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V
Can These Things Be True?
Can these cold-blooded deeds of atrocity be true? Is it a fact that they have been proved to the satisfaction of the most exacting critics? Is this “welter of fire, blood, and destruction” to be written finally on the pages of history?
I can only say this:
1. These stories came to us first from responsible correspondents of all our leading newspapers, who took them down for the most part at first hand from eye-witnesses and from the poor victims themselves.
2. A committee of eminent lawyers, assisted by the Belgian Minister of Justice, made a searching inquiry, sifting vague reports from actual facts.
3. The evidence of the atrocities thus collected was formulated in an Official Report to be presented to the President of the United States by the Belgian Delegation of Ministers of State, now on their way to America.
4. The British Official Press Bureau issued, on the 25th August, a statement of the representations made to them, which I have already quoted.
5. The Report of the Belgian Government was confirmed by the French protest against German atrocities which was addressed on September 2nd to the Powers by the Minister of Foreign Affairs.
6. Mr. Richard Harding Davis, an eminent American author and correspondent in Belgium of the New York Tribune, has entirely confirmed, in cables sent to this leading American journal, things he has seen with his own eyes.
7. I have narrated the information given to me verbally by M. Van der Velde himself. “I myself examined the bodies of a peasant and his son which have been cut to pieces by bayonet thrusts.”
8. While at first the reports of these atrocities were received in this country with some reserve, the accumulated and overwhelming evidence, aggravated from day to day since the very commencement of the war, has provoked the public men of England, and every responsible newspaper in the country, as well as all our leading weeklies like the Spectator, the Saturday Review, the Nation, the British Weekly, and others, into a passionate protest against the inhuman and barbarous methods of warfare that have stained the name of Germany for ever.
9. Germany herself has admitted her wanton deeds, and sought to excuse them in a way that makes her guilt all the more deplorable. We are told that these barbarian atrocities against the civil population and unoffending peasants, the sacking, looting, and burning of towns and villages, are part of the general plan of attack, and that they are accomplished in cold blood for purely strategical considerations. Unfortunately they are not merely the riotous and isolated outbursts of marauding and buccaneering soldiers.
“The only means of preventing surprise attacks from the civil population has been to interfere with unrelenting severity and to create examples which by their frightfulness would be a warning to the whole country.” To prevent “surprise attacks” tortures were inflicted on helpless old men, women, and children, peaceful villagers were hanged, innocent children were savagely sabred by German officers, wounded soldiers and officers shot and mutilated. There was the burning of Visé and the terrible massacre at Seraing, the sacking and plundering of many another harmless village, the bombardment of Malines, and the crowning sacrilege of all, the burning and sacking of Louvain, the torture and massacre of its defenceless people. Abler pens than mine have told the story of these blood-guilty ruffians, and abler historians will yet chronicle for future generations the record of the modern Huns of Attila. “For every vile deed wrought under the impious benedictions of the monarch who is ravaging Europe ample reparation will be exacted… The memory of them will burn in the heart and mind of every Englishman.” So said the Times. I affirm this is the feeling of every true Britisher.
VI
It is specially forbidden “To kill or wound an enemy who, having laid down his arms, or having no longer means of defence, has surrendered at discretion. To make improper use of a flag of truce, of the national flag, or of the military insignia and uniform of the enemy.” – Hague Convention, Article XXIII.
Wanton Brutality.
I have made it plain from the official documents I have quoted that the German troops violated every item of this article. But in addition to cases of brutality already cited in the official document, the Belgian Mission, while in London, gave me the following: —
On August 19th Aerschot, in North Brabant, with about five thousand inhabitants, was, as already reported, destroyed. It appears that during the three days the German soldiery massacred and pillaged the town, which had not resisted, although there was no military force there whatever.
In the neighbouring village of Diest many of the inhabitants were put to the sword. The wife of Francis Luyckx, aged forty-five, and her daughter, twelve years of age, had, in their terror, taken refuge in a sewer. They were discovered, dragged out, and shot.
