“THE YELLOW HELL.”

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 56, Issue 26, 12 November 1935, Page 5

“THE YELLOW HELL.”

hundreds of abyssinians die. THREAT TO POISON WELLS. (United Press Association— Copyright) ADEN, Nov.. 10. ‘‘Carrying out a plan formulated at Addis Ababa with a young Belgian gun-runner, I posed as his assistant and succeeded in penetrating 100 miles beyond Jijiga into Ogaden ‘the Yellow Hell,' ” says Noel Monks, correspondent of the SunHerald” news agency. “When our caravan reached the last civilised outpost, Jijiga, I liad my first glimpse of the horrors or Ogaden. In a small hospital I saw 400 Abyssinians dying from every sickness from malaria to leprosy. One lone medical man, Dr. Hacklqan, an American, is fighting heroically for their lives. Two days before I arrived, 50 died from cholera. “Fifty miles beyond Jijiga there is nothing but a desert of sand and stones for 300 miles into . Italian Somaliland. We pushed on in terrific heat to Warror, which is the last connecting link with the front vne, 150 miles further across the desert. “Six . weeks ago the Warror garrison numbered 5000 men, but I was shown the graves of 1200 who died i from sickness. Giant buzzards swarmed black over the sandy mounds where lay some of Abyssinia’s fittest and bravest young men, who had never even fired a shot in the war. “A young Abyssinian officer, who refused to allow us to go any further, told me that the Italians were dying in even greater numbers than the Abyssinians. I was told that the Abyssinians bad surrounded all the known water boles within an area of 200 square miles, and that those they could not hold they would poison. The Italians have definitely not advanced any further than in the first week’s hostilities. “Returning to Jijiga, I passed through .British Somaliland and embarked at Zeila, arriving here to-day. I am satisfied that Mussolini will, never conquer Abyssinia.”