A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P R S T U V W X Z

The War Romance of the Salvation Army

E >> Evangeline Booth and Grace Livingston Hill >> The War Romance of the Salvation Army




I was on the road all of night before last and on guard last night and I'm
a wee bit tired so I'm making this kinder short; but it's a little
reminder that the boy who is 5,000 miles away is thinking, "I love you my
ma," same as I always did.

And, by gosh, don't forget about that pumpkin pie!

Good-night, mother of mine; your soldier boy loves you a whole dollar's
worth.

[Illustraion: "Here during the day they worked in dugouts far below the
shell-tortured earth"]

[Illustration: They came to get their coats mended and their buttons sewed
on]

[Illustration: "L'Hermitage, nestled in the heart of a deep woods, was no
quiet refuge"]

[Illustraion: L'Hermitage, inside the tent. Several of these boys were
killed a few days after the picture was taken]

The Salvation Army hut was home to the boys over there. They came to it in
sorrow or joy. They came to ask to scrape out the bowl where the cake
batter had been stirred because mother used to let them do it; they came
to get their coats mended and have their buttons sewed on. Sometimes it
seemed to the long-suffering, smiling woman who sewed them on, as if they
just ripped them off so she could sew them on again; if so, she did not
mind. They came to mourn when they received no word from home; and when
the mail came in and they were fortunate they came first to the hut waving
their letter to tell of their good luck before they even opened it to read
it. It is remarkable how they pinned their whole life on what these
consecrated American women said to them over there. It is wonderful how
they opened their hearts to them on religious subjects, and how they
flocked to the religious meetings, seeming to really be hungry for them.

Word about these wonderful meetings that the soldiers were attending in
such numbers got to the ears of another commanding officer, and one day
there came a summons for the Salvation Army Major in charge at Gondrecourt
to appear before him. An officer on a motor cycle with a side car brought
the summons, and the Major felt that it practically amounted to an arrest.
There was nothing to do but obey, so he climbed into the side car and was
whirled away to Headquarters.

The Major-General received him at once and in brusque tones informed him
most emphatically:

"We want you to get out! We don't want you nor your meetings! We are here
to teach men to fight and your religion says you must not kill. Look out
there!" pointing through the doorway, "we have set up dummies and teach
our men to run their bayonets through them. You teach them the opposite of
that. You will unfit my men for warfare!"

The Salvationist looked through the door at the line of straw dummies
hanging in a row, and then he looked back and faced the Major-General for
a full minute before he said anything.

Tall and strong, with soldierly bearing, with ruddy health in the glow of
his cheeks, and fire in his keen blue eyes, the Salvationist looked
steadily at the Major-General and his indignation grew. Then the good old
Scotch burr on his tongue rolled broadly out in protest:

"On my way up here in your automobile"--every word was slow and calm and
deliberate, tinged with a fine righteous sarcasm--"I saw three men
entering your Guard House who were not capable of directing their own
steps. They had been off on leave down to the town and had come home
drunk. They were going into the Guard House to sleep it off. When they
come out to-morrow or the next day with their limbs trembling, and their
eyes bloodshot and their heads aching, do you think they will be fit for
warfare?

"You have men down there in your Guard House who are loathsome with vile
diseases, who are shaken with self-indulgence, and weakened with all kinds
of excesses. Are they fit for warfare?

"Now, look at me!"

He drew himself up in all the strength of his six feet, broad shoulders,
expanded chest, complexion like a baby, muscles like iron, and compelled
the gaze of the officer.

"Can you find any man--" The Salvationist said "mon" and the soft Scotch
sound of it sent a thrill down the Major-General's back in spite of his
opposition. "Can you find any mon at fifty-five years who can follow these
in your regiment, who can beat me at any game whatever?"

The officer looked, and listened, and was ashamed.

The Major rose in his righteous wrath and spoke mighty truths clothed in
simple words, and as he talked the tears unbidden rolled down the Major-
General's face and dropped upon his table.

"And do you know," said the Salvationist, afterward telling a friend in
earnest confidence, "do you _know_, before I left we _had prayer
together!_ And he became one of the best friends we have!"

