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Show - 00 DESECRATE SOIL OF BATTLEFIELD Tourists Dance on Spot Where Heroes Died Steal Cresses from Graves By NEVTN" C. PAltKB. International News Service Staff Correspondent, Cor-respondent, PA It I S Complaints that among the the thousands of touiis;-v now visiting I'Ycnch battlefields are many who have been guilty of thoughtles3 acts of desecration of sacred soil have lii-en reaching the French press for several weeks. There have been no specific reports of misconduct on the pari of Americans, the majority of the complaints com-plaints having been registered against visitors from countries that did not enn r the war. line incident that has aroused much indignation was reported from Mul-hausen. Mul-hausen. In Alsace. A party of tourists tour-ists visiting the Vosges Mountains battle front gave a dance on the summit sum-mit of Hartinahnewllerltopfi whore .',.uo0 French and German soldiers sacrificed their lives. General Tabouix. commanding a brigade of French troops in the vicinity, has sent a letter 10 the newspapers news-papers protesting ag unst the Incident. "So long as people dance In their homes or in restaurants I have nothing noth-ing to say;" he wrote, hut 1 must protest when the folly of the dance leads to a violation of sacred soil I learn that a dance wis given recently on the summit of Hurtmannswiler-k'pf Hurtmannswiler-k'pf Those who have thus insulted the dead Ignored the fact that more than 2,000 Frenchmen and more ihan 3,000 Germans gave their lives there, the first that Alsace might be re-I re-I turned lo France, and the second that j It might remain German. This soli, j literally bathed In generous blood, Is I a place where heads should be uncovered, uncov-ered, where, the brainless should nit I be permitted to go." There have been numerous reports I of thefts by souvenir fu nds At the I famous "Bayonet Trench.'" near r dun. where a squad of French soldiers were buried alive by a shell burst, as !hey stood erect, many of the baj -OnetS protruding through the earth and which gave the trench Its name, have been stolen by tourists. At other places the graves of German Ger-man soldiers have been vlolutvd. Neat Chateau-Thierry one party of tourists tour-ists removed the identification crosses above the graves of a number of C'er-tiian C'er-tiian dead and carried them off as souvenirs. |