Samuel Cranston Benson

“ They endure today in silence, their Calvary of war, the bloody Golgotha of France.
Yet I would not have you think that war is all battle. Not all of the hours nor even the days of the men in the war country are taken up with thoughts of horror, or in listening to the explosions of shells, or the carrying of mangled or lacerated men. The war is so gigantic in its operation and it covers so vast an area that millions of the people engaged find themselves many times occupied with the most peaceful thoughts and the most commonplace pursuits. ”

“ The war hospital during a battle is a fearsome place and it always smells strongly of chloroform and ether. At the door of one of them the brancardiers carry the body of a man who has made a heroic struggle in the race against death. His head is battered fearfully and death has won the race. But then—what is death? The commonest figure that stalks around on the earth today. And, after all, it is not so terrible. A little sooner, or a little later, it comes. All must die. Death is not the dreadful thing, nor even the important thing. ”

“ Our forefathers desired to promote the general welfare and insure the blessings of liberty to themselves and to posterity, while the German machine had existed and had begun this war for the purpose of enslaving people and exploiting them, thus depriving them of liberty.
Now one or the other of these viewpoints was right. If America was right, Germany was wrong. Every clod and stone of Belgium declared the guilt of Germany. And I now declare that Germany is wrong! And therefore when she menaces the world in a military sense she must be put down by military means. ”

“ Buy Liberty Bonds, give to the Red Cross, conserve the food, encourage the drafted men, enlist yourself in some branch of the Service and Help to Win This War! If you can't go, remember this: You must equip the brave fellows who do go. As my friend said to me, "None of us must think his part insignificant."
Out there, it is a fact that the spirit of sacrifice is contagious. No man counts his life dear to himself. It must become so here. Every shoulder is required at the wheel, as our foe is a monstrous one. ”

“ If all of the people engaged were compelled continually to face the cannon and the barbed wire, or to listen to the moans of the dying, and feel that they themselves were apt to be taken off at any minute, they would not be the cool-headed people that they are, but instead would be a crowd of raving maniacs. The person thousands of miles away from the spectacle who only reads about it often gets a wrong impression on this point. Nations are mobilized; multitudes are under arms ”

“ I could not help myself, but today I am proud to state that I accepted this conclusion and that deliberately and boldly I will defend it.
In a Utopian world one can act in a Utopian manner. And a Utopian world is a beautiful theory. But it is a theory and a dream. You and I today are living in a world of stern, cruel fact; in this world of fact we find the stern, cruel German. ”

“ And, because of this method of warfare, the death list is a hundredfold more frightful, and so along that battle line in France, three hundred and fifty miles in length, the weekly toll of human life staggers all conception. The contemplation of it saddens the soul. Nothing but the vision of Liberty and Right triumphant can ever compensate for the slaughtered loved ones.
[Pg 55]
The piles of dead and wounded men, bleeding, groaning masses of human pulp, rotting flesh and decaying bones, carry disease and fever to ambulance rescue workers and all. ”

“ Scientists tell us that nothing is in reality ever lost or wasted and a battle field gives a most striking illustration of this law of the indestructibility of matter. We are prone to say that war is all waste, and that the enormous quantities of iron and steel, trees and horses (and even men) , which are used up become a fearful waste in nature. Yet it is literally true as a thoughtful Irishman said to me in France, "Nature protects the land." In other words, Mother Earth from which everything comes protects and perpetuates herself so that no nation or generation can destroy her. ”

“ Accuracy, in time and in range, is the one thing which must be most strictly observed by the men who are conducting the barrage hundreds of yards back of the line.
These men project a hail of shells over the heads of their own infantry and across a thin strip of land parallel to the enemy's trench and directed in the first place at his barbed-wire defenses. This line or belt of bursting shells must be so fierce and continuous as to make it impossible for any man to go through it, or at least so perilous and costly to life that no one in his proper senses would try the hazardous experiment. ”