Before he left, also, the Major-General signed the authority which gave
him charge of the Guard Houses, so that he might talk to the men or hold
meetings with them whenever he liked. This was the means of opening up a
new avenue of work among the men.

The Scotch Major had a string of hospitals that he visited in addition to
his other regular duties. He knew that the men who are gassed lose all
their possessions when their clothes are ripped off from them. So this
Salvationist made a delightful all-the-year-round Santa Claus out of
himself: dressing up in old clothes, because of the mud and dirt through
which he must pass, he would sling a pack on his back that would put to
shame the one Old Santa used to carry. Shaving things and soap and
toothbrushes, handkerchiefs and chocolate and writing materials. How they
welcomed him wherever he came! Sick men, Protestants, Jews, Catholics. He
talked and prayed with them all, and no one turned away from his kindly
messages.

Six miles from Neufchauteul is Bazoilles, a mighty city of hospital tents
and buildings, acres and acres of them, lying in the valley. Whenever this
man heard the rumbling of guns and knew that something was doing, he took
his pack and started down to go the rounds, for there were always men
there needing him.

Then he would hold meetings in the wards, blessed meetings that the
wounded men enjoyed and begged for. They all joined in the singing, even
those who could not sing very well. And once it was a blind boy who asked
them to sing "Lead Kindly Light Amid the Encircling Gloom, Lead Thou Me
On."

One Sunday afternoon two Salvation Army lassies had come with their Major
to hold their usual service in the hospital, but there were so many
wounded coming in and the place was so busy that it seemed as if perhaps
they ought to give up the service. The nurses were heavy-eyed with fatigue
and the doctors were almost worked to death. But when this was suggested
with one accord both doctors and nurses were against it. "The boys would
miss it so," they said, "and we would miss it, too. It rests us to hear
you sing."

After the Bible reading and prayer a lassie sang: "There Is Sunshine in My
Heart To-day," and then came a talk that spoke of a spiritual sunshine
that would last all the year. The song and talk drifted out to another
little ward where a doctor sat beside a boy, and both listened. As the
physician rose to go the wounded boy asked if he might write a letter.

The next day the doctor happened to meet the lassie who sang and told her
he had a letter that had been handed to him for censorship that he thought
she would like to see. He said the writer had asked him to show it to her.
This was the letter:

Dear Mother: You will be surprised to hear that I am in the hospital, but
I am getting well quickly and am having a good time. But best of all, some
Salvation Army people came and sang and talked about sunshine, and while
they were talking the sunshine came in through my window--not into my room
alone, but into my heart and life as well, where it is going to stay. I
know how happy this will make you.

The hospital work was a large feature of the service performed by the
Salvation Army. In every area this testimony comes from both doctors,
nurses and wounded men. Yet it was nothing less than a pleasure for the
workers to serve those patient, cheerful sufferers.

A lassie entered a ward one day and found the men with combs and tissue
paper performing an orchestra selection. They apologized for the noise,
declaring that they were all crazy about music and that was the only way
they could get it.

"How would you like a phonograph?" she asked.

"Oh, Boy! If we only had one! I'll tell the world we'd like it," one
declared wistfully.

The phonograph was soon forthcoming and brought much pleasure.

A lassie offered to write a letter for a boy whose foot had just been
amputated and whose right arm was bound in splints. He accepted her offer
eagerly, but said:

"But when you write promise me you won't tell mother about my foot. She
worries! She wouldn't understand how well off I really am. Maybe you had
better let me try to write a bit myself for you to enclose. I guess I
could manage that." So, with his left hand, he wrote the following:


Dearest Mother:--I am laid up in the hospital here with a very badly
sprained ankle and some bruises, and will be here two or three weeks. Do
not worry, I am getting along fine. Your loving Son.


Two automobiles, an open car and a limousine, were maintained in Paris
for the sole purpose of providing outings for wounded men who were able to
take a little drive. It was said by the doctors and nurses that nothing
helped a rapid recovery like these little excursions out into an every-day
beautiful world.

A boy on one of the hospital cots called to a passing lassie:

"I am going to die, I know I am, and I'm a Catholic. Can you pray for me,
Salvation Army girl, like you prayed for that fellow over there?"

