VETERANS FVICTED

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXII, Issue 193, 30 July 1932, Page 8

VETERANS FVICTED

U.S. “BONUS ARMY” TROOPS USE TEAR GAS. CAVALRY CHARGE IN STREETS. Washington, July 29. for the first time since the civil war the capital of the United States was last night under virtual martial law, with SOO tegular army troops, including infantry, cavalry, machine-gun, tanks and engineering detachments, patrolling the city, apparently prepared to continue the offensive against the bonus expeditionary force.

A thousand veterans were evicted from Federal buildings in the down town area after fighting thoughout the day between police and veterans, in which one veteran was killed and two seriously injured, one policeman seriously injured and a score of policemen and veterans, including one woman attached to the army, slightly injured or tear gassed.

When tie veterans learned that the military were coming to take charge they greeted the news with cheering and predicted that “soldiers won’t molest soldiers.” Many looked forward to good old-fashioned army food rations. Instead the soldiers, after donning steel helmets and gas masks, proceeded systematically to evict the veterans, using tear gas bombs freely on the slightest resistance. On the streets squadrons of cavalry repeatedly charged veterans, slapping them with the flats of their sabres when not moving fast enough.

VETERANS ON THE RUN. . Soon after dark, as some 600 troop reinforcements were available from a nearby camp, General Douglas Macarthur, Chief of Staff of the United States Army, prepared to continue the offensive against a suburban camp at Anacostia, which was reported to be in •omplete chaos. All semblance of leadership had disappeared, although an effort was being made to evacuate women and children, who numbered more than 500.

At midnight the military threw down a heavy barrage of tear gas. This was sufficient to effect a general evacuation of Anacostia. By the light of burning shacks which had been their home for the past two months, weary, hungry veterans started streaming in all directions, apparently completely disorganised.

Soldiers are heavily patrolling all evacuated areas to prevent their return, for small camps have still not been visited, although it is understood that the military will continue to-day and not stop till the last veteran has left Government property. It is feared that the presence of the veterans will provoke serious police problems in the immediate future in neighbouring States as well as in Washington.

UTMOST CONFUSION. Federal detachments, with General Macarthur and an assistant occupying a staff-owned car, moved in on the Anacostia camp after some confusion over an alleged order which Mr Hoover had issued to suspend operations in the morning. Soldiers surrounded the eamp and unlimbered their equipment for any emergency. Meanwhile the veterans evacuated all women and children. Although some inflammatory speeches were made, in which self-appointed leaders urged te•istance, a fceheral evacuation started with the utmost confusion, many catching freight trains and others starting walking along various highways. Those remaining as an act of defiance to the soldiers set fire to their own shacks, casting a red glow over the whole scene of disorder.

Genera] Macarthur, who was in charge of the evacuation of the veterans, expressed the belief on Friday morning that the “Government would have been threatened” had not President Hoover ordered the troops out on Thursday.