"Could they subsist on this food?"
"No, but the inhabitants of Charleville formed a little committee to supply the prisoners with food and with linen. The food had to be given to them clandestinely."
M. Rollett, who left Charleville on December 19, 1917, to come into France by way of Switzerland, visited the Embassy to forward to the relatives of the three American prisoners messages saying that they were still alive. The addresses they gave him were: Mrs. James Mulhull, 177 Fifth street, Jersey City, N. J.; Mrs. R. L. Dougal, 822 East First street, [Maryville, Miss.;] and Mrs. O. M. Haines, Wood Ward, Oklahoma. On the day the Americans were captured, he added, the American communique (published later on by the Germans) had reported five men killed and seven wounded.
"They were written," he replied, "on a piece of linen which a young girl who speaks English had sewed under the lining of a cloak belonging to one of my daughters."
"Black Misery" In Germany.
[In conclusion, M. Rollett was asked if, from his journey from] Charleville through Germany to Switzerland, he could form any idea as to conditions in Germany.
"No," he answered, "because we traveled through Alsace-Lorraine at night; but the German soldiers talked very freely about conditions in Germany, and they said that life in all parts of the Empire is black misery. They all long for peace; and the soldiers are in dread of the British and French heavy artillery."
M. Rollett's disposition was subscribed and sworn to before Secretary Frazier on January 9, 1918, and a copy of it is in the archives of the American Embassy.