The young lassie assured him that he was not going to die yet, but she
knelt by his cot and prayed for him, and soothed him into a sleep from
which he awoke refreshed to find that she was right, he was not going to
die yet, but live, perhaps, to be a different lad.

A sixteen-year-old boy who at the first declaration of war had run away
from home and enlisted was wounded so badly that he was ordered to go back
to the evacuation hospital. He was determined that he could yet fight, and
was almost crying because he had to leave his comrades, but on the way
back he discovered the entrance to a German dugout and thought he heard
someone down in there moving.

"Come out," he shouted, "or I'll throw in a hand grenade!"

A few minutes later he reached the evacuation hospital with thirty
prisoners of war, his useless arm hanging by his side. That is the kind of
stuff our American boys are made of, and those are the boys who are
praising the Salvation Army!

It was sunset at the Gondrecourt Officers' Training Camp. On the big
parade ground in back of the Salvation Army huts three companies were
lined up for "Colors." The sun was sinking into a black mass of storm
clouds, painting the Western sky a dull blood red with here and there a
thread of gleaming gold etched on the rim of a cloud. Three French
children trudged sturdily, wearily, back from the distant fields where
they had toiled all day. The elder girl pushed a wheelbarrow heavily laden
with plunder from the fields. All bore farming implements, the size of
which dwarfed them by comparison. They had almost reached the end of the
drill ground when the military band blared out the opening notes of the
"Star Spangled Banner," and the flag slipped slowly from its high staff.
Instantly the farming tools were dropped and the three childish figures
swung swiftly to "attention," hands raised rigidly to the stiff French
salute. So they stood until the last note had died. Then on they tramped,
their backs all bent and weary, over the hill and down into the grey,
evening-shadowed village of the valley.

In a shell-marred little village at the American front, the Salvation Army
once brought the United States Army to a standstill. Several hundred
artillerymen had gathered for the regular Wednesday night religious
service, held in the hutment, conducted by that organization at this
point, and, in closing, sang vigorously three verses of "The Star Spangled
Banner." A Major who was passing came immediately to attention, his
example being followed by all of the men and officers within hearing, and
also by a scattering of French soldiers who were just emerging from the
Catholic church. By the time the second verse was well under way three
companies of infantry, marching from a rest camp toward the front, had
also come to a rigid salute, blocking the road to a quartermaster's supply
train, who had, perforce, to follow suit. The "Star Spangled Banner" has a
deeper meaning to the man who has done a few turns in the trenches.

They had a pie-baking contest in Gondrecourt one day, where the renowned
"Aunt Mary" was located, with her sweet face and sweeter heart.

One of the other huts had baked two hundred and thirty-five pies in a day.
The people in Gondrecourt believed they could do better than that, so they
made their preparations and set to work.

The soldiers were all interested, of course. Who was to eat those pies?
The more pies the merrier! The engineers had constructed a rack to hold
them, so that they might be easily counted without confusion. The soldiers
had appointed a committee to do the counting with a representative from
the cooks to be sure that everything went right. Even the officers and
chaplain took an interest in it.

This hut was in one of the largest American sectors. It was so well
patronized that they used on an average fifty gallons of coffee every
evening and seventy-five or more gallons of lemonade every afternoon. You
can imagine the pies and doughnuts that would find a welcome here. One day
they made twenty-seven hundred sugar cookies, and another day they fried
eighteen hundred and thirty-six doughnuts, at the same time baking cake
and pies; but this time they were going to try to bake three hundred pies
between the rising and setting of the sun.

An army field oven only holds nine pies at a time, so every minute of the
day had to be utilized. The fires were started very early in the morning
and everything was ready for the girls to begin when the sun peeped over
the edge of the great battlefield. They sprang at their task as though it
were a delightful game of tennis, and not as though they had worked hard
and late on the day before, and the many days before that.

It was very hot in the little kitchen as the sun waxed high. An army range
never tries to conserve its heat for the benefit of the cooks. In fact
that kitchen was often used for a Turkish bath by some poor wet soldiers
who were chilled to the bone.

