"PARIS IS AWFUL"

Sun (Christchurch), Volume VI, Issue 1628, 3 May 1919, Page 11

"PARIS IS AWFUL"

MURDER AND VIOLENCE. AMERICANS FILL TEMPORARY GAOLS. TRUTH ABOUT REPORTED RUFFIANISM. ISeyen or eight weeki ago the tabic* reported an outbreak of American rowdyism—in London ai well ai in Paris. Believing that fart (a leas dangerous than fiction, one of the best known of the transatlantic eerrespondents tells a plain tale here about the trouble in France.]

In the United States we average •It homicides a day. There are the New York and 'Frisco Chinatowns, with their quotas; the once Wild West, with its average; the South, with its records, and the big cities with their holdups and their gang killings. We are a mussy folk in the United States, from the gentler European 'viewpoint, when it conies to standing up for our individual rights or for the honour of our women. We kill quicker for our women than other men; and when, in our mixed peoples, men go into crime, they go in desperately, head first, with revolvers and knives, ready to kill, or be killed. We are not proud of this, but we do not apologise to the outside world for our vigour in this or in any other respect; we consider it our own concern; violence, though it is diminishing in the United States, is one attribute of your youth. But our bad name in this respect is finding its way into France. If it lis enemy propaganda that is doing (this thing, then this particular job is jOne of the most thorough the Germans have done in nil the war.

Lies J3JJSS around Paris as to American killings. In the famous old Maxim's, for instance, so a recent rumour said, an American officer was murdered by another, at the bar. It was not a true story; they say at Maxim's that another restaurant keeper started the yarn to hurt Maxim's trade. It had that effect, indeed; Maxim's advertised in a leading newspaper that the story was not true. But the effect this lie had on Maxim's trade was nothing compared with the injury it did the prestige of American officers.

Hostile Taxi-drivers. iThe taxicab drivers of Paris are no friends of Americans, i They began, with the arrival of Americans, to cheat them on prices and in giving change. Before long the American doughboy and the American officer learned to distrust the taxi men. I' became the custom to give the smallest possible tips to the drivers. Many officers from New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, San Francisco, and other large towns where, the. custom of tipping taxi men is passing, away declined to give any tips at-'all. And so the taxi men of Paris and the American troops here are at enmity over finance.' And" the taxi men are lively tale bearers. The real figures as to crime in.Paris, attributed to American troops, have been made public by Brigadier-General W. W. Harts, commanding general, district of Paris. It was necessary to make a public statement in Paris because there had been printed here a report that, during the month of December alone there were 34 murders, 220 physical attacks, and 500 bloody fights by Americans in the Seine district. It was enough to make a French householder keep to his home o' nights. The real facts of December offences .in Paris are these: Two cases of assault and battery, three cases of housebreaking, and seven cases of disorderly conduct. Between taxi-driver propaganda and German propaganda, this record is increased to 34 murders and 720 bloody affairs. * Prison Full of Yanks.

It Is frue, indeed—and this is one of the facts on which much of the criticism against American troops in Paris is based—that there is an American prison in Paris which is, usually, more or less filled. But most of the doughboys -who find their way thereto are men who are absent without leave. They came to Paris on leave, with a little money. Paris is full of bars and soldier traps. It would be a godsend to these boys and to the good relations between . France - and the United States if these bars were closed to troops as they are at home. But they are not. The Paris bartenders are not only good drink mixers: they are excellent salesmen as well. When the holidav is over and the soldier boy finds himself penniless and absent beyond his leave, he falls into the hands of the American soldier policemen who are stationed all about Paris. Off to the gaol he goes until he can be returned to his unit. "What I have just described does not have a pleasant sound to the folks at home, but it puts another light on the matter to say that during December the average number of such arrests was less than four a day. Out of 173 cases handled by the provost marshal, 103 were these harmless and misled youths absent without leave. We're behaving belter over here than we would at home, if that's anv comfort to these French folk. In 10 months, up to Armistice Dav, the French police reported only 39 crimes in which Americans were concerned. For six months up to December there were six shooting cases. Two Murders. Two Frenchmen have been murdered bv Americans in the Paris district. They were policemen who attempted to prevent burglary of a freight car. The men who wore the American uniform on that occasion must have been some of our bif? town gunmen; they killed in gunman istvle. But they occupy cells to-day. (awaiting trial. These two policemen are the only French victims *jf American violence. Another shooting was an accidental affair. A military policeman shot a gendarme, who immediately declared that it was an accident And- this is as black as we can be painted in France. In the towns outside Paris the stories of our violence do not circulate; in the countrytowns our soldiers are beloved. Over 3500 orphan boys and girls have been adopted by American soldiers out in the clean country where booze orgies and soldier-traps are tinunknown. "Thank God! I'm on my way to the clean, good country," said a doughboy at the railroad station as he started back to the wet, muddy front. "Paris is awful." Paris will have one impression of i us for years to come, perhaps. The Frenchman in the country places

will have another. He hasn't tried to cheat us and hornswagjde us. Ho has seen us as we naturally are, not on holiday, not being treated lue a lot of lumberjacks just in from the ' woods, or a lot of sailors just aitbore after a spell at sea, but busy at our day's work. Paris is a wise town and wicked, in. spots, like all great towns. Twenty thousand of our American boys are stationed here and 3000 pass through here daily. Our record ii extremely good. Perhaps, as an afterthought, there wouldn't be so much drinking if the soldier boy didn't think this his last chance in life to drink his filL "What a tragedy it would be," 1 heard a moderate drinker in oißctr's uniform, say, "to land in New York the day after she goes dry. Let's have another drink. 1 *