband's family, taken into their home and defended by them, until she was able to return to France,