But the heat did not delay the workers. They flew at their task with
fingers that seemed to have somehow borrowed an extra nimbleness. All day
long they worked, and the pies were marshalled out of the oven by nines,
flaky and fragrant and baked just right. The rack grew fuller and fuller,
and the soldiers watched with eager eyes and watering mouths. Now and then
one of the soldiers' cooks would put his head in at the door, ask how the
score stood, and shake his head in wonder. On and on they worked, mixing,
rolling, filling, putting the little twists and cuts on the upper crust,
and slipping in the oven and out again! Mixing, rolling, filling and
baking without any let-up, until the sun with a twinkle of glowing
appreciation slipped regretfully down behind the hills of France again as
if he were sorry to leave the fun, and the time was up. The committee gave
a last careful glance over the filled racks and announced the final score,
three hundred and sixteen pies, in shining, delectable rows!

By seven o'clock that evening the pie line was several hundred yards long.
It was eleven o'clock when the last quarter of a pie went over the
counter, with its accompanying mug of coffee. Think what it was just to
have to cut and serve that pie, and make that coffee, after a long day's
work of baking!

One of the officers receiving his change after having paid for his pie
looked at it surprisedly:

"And you mean to tell me that you girls work so hard for such a small
return? I don't see where you make any profit at all."

"We don't work for profit, Captain," answered the lassie. "I don't think
any amount of money would persuade us to keep going as we have to here at
times."

"You mean you sort of work for the joy of working?" he asked, puzzled.

"I don't know what you mean," responded the lassie pleasantly, "but when
we are tired we look at the boys drilling in the sun and working early and
late. They are splendid and we feel we must do our part as unreservedly as
they do theirs."

"No wonder my men have so many good things to say about the Salvation
Army!" said the Captain, turning to his companions. But as he went out
into the night his voice floated back in a puzzled sort of half-
conviction, as if he were thinking out something more than had been
spoken:

"It takes more than patriotism to keep refined women working like that!"

These same girls were commissioned also to make frequent visits to the
hospitals and talk with the sick soldiers. Often they read the Bible to
them, and many a man through these little talks has found the way of
eternal life. This in addition to their other work.

One night after a meeting in the hut a lad wanted to come into the room at
the back and speak to one of the women about his soul. They knelt and
prayed together, and the boy when he rose had a light of real happiness on
his face. But suddenly the happiness faded and he exclaimed:

"But I can't read!"

"Read? What do you mean?" asked the lassie.

"My Bible. Nobody never learned me to read, and I can't read my Bible like
you said in the meeting I should."

The lassie thought for a minute, and then suggested that he come to the
hut every morning just before first call and she would teach him a verse
of scripture and read him a chapter. This meant that the lassie must rise
that much earlier, but what of that for a servant of the King?

Just a month this program was carried out, and then came marching orders
for the boy, but by this time he had a rich store of God's word safe in
his heart from the verses he had memorized. The last night when he came to
say good-bye he said to his teacher:

"Your kindness has meant a lot of trouble for you, miss, but for me it has
meant life! Before, I was afraid to fight; but now I don't even fear
death. I know now that it can only mean a new life. Thank God for your
goodness to me!"

There was one soldier who went by the name of Scoop. He had been a
reporter back in the States and learned to love drink. When he joined the
army he did not give up his old habits. Whenever anybody remonstrated with
him he invariably replied gaily, "I'm out to enjoy life." On pay-days
Scoop celebrated by drinking more than ever.

One day he happened into the Salvation Army hut. Whether the pie or the
doughnuts or the homeyness of the place first attracted him no one knows.
He said it was the pie. Something held him there. He came every night. The
spirit of the Lord that lived and breathed in those consecrated men and
girls began to work in his heart and conscience, and speak to him of
better things that might even be for him.

When he felt the desire for drink or gambling coming on he gave his money
to the girls to keep for him.

On the last pay-day before he was sent to another location he took a
paint-brush and some paint and made a little sign which he set up in a
prominent place in the hut, his silent testimony to what they had done for
him: "FOR THE FIRST TIME ON PAY-DAY SCOOP IS SOBER!"

