ITALIAN RELIEF NOTES
All reports and private letters received by the American Red Cross from the scene of disaster speak in the very highest terms of the work done at Syracuse by Miss Katherine B. Davis, who happened to be in Sicily at the time of the earthquake. Speaking of her work in private letters, Miss Davis says:
“Of course, you know what the papers have told of the terrible disaster to the towns along the Straits of Messina. I was at Girgenti the morning of the shock. It was strong enough to wake me, but it was nottill thirty hours later that I, with the English ladies with whom I was traveling, heard of the disaster. A priest with the Red Cross badge got into a compartment on the train and told us.
“Yesterday and today a Russian and an English warship have brought here six hundred of the wounded and more are expected tomorrow. It is like what it must be after a battle. Many of them are horribly mutilated. There are no hospital accommodations, and you cannot buy a ready-made garment in the town. There is only one trained nurse in town—an English girl, who escaped in her night dress from Messina. She is a heroine and is working day and night assisting with the amputations. I am afraid she will break down. I was with an English woman last night who had to have both legs amputated at one o’clock this morning. Her husband, two children, a brother and a sister were killed. But I cannot stop to write you tonight of the many pathetic cases I have seen. We have four thousand refugees, one thousand of whom are seriously wounded. The German Red Cross, of Berlin, and the Italian, from Brescia, got here on Monday of this week, the 11th. They have taken over the barracks hospital, the worst of all, and such a transformation! They are doing fine work, with splendid fellows in charge. It was unspeakably horrible until they came. After the first few days in the hospitals I found I could do better work in helping the refugees to help themselves, and soon started the women from Messina to making clothing.
“Fortunately, there is a sewing machine agency here, and the Mayor of the town is of the right sort. He placed a room in the Municipio at my disposal, and an alderman—or whatever corresponds to alderman—who speaks some English, selected the women for me, and I pay them a franc and a half a day. We now have sixty-eight employed, in three different places. No ready-made garments could be purchased in the town, and the need for clothing was extreme. I soon used up my own money and what I could collect from people at the hotel, but, fortunately, Bayard Cutting, Jr., came on Wednesday, and liked the work so much that he gave me $600 from the relief funds to pay wages, and has had me appointed the Red Cross representative here.
“I have persuaded the Mayor to start relief work for the men, road building or what not, he to furnish the tools and oversight, and we (the American Red Cross) will pay the wages. We begin tomorrow. In short, I am organizing all I can on the good Charity Organization Society plan of making the able-bodied needy work for what they get.
“My personal impression of the situation is that the worst is yet to come, when the temporary relief ceases.
“I shall never forget the horrors I have seen and heard, and I was not at Messina!”
Dr. Francis Metcalf, formerly of the United States Army, who, during the Spanish War was a surgeon on the U. S. A. Hospital ShipRelief, in a personal letter written January 15th from Capii to Surgeon-General Torney, U. S. A., says:
Embarking the Injured.Dr. Metcalf at Messina.
Embarking the Injured.
Embarking the Injured.
Embarking the Injured.
Dr. Metcalf at Messina.
Dr. Metcalf at Messina.
Dr. Metcalf at Messina.
“Of course, I volunteered immediately to go to Reggio and Messina and stated my former service on theRelief. I was accepted and was the only American there, excepting a couple of correspondents and the vice-consul. To avoid red tape and the questioning of orders I stuck the old insignia (the Red Cross) on a riding suit. Technically I suppose that violated the proprieties, but it wasn’t much of a time for technicalities and it avoided a lot of palaver. At any rate, I didn’t discredit the corps of which you are the head.
“Unfortunately, I was not able to do as much as I should have liked to do. I did accomplish a little, though, more especially in the embarcation of the wounded. They were all being carried up the longest and narrowest sidestairs I have ever seen alongside a ship, sometimes head first, more often with the head down and banged and jostled unmercifully. They were lying alongside for hours, seasick and unhappy, until I tried the oldRelieftrick. I enlisted the aid of the ships’ officers and used a boat fall, clearing out the small boats in short order and sending the patients up without suffering until I had every gangway crowded. Nothing you have read in the papers nor experienced in San Francisco can give you an adequate idea of the situation down there. It was just one infernal smash and not less than a hundred thousand dead at Messina alone. The wounded were in horrible condition, as gangrene was almost universal.”
Miss Brockius, in a letter to a friend in this country, writes:
“If I wrote for hours I could not tell you of the horrors we have seen in the last three days. During the first the long trains came in perhaps every hour with the wounded and the dying, huddled together with the refugees, all with that frightened look of horror in their faces. When they thought the people were dying they would be taken off at our station and we had arranged the waiting room into a place to receive them. When the tables were all full they would have to go on the floor—poor, poor people, sometimes you could hardly see for the blood that they were human beings, and they were mangled beyond words. Some had both legs and both arms broken, and many had not eaten for days, and their thirst was terrible.
“We worked over one poor thing for hours, for the doctor said she had no bones broken, and she seemed very young and strong, but she must have been injured internally, for she died without becoming conscious. One man was taken off here who had been in the ruins for four days, of course with nothing to eat. He had to be fed at first with a drop of milk at a time, and in several hours he was able to walk to the carriage. One young fellow’s eyes were glassy with hunger, and after we had given him some hot broth we could see that awful look go away, but, poor thing, he had lost his memory entirely, and did not even know where he had been.
