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 just used to love to listen to the Salvation Army at 6th and Penn
Streets, but I never dreamed of seeing them over here. And when I first
saw four girls cooking and baking all day I wondered what it was all
about.
“But I didn’t have long to find out, for that night I saw these same
girls put on their gas masks at the alert and start for the trenches.
Then I started to ask about them. I never spoke to the girls, but
fellows who had been in the trenches told me that they came up under
shell fire to give the boys pies or doughnuts or little cakes or cocoa
or whatever they had made that day. I thought that great of the
Salvation Army. And many a boy who got help through them has a warm
spot in his heart for them.
“You can see by the paper I write on who gave it to us. It is Salvation
Army paper. Altogether I say give three hearty cheers for the Salvation
Army and the girls who risk their own lives to give our boys a little
treat.”
“I am going to crow about our real friends here—and it is the verdict
of all the boys—it is the Salvation Army, Joe. _That is the boys’
mother and father here. It is our home_. They have a treat for us boys
every night—that is, cookies, doughnuts or pie—about 9 o’clock. But
that is only a little of them. The big thing is the spirit—the feeling
a boy gets of being home when he enters the hut and meets the lassies
and lads who call themselves the soldiers of Christ, and we are proud
to call them brother soldiers. We think the world of them! So, Joe,
whenever you get a chance to do the Salvation Army a good turn, by word
or deed, do so, as thereby you will help us. When we get back we are
going to be the Salvation Army’s big friend, and you will see it become
one of the United States’ great organizations.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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