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Show Axis Captives Aid in Forests Help Meet Critical Needs Of Nation in Lumber And Pulpwood. WASHINGTON. -More than 10 000 Axis soldiers who fought with Marshal Mar-shal '. win Ron.i;: J in North Afr:vd now are swinr-? axes in Amrr en forests to help meet the nation's critical needs in lumber and pulp-wood. pulp-wood. Their numbers may be increased in-creased sevcralfold as the result of an order by Gen. George C. Marshall, Mar-shall, army chief of staff, permitting permit-ting broader use of prisoners of war in forestry operations. Wood cut by the prisoners will help particularly in supplying lumber lum-ber and pasteboard for containers needed to move fruits, vegetables, eggs, meat and other food products. The War Food administration hss warned of a possible breakdown in movement of food to consumers because be-cause of a shortage of containers. The story of how these German and Italian prisoners were obtained and trained for work in the forests goes back to last summer, when the War Production board appealed to the forest service to step up a rapidly rapid-ly declining lumber production. The decline was laid to heavy loss of manpower to the military services and to better paying war industries. Feared Forest Hazards. The forest service sent Don M. Rochester, its chief training officer, to the war department to learn whether prisoners could help. The war department shook its head. It said such use of prisoners would be an apparent violation of the Geneva convention, which prohibits use of prisoners In hazardous occupations. Rochester replied that lumbering need not be so hazardous, that proper training and observance of safety practices had reduced forestry for-estry casualties. He cited the low injury record of civilian conservation conserva-tion corps units on forest projects. Finally he won agreement to experimental ex-perimental use of a few prisoners. The experiment started last fall near Huntsville, Texas, where a paper pa-per company offered to employ prisoners pris-oners on a pulpwood project. Rochester Roch-ester rounded up 25 volunteers among German noncommissioned officers from a near-by prison camp. Seven of the 25 had worked on farms in Germany and were familiar famil-iar with use of the ax. Other woodsmen's woods-men's tools were strange to them. All were given a 10-hour instruction instruc-tion course. Then, using these 25 men as instructors, Rochester took out 50 German privates each day for training, which was carried on throurih German soldiers who could speak English.. The training plan included a sort of "schnitzelbank" chart to teach the names and uses of the various tools and also safety practices. Must Pay Equal Wages. After several hundred prisoners had been trained, Rochester took several logging contractors and tlm-berland tlm-berland owners into the woods to watch. Few of them had thought prisoners would be good enough workers to assure a financial return re-turn from their use. Employers of prisoners must pay wages equal to that paid free American Amer-ican workers. The prisoners, however, how-ever, get only 80 cents a day. The difference goes to the federal treasury. treas-ury. Most of the prisoners went about the timber work with earnestness. When they worked they got 80 cents a day. If they remained in camp they got only 10 cents. Most of them wanted the extra money to buy cigarettes, candy and other little lit-tle luxuries. The war department, which had watched the experiment with crossed fingers, relaxed after a representative representa-tive of the International Red Cross made an inspection tour and prepared pre-pared a report to the German government gov-ernment that the United States, by means of its training program and supervision, was not subjecting the prisoners to undue hazards or dangers. dan-gers. During the several months that prisoners havo been used in the woods, there has not been one serious seri-ous injury, according to Rochester. |