Passed by the censor

by Wythe Williams

After visiting her wounded, Sister Julie went out the back door of the house accompanied by two of the Sisters. The three carried large clothes baskets, kitchen knives, and a hatchet. Through the gardens and behind the burning houses they passed down the hill to the part of the city near the river, which was already smoldering in ashes. They went into the ruined barns, where the cows and horses were all burned alive. I was shown a bleached white bone, a souvenir of one of the cows.

With the hatchet and knives they secured enough bones and flesh from the dead animals to fill the two great baskets. Then they climbed painfully up the hill, behind the burning buildings, to the back door of their home. Water was drawn from their well, and a great fire built in the old-fashioned chimney in the kitchen. The enormous kettle was filled with the water, the meat and the bones, and soon the odor from gallons of soup penetrated the outer door to the street. Again a German officer headed a delegation into the hall.

"You have food here," he announced to Sister Julie.

"We have," she snapped back. She was very busy. She waved the butcher knife under his nose. She then told him that the soup was for the people of Gerbéviller and for her wounded. She expressed no regret that there would be none left for Germans.

The officer said that the twelve thousand who entered Gerbéviller that afternoon was the advance column. The main body, with the commissariat, was coming shortly. Meanwhile, they were hungry. They would take Sister Julie's supply. They would take it—eh? Take it? They would only do that over her dead body. Meanwhile, they would leave her kitchen instantly. They did—the butcher knife making ferocious passes behind them on their way to the door. Sister Julie was still doing her "work for the Lord."

She then ordered all the wash tubs filled with water and brought inside the hall. The fire was coming into the street. Dense smoke was everywhere. Even the Germans now seemed willing to save that particular part of Gerbéviller. It was the portion near the railway station and the telegraph. A substantial building near the gare would make an excellent headquarters for their General, who was due to arrive shortly. The civilians (only a few of the 2,000 inhabitants remained) were all herded into a field just on the outskirts of the town. Sister Julie, with Sister Hildegarde, sallied forth with their soup, and fed them. The next day she would see that the Germans allowed them to come to the hospital for more.

When she returned, a number of soldiers who had discovered a wine cellar were reeling up the street. They stopped in front of the hospital, but turned their attention to the house opposite. They would burn it. It had evidently been forgotten. They broke into the place, and in a moment flames could be seen through the lower windows.

Sister Julie called to the soldiers. They stared at her from the middle of the road. She motioned for them to come to her. They came. She told them to follow her into the hall. There she showed them the wash tubs full of water. They were to carry those tubs across the street and put out the fire they had started, and which would endanger the hospital. This was according to orders given by the officers. After putting out the fire they were to bring the tubs back and refill them from the well in the back yard. The work was too heavy for the Sisters.

When these orders were obeyed, Sister Julie carried a little camp chair to the front steps and began a vigil that lasted all night long and half the next day. She saw the great German army of a hundred and fifty thousand march by, the band playing "Deutschland über Alles," the infantry doing the goose step as they passed the burning houses. Four times during the night the tubs of water in the hall were emptied and refilled when the flames crept close to her house.

At dawn next morning four officers approached her where she sat upon the doorstep. One of them informed her that, inasmuch as she was concealing French soldiers with arms inside the house, they intended to make a search.