Sheffield Daily Telegraph – Monday 27 March 1922
Relief Work In Russia.
Yorkshire Worker’s Account of What is Being Done.
John H. Brocklesby, of Conisborough, who has been working two months in the heart of the Russian famine area, sends a description of the appalling conditions which prevail there.
” Hundreds of people,” he says ” are dying every day. In the cemetery at all times there seem to be a pile of about two hundred naked corpses waiting for burial. I saw a murdered man lying near the roadside on Sunday. Murder is all too frequent if any food is thereby to be obtained. People die in the streets every day. They are soon stripped of all clothing, and lie there maybe hours, until they are collected.”
Writing of the relief work, Mr. Brocklesby states: “Our scheme is going full swing. We are now feeding nearly one hundred thousand people in their own villages, our principle being, ‘You provide the transport and we’ll provide the food.’ Some of the caravans come a four and five day journey. The scheme is now beginning to take great effect. The refugees are ceasing to leave their own villages to die in the town, though our work must be expanded three or four times to cope with the situation adequately.”