The little daughter of Jean Oyyen, a pretty child of nine, was shot, and a man named Andre Willem, aged twenty-three, the village sexton, was bound to a tree and burned alive.
In the village of Schaffen, near Diest, two men, named Lodts and Marken, both aged forty, were captured and entombed. When exhumed, it was found that they had been buried alive, head downwards. These occurrences – which are only a few of a very long list – had been fully inquired into, and confirmed by the committee of investigation, which was composed of the highest magistrates of Belgium and the chief professors of the Universities.
Statements were made that aged villagers in many places on the Franco-German frontier were hanged to trees; others, after being killed, had their eyes gouged out. In one place fifteen bodies were found mutilated in a heap, and along the whole frontier from Luxemburg to Basle outrages were committed on women, girls, and children.
Mlle. Marie Malet, the daughter of a judicial official in Brussels, who had been sent to London with a party of Belgian girls for safety, stated that she had seen a little girl, a friend of hers, aged ten, savagely sabred by a German officer, merely because she made a remark that the Germans were bullies. The child died an hour afterwards. Mlle. Malet stated that she had been sent from near Brussels with her sister, owing to the insults to which Belgian girls were subjected by German soldiers. Her mother had been wounded and her home looted of food and valuables.
The record of German atrocities in Belgium, indeed, rivals that of Alva in the Netherlands in the sixteenth century. The worst Balkan methods were being pursued by the army of the pious Kaiser. At Pontillac, between Liége and Namur, the Burgomaster officially reported that the men of the 17th Hussars from Mecklenburg entered the place, met with no resistance, and demanded food, which the inhabitants at once gave them. After eating and drinking to their full, to the surprise of everyone they rode wildly through the streets emptying their carbines at the windows of the houses. Two Belgian soldiers who were secreted in the village returned their fire. A hot fusillade ensued, and then the Germans deliberately shot down all the villagers they could find. They also seized a M. Lahaye, a member of the Communal Council, and dragged him through the streets with a rope round his neck.
Drunken German Soldiers.
Further details regarding the wild savagery at Aerschot reached the Belgian Government after the issuing of the official report printed in the foregoing pages. It seems that the population of the Belgian provinces overrun by the Germans suffered, not only from the outrages of the troops acting under the orders of their officers, but also from atrocities due to drunken soldiers.
In one town some of them fired their rifles openly into the air and afterwards declared that the inhabitants had fired on them. On this pretext the people were dragged from their houses, which were then set on fire, and in many cases women and girls were outraged and the men shot. At Aerschot the troops – upon whom the Kaiser and the Austrian Emperor were beseeching God’s blessing – stabled their horses in the church, one of the most beautiful in Belgium, while the troops were set to work to destroy the pictures and fittings in the noble edifice. The Germans accused the son of the Burgomaster of killing the son of a German colonel. This was denied by the Burgomaster’s son, who only fired to defend his mother and sister from gross insults by the soldiery.
“For every evil and unwarrantable act committed in the Western theatre, ample vengeance will be exacted at the other end.” —Times.
The Germans, however, surrounded the town. The inhabitants were then dragged from their homes and the women separated from the men. The latter were divided into batches and forced to run towards the river, the troops laughing at them and firing at them as they ran. One man who escaped by feigning death afterwards returned and counted forty-one bodies of his friends. Many of them had been stabbed by bayonets after being wounded. About one hundred and fifty of the male inhabitants of this place were compelled to watch the German troops shoot the Burgomaster, his son, and the Burgomaster’s brother.
Women Mutilated.
Mr. Adolph Coussmaekrs, a well-known resident of Antwerp, wrote giving nine cases of atrocities committed by the Germans in the districts of Orsmael and Barchon.
I do not reproduce here the nine cases instanced by this gentleman. The wanton mutilation on women and children is revolting and seems incredible.
