Mutual Work

The trans-Atlantic cables were taken over by the U. S. Government on December 1, against the protest of the cable companies. Official German and Turkish statistics give the number of Armenians deported from their homes as 3,094,350, of whom 1,054,550 were later murdered.

Demobilization of the American Army, in the home cantonments, went on apace during December. Large numbers of soldiers were dismissed and returned to their homes. The first returning American troops landed in New York on the Mouretania on December 1st. They numbered 4,069, the majority being members of the Aero squadron. On the 16th, 9,000 returning soldiers landed in New York, from the Leviathan. Relations between Chile and Peru were greatly strained during November and early December, the trouble being the demand of Peru on Chile to return the provinces Tacna and Arica which Chile took after the war of 1879, and which the Peruvians say have always wanted to be restored to their own country. American Army casualties up to Dec. 1, 1918, show a total of 262,693 exclusive of prisoners. It is semi-officially stated that the total number of deaths in the armies of the nations during the war approximate ten millions. In the twelve leading nations involved there were 58,514,700 men in arms, and a total of casualties of 24,536,108. The extradition of the former Kaiser from Holland was seriously considered by the allied governments. On December 16 it was reported that Mr. William Hohenzollern, former German Autocrat, had refused to leave Holland, notwithstanding it had been officially called to his attention that his continued presence was likely to involve the country in serious difficulties.

Bryon F. Crookston, 3rd Detachment, 10th Engineers, "Forest" American Expeditionary Forces, France, writes from France, October 12, renewing his subscription for the Era, and says, "I enjoy the magazine a great deal and read it from cover to cover. A short time ago I had the pleasure of hearing Chaplain B. H. Roberts preach in Sunday School, at the Camp of the Utah Artillery. I was lucky enough to get a chance to go there and visit my brothers and friends. I met many of the boys from home that I had not seen since I joined the army. It was like going home. I have been down here in the timber for almost a year." Stephen C. Marchant, writing from St. Mai, France, member of the 3rd Company, 20th Engineers Forestry) A. E. F., says to a friend in this city, among other things, "Conditions are changed here somewhat. The French people were wondering some months ago if they could hold out until the Americans could come. Now the question is: 'How long can the Huns hold out?'" His letter was dated November 1, and the answer to this question came ten days later. He says, further: "I send you our paper, Jusqua Bout. I hope you will appreciate it, because it is edited by on|e of our boys from Utah, Mr. Robert Major, of Ogden, Utah. He and 1 are

276 IMPROVEMENT ERA the only Utah boys in the company, so yon see we are interested in each other; but say, we have some fine boys with us from other states."

Justice Wm. M. McCarty, of the Supreme Court of Utah, died at his home in Salt Lake City, December 19, 1918, of pneumonia. He was born May 15, 1859, at Alpine, Utah, and was the son of James Hardwick McCarty, of Kentucky, who came from Indiana to Utah, in 1854: his mother was Lydia Margaret Cragun-McCarty, who was born at Nauvoo, and came to Utah in 1852. Judge McCarty received his education in the public schools of Utah, and in the Brigham Young Academy in 1881-2. He studied law first while freighting between Utah points and the Nevada mines, began the practice of law early and had been on the supreme bench since 1902, and had twice served two-year periods as chief justice and was about to enter upon his third term. Before being elected to the supreme court bench, he served as judge of the Sixth judicial district at Richfield. His wife, Lovina Murray McCarty, and four children survive him.

President Woodrow Wilson sailed for France December 4, on the United States steamship, George Washington, which bore the presidential pjrty. As the ship steamed from its pier, there was a rousing farewell from both shores of the North River which were lined_ solid with cheer in? humanity, a striking testimony to a great man by a nation whose safety rests in his hands. By wireless, he kept in communication with Washington on the trip over. He arrived in Brest on the afternoon of December 13, amid a demonstration of popular enthusiasm. He made his entrance into Paris at 10:15 a. m. on the 14th, being greeted with a salvo of artillery in salute. The city made a vast fete of the President's coming. President and Madame Poincare gave a dinner at the Palace de la Elysee in honor of President and Mrs. Wilson. President Wilson attended church twice on Sunday 15th, visited the tomb of LaFayette, placing on it a wreath, bowing his head as he did so, standing in silence with no speech whatsoever. France generally recognizes that the coming of our American president is to hasten the dawn of final peace. He will perhaps not sit in the peace council himself, but his presence in the land will have its effect for good. The delegation who will represent America in the peace settlement, are Secretary Lansing, Col. House, General Tasker H. Bliss, and Mr. Henry White. — — Germany's surrendered Navy the high seas fleet "crept meekly into custody" of the Allied grand fleet, on November 21, 1918, "out of the mist" at 9:30 o'clock, thirty miles east of May Island, off the coast of Scotland, whence the ships were conveyed to the Firth of Forth. No nation of such proud rank has suffered such humiliation, we read in the Literary Digest, as this defeat at a "bloodless Trafalgar," when the British fleet, accompanied by units of the French and American navies, occupying a stretch of water forty miles long and six wide, received the submission of thirteen German battleships and battle-cruisers, six light cruisers and fifty destroyers, manned by 14,000 officers and men, under Admiral Meurer. "Der Tag" is here, we read, "and this day there lies in the Firth of Forth, 224,151 tons of German battleships, 121,800 tons of German battle-cruisers, and 18,000 tons of Ger- — man light cruisers in all, 364,751 tons of the finest ships of what was once the Germany Navy, the pride of the Kaiser. It is not expected that Germany will recover her surrendered ships, her colonies in all parts of the world are gone, her foreign trade is only a memory, and her merchant marine is no more than a nucleus." The great naval and commercial fabric, raised with vast expenditure of gold and toil, "lies prostrate and dismantled." The New York Times is quoted as saying, "regarded merely as a spectacle of arrogant ambition brought low, the fall of the German Navy from its great eminence is a national tragedy for which no parallel can be found in history."