A message received at Amsterdam, Holland, tells of the shooting of an English woman as a spy in the German barracks at Courtrai, Belgium. The woman, it was said, was dressed in the garments of a priest when captured by the Germans.
A German girl spy was caught a few miles outside of Petrograd. She has been court-martialed and shot. Her clothes were lined with admirably executed plans of Kronstadt and other military stations.
To what extent the spy has been busy is indicated by the references in English newspapers to the extraordinary good information possessed by the Germans concerning the movements and even the contemplated movements of the British troops. At the outbreak of the war it was declared that there were thousands of spies in England. In France many Germans have been executed as spies. A recent dispatch told of the execution of fifteen Germans who were found in an insane asylum in Lorraine. All the doctors and most of the attendants had deserted the institution with the approach of the French army, and their places were taken by the spies. By clever use of flags, the spies were able to direct the German artillery fire, at a distance, against the French.
Fewer reports have come from Germany regarding spies. It is said, however, that many Russians have been detected in Germany. The Russian espionage system is in many ways superior to all others. Russian spies in Austria have been of great assistance to the czar’s army chiefs. In all the countries at war passports have been stolen by spies and the signatures studied so that the holders can produce passable imitations. Spies have even been caught with their own photographs pasted over others in passports and with the official stamp on the photographs counterfeited.
When the spies are captured and sentenced, they meet death bravely. That is part of their creed. Soldiers loathe the task of shooting women, but such is the law of war. All accounts of the executions of women state that they have died as bravely as the men, with no appeal and no complaint in giving their lives for their country.
Some Sleeper, This Fellow.
After Eugene Hyland and Scott Anderson had searched the pockets of Paul Busselet, whom they found lying in the gutter at Sansome and Washington Streets, San Francisco, Cal., early in the morning, one grabbed him by the heels and the other by the shoulder and tossed him over a fence into a vacant lot.
When the pair turned around, they were looking into the muzzle of a revolver in the hands of Policeman Lenhardt. At the city prison Lenhardt charged the pair with attempted robbery. Busselet, whom they tossed over the fence, was not even awakened by the rough treatment and was reported by the officer still sound asleep when the case of the accused pair was called in court.
Thirty in This Kentucky Family.
Mr. and Mrs. John Kiser, who live in Kentucky, just across the mountains from Big Laurel, Va., have the largest family in this part of the country, if not in all America. They have been married thirty years, and have[Pg 59] twenty-eight children, including one set of triplets and five sets of twins. Only a few days ago two boys were added to the family. All the children are unmarried and make their home with their parents.