In addition, there were criminal assaults on women which I cannot dwell upon in these pages; they have been narrated by unimpeachable persons. Mothers had their daughters dragged away from them by shameless officers to a fate that must have driven them to despair. Women and young children were injured by bayonet-thrusts and revolver-shots, and were still suffering from their wounds.
“In no war of modern times has an enemy so distinguished himself by war on civilians as in this. The brutality of the methods employed by the Prussian apostles of ‘culture’ is only equalled by its futility.” —Daily Telegraph.
VII
300 Men Shot in Cold Blood
A terrible story of the holocaust at Liége was told to the correspondent of the Daily Mail by a wealthy Dutch cigarette manufacturer who had lived for a long time in Belgium, and was married to a Belgium woman. He stated that on the day of their entry the Germans posted an order on the streets that all arms in possession of private persons must be immediately delivered, under the threat of being shot. The inhabitants complied with the order. Among others, collections of old arms were brought, valued sometimes at hundreds of pounds. The new vandals destroyed all these pitilessly.
“During the first days the Germans paid for everything they took. But later on soldiers produced valueless pieces of paper, on which something had been scribbled which could hardly be read. On Sunday, August 23rd, at midnight, the inhabitants were suddenly awakened by soldiers knocking at the doors. ‘We need immediately two hundred and fifty mattresses, two hundred pounds of coffee, two hundred and fifty loaves of bread, and five hundred eggs,’ they said. ‘If these are not delivered in an hour’s time your hostages will be shot.’ Everybody rushed to the market-place, many people in their night clothes. There stood the mayor, half-dressed.
“After the inhabitants had brought in everything which was demanded they were informed that the whole was a mistake and that they could go to bed. The old mayor, however, was detained the whole night in the street.
“One day when the soldiers sat down to dinner, an alarm was suddenly beaten in the streets. Soldiers from all the houses were summoned to their regiments. Immediately after, the bombardment of the houses began. The informant took refuge with his wife and children in a cellar, which was constantly filled with smoke from the neighbouring houses, which had caught fire. On Wednesday morning the bombardment ceased and they ventured to the station.
“Here, notwithstanding his protests, and proposals to produce papers, showing that he was a Dutch subject, the cigarette manufacturer was separated from his family, of whom he has since lost sight. He was surrounded by soldiers, who bound his hands behind his back, and with other refugees he was kept at the station many hours. During this time he saw a party of three hundred Belgian civilians, among whom were old men and lads of fourteen or fifteen, driven at the point of the bayonet to a remote spot near the station, where they were all shot before his eyes.
“After a terrible night, he and his group of seventy-six men were set free. They had had nothing to eat or drink for thirty-six hours. All streets and roads in and round Liége were strewn, according to the witness, with bodies of men, women, and children. Among those shot were the mayor, two aldermen, the rector of the University, two deans, and many police inspectors.”
VIII
“Our German people will be the grand block on which the good God may complete His work of civilizing the world.”
From a speech of The Kaiser’s.
The Inferno at Visé
A correspondent of the Handelsblad was an eye-witness of the scenes in Visé, near Liége, when it was burned, and told a tale of German barbarity, and of the murder and torture of its helpless inhabitants, of a nature to make one’s blood run cold. As summarized in the Daily News the story is as follows: —
“It was an awful sight. Every house was a mass of flames, through which the streets were hardly visible.
“At the entrance of the Grand Hotel were three disarmed soldiers bound hand and foot. Entering the hotel, I found the floor covered with dead bodies. In that hall of the dead several soldiers stood guard. From this awful, nauseating scene I hurried back to the blinding glare and suffocating heat of the burning villages.
“The correspondent describes how a colleague supported an aged lady found lying near her blazing house. She pleaded, ‘Let me die.’ Poor, unhappy creature, bereft of home and even of adequate clothing, the aged and defenceless victim of the Kaiser’s gallant army! He adds: ‘We fled from the scene that must for ever blur the scutcheon of the Kaiser, and I pray as long as I live it will never be my task to see such an inferno again.’
