HINDENBURG HOMESTEADS.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XLII, Issue 12821, 17 April 1916, Page 3

HINDENBURG HOMESTEADS.

How General Hindetiburg bas inspired a movement in Germany to lake in hand the problem of settling the soldiers after the war is thus told by the Berlin correspondent of the "New"York Post." "The League of German Cities has conferred with the League for Land Reform, and together they have founded an organisation which "is working iii conjunction with a special committee of the Reichstag for the solution of this, problem. Tins organisation calls itself the 'Central Committee for Soldiers' -Homesteads,' and has been at work for more than a year, with an ever-increasing prospect of success, for a national law which shall give returning soldiers much the same- right that our homesteaders had in the West before the Government land gave out. . "The German Government would, of course, have to buy- the land.- But, according to the proposed; law, the purchase would not be at the market price, butrat a price that would take from the owner and give to the homesteader that increased value which the, asia soldier, lias helped produce. , ; "The agitation lor this- law /has" been so successful that more than a'.thousand organisations of all sorts -are now working for it. Hundreds' of officers bare written home from the field demanding tlie putting through of the measure for the sake of their men. And the man who.has agitated for the Bill most successfully—although quite unconsciously—is General von ; Hindenbtug himself. .'-'.'.'''- . '"As I set out tor the.battle of Taiir nenburg,' he said—the famous'bajtle;ii which he drove the first Russian.invasion back from the soil of East Prussia—'l had to pass through my own" estates; and so-1 had the feeling of'going-out,- the leader of au Army, but as a- man iti private life who is "defending : Ids, hqme'.and his' family/ ' ' * ' ■ ' '••;' V<' /■ "That remark of his has been repeated" all over Germany, ,and, has won "him a securer place than ever in' the German heart. For it" is a peculiarly German sentence. ■. "We Americans, when we fight, like to feel that we are fighting for 'bberty.' the English for 'a" principle,' the French for their country in the abstract, for 'la Franco,' but the' German "sentiment likes to root its*lf:in'the' concrete. When the

German ialks of fighting 'for home and fatherland/ ho thinks of the actual Gerj man landscape, he prefers to think of an actual house some hundred of miles behind him, containing wife and children i and title-deed safely locked up in the table drawer.

"So tho idea lias come to many that, instead oi' adding to the hundreds of not too artistic Hindenburg monuments that have already been erected, "Hindenburg homesteads' for the soldiers who have fought under him would be u much more fitting memorial. And the city of Landshut has already set the example by putting up a street, of small houses for this purP ° : -Traniediately after the war of 1870-71 there set in a period of wild-cat companies and land speculation m Germany | which almost, equalled some of the speculative booms in our own history in the development of the West. The ultimate result was a financial panic and period of depression. But long before the bubble burst its uuwholesome effects were felt by the poor of the big cities. In Berlin, lor example, barely five months after the conclusion of peace over 10,500 families were homeless. These were, of course, almost without exception the families of soldiers just returned from the front., or of the widows of soldiers. ••When thev realised tliat it was their verv courage" and success in the held winch (bv bringing on the boom m land) had raised rents and rendered them homeless thev were filled with anger and despair. "Some took their own lives; others took part in street demonstrations of a serious nature, in which barricades were erected in the streets of Berlin. "With their habit of preparing for all lxissible contingencies, tins Germans are now considering steps to prevent tins situation from repeating itself. "To cany this out on a large scale wil cost the German Government a great deal of monev. But from many poults of view it will lie a profitable investment. Thi.- is particularly true of homesteads that mav be erected on the under-popu-lated lands of East Prussia, where labour has to be imported every year from Russia, and where the under-production ot animal products is directly traceable to the large holdings. From a military point of view it will also, the Germans believe, be profitable fo colonise exsoldiers along the new frontiers. Bismark expressed great regret that he had not adopted this plan after the 1-ranco-Prussian war."