An Interrupted Wedding.

Hastings Standard, Issue 21, 20 May 1896, Page 4

An Interrupted Wedding.

Tbc horrors are never more deeply felt than in a single concrete example —such an example as the following, furnished by Mr Archibald Forbes in his " Memories of War and Peace." The occurrence took place during the Franco-German war, while several war correspondents were at Saarbiicken : Within two mile? of the little town lay a whole French army corps, which any dav might overwhelm the town and its slender garrison. So we lived a little detachment of u-. in an hotel on the outskirts, ready for a judicious bolt. At this hotel there arrived one morning a youns German crirl who wiis ongaged, we learned, to a sergeant of the gallant Hohenzolkrns. She had come, it seemed, to say farewell tohersWeetheart before the fighting should begin and he should march away, mayhap never to return. Some of the livelier spirits among ns conceived tin.' id<T* that the pair should get married before the farewell should be said. IJoth were willing. The bridegroom's officer gave him leave on condition that should the alarm sound he was to join his company immediately. All was i:i readiness. and the clergyman was just about to join the couple in holy matrimony, when the jourul of a bugle broke the stillness. It was the alarm! The bridegroom lmrriedly embraced the bride, buckled on his accoutrements, and darted off to the place of rendezvous. In ten minute; more the combat was in full intensity ; the French had carried the heights overhanging the town, and were pouring down upon it their artille-ry and mitrailleuse tire. Our hotel was right in line of the fire, and soon became exceedingly disagreeable quarters. V. e got the woman down in the cellar, and waited for events. A shell crashed into the kitchen, burst aside the cooking-stove and blew the wedding-breakfast, which was still being kept hot, into what an American colleague called " everlasting smash." It was too hot to stay there, and everybody manoeuvred stagtegically to the rear. A few days later was fought, close to Saarbrucken, the ! .-rate battle of Spieheren, in which the bridegroom's regiment took a leading part. The day after the battle I was wandering over the fit-Id helping to relieve the wounded, and gazing shudderinglv on the heaps of the dead. Suddenly I came on our bridegroom, in a sitting posture, with his back resting against a stump. He was dead with a bullet throught his throat.