North Carolina Newspapers

IMPORTANT NEWS THE WORLD OVER IMPORTANT HAPPENINGS OF THIS . ' AND OTHER NATIONS FOR SEVEN DAYS GIVEN THE NEWS OFfHE SOUTH What Is Taking Place In The South ' land Will Be Found In .-.it - Brief Paragraphs Domestic. 0 George LaBlanche, a middleweight boxer, prominent in the days of John 1m. Sullivan anr HpmnTistratnr of the famous "pivo't punch," died at Law rence, Mass. In his prime he only .weighed 150 pounds, but defeated the best" pugilists of his day. The pivot blow has been barred from pugilistic encounters. Protests, against the recruiting of farm labor from farms and other es sential industries in Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and Tennessee by private contractors working for the war de partment have been made to the de partment of labor and agriculture and to the shipping board. It is probable that the entire la bor problem will be placed in the hands of the United States employ ment service. - The claim is made by the president of the National Association of Cotton Manufacturers that textile manufactur ers face a cotton shortage during the .. doming year and that the labor situa tion threatens to be acute. ! As many millions of men as may be needed to win the war will be sent to the battle front, Secretary of the Navy Daniels told the Philadelphia chamber of commerce" recently. j Secretary Daniels says that if there are not "enough 21 and 31 year old men to wjn the war, men of 40 and 50 will rush to the colors. V The addresses of men wounded or killed in France will be given the public at an early date. Maj. Oscar A. Brindley and Colo nel Damm, two expert aviation men from, the McCook federal flying field at Daykin, Ohio, met death at the 'Mo raine City aviation field. The ma chine dropped four hundred feet in making a turn' in the air. Two soldiers were burned to death and ; eighteen were burned seriously when a captive observation balloon of the Casquet type exploded at Flor ence field, the army balloon school at Fort Omaha, near Omaha, Neb. Carl Rbdiger, known also as Karl Schroeder; said to be a lieutenant commanded in the German navy, and Ibeliev'ed by: secret service agents to "be 'the "paymaster of German agents in tlife "United States, Central and South America, has been arrested at New York and put in jail. One of his chief purposes in this country is said to have been to induce Irishmen to enlist in the British navy in the hope that these Irishmen would plant bombs on the warships. Rodiger, . flatly denies that he is in any way connected with the Germans. Washington. Sixty-six persons lost their lives when the steamship City of Athens, bound from New York for Savannah, waa rammed and sunk. by a French ' cruiser off the Delaware coast. The missing include ten men and two wom- en wno were passengers, seven out ' of 'twenty-four United States marines who were on board fourteen out of twenty French sailors and thirty-three "members of the crew. Both ships were carrying running lights because of the heavy fog which hung over, the sea. . 1 Gavrio Prinzip, the assassin of Arch duke Francis Ferdinand, heir appar ent to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife at Sarajevo, Bosnia, died in a fortness near Prague, of tubercu losis. - , , 0 British' troops in Mesopotamia are carrying on their pursuit . ,of the re treating Turks, and have advanced as far as the Tauk river. . Knowing that the Americans are persistent souvenir hunters, the Ger mans in the Toul sector have been strewing No Man's Land with all sorts of infernal devices. In a number of instances Americans have tripped over infernal machines, but have escaped. Eighteen thousand soldiers of Rou manian origin who were captured by the Italians while fighting under the Austrian flag have asked permission to go to the front against Austria. It is stated in a, dispatch from Paris that the request has been granted German field depots are being very heavily drawn upon to replace recent casualties. A company of 250 boys of the 1919-20 class, who had onlv eight, weeks' training, were 1 Dut In the fighting line recently. , . German forces have occupied Sebas toppL the k great Russian fortress in Jthe-Crimea. .,The :flrst step in the organization of the, five hundred million dollar gov- ernment war finance corporation has been taken. The president has nomi r -nated: four directors, who. with Sec retary McAdoo, will conduct the work f raiding - in financing essential war enterprises. . &eM Amendments designed ij.6 President's authority; the . senate .afesed the Overman bill with its 'general ;rant .of power for co-ordinating and reorganizM P11???. other agencies dur- Every ton of steel aad pig iron in the country virtually faas been com mandeered by the government for war purposes, and any surplus remaining after war needs are met will be dis tributed to non-war industries under strict government supervision. In a desperate air fight over the American lines' in France northwest of rToul, Charles W. Chapman, Jr., of Waterloo, Iowa, and a German pilot with whom he was fighting, plunged to earth inside the German lines, both machines wrapped in flames. A dispatch from Three