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
The fame of the Ensign went abroad and the doctor at the Base Hospital
asked him to take charge of athletics in the hospital. He was also
appointed regularly as chaplain in the hospital. Every day he drilled
the five hundred women nurses in gymnastics, and put the men attendants
and as many of the patients as were able through a set of exercises.
Thus mingling his religion with his athletics he became a great power
among the men in the hospital.
The Salvation Army asked the hospital if there was anything they could
do for the wounded men. The reply was, that there were eighty wards and
not a graphophone in one of them, nothing to amuse the boys. The need
was promptly filled by the Salvation Army which supplied a number of
graphophones and a piano. Then, discovering that the nurses who were
getting only a very small cash allowance out of which they had to
furnish their uniforms, were short of shoes, the indefatigable good
Samaritan produced a thousand dollars to buy new shoes for them. The
Salvation Army has always been doing things like that.
The Salvation Army built many huts, locating them wherever there was
need among the camps. They have a hut at Camp Grant, one at Camp
Funston, one at Camp Travis, San Antonio, one at Camp Logan, Houston,
Texas, one at Camp Bowie, Fort Worth, one at Camp Cody, Deming, New
Mexico, one at Camp Lewis, Tacoma, a Soldiers’ Club at Des Moines, a
Soldiers’ Club with Sitting Room, Dining Room, and rooms for a hundred
soldiers just opened at Chicago. There is a charge of twenty-five cents
a night and twenty-five cents a meal for such as have money. No charge
for those who have no money. There is such a Soldiers’ Club at St.
Louis, Kansas City, St. Paul and Minneapolis. All of these places at
the camps have accommodations for women relatives to visit the
soldiers, and all of the rooms are always full to the limit.
In Des Moines the Army has an interesting institution which grew out of
a great need.
The Federal authorities have placed a Woman’s Protective Agency in all
Camp towns. At Des Moines the woman representative of the Federal
Government sent word to the Salvation Army that she wished they would
help her. She said she had found so many young girls between the ages
of fourteen and sixteen who were being led into an immoral life through
the soldiers, and she wished the Salvation Army would open a home to
take care of such girls.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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