| OCR Text |
Show MEXICANS ARE FACING DEATH Awful Suffering in the Three Northern States of the Republic. Chihuahua City, Me.w, Jan. 31. Francisco Villa, according to reports received here today, has been driven out of the Picachos hills and Santa Clara canyon and is now surrounded by Carranza forces near El Valle. El Paso, Jan 30 The starvation and distress reported among the native na-tive population of the Mexican state of Sonora can hardly equal the conditions condi-tions that prevail in the states of Chihuahua, Coahulla and Durango, according ac-cording to J. W. Newcombe, a British doctor and journalist, who until recently re-cently served in a semi-official capacity capa-city for the Carranza government in northern Mexico. "In Chihuahua state particularly," says Newcome, "I saw children, girls and bojs as young as 12 and 14 years, stark naked in the cold temperature of the highlands Many of the women were hardly better off as regards clothing. No Crops in District. "Robust Mexican peons," continued Newcomo, 'who easilv can eat sixteen to eighteen tortillas at a sitting, now have to subsist on two or three enkes a day. Tho women and children get less. There are no crops now and tho small corn supply is rapidly dwindling. Starvation will be rampant throughout through-out northern Mexico before the year is many months older. "What little corn there is sells for 80 cents Mexican per liter, which is more than Mexican workmen can earn even under fairly normal conditions, and there is practically no work to bo had now." Newcome added that the few European Euro-pean physicians left in northorn Mexico Mexi-co report widespread epidemics of pneumonia and typhoid among the lower classes, while the death rate from tuberculosis is rapidly increasing. increas-ing. Typhus fever, ho said, was not generally prevalent in northern states Newcome also declared that he personally per-sonally saw many victims of leprosy roaming at will. |
