Lacked Coffins at
Brest. . . 2,000 Soldiers Brought Into the Flue Stricken District Died and Took
Camp by Surprise. . . Bodies Reverently Buried by Negroes
Much has been said of the terrible conditions existing at
Brest at the time when soldiers were soldiers were being rushed to the front to
stem the tide of the German advance. In a letter, which we quote, from Chaplain
W.B. Ayres of the navy, who served eight months at Brest, he denies many of
these reports and graphically describes and explains the situation.
Chaplain Ayers, who has just returned from France, says
Brest has proved a healthful camp in spite of the mud and almost continuous
rains experienced during the winter months and told that there has been no
initial epidemic there. Approximately 2,000 soldiers died there from influenza,
but the chaplain says that “in practically all of these cases these men were
brought ashore with the disease from transports.”
“In the midst of the influenza in the rear a great drive was
on at the front, and the streams of the wounded began to flow in. In a very
special sense Brest was the place where these two fronts met. We had a kind of
a hell there, but it was only because death stalked everywhere and in so many
cases we did not seem to have a fighting chance.
“Kerbaun, a new base hospital, was in the process of
construction when the influenza reached us. It was not designed as a hospital
for the sick and contagious diseases, but it had to be pressed into this
service.
“At the first there was no chaplain at Kerbaun. Naturally I
offered to help. The boys have been ministered to when dying, first by the chaplains
of navy, Catholic and Protestant, whom we sent out there whenever they were
called for.
“It is true that bodies were placed on trucks, the only available
means of transportation, and at the time when the influenza raged most terribly
there was not a coffin to be had in the whole district, nor the lumber to build
them of. It finally became necessary for the army to face the prospect of
burial without caskets. There was no other way. That very day about 500 bodies
in the Brest district awaited burial, and a little over 100 caskets only. They had
accumulated there while awaiting caskets. Each body was swathed in canvas or
sheeting, completely covered.
“The army had purchased a field outside of Brest at
Lombecelec, where perhaps 1,000 of our boys lie; 250 negroes were detailed to
dig graves.
“When the graves were dug the negroes lifted the casket to
their shoulders and marched to the individual graves. Tenderly they lowered
them, and I have never seen such reverence. Then, with hats off, beside each
grave, two negroes stood at attention while friends and fellow officers stood
near, as the funeral services were conducted. I have never seen more reverently
conducted funerals, and I have witnessed many.
“When night came the caskets were exhausted and by the light
of a torch I stood at their graves as I looked down at their shrouded figures
and asked God’s blessing upon their souls. Before the day came I had said
prayers over approximately 300 thus, and I can vouch that every man had what
blessing faith can bestow. Where Catholics and Protestants mingled at the same
grave the priest and minister stood side by side and together invoked the divine
blessing, a fitting testimony to the fine brotherhood that is possible.
“I have written a thousand letters to parents or wives whose
boys died under these conditions, and I do not like to see war critics, whose
missions and value I have not been quite able to determine, destroying what
meager comfort our honest and sincere assurances can bring.”
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