Rivers, Que bec, which was half destroyed by fire in 1906, says that a fixe which started in the film room of the Victoria the atre, destroyed the building' and a number of stores and residences, wih a property loss of $150,000. . Blanket authority for the president to increase the army to whatever size may be necessary to win the war, is proposed to the house military com mute by Secretary of War Baker Ma jor Greneral March and Provost Mar shal Crowder. An administrative measure amending the selective draft act to provide for this grant Of power will be prepared immediately and prompt action on it is asked. Secretark Baker says it is unwise to set any limit on the number of men who may be called to the colors, and that the president should be grant ed complete discretionary authority to increase the size of the army as rap idly as transportation and equipment facilities may warrant. Secretary of War Baker says the army appropriation bill should provide for approximately three million men, but this should not be accepted as any fixed limit to the number of men to be called Within the year 191$. A nation-wide round-up .of regis trants escaping military service by unfair classification has been ordered by -Provost Marshal General Crowder. The number of men who have sudden ly become "skilled farmers" and "in dispensable government workers" has drawn the searching eye of the war department to the situation. Senator Hitchcock says the aircraft board has been "playing a gigantic confidence game on the whole country.- The Shah of Persia has applied for $100,000 worth of Liberty Bonds. The request is in the hands of the state department. Charges and intimations of irregu larities in connection with the aircraft program which have been published an discussed in capitol cloakrooms for some time have been brought to the floor of the senate with demands for a new investigation with a view to criminal prosecution. ' There is a Polish army on the French front just as enthusiatsic as are any of the allied soldiers, and re ports are that they are doing good work; An English military authority esti mates that the number of Germans killed and captured since March 21 is nine hundred thousand. European. Germany's barbarous treatment of the inhabitants of occupied territories and constant requisitioning of food are provoking great resentment and caus ing armed clashes. In a village in the Kiev district the inhabitants resisted nd the Germans subdued them with armored cars. ; 1 A report has it that In the govern ment of Minsk, Russia, the Germans are seizing able-bodied men and send ing them to Germany in locked cars. 1 The streets in the towns and cities of Russia are armed with patrols of German troops and machine guns ev erywhere. i Having met with a reverse in their operations on the northern side of the Flanders salient; where the French and British have stood shoulder to shoulder in defense of Ypres and the high ground which forms a bulwark in front df the channel ports, the Ger mans have, as indicated by the most recent reports, turned to the allied lines- in. northern France. A report from Paris says the German artillery is now centering its fire . on the line between Givenchy and ' the Neippe forest, and it may be that the Teutons will launch an attack against this vital section of the British line. From articles appearing in German newspapers which have reached neu tral countries, it would seem that Ger many will: make no immediate at tempt to take Ypres, as they consider nothing would be gained by capturing a ruined city. , Some military experts in neutral countries opine that the Germans may make an attempt to cut straight through the allied lines in an effort tto reach Paris and the channel ports, believing that by so doing they will strike terror to the French heart. . The critics all agree that Ger toany is still pursuing the same tactics of trying to whip her enemies one at a time. It is rumored in The Hague that Dr. John Loudon, minister of foreign af fairs of Holland, will resign. It is said the rumor is based on the suppo sition that he could not retain office now that his undertaking respecting the gravel must be revoked. ' It has been learned from Serbian sources that unmistakable signs of an -approaching revolution in Austria-Hun gary are becoming daily more evident. The archbishop of Carniola is at the head of the movement. British April castualties total 52,- 475 died of wounds or killed, officers. L2I; men; 7,723; wounded or miss ing, officers, 7,447; men, 35,684. Again there has come a pause in the battle of Flanders, where' the ground everywhere is covered with the gray-clad bodies of German dead, and the British and French are holding securely to an their positions. POLK COUNTY NEWS, TRYON, N. 0. M m wo irr'iH.ir't ". : 1-Recent view in ruined Ypres, objective of the Germans in Flanders. reviewing a body of American infantry at the front. 