AMERICAN MOTHER

Evening Post, Volume CXXXVI, Issue 66, 15 September 1943, Page 8

AMERICAN MOTHER

BRITISH SAILORS' FRIEND

A lonely English sailor who asked the way of a silver-haired motherly woman in the street of a United States city was responsible for the opening of 100 private homes to British seamen in one American town alone.

Mrs. Mary Starr is th£ woman. When she talked to the sailor she realised how much he and thousariPs of others on leave far from home longed for the atmosphere and comforts of family life. She decided she would make it her job to help them. She took the man with her to her home in Essex, Connecticut. Here he found happiness, for a few days, and when he left begged Mrs. Starr to befriend other British sailors. -■ Through a club in New York she arranged for men who wanted a rest in the countryside to come' to her house. It soon became the American home of hundreds of sailors on leave or survivors of lost ships.

WONDERFUL WELCOME AWAITING.

Unable to provide for all the men who wanted to come, Mrs. Starr enlisted the help of friends and neighbours, and it was not long before Essex town became the homing place of men of the sea who had heard from their pals of the wonderful welcome awaiting them there. Once a long-distance telephone call asked this American mother if she could take 34 sailors for 18 days. They would arrive within 24 hours. Her reply was, "Send them along." With a list of telephone numbers at her elbow, she tackled the tremendous task. When the men arrived 22 homes, including Mrs. Starrs, were waiting to make them honoured guests. In one month 145 men stayed an average of eight days each in Essex, sharing the beauties of the countryside and the comforts of home life with their American friends.

"H.M.S. CONNECTICUT."

Mrs. Starr never made a fuss about what she was doing, but it came to the notice of the British Naval Attache in Washington, who wrote thanking her for her wonderful work. The boys have christened her home "HM.S. Connecticut." On the door post is a brass plate bearing the name and a decorative plaque similar to those on British warships. And over this haven for British sailors flies the White Ensign, brought to Mrs. Starr from Malta.