“ THE BURNING OF A FRENCH FIELD HOSPITAL.
The hospital was hit by an incendiary shell. So sudden was the blaze that only a few of the Red Cross ambulances could be saved. The hospital and surrounding buildings were razed to the ground.
If we see a wolf we meet him with force. If we deal with a kind man we meet him with kindness. If we meet a reasonable and intelligent being we answer him with reason and intelligent argument, and if we find vicious, violent men, whether burglars, I. W. W.'s, or Germans, we meet them with police, with militia, and with force. ”

“ The routes of travel were jammed with soldiers and the rumble and roar of the monster guns of the Teutons dinned into one's ears the message that the world was locked in a death struggle.
[Pg 80]
Men and munitions are the only things that count in such an hour; and at Verdun in those perilous times so many thousands of noble men were wounded and cast aside that inconceivable numbers were required to take their places and fill the ranks. Such is the wonderful spirit of France that men always are ready to fill the gaps in the line. ”

“ America, like other nations, may sometime go down. When we have accomplished our mission we too may pass off the stage of action. But, please God, when the names shall be called from the great Book of Life and the records of the nations now gone, shall be read, lack of vision and failure in duty shall not be charged against America; and, in the new and better world, America's part in making possible the higher order of things shall be recognized and acknowledged.
Every man has his duty. Every woman her sphere. ”

“ The Huns have forgotten that they ever were human beings and have reverted to the wolf, and so they swarmed through Belgium and through northern France, this scourge of God, two million strong, blasting and withering everything they touched.
As I traveled through the country I saw houses by the scores and hundreds upon which machine guns had been turned, while occupied by unarmed and innocent people, and the tragedy was fearful. These things I have seen with my own eyes and heard with my own ears. The high power of these modern shooting devices is almost beyond conception. ”

“ It is not like any ordinary bombardment when you know the enemy is letting you have it from only one side—the front. The sense of utter helplessness when you feel he is all about you and peppering you from a thousand angles isn't comfortable to say the least. ”

“ The United States has consecrated herself to this task. Stupendous as it is, she can accomplish it. France has done her part, Britain has performed her duty, but France and Britain today are calling to us. Not in any spirit of boastfulness therefore, but in a spirit of deep humility coupled with a determined confidence must we respond to their urgent plea. We must go, we must give, we must sacrifice. If America is to save the situation, as I believe she is, she must know beforehand that it will be at a price such as she has never paid before. Widows will pine and daughters will mourn. ”

“ Caring for men, not only those who are wounded, but for those who are sick or in trouble as well, the Red Cross is without a doubt the greatest relief organization in the world today. It is so far-reaching in its scope that it does not stop with the soldiers, but includes also in its ministrations indirect victims of war—the widows, the fatherless, the aged left desolate, the homeless, and the refugees of every age and condition of life. ”

“ The surgeons in France are doing most wonderful things and it must not be forgotten, that along with all the awful phases of the war, with all the pathos and the horror, there are many brighter incidents and many humorous episodes.
For remember, the war today is just a national life. The whole existence of these countries is thrown into the war and for the time being, that is the natural course of life. So they live for war, the same as another nation lives its existence for money, art, or anything else. The individual's life goes on just the same, only the conditions are changed. ”

“ A stable boy's bullet from the enemy's lines will pick off the wealthy magnate as quick as any other's, and the rich man's usefulness is no greater than his servant's, in the trenches. So they realize this fact and act as though it were true. The only place in all the world today where we have a real Brotherhood of Man is in the Allies' trenches on the Western front. Men display heroism there; but they don't know it. Men are brave out there; but they don't think of it. It never enters a man's head that he has been a hero, it's all duty, all just natural ”

“ It is where the ebb and flow of the human tide of life is.
But I think in this time of war, especially, there is no place which so well shows up the psychology of the people as the railroad depot. Often have I stood in those large Paris stations and watched the people come and watched them go. The Gare du Nord, the Gare du Lyons, and the Gare la Chapelle are full of sentiment and pathos.
Once at the last named station I was standing in the background in the shadow of a pillar, where I was unobtrusive and unnoticed, and watched the anxious people. ”