3-One of the huge of the bombing squadrons. NEWS REVIEW OF THE PAST WEEK Germans Defeated With Awful Slaughter in an Attack on Ypres Salient. PREPARING FOR HEW SMASH Americana Gallantly Repulse Hun As sault Near Amiens Teutonic "Peace Offensive" Developing Third Uberty Loan Heavily Oversubscribed Plana to Expand Our Army. By EDWARD W. PICKARD. Monday of last week was a bitter day for the Hun the day of his worst 'defeat since the great spring drive be gan. Under orders from General von Arnlm to take Scherpenberg, Mont Rouge, Mont Noir and all the high ground back of Kemtnel, the Ger mans hurled themselves time after time against the stone wall of Brit ish and French defenders, only to fall back In disorder, leaving thousands of their men dead and. wounded on the field. The enemy employed about thirty fresh battalions, In addition to the numerous divisions already in po sition on that front, and his onslaughts were so frequent as to be almost con tinuous throughout the day. When the morning of Tuesday came the great numbers of gray-uniformed dead in front of the defending posi tions showed the awful price the Hun had paid. Moreover, he had nothing to show for this expenditure of life, for the allied lines were virtually in tact at all points, and the British late in the afternoon counter attacked north of Kemmel and regained consid erable ground previously lost. Just to the west of this position, about Locre and at the cross roads between Scherpenberg and Mont Rouge, the French met the fiercest assaults of the day. Changing hands several times, Locre was held by the Germans at nightfall, and they had pushed ahead until the situation was most critical for the defenders, but the French came back with such Irresistible dash that the advance was stopped, and af ter dark they pushed the Germans out of Locre and back from the -positions they had won between the two hills. In this, the most pretentious attack on the Ypres salient, the British and French, largely outnumbered, fought with equal gallantry and determina tion. At the same time the brave Belgians, farther north, repulsed an other attack, not yielding a foot of ground. The kaiser had just visited the German lines and exhorted his troops to pusb the British back to the channel, "where they belonged," but the stubborn Tommies didn't wish to be pushed, and they were not. The big attack probably had the double purpose of capturing Ypres and di verting large numbers of allied troops from the Amiens salient so the Ger mans could make another drive there, but neither object was attained. The artillery fire from both sides was con tinuous and very heavy, and the Ger mans, despite the excellent work of the airmen, improved their transport and brought up many of their large guns. The British batteries west of Kemmel devoted much of their efforts during the week to deluging the top of that h'll with shells, so that the Huns were unable to obtain any bene fit from its capture. The Intense activity observed be hind the German lines indicated that Von Arnlm was preparing to resume the attack on the Ypres salient imme diately. Except for Kemmel hill, his troops are occupying lower ground than that held by the allies, and they cannot continue there long under the smothering fire of ..the British and French artillery. If they cannot gain the line of heights they seemingly" must soon retire. to Following their disastrous repulse in Flanders, the enemy made two at tacks in the Amiens region. The first was directed especially at the Ameri can troops, now revealed as. holding positions In the vicinity of VlHers- Bretonneux, east of Amiens. After an intense preliminary bombardment lasting two hours, the Germans ad vanced, three battalions strong, and hand-to-hand fighting ensued all along the line. The Americans put up a de fense that won the warm praise of the French commanders on their flanks, and the Huns, after considera ble time, were driven back with heavy loss. The losses of the Americans were said to be rather severe. The second attack was made Wed nesday night in the Thennes sector, southeast of Amiens; and was as com plete a failure as the other. Already, the expected Teutonic "peace offensive" is beginning to de velop, as It always does after the kaiser has won some successes and then has been brought .to a halt. Charles of Austria is said to have made peace offers to Italy, the real purpose of which Is evidently to cre ate discord In Italy and at the same time to quiet the. discord among his own subjects. The pope, It Is under stood, will put forth peace proposals on Whitsuntide, May 19, making con crete offers of mediation by the holy see. Germany's own offers are ex pected after another, great effort has been made to smash the allied armies in France. This peace offensive will be no less offensive to the allies than Its prede cessors. They will not be deceived by offers to restore Belgium and to cede Lorraine. Nothing less than the ut ter, defeat of the central powers will satisfy them, unless, there Is -an un believable change In the state of mind of the governments and the peoples. This is no less true in America then In England and France. The Ameri can casualty lists, though still com paratively short,, are scattering all over the country's .map little black dots of mourning, each of which be comes the center of a strengthened de termination to see the war through to complete victory. to The