“Absolutely incredible was the picture of incidents connected with the burning of Visé by the Germans and the shooting given in private letters which arrived from Eysden, on the Dutch frontier, and seen by the Telegraaf. According to these letters, the Germans alleged that the citizens had fired on the troops. All the inhabitants were then hunted out of their houses to spend the night in the square watching the burning. Men were taken prisoners, and possibly shot, and the rest were driven out of the town, which was given to the flames. Eysden is filled with refugees – one hundred and fifty in one canteen and two hundred and fifty in the Protestant Church, while four hundred have been sent to Maastricht.
“Two trainloads of refugees came into Brussels from the Tirlemont district. The scenes I have witnessed,” telegraphs a Press Association correspondent, “and the stories told by these poor people would melt a heart of stone. Removal from the face of the earth – a phrase of the German papers themselves – continues to be the invader’s idea of how best to deal with unarmed, unoffending villages, the only crime of whose people is that they have fallen in his path.
“The Germans entered Tirlemont, in the vicinity of which they have been for some days. They were in strong force, mostly cavalry and artillery. The big guns shelled the place, and the cavalry played at war by attacking the flying and panic-stricken populace, shooting and stabbing them at random.
“Never have I seen such a picture of woe as a peasant woman and five children who stood bewildered in the Place de la Gare here, all crying as if their hearts would break. It was a terrible story the woman had to tell. ‘They shot my husband before my eyes,’ she said, ‘and trampled two of my children to death.’
“A German knocked at the door of the house of the Burgomaster at Venne, near the Dutch frontier, and when the Burgomaster’s wife opened the door she was knocked down and killed with the butt end of a rifle.
“A solicitor, who was a member of the Belgian Chamber, and who was staying in the house, rushed to the front door, and he also was instantly knocked down and killed with a bayonet thrust. On hearing of these atrocities the population fled in terror.”
Lancer’s Fiendish Act.
M. Isadore Felix Cruls, a Belgian refugee who arrived in London, had a tragic story to tell. He carried on a prosperous printing business at Saint Jossé, a suburb of Brussels. When hostilities broke out he was called up for service in the Civil Guard, and stationed on the Chaussée de Louvain, the road between Louvain and Brussels. As reported in the Daily Telegraph, he stated: —
“At midnight on August 19th-20th I was on duty on the Chaussée de Louvain watching the refugees come in from the various towns and villages. The road was blocked when I got near. I saw that a party of German Lancers were at the rear of the procession of refugees. I saw one of the Lancers prodding a woman, who had four or five children walking by her side.
“There was an old woman, evidently the mother of the young woman, walking with them. One of the Lancers was amusing himself by pricking this old woman with his lance in order to make her walk along more quickly. The young woman turned round and shouted something at the Lancer, either by way of remonstrance or insult. I was not near enough to hear what she said. The Lancer took up his lance and ran it through one of the little girls who was walking along, clutching the hand of her mother. She was a fair-haired girl of about seven or eight years of age. When the crowd saw this they became infuriated, and a panic ensued. The Lancers bore down upon the people, scattering them in all directions. What became of these people I do not know.”
IX
The Maiden Tribute
Another story M. Cruls related was told to him by the mother herself. At a village called Leau a squadron of about five hundred Uhlans was marching through the town when they declared that someone had fired at them. On going round to all the houses, searching for firearms, they came to one where the family circle consisted of a grandfather, the father, mother, and a girl of seventeen or eighteen, and a young boy, who, upon seeing the approach of the German soldiers, fled and hid himself. The soldiers came in, and without any questioning fired at and killed the father. They were going to shoot the grandfather when the mother and daughter fell on their knees and begged the soldiers to spare the life of the old man. The officer, or under-officer, of the party then said, “Yes, we won’t trouble about the old people,” and touching the cheek of the young girl with his fingers, he added, with a significant laugh, “Pretty youth is better.” The sequel need not be written here, although the mother of the girl has told it.
A Governess Hanged.