“ As we went through the streets I noticed that every house in the place had been riddled with bullet holes. There were hundreds of holes right through the solid brick. The German machine gunners had simply gone through the place and raked every house so that if there was a single person in it, even asleep in his bed, those bullets would seek him out and send him to meet his God. ”

“ Not only has she stirred up bitterness and hate in the breasts of her own people, but by her foul deeds, the offspring of that hatred, she has planted a hate in the very beings and natures of the people of her enemy countries which almost equals it. In the earlier days of the war it was occasionally said that there was no hatred between the opposing soldiers and that the people of the conquered territories often fraternized with the German invaders. ”

“ We were compelled to stay over night, but at any rate I did not have to face court-martial as a deserter, and in the morning I was in Paris. There is nothing like having a fluent speaker of French with you in France, especially when you are in trouble. I was now back again in the good old country. Dear old France, how good it looked! My heart had been changed and I now immediately went into action again, under the colors of France. The fighting had been very heavy and some terrible scenes were shortly to be witnessed. Hundreds of men were now literally ground to pieces on the Western front. ”

“ In every age Liberty has had its champions and morality its martyrs, but there never was a time when such hosts of crusaders from every corner of the world with one accord marched forth to sacrifice for a common cause. ”

“ I had already, on the previous day, as I came into Antwerp, witnessed many towns lying in ruins, the remains of which I could see from the car window. But when I went out into the town of Antwerp, I learned just what the German could do in the way of vandalism and ruthlessness. I saw the forts which they had bombarded for three days, on the third day of which they had tossed over those forty-two centimeter shells at the rate of one every five seconds all day and all night. The destruction was terrific. I came back to the center of the city and went into a little café to get some lunch. ”

“ It was all for La Belle France.
The soul of the French is a wonderful thing. They have a calm confidence that finally the invader will be vanquished, and that confidence goes a long way toward the goal. Not so many years since, the French were looked upon by many as being an enervated, effeminate people. I suppose the tourists who visited Paris had taken their impressions from a few of the men and women whom they had observed in the cafés and public places. ”

“ Where hundreds upon hundreds of thousands of men have been engaged in shooting iron and steel as fast as they can fire it, the amount of these metals which lies about is something almost beyond conception. And the amount too, which buries itself beneath the surface of the earth is enormous. The money value and military worth of these vast quantities of metal is also a thing which must be taken into consideration. A battle field today is little less than a great ocean of craters which oftentimes touch one another. ”

“ A diplomatic officer is a peculiar individual. I wish I were one—sometimes. I wouldn't have liked to be Brand Whitlock, however, when this war broke out. He had been living a quiet, peaceful existence in that wonderful city of Brussels, no doubt having a good time in general, when suddenly and without warning the country was invaded by hordes of hostile Germans, who bombarded the cities, burned the hamlets, and slaughtered the people in large numbers, driving others by thousands from their homes and out of their country. ”

“ At any rate, a great many Americans thought that as a nation she was degenerating and decaying, but France has proven to the world that [Pg 231] such an impression is not true, and no one has learned this lesson better than the German. Today I believe Germany respects France more highly than any other of her enemies. This great Republic has conducted through these years such a remarkable war, and all the while kept up such a magnificent spirit that she has placed herself in the very front rank of the world's great powers. ”

“ Broken pieces of glass, bits of shell and upturned cobblestones fill the streets, and battered carts and wagons lie [Pg 84] everywhere. Houses are smashed to pieces and smoke-blackened brick and charred timbers, the worthless remains of burned buildings are seen on every hand. From the individual viewpoint Verdun is very sad, extremely so. Thousands of people have been driven from their homes and when they left they had to say good-bye to those homes forever. Multitudes have had loved ones killed while others have lost track of their relatives and probably will never find them. ”