Austrian emperor is truly hav ing a hard time keeping his subjects to their allegiance. From Serbian sources conies the news that the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes In the dual mon archy are holding a plebiscite on the plan to join with" Serbia and Monte negro in one national Independent state, with Peter of Serbia as the king. This movement Is led by the prime archbishop of Carniola. Mean while the Austro-Hungarian military commanders have been greatly exer cised by the fact, just announced, that large numbers of Bohemian troops are joining the Italian army and are now on the Italian front in Italian uniforms. They belong to the Czecho-Slovak army which is being formed at many points within Austria Hungary. . Pea Though they have slowed up a bit in Russia proper, the Germans are go ing ahead steadily with their 'penetra tion of Ukraine, and now have es tablished military rule in Kiev, Its capital, on the ground that the gov ernment has proved too weak to main tain law and order. A number of the members of the Ukraine government have been arrested. Of course, the prevailing disorder there Is mainly due to the presence of the German troops and their oppression of the peo ple, but a little discrepancy like that does not bother the kaiser. Recently General .von Elchhorn, the German commander there, ordered the peas antry to return all property and ef fects taken from the landholders and to begin at once the cultivation of the estates." This order, designed to pro tect the Interests of the landholders, most of whom are Poles and Russians, was vigorously' opposed by the rada, which declared It would not permit in terference by German or, Austro-Hungarian commanders in the internal af fairs of the country. The minister of agriculture was instructed to tell the peasants not to obey Von Elchhorn's order. Berlin announced on Thursday that Sevastopol had . been occupied by - the German forces. to For a day or two last week the world was startled by a report that there had been a Counter-revolution In Russia, and that the former czar's little son had been proclaimed emperor, with his uncle. Grand Duke Michael, as re gent The story came from Scan dinavia, and soon was recognized as 2-Generar Pershing and his! aides bombsused by the British aviators : , German propaganda, though there was doubt as to its motive. It was not confirmed from any Russian source. Possibly the Germans meant to use the alleged revolt as an excuse for seizing Petrograd, a move they al ready have threatened to make unless the Russians agree to their outrageous ly unfair plan for the exchange of prisoners. According to this plan, which Russia rejects, all German pris oners in good health are . to be re turned, the unfit being, kept in Rus sia; and all unfit Russian prisoners will be returned, the fit being retained In Germany. 4 -to- Another bit of characteristic Ger man Insolence cropped up last .week, when Berlin formally protested against the action of the allies in giv ing aid to the Red guard of Finland, because it interfered with the Internal life of Finland, though the Germans themselves are helping the White guard of the country with land and sea forces. This combination has now occupied Viborg after severe fighting. to The Russian bolshevik government Is really preparing to re-enter the war against the central powers, whose ag gressions have . become . Intolerable. The pan-executive council at Moscow has adopted Trotz'iy's plan for uni versal military training for . all men between the ages of eighteen and forty and the conscription of all -workers and peasants. The best military experts have been recalled to the serv ice and the government expects to have a large and effective army with in ten months. to War work in America is progressing with unprecedented speed these days. The, third Liberty Loan campaign closed on Saturday with the $3,(XX), 000,000 of bonds heavily over-subscribed. The most satisfactory fea tures of this loan are the large num bers of Individual subscribers and the fact that the country districts took a portion of the loan relatively much larger than they did of the previous Issues. As the campaign neared its end the enthusiasm became really tre mendous. All classes of the popula tion joined in the work of selling the bonds, and most substantial aid wasi rendered by 50 wounded American sol diers arid a group of French "Blue Devils" who came over from France for the purpose. The war department permitted it to be known that It now plans to have 1,000,000 men In France by July 1. and that considerably more than 500, 000 are already there. Secretary Ba ker says the army will be expanded to 3,000,000 men and then will be made as much larger a Is considered necessary. The movement of troops across the Atlantic Is so swift that the training camps are being emptied, and therefore the draft registrants are be ing called In Increasing numbers. Sec retary Daniels is enthusiastic for an army of unlimited size, and says if there are not enough young men to whip Germany' the age limit will be changed and the older ones will go. The brigading of the Americans with the British and French has