One morning a lassie was frying some doughnuts in the Gondrecourt hut,
another was rolling and cutting, and both were very busy when a soldier
came in with the mail. The girls went on with their work, though one could
easily see that they were eager for letters. One was handed to the lassie
who was frying the doughnuts. When she opened it she found it was an
official dispatch. The others saw the change of her expression and asked
what was the matter, but she made no reply while tears started down her
cheeks. She, however, went on frying doughnuts. The others asked again
what was the trouble and for answer the girl handed them the open
dispatch, which stated briefly that one of her three brothers, who were
all in the service, had been killed in action on the previous day. The
others sympathetically tried to draw her away from her work, but she said:
"No, nothing will help me to bear my sorrow like doing something for
others." This is the spirit of the Salvation Army workers. Personal
sorrows, personal feelings, personal difficulties, hardships, dangers, are
not allowed to interrupt their labors of love. Fortunately, it was later
discovered that this message about her brother was unfounded.

A boy told this lassie one day that the next day was his birthday, and she
saw the homesickness and yearning in his eyes as he spoke. Immediately she
told him she would have a birthday party for him and bake a cake for it.

She found some tiny candles in the village and placed nineteen upon the
pretty frosted cake. They had to use a white bed-quilt for a tablecloth,
and none of the cups and saucers matched, but the table looked very pretty
when it was set, with little white paper baskets of almonds which the
girls had made at each place, and all the candles lit on the white cake in
the middle. The boy brought three of his comrades, and there were the
Salvation Army Major in charge and the lassies. They had a beautiful time.
Of course it was quite a little extra work for the lassie, but when
someone asked her why she took so much trouble she had a faraway look in
her eyes, and said she guessed it was for the sake of the boy's mother,
and those who heard remembered that her own three brothers were in United
States uniform somewhere facing the enemy.

There are several instances in which American soldiers coming from British
and French Sectors, where they had been brigaded with armies of those
nations, have upon entering a Salvation Army hut for the first time
without noticing the sign over the door started to talk to the girls in
French--very fragmentary French at that. When they found the girls to be
Americans they were almost beside themselves with mingled feelings of
bashfulness and delight. Most of the soldiers exhibit the former trait.

One boy approached one of our men officers.

"Can them girls speak American?" he asked, pointing at the girls.

On being assured that they could, he said: "Will they mind if I go up and
speak to them? I ain't talked to an American woman in seven months."

Two soldiers were walking along the dusty roadway.

First soldier: "Let's go to the Salvation Army hut."

Second soldier: "No, I don't want to."

First soldier: "They've got a piano and a phonograph and lots of records."

Second soldier: "No, I don't want to."

First soldier: "They've got books and _beaucoup_ games."

Second soldier: "No, I don't want to."

First soldier: "Two American ladies there!"

Second soldier: "No, I don't want to."

First soldier: "They've got swell coffee and doughnuts!"

Second soldier (angrily): "No! I said NO!"

First soldier: "Aw, come on. They got real homemade pie!"

Second soldier: "I don't care!"

First soldier: "They cut their own wood and do their own work!"

Second soldier: "Well, that's different! Why didn't you say that right
off, you bonehead? Come on. Where is it?"

And they entered the Salvation Army hut smiling.

One dear Salvation Army lady had a little hand sewing machine which she
took about with her and wherever she landed she would sit down on an
orange crate, put her machine on another and set up a tailor shop: sewing
up rips; refitting coats that were too large; letting out a seam that was
too tight; and helping the boys to be tidy and comfortable again. A good
many of our boys lost their coats in the Soissons fight, and when they got
new ones they didn't always fit, so this little sewing machine that went
to war came in very handy. Sometimes the owner would rip off the collar or
rip out the sleeves, or almost rip up the whole coat and with her mouthful
of pins skillfully put it together again until it looked as if it belonged
to the laddie who owned it. Then with some clever chalk marks replacing
the pins she would run it through her little machine, and off went another
boy well-clothed. One week she altered more than thirty-three coats in
this way. The soldiers called her "mother" and loved to sit about and talk
with her while she worked.

The men went in battalions to the Luneville Sector for Trench Training
facing the enemy. Of course, the Salvation Army sent a detachment also.

Over here they had to give up huts. No huts at all were allowed so near
the front. No light of fire or even stove, no lights of any kind or
everything would be destroyed by shell fire at once. An order went out
that all huts near the front must be under ground. Yet neither did this
daunt the faithful men and women whom God Himself had sent to help those
boys at the front.

Copyright (c) 2007. famouswriterz.com. All rights reserved.