STOLEN CHILDREN.

Press, Volume LIV, Issue 16370, 15 November 1918, Page 2

STOLEN CHILDREN.

I AWFUL DESTRUCTION BY HUNS. LONDON, November 2. Router's correspondent at Paris reports that the rector of Lille University has forwarded- to President Poincar6 a petition signed by five thousand parents, entreating the French Government to summons Germany for the return of their children, who were carried off during the occupation, in violation of international law. The document, which is most pathetic, says, amongst other things:— "We are tortured by the thoughts that our children are weakened by unheard-of privations, exposed to fatigues, dangers, and miseries of a ruined army, being dragged along by savage hordes flying in disorder, and abandoned to the mercies of pitiless and! heartless men." Correspondents who have visited the Champagne-Ardennes region speak of the enemy's awful wanton destruction of private houses. Their method was to conscientiously burn every house by placing mines in the cellars, which exploded at the moment of evacuation by the sappers. Even churches were not spared, while the destruction of wells was executed with diabolical skill. All this was carried out amidst the deep indignation of the inhabitants. Officers told the people, "We have orders to do it."