A Service of Love in War Time - American Friends Relief, Work in Europe, 1917-1919 #225124

This book does not profess to be a history of the work of relief and reconstruction which Friends have done in France and Russia and in other countries since the fateful autumn of 1914. Only one who has been in the thick of the work on the field can write the final, intimate history of any one of the major relief undertakings of Friends. And as the work since 1917 has been a joint endeavor of English and American Friends the complete history of it must be composite, i. E. Written by both English and Americans. It is to be hoped that persons of leisure will be found in the not distant future who can tell with sufficient detail the inter esting story of the labors of this large band of volunteers who have rebuilt homes, revived agriculture, restored the spirits of depressed refugees, saved the lives of many chil dren and reconstructed extensive areas of the desolated war zones, who have gone out with living faith and with efficient relief into some of the darkest regions of the suffering world, both in war-time and in the no less appalling period Which has followed the armistice. My attempt is much more modest. I am merely endeavor ing here to interpret the effort which American Friends have made to express their spirit of human love to a part of the world — an innocent part — caught in the awful tangle of the tragedy. I should not have written it, certainly not at this time, if it had not been for the irresistible appeal of Isaac Sharpless, President Emeritus of Haverford College.