PRISONERS OF THE TURKS.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XLII, Issue 11469, 22 February 1918, Page 5

PRISONERS OF THE TURKS.

INHUMAN TREATMENT. A NEW ZEALANDER'S EXPERIENCE. United Service. London, Feb. 20. Corporal i.. Shoebndge 10-603, Wellington Battalion, Ne-" Zealand, was among the first of the prisoners to arrive from. Turkey. Ho states he was_ engaged in the attack on Anafarta in 1915. When the Anzacs were forced to retire he was left on. the field shot through the elbow He was taken with other New Zealanders from Gallipoli in a jolting cart. Once £it stopped at the roadside, and an old Turkish woman belaboured the prisoners with a heavy stick, billing his mate who suffered from a serious bayonet wound in the stomach. The body was left on the roadside. Corporal Shoebridge was sent to a good hospital in Constantinople. A few days after he was told that the British were iil-trentinfg Turkish prisoners and as a reprisal ho was sent to a building like a stable. The windows wore boarded up and in the dark fie was laid on the dirty tiqor in a blanket. None of his wounds were attended to. Later he was sent to various hospitals. Throughout, the treatment amt food rwere wretched. The food consisfed of bread and boiled wheat and potatoes. Other prisoners state that the Britisli prisoners died like flies and were buried unclothed and uucoffined in holes each holding four. The condition of the prisoners from Kut was indescribable, and at iirst they could not believe they were British. Some were clad in a shirt only. The prisoners received £4 monthly from the Americans. Then the Dutch Consul was permitted to buy them food. The prices were terrible.

They stayed ten weeks in Austria, en route. The food there was worse and scarcer than in Turkey. Conditions in Turkey are now improved. [Corporal Shoebridge has many friends in Palmerston, where lie resided for seven or eight years, and was a member of the local Oddfellows’ Lodge. He enlisted from Foiiding, and went to Gallipoli with the Main Body, whore lie was wounded and taken prisoner as described. His relatives reside in England. 1