“It is so hard for us, not knowing much of the language, to tell what they want. A poor dying soldier was begging me to let him kiss something that was around his neck in a bag, and I couldn’t understand until a priest told me what he wanted.
“Many were in open coal cars and, as it has rained almost constantly since the catastrophe, the suffering must have been frightful.
“One man who went to Messina to help dig out the people told us it was much worse than a field of battle, for there were so many children lying there injured.”
Premier Giolitti, in speaking of the American people’s generosity, said:
“What the United States has done on this occasion is magnificent, and shall not be forgotten. The United States stands first, outdistancing all others in sympathy and generosity.
“Our gratitude is so great that we cannot find words in which to express it. Besides, appreciation on our part is heightened by the fact that so many of our compatriots have found hospitality in America.
“With us it is traditional to consider Americans, who visit Italy in such great numbers, as our best friends, since we love their country and their race, because of its liberal organization and its progressive principles.”
Signor Tittoni, the foreign minister, said: “Never before on any occasion has occurred such a demonstration of sympathy as that of America. It includes all classes and conditions from the President to the humblest citizen. Nothing could more tightly bind together the two countries or render their friendship closer.”
In a letter of February 2nd to the Central Committee of the American Red Cross from M. Ador, Vice-President of the International Red Cross Committee of Geneva, he says:
“The large contributions received by you for the victims of the earthquake in Sicily and Calabria are a splendid testimony of your benevolent activity and the solidarity which unites our Societies of the Red Cross in times of peace as in times of war.”
The following is a copy of a newspaper clipping relative to the disbanding of the American Relief Committee, at a meeting of which Mr. Samuel L. Parrish stated that the Pope had bestowed his blessing upon the American Society:
RELIEF COMMITTEE DISBANDS.At 4 o’clock this afternoon there was a strong shock at Reggio. Shocks are still occurring at Reggio and Messina.The American relief committee, which was organized for the purpose of directing the American charities in connection with the earthquake sufferers, has been dissolved. The Italian authorities have now everything well in hand.In cash alone the relief committee on the steamerBayerndistributed $30,000. The vast supply of provisions on board the steamer proved all too small for the innumerable calls made upon the relief party’s resources, but the distribution was made as widespread as possible.During the sitting of the committee today Samuel L. Parrish informed the other members that he had been received in private audience by the Pope, who said that he admired especially the exemplary generosity of the American Red Cross, and wished to have these sentiments conveyed to that noble institution.Mr. Parrish also said that, wishing to satisfy the desire of the Pope, he had written President-elect Taft, the President of the American Red Cross Society, reporting the result of the audience, and adding:“The Pope gave his blessing to the American Red Cross, expressing his gratitude and high appreciation of the work of that association.”
RELIEF COMMITTEE DISBANDS.
At 4 o’clock this afternoon there was a strong shock at Reggio. Shocks are still occurring at Reggio and Messina.
The American relief committee, which was organized for the purpose of directing the American charities in connection with the earthquake sufferers, has been dissolved. The Italian authorities have now everything well in hand.
In cash alone the relief committee on the steamerBayerndistributed $30,000. The vast supply of provisions on board the steamer proved all too small for the innumerable calls made upon the relief party’s resources, but the distribution was made as widespread as possible.
During the sitting of the committee today Samuel L. Parrish informed the other members that he had been received in private audience by the Pope, who said that he admired especially the exemplary generosity of the American Red Cross, and wished to have these sentiments conveyed to that noble institution.
Mr. Parrish also said that, wishing to satisfy the desire of the Pope, he had written President-elect Taft, the President of the American Red Cross Society, reporting the result of the audience, and adding:
“The Pope gave his blessing to the American Red Cross, expressing his gratitude and high appreciation of the work of that association.”
Mr. Parrish’s letter to the President follows:
Rome, January 15, 1909.Hotel d’Europe.HONORABLE WILLIAM H. TAFT,President Red Cross,Washington, D. C.My Dear Mr. Taft:I was this morning received in audience by the Pope, to whom my sponsor, Monsignor Ugolini, explained in succinct form the generous activity of the American Red Cross in connection with the sufferers in the recent earthquake in Calabria and Sicily. The Pope then gave his blessing to the American Red Cross, and while expressing his gratitude and high appreciation of the work of the Association, desired that his benediction might be known to its members. In seeking to fulfill this request, I know of no better method than to thus simply state the fact to you.Yours sincerely,(Signed) SAMUEL L. PARRISH.
Rome, January 15, 1909.Hotel d’Europe.
HONORABLE WILLIAM H. TAFT,President Red Cross,Washington, D. C.
My Dear Mr. Taft:
I was this morning received in audience by the Pope, to whom my sponsor, Monsignor Ugolini, explained in succinct form the generous activity of the American Red Cross in connection with the sufferers in the recent earthquake in Calabria and Sicily. The Pope then gave his blessing to the American Red Cross, and while expressing his gratitude and high appreciation of the work of the Association, desired that his benediction might be known to its members. In seeking to fulfill this request, I know of no better method than to thus simply state the fact to you.
Yours sincerely,
(Signed) SAMUEL L. PARRISH.