Abraham Lincoln Brigade Archives alba educational Modules 03 tsdp Page 23
Letter to Mrs. Roosevelt from Martha Gelhorn
LETTER TO Mrs. Roosevelt (Eleanor Roosevelt)
From Martha Gellhorn
"They also draw pictures, because with some food in them (that's all the food they have in them) they
feel very lively and happy: so they make wonderful pictures of the Quakers-who distribute this food-in
their home, which is called the White House, and the pictures are signed: Para el Presidente Roosevelt,
Juanito Menendez, 10 anos. There is some confusion as to who is God, whether it is the Quakers, or the
Red Cross, or the White House, or the Roosevelts. But all they know is that God sends them bread. The
children eating these huge hunks of dry bread was about the only happy thing I saw. I was in various
schools during air raids and the children waited patiently and sadly for it to finish, because until the raids
finished they would not get their bread. So it goes. I cannot yet understand why there must be so much
suffering. I shall never be a good writer, the human animal escapes me. Because evidently, the men in
the planes have families, too, and the men who sink the food ships have families, and the men who run a
war have sons who can also get killed, but none of this seems to have any serious effect upon behavior."
