Sullivan letter diary, 27 October 1915-9 October 1917 / Eugene Sullivan - Page 190
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[Page 190]
It is pitiful to see the state of La pauvre France. We passed through several large towns on our way here and they are a mass of ruins. Any high steeples and towers have been made special marks and are now crumbled ruins. I saw several beautiful churches in ruins. Their belfries generally tower high above the other buildings and that is I suppose why they always suffer.
Going through France one can hardly credit that it is such a home of iniquity. Numbers of houses in all the towns through which we passed have small shrines to "the Sacred Heart" or the Blessed Virgin or some other saint built into the wall and all of them have some holy image in a prominent position inside, the few shops too which remain open are replete with religious relics.
I raked around one of the damaged churches in search of a fragment of the stained glass windows but although they were smashed to atoms I was unsuccessful in finding even the smallest particle.