AT THE FRONT

Evening Post, Volume XCIII, Issue 31, 5 February 1917, Page 2

AT THE FRONT

BISHOP CLEAItY'S EXPERIENCES

In a circular letter containing an interesting account) of his experience "at the front" the Kt. Hey. Dr deary, Koman Catholic Bishop of Auckland, says: —"There was so great need for spiritual assistance for our New Zealand troops in hospitals and training camps in England, that I felt it to be my undoubted duty to do what I personally could to afford them greater facilities for the performance of their religious duties. Our one military chaplain in England, though not very strong in health, overworked himself greatly in his zealous endeavours to get around 'among our scattered New Zealand troops there, and he is immensely respected and beloved by all ranks of our gallant men. Through the goodwill of the Jesuit Fathers' of Farm-street, I succeeded in relieving him of the care of a large convalescent camp, and, by arrangement with the War Office, I also secured for another large military hospital of ours, the at least temporary services Of an Imperial chaplain on Imperial pay. The situation was also considerably relieved in England by my taking, over the spiritual charge of two of our large camps iii the south, seventeen miles- apart—one of them being our largest training camp, the other a smaller training place and a hospital of 350 beds For the benefit of the patients I resided in the latter place, and was formerly appointed military chaplain It would be quite impossible for me to speak in terms of too high praise of the splendid courtesy and helpfulness of the General Headquarters and of th^ local Headquarters staffs to me, and of the devotion of the New Zealand nurses and doctors to their patients. The parents of sick and wounded men at the front and in the hospitals in England can rest assured that no better care nonld be bestowed upon patients in private hospitals. This is, indeed, one of the most gratifying features of this great and tragic war Apart from the treatment of tho wounded, what may be described as the Health Department of the War ( is managed with great skill and care Camp sanitation is carried out with scrupulous and most minute care, and, .tinder my eyes here in France, om New Zealand medical men (some of them personal friends from Auckland and elsewhere) are assiduously -working over wide areas, to overcome the unhealthy conditions prevailing in numerous small towns and villages, around where I write, that have no drainage whatsoever, and in many cases no wholesome drinking water. ' "The near arrival of another Catholic chaplain from New Zealand, and the kindly promised help of a local Australian chaplain left the two New Zealand camps under my charge,in England sufficiently provided for some three weeks ago. I was, therefore, free to devote myself, for a time, to a brigade of our troops that had been left without Catholic spiritual assistance owing to its chaplain having been invalided to a hospital in the South of England. The need of the Catholics among those troops was very pressing, as they were taking their full share of the trench work, in which they were engaged when I first met them at the front. . The Catholic - men are greatly pleased at the arrival of a Catholic chaplains, and are very responsive indeed In.'some places formerly occupied by the Germans there is difficulty about finding accommodation for the Catholic soldiers at mass on Sundays^' as the Germa-n troops seem to have made the destruction of churches (there are only Catholic churches here) something like a systematic practice.. Even within easy range of the German field and machine-guns many villagers etill cling to their (often greatly battered) homes, and the close and systematic tillago of tho country is carried on by women, children,-and old men, right up to our subsidiary lines, with the boom and crash and rattle of the guns all round and the bursting of shrapnel and high explosives shells quite easily visible a little way off. But the people go on about thoir daily work quite serenely." ; . ■'•:■■