The War Romance of the Salvation ArmyHill, Grace Livingston
History
The War Romance of the Salvation Army
Hill, Grace Livingston
World War, 1914-1918 -- War work -- Salvation Army
“I was wounded, lying on the ground over there in No Man’s Land,” he
went on. “It was all dark and I was waiting for someone to come along
and help me. I thought it was all up with me and while I was lying
there I felt something. I can’t explain it, but I knew it was there and
I saw my mother and I prayed. Then my Buddy came along and I asked him
if he could baptize me. He said he wasn’t very good himself but he
guessed the heavenly Father would understand. So he stooped down and
got some muddy water out of a shell hole close by and put it on my
forehead, and prayed; and now I know it’s all right. I wanted you to
know.”
Often the boys, just before they went over the top, would come to these
girls and say:
“We’re going up there, now. You pray for us, won’t you?”
One day some boys came to the hut when there were not many about and
asked the girls if they might talk with them. These boys were going
over the top that night.
“We fellows want to ask you something,” they said. “Some of the
chaplains have been telling us that if we go over there and die for
liberty that it’ll be all right with us afterward. But we don’t believe
that dope and we want to know the truth. Do you mean to tell me that if
a man has lived like the devil he’s going to be saved just because he
got killed fighting? Why, some of us fellows didn’t even go of our own
accord. We were drafted. And do you mean to tell me that counts just
the same? We want to know the truth!”
And then the girls had their opportunity to point the way to Jesus and
speak of repentance, salvation from sin, and faith in the Saviour of
the world.
A lassie was stooping over one young boy lying on a cot, washing his
face and trying to make him more comfortable, and she noticed a hole in
his breast pocket. Stooping closer she examined it and found it was a
piece of high explosive shell that had gone through the cloth of his
pocket and was embedded in his Testament, which he, like many of the
boys, always kept in his breast pocket.
Another boy lay on a cot biting his lips to bear the agony of pain, and
she asked him what was the matter, was the wound in his leg so bad? He
nodded without opening his eyes. She went to ask the doctor if the boy
couldn’t have some morphine to dull the pain. The Sergeant in charge
came over and looked at him, examined the bandage on the boy’s leg and
then exclaimed: “Who bandaged this leg?”
“I did” said the boy weakly, “I did the best I could.”
The poor fellow had bandaged his own leg and then walked to the
hospital. The bandage had looked all right and no one had examined it
until then, but the Sergeant found that it was so tight that it had
stopped the circulation. He took off the bandage and made him
comfortable, and the agony left him. In a little while the Salvation
Army lassie passed that way again and found the boy with a little book
open, reading.
“What is it?” she asked, looking at the book.
“My Testament,” he answered with a smile.
“Are you a Christian?”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account