Civilian relief work in France has embraced a campaign against tuberculosis, care of refugees and repatriés, care of children, reconstruction and repair work in devastated areas and home service among the families of French soldiers. While much of the work in behalf of refugees has been done in the zones of comparative safety to which people have fled from the war areas, the German offensive launched in March found American Red Cross men in large numbers performing actual rescue work in villages that were under fire of the enemy. With the aid of the motor transport service, hundreds of noncombatants were removed to places of safety.
At Evian, on the Swiss border, a corps of workers has been maintained for several months, together with a children's hospital, disinfecting plant, &c., for the care and relief of the children and aged and infirm persons who have been sent back by the Germans from the occupied portions of France and Belgium at the rate of 1,000 or more a day.
Relief for the families of French soldiers has had for its object the double purpose of providing for the wants of the sick and destitute, and strengthening the morale of men at the front. In respect to the latter objective a success has been achieved which has called forth many expressions of praise from the highest French military and civil authorities. A gift of a lump sum of $1,000,000 for distribution among 50,000 needy families was one of the initial acts in this particular line of relief.
FOR WOUNDED AND PRISONERS
Minor Red Cross activities in France have included assistance in the care of mutilated soldiers, aid in re-educational work and care of the blind, and maintenance of plants for the manufacture of splints, anaesthetic, &c. An important work in connection with the prosecution of medical research has been the carrying on of experiments to ascertain the cause of trench fever, which in point of wastage is responsible for more than any other sickness.
Since air raids on Paris and other French cities have become a regular feature, the American Red Cross has established a day-and-night service to respond to air raid alarms, perform rescue work, and remove the injured to the hospitals. On many occasions the effectiveness of this work has commanded widespread interest.
Among the newer developments is the establishment of a casualty service, for the gathering of detail information regarding American soldiers who are killed in battle, sick or wounded in the hospitals or taken prisoner by the enemy. The information collected is transmitted to relatives at home.
Prisoner relief is administered through a central office at Berne, Switzerland, where ample supplies of food are stored for shipment to German prison camps as the need requires. Recently plans were started to have emergency rations stored in prison camps, so that American prisoners could have the benefit of them on their arrival there. Through the arrangements made all prisoners in enemy camps will receive rations in plenty at frequent intervals, and special rations will be provided for invalids.
IMPORTANT WORK IN ITALY
Appropriations for relief work in Italy have totaled $3,588,826. Emergency relief work, rendered at a time when no permanent commission had been established in Italy, stands among the most notable of the Red Cross achievements of the first year of the war. When the Teuton hordes swept into the plains of Northern Italy in October, 1917, driving thousands of panic-stricken men, women, and children before them, American Red Cross veterans from France rushed into the breach, helped to stop the rout, relieved the acute distress, and contributed in no small measure to the saving of the country from complete subjugation. What the American Red Cross did for Italy in this crisis was made the subject of official commendation on various occasions, and elicited thanks from the King, Prime Minister, and other dignitaries. A most important result accomplished was the cementing of friendship for America on the part of the Italian people, who previously, largely through German propaganda, had been skeptical of the good faith of the United States in the war.