greatly expedited the placing of the men on the firing line, for now only 30 days of training in France is considered necessary. The senate grew impatient all of a sudden last Tuesday and three bills were introduced for expanding the army. In the house Chairman Dent of the military affairs committee also In troduced such a bill, but he would limit the size of the army to 4,000,000 men. As usual, he Is not In. accord with the spirit of the nation. On Thursday Secretary Baker pre sented the administration's program to the house committee. It includes ex penditures on the army aggregating $13,000,000,000 In the next fiscal year ; manufacture of artillery on a stu pendous scale; drafting of at least 1,000,000 additional registrants and as many more as can be equipped and 1 transported to France. The Overman co-ordination bill was passed, by the senate Monday by a vote of 63 tq 13, and when it gets through the house there will be little in any way connected with the war which the president wll not be em powered to do. The measure gives him dictatorial , powers to reorganize bureaus and departments of the gov ernment and to transfer government functions at will. , CANADIANS ARE i ACTION IN WEST CONSIDERABLE ADVANCE made BY THEM ON-BRITISH L!NES NEAR AMIENS. AMERICANS UNDER SHELL FIRE Intimations Come That Hee Fight. ing may dc resumed in FranC, at Any Time. f a m , Australian and Canadian ;, In action on the British in., the vital sectors of the bart i France. ;)s are along i;t in The Australians have sti ; k Q Germans near Morlancourt, Irwee-i the Ancre and Somme rivor ;, cast y Amiens, and have advanced their lines upward of three-quarters of a mile. ,s a result of two assauls on tiu Teu tonic positions. The Canadians have appearp l in the Arras sector, further south than they have been since the battles in this re gion began March 21. This part of the line is most important, as it de fends Arras to theh southwest and includes localities such as Neuville-Vi-tasse, there have been bitter strug gles since the Germans launched their great offensive. American troops, on the French front not far from Montdidier, have been under a storm of shells for the last couple of days, projectiles con taining high explosives being mingled with those charged with poisonous gas fired into the lines held by Gen eral Pershing's men. No Attack Upon Italy. Along the rest of the front in France there have been no engage ments of unusual character, nor hao the Italian front been attacked as yet by the Austrians who have assembled there The British forces which have been holding the town of Es-Salt, east of the Jordan and northeast of Jericho for about a week have been compelled again to abandon the place-before the superior forces of Turkish and Ger man troops. The British, however, are still maintaining their control of the crossing of the Jordan further south. From the official reports and spe cial dispatches filed by correspondents at the front, there come intimations that heavy fighting may be resumed at any time. The fact that heavy rains are falling may have a great deal to do with the delay in the German drive but. the allies hold high ground from which they can observe the Ger man positions, which are generally in the 16wlands and have kept up a heavy artillery fire in sectors wher& the Germans have been assembling or have been at work in bringing up guns for the battle which is virtually cer tain to come. METHODISTS WOULD CURTAIL THE BISHOP'S POWER Atlanta, Ga. In connection with the demands of the laymen of the church that the power of the college of bish ops be curtailed, additional memorials were presented, asking laws providing for the trial of bishops against whom charges have been made and provid ing that all involved in the appoint ments of ministers at annual confer ences be given full and free consulta tion. The presentation of memorials and an outburst of patriotism in connec tion with the address of Maj. C. W. Gordon, of the Canadian army, bet ter known as "Ralph Connor," the author, featured the conference ses sion. Gordon's declaration that the war would be won when the United States gets 2,000,000 soldiers on the western front brought a demonstra tion which, it is said, never had been equalled at a Methodist confer ence. ACCEPTS GERMAN PEACE RATHER THAN BE CRUSHED London. Count Czernin, then Austro-Hungarian foreign minister, paid a secret'visit to Jassy in the latter part of February and delivered in person a verbal ultimatum of the most drastic sort from the central powers to King Ferdinand, of Rumania, it became known with the arrival here of. the American Red Cross mission to Ru mania. Count Czernin's visit was known only in the highest official cir cles. CIVIL WAR PEN8ION BILL IS PASSED BY THE HOUSE Washington. The Sherwood bill granting a minimum pension of $2i a month to civil war veterans was passed by the house and now goes to the-senate, The house also passed a bill to re store the pension status of widows of civil war veterans who married affer the death of their soldier husbands and who were inadvertently deprived of their pension rights under an act of 1916. It now goes to the senate.