The Blot on the Kaiser's 'ScutcheonHillis, Newell Dwight
History
The Blot on the Kaiser's 'Scutcheon
Hillis, Newell Dwight
World War, 1914-1918 -- Sermons
Filled with high hope, burning with enthusiasm, exhaling a happiness
that cannot be described, the bronzed farmer-soldier stepped down from
the car to find the French official waiting to conduct him to one of the
houses of refuge where his young wife was waiting.
My American Red Cross friend witnessed the meeting between the girl and
her husband. When the fine young soldier entered the room he saw a poor,
broken, spent, miserable creature, too weak to do more than whisper his
name. When the young man saw that tiny German babe in his young wife's
arms he started as if he had been stung by a scorpion. Lifting his hands
above his head, he uttered an exclamation of horror. In utter amazement
he started back, overwhelmed with revulsion, anguish and terror.
Gone--the beauty and comeliness of the young wife! Gone her health and
allurement! Perished all her loveliness! Her garments were the garments
of a scarecrow. Despite all these things the girl was innocent. But she
realized her husband's horror and mistook it for disgust. She pitched
forward unconscious upon the floor before her husband could reach her.
The history of pain contains no more terrible chapter. That night the
dying girl told the French officials and her husband the crimes and
indignities to which she had been subjected. Two other babes had been
born under German brutality, and both had died, even as this infant
would die, and when a few days later her husband buried her he was
another man. The iron in him had become steel. The blade of intellect
had become a two-edged sword. His strength had become the strength of
ten. He decided not to survive this war. Going back to the front, he
consecrated his every day to one task--to kill Germans and save other
women from the foulest degenerates that have ever cursed the face of the
earth.
8. An American Knight in France
Coming around the corner of the street in a little French village near
Toul, I beheld an incident that explained the all but adoring love
given to our American boys by the French children. The women and the
girls of that region had suffered unspeakable things at the hands of the
German swine. Photographs were taken of the dead bodies of girls that
can never be shown. The terror of the women at the very approach of the
German was beyond all words. The very words "Les Boches" send the blood
from the cheeks of the children. The women of the Dakotas on hearing
that the Sioux Indians were on the war-path with their scalping knives
were never so terrified as the French girls are on hearing the German
soldiers are on the march. Even the little children have black rings
under their eyes, with a strained, tense expression as they stand
tremulous and ready to run.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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