Bombardment of Bitola during WW1 – memories of Mary L. Matthews

Mary L. Matthews (1864-1950) was missionary to the Protestant American School for Girls in Bitola (Monastir).  She arrived in Bitola in 1888 and her post lasted for 32 years, in which she took only three short furloughs to the U.S., in 1893-1896, 1904-1905, and 1913-1915.

Mary L. Matthews (1863-1950)

She was a witness of the Ilinden upraise, the situation of the local population during Turkish Rule, the Young Turks' Revolution in 1908, Balkan Wars, First World War and she remained in Bitola until 1920.
During this time she kept a diary recording many events and also she personally took many valuable photos with her own camera.

In this article, short excerpts of her diary are presented, giving us valuable information about the use of gas bombs during the bombardment of Bitola.

Excerpts from the diary of Mary L. Matthews

1915. In September, M.L.M. returned to Bitola (Monastir).
Two months later, the Central Powers (Bulgaria with Germans and Austrians) took our city and occupied it for a year.
Order was maintained.
Safe to go on the streets.
We were cut off from Salonica and lost our mail coming that way. German officers were arrogant. They requisitioned our laundry against my protests that the U.S. was not in the War. They put six big horses and three soldiers in the laundry-drying room. They were there for three weeks. Battles were being fought on the plain less than 15 miles away, which could be seen from the roof of the School, for five days. 

....

The Serbs with French and British troops were victorious. (November 19, 1916)

From my windows I could see the Serbs and French march into the city before the last of the enemy had fled. This was just four years from the day the Serbs entered the city, Nov. 19, 1912. The enemy retreated towards Prelep and to near-by mountains. It was from these mountain batteries that we were bombarded and much of the city destroyed, some incendiary shells being used and fires set in several places. The fire came near us but across the street. For twenty-two months we were under fire, twelve shells hitting mission property. 

Monastir (Bitola) following fire-bombing by Germans, circa 1917 (Photo by MLM)

Mary L. Matthews was the only missionary in the city for two and a half years, and had Protestant refugees in the School all that time—20 to 40 of them.

We had narrow escapes, but no injury except that one woman was affected by gas.
During bombardments we gathered in the basement of the Main Building. Shelling was usually in the afternoon from 3:30, because then the sun was behind the batteries. It was fairly safe to go down town in the morning, but once I had to take refuge in the Cathedral.
Seven of our shells were meant for Gen. Dessort of the 16th French Div. who requisitioned our Annex against all my protests.
I told him we should have shells.
He did not believe it.
The first night, nothing.
The second night, at ten o’clock (we were all in the basement) six shells were aimed at us. One sent him [Gen. Dessort] to the Annex celler; one, fell on an alley across the street; one buried itself in our garden; two in the yard; and one large shrapnel came through the roof, bursting in the dormitory on the second floor. A store-room door was pierced by 140 bullets some of which still had force enough to go through old magazines and a Geography.
Four hundred bullets were found.
The brass head went almost through a chimney and I brought it home in 1920; also, pieces of the shell and some bullets and splinters.
The next night, at ten, another fell in the back yard, near us who were in the basement. I told the General these were for him. He believed me, and he moved to another place; they followed him there, and he left the city.
He gave us all gas masks, for the French intended to fire gas and the enemy would return the same. 

The Annex building to the school, damaged by German bombs in WWI

On May 8, 1917, the gas came—lachrymose gas which blinded our eyes with tears. Washing our eyes with diluted condensed milk took away all the discomfort. One gas shell fell on a house three doors from us, but the father, mother and two daughters (graduates of our School—Albanians who taught in the school opened by other graduates, in Albania, who are still in Tirana and suffering much under the present government) [were away.] One of the daughters went to the home without her mask and her lungs were affected for about a month. 
The family lived in the School for two years, which saved their lives.
...

The full diaries and letters of Miss Mary L. Matthews will be available online after the opening on September 15 of an exhibition at Mount Holyoke College, where she was in the class of 1885.   https://ascdc.mtholyoke.edu/exhibits/show/marymatthews

References
1. Peggy Hanson Website - grand niece of Mary L. Matthews

2. Mary L. Matthews Papers, 1863-1950 - Mount Holyoke College Archives and Special Collections