Y.M.C.A.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 28, 28 December 1917, Page 3

Y.M.C.A.

■ It is no wonder tliat the soldiers say “The Y.M.C.A. men are not quitters!” remarked a well-known American manufacturer after a tour of the British fighting area in France. “The troops have seen the Y.M.C.A. secretaries stand under fire and shell as steadily as the soldiers themselves, and go right along with the troops as they make their charge, and- set up •their dugouts, quickly getting ready for work. The minute wounded soldiers, who were able to walk, came back from the trenches, the Association men'were on hand ready to serve them with tea and cocoa, to give them words of cheer, to find resting places, and perhaps warmth from a fire—the smoko of which was carefully concealed from enemy observation, you may be sure. In one district our men served ninety gallons of coffee in one day 2-9,000 cups of coffee in a single week —to meii who were going back and forth to the trenches. In all dressing stations to which wounded men Were taken before being sent to hospitals toward, the rear, were sighs reading.: ‘Walking wounded, this way.’ And in.every dressing station.the association had a tent. At these tents wounded men rested while awaiting their turns to go before the lue conditions are such that all wounded men who can walk have to walk— and a man can walk a long distance if he has to. One man I saw had walked five miles with >i bullet through Ids stomach:”