(The following was published in a February 26, 1916 issue of Literary Digest giving the account of the “friend of the wounded” furnished by a soldier:
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“After many a hot engagement a man in white had been seen bending over those who lay behind on the field. Snipers sniped at him. Shells fell all around. Nothing had power to touch him. This mysterious one, whom the French called the “Comrade in White,” seemed everywhere at once.
. . . Our captain called for us to take cover, and just then I was shot through both legs. I fell into a hole of some sort. I suppose I fainted, for when I opened my eyes I was all alone. The pain was horrible, but I didn’t dare move lest the Germs should see me, for they were only fifty yards away, and I did not expect mercy. I was glad when the twilight came. There were men in my company who would run any risk in the darkness if they thought a comrade was still alive.
The night fell, and soon I heard a step, not stealthy, as I expected, but quiet and firm, as if neither darkness nor death could check those untroubled feet. So little did I guess what was coming that, even when I saw the gleam of white in the darkness I thought it was a peasant in a white smock, or perhaps a woman deranged. Suddenly I guessed that it was “The Comrade in White.”
At that very moment the German rifles began to shoot. The bullets could scarcely miss such a target, for he flung out his arms as tho in entreaty, and then drew them back till he stood like one of those wayside crosses that we saw often as we marched through France . . . And then he stooped and gathered me into his arms—me, the biggest man in the regiment—and carried me as if I had been a child.”
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