Lieutenant Donald H. McGibney: of the French Ambulance Corps

              Figure
LIEUTENANT DONALD H. McGIBNEY
 of the French Ambulance Corps



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The Horrors of War as Told by An Eye Witness



Mr. McGibney's Lectures are illustrated with pictures actually made by him, in the trenches and on the battlefields of France and Belgium.



Figure


A kodak view of the first line trenches on the Yser.  Photographs of first line trenches are forbidden and the story of the methods used by Mr. McGibney in securing this exclusive view is both interesting and exciting.



CONVINCING, Vivid, thrilling, even amazing is Lieutenant Donald H. McGibney's story of personal participation in the great war.  It takes one to the very center of the titanic struggle.  That a man can live thru such diabolical experiences—can continue, day and night, for months amid such surroundings, to minister to the suffering and dying, puzzles human credulity.



When the war storm broke, this typical young American collegian was a teacher in the Protestant college at Beyruit, Syria, within a day's journey of the scenes of the ministry of Jesus of Nazareth and of the plains where Joshua led the Israelites against the heathen hosts of Canaan.




Almost before he had become accustomed to the ways of the East, there marched out of the historic Mountains of Lebanon and thru the streets of Beyruit, one hundred and fifty thousand turbaned Moslems against the defenders of Suez, that pathway of civilization, only to meet with slaughter by the British veterans, and death by thirst in the desert.  So came the conflict before his very eyes.



Altho under the protection of the frowning guns of two great American warships, a position of comparative safety, a man of McGibney's mould could not complacently pursue his congenial calling, with the world conflagration spreading by leaps and bounds.




Profoundly moved by the cries of anguish from the war zone, he went at once to Paris, and soon became a lieutenant in the American Ambulance Corps.  There his duties called him to the very center of the maelstrom of fire.  His narrative therefore is not the product of a word painter nor the output of a literateur or rhetorician, but the intimate, personal story of a man to a friend, as if seated in comfortable chairs before an open fireplace.  Yet, thru it all, there is that shrinking from personal adulation which always characterizes the truly heroic.



To sit with him in the front of an auto ambulance, go bowling thru the night along the war plowed road ever lighted by flaring rockets and rocked by thunderous shell bolts, to the first relay of the mangled—then crawl by inches thru icy slime across 
no man's land,
 carefully feigning death while each sputtering light bomb spends its ghastly rays, then dragging back a helpless, torn and bleeding soldier, and carefully hurrying him with a cargo of his comrades past the dying heroes who are so far gone that they are not—in the cruel realism and stern economics of war—worth saving, to the hospital!—Ah!  No mortal man can make this journey without a high resolve to firmly face every duty of citizenship in this good land and never to ignobly shirk any debt to his fellowmen thruout the world.



To hear from his own lips the story of a man from the very front is now possible thru the good offices of the Redpath Bureau.


Figure


This snap-shot taken by Mr. McGibney is remarkable because of the number of noted persons appearing within range of his camera.  This picture shows President Poincaire of France, the King and Queen of Belgium, Lord Kitchener of England, Colonel Moriet, commanding the French ambulance forces, Sir John French, commander-in-chief of the English expeditionary forces, M. Briand, the Socialist Premiere of the French Cabinet.





Comment of the Widely Known Author, Booth Tarkington



I have heard many talks and lectures by men who have been 
at the front,
 but none which has taken me actually (as it seemed) to the front with the lecturer, as did Mr. McGibney's.  He knows how to make his audience see what he has seen—and he has seen the vital part of this war:  the Western battle line.  He lived in it and he makes his hearers live in it.  He makes you see the picture of it, hear the sound of it and feel the sensation of it.




BOOTH TARKINGTON.





Other Comments of Well Known People and Newspapers



I have heard Cobb, Powell, Archibald.  It gives me pleasure to advise you that none of these men gives a more convincing account of the important events that are transpiring in Europe than does Mr. McGibney, and I heard many things from Mr. McGibney I did not hear from the others.




WILLIAM ALLEN WOOD, Indiana Society Sons of the Revolution.




I do not recall that I have ever listened to a more interesting lecture * * * * Mr. McGibney's story of his experience * * * * brought to me in a close, intimate way the great European war as it has never been brought before.  Mr. McGibney has a pleasing personality and a good, easy delivery, and, above all, he seems to know what he is talking about.




GEO. OSCAR DIX, Royse, Dix and Cooper, Law Offices, Indianapolis.




* * * * I take this means of emphasizing two points in chief, namely, Mr. McGibney's wholehearted earnestness and his forceful and expressive delivery.  Mr. McGibney comes with a message of facts, together with very interesting and valuable pictures.




FELIX M. McWHIRTER, Pres. Peoples' State Bank, Indianapolis.




As president of the Woman's Press Club of Indiana, I want to express my great appreciation of the lecture of Lieut.  McGibney, and my satisfaction at having secured his appearance before the Club.  I have received copies of various papers in the state, in which club members have given Mr. McGibney great praise.




BLANCHE CONSTANCE FOSTER.




Lieut. McGibney is an excellent speaker and maintained the interest of his hearers thruout the lecture.  His personal experiences at the front were graphically related and the stereopticon views which were shown in connection with the story added much.  He gave a clear explanation of the work accomplished by the division with which he was connected, and vividly described the terrible conditions which exist on the battle fronts.  Those who attended were fortunate in hearing an unusually instructive and meritorious lecture.


From the Johnstown, N. Y., “Herald.”




The lecture by Mr. McGibney was one of the most interesting addresses given here in recent years.  In closing, the speaker brought out the great need of preparedness in this country of ours.  He said that our war equipment at present is very antiquated and that with it, we would be utterly unable to cope with the modern methods now being used in Europe.


From “Brown and White,” Lehigh University, Bethlehem, Pa.




I have heard several lectures during the past year on the war, but have gotten neither as much enjoyment nor instruction from them as from yours.  The other gentlemen were all courteously treated guests of the combatting forces and witnessed only such things as the censorship of the officers permitted, where you, in actual service, saw war as it really is.  Knowledge of conditions is the first step toward preparedness.  * * * * It is my earnest wish that every true citizen of the United States hear you and profit by the bitter experience of other countries.




STANLEY C. BROOKS, Sec. Society of Colonial Wars.





Figure
LIEUTENANT DONALD H. McGIBNEY wearing an army overcoat which formerly belonged to a Belgian officer who lost his life in action.



Figure

LIEUTENANT DONALD H. McGIBNEY wearing the full fatigue uniform of the American Red Cross Ambulance Corps, in which he served seven months


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