A Woman's Experiences in the Great WarMack, Louise
History
A Woman's Experiences in the Great War
Mack, Louise
World War, 1914-1918 -- Personal narratives
The Dutch at Bergen-op-Zoom, where the majority of the refugees were
gathered, gave up every available building to these people. They filled
all their churches with straw to make beds for them; they opened all
their theatres, their schools, their hospitals, their factories and
their private homes, and, without a murmur, indeed, with a tenderness
and gentleness beyond all description, they took upon their shoulders
the burden of these million victims of Germany's brutality.
"It is our duty," they say quietly; and sick and poor alike pour out
their offerings graciously, without ceasing.
In the Grand Place of Bergen-op-Zoom stand long lines of soup-boilers
over charcoal fires.
Behind the line of soup-boilers are stacks of bones, hundreds of bags
of rice and salt, mountains of celery and onions, all piled on the flags
of the market-place, while to add to the liveliness and picturesqueness
of the scene, Dutch soldiers in dark blue and yellow uniforms ride
slowly round the square on glossy brown horses, keeping the thousands of
refugees out of the way of the endless stream of motor cars lining the
Grand Place on its four sides, all packed to the brim with bread, meat,
milk, and cheese.
Inside the Town hall the portrait of Queen Wilhelmina in her scarlet and
ermine robes looks down on the strangest scene Holland has seen for many
a day.
The floors of the Hotel de la Ville are covered with thousands of big
red Dutch cheeses. Twenty-six thousand kilos of long loaves of brown
bread are packed up almost to the ceiling, looking exactly like enormous
wood stacks. Sacks of flour, sides of pork and bacon, cases of preserved
meat and conserved milk, hundreds of cans of milk, piles of blankets,
piles of clothing are here also, all to be given away.
The town of Bergen-op-Zoom is full of heart-breaking pictures to-day,
but to me the most pathetic of all is the writing on the walls.
It is a tremendous tribute to the good-heartedness of the Dutch that
they do not mind their scrupulously clean houses defaced for the moment
in this way.
Scribbled in white chalk all over the walls, shutters, and fences,
windows, tree-trunks, and pavements, are the addresses of the frenzied
refugees, trying to get in touch with their lost relations.
On the trees, too, little bits of paper are pinned, covered with
addresses and messages, such as "The Family Montchier can be found in
the Church of St. Joseph under the grand altar," or "Anna Decart with
Pierre and Marie and Grandmother are in the School of Music." "Les
soeurs Martell et Grandmère are in the Church of the Holy Martyrs."
"La Famille Deminn are in the fifth tent of the encampment on the
Artillery ground." "M. and Mme. Ardige and their seven children are in
the Comedy Theatre." .... So closely are the walls and shutters and the
windows and trees scribbled over by now that the million addresses are
most of them becoming indistinguishable.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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