A well-known family in Brussels were staying at their villa at Genck, about six kilometres from the capital. On arrival of the Germans there they entered the villa, smashed everything they could, and stole whatever was of value, “even taking away the wedding-ring that the husband wore on his finger.” They took away the men first, and nobody knows what has become of them. A member of the family and two servants fled from the house in terror, but returned when they saw the German soldiers going.
This is what they saw: “The body of an old lady of seventy years of age lying on the floor with her throat cut. A governess, about thirty years of age – I cannot tell you her nationality – was found hanging from a tree, stark naked and mutilated.”
Although this happened within six kilometres of Brussels, yet no atrocities were known to have been committed in the capital, the Kaiser’s unrestrained savages being there under the eyes of the representatives of the Powers.
A Dutch gentleman named Couzy, of Amsterdam, was staying at Mont, a village in the hills above Comblain au Pont, when war broke out. Having missed the last train which the Belgians ran to Dinant, he was obliged to return to Mont, where he witnessed the arrival of thousands of Uhlans and many batteries of German artillery. Mr. Couzy declared that the treatment of the Belgians by the enemy was merciless. He was witness of many horrible scenes. He was present when, after the discovery of the bodies of two German officers in a horse-dealer’s yard at Comblain au Pont, seventy villagers were brought before the commanding officer. Without question, the officer selected thirty, who were shot without any form of trial whatever. Several of these men were known to Mr. Couzy as honest and trustworthy citizens.
On another occasion a number of villagers were searched for weapons. A young Dutchman, also known to Mr. Couzy, had upon him a razor which he used daily. Immediately he was placed against a wall and shot.
A refugee arriving at Maastricht from Bassenge stated that ten thousand Germans came from the direction of Louvain, and began to burn everything that had been left standing and shoot everyone opposed to them. Two hundred of the villagers were driven out by the Germans and ordered to hold their hands above their heads. Anyone who dropped his hands for an instant was shot, and anyone who looked at or showed sympathy with the victims shared the same fate. They were marched for two hours, and during that time many shots whistled over their heads. The Germans then stopped and threatened that the first who looked back would be shot.
A Senator’s Story.
“M. Leon Hiard, senator of Hainaut, one of the largest manufacturers in Belgium, lived at Haine Saint Pierre, where before the battle of Mons the Germans requisitioned everything. He states that, revolver in hand, threatening death for unpunctuality or disobedience, the German officers spread terror into the hearts of the inhabitants. At Peronne the mayor, M. Gravis, had very imprudently caused all the arms of the inhabitants to be deposited at his house instead of the town-hall. He also carried a revolver, and some of his carts had been used to bar a road.” The Daily Express correspondent continues —
“He was taken before the German general at the town-hall with his secretary. The séance was short. ‘Vous fusillé,’ said the general, and the unfortunate man was led out blindfolded and shot. As the secretary was following him a more kindly officer said in his ear, ‘Mais filez-donc, imbécile,’ and pushed him on one side.
“The body of M. Gravis was propped up against a wall for forty-eight hours as an example to the town. Men were billeted in all the houses, and although in the better houses the officers behaved with some restraint, in the peasants’ cottages unbridled licence was the rule.
“Women were treated infamously, indescribable scenes of debauchery taking place, while all the possessions of the unfortunates were wilfully wasted and destroyed. The fiery-tempered people were being driven to reprisals, so that an excuse for further cruelty might be found.”
What General von Boehn said.
I take the following extract from a long dispatch in the Daily Chronicle, from Mr. E. Alexander Powell, the Special Correspondent of the New York World: —
“Three weeks ago the Government of Belgium requested me to place before the American people, through the medium of the New York World, a list of specific and authenticated atrocities committed by German armies upon Belgian non-combatants.
“To-day General von Boehn, commanding the Ninth Imperial Field Army, and acting as mouthpiece of the German General Staff, has asked me to place before the American people the German version of the incidents in question…
“General von Boehn began by asserting that the accounts of the atrocities perpetrated on Belgian non-combatants were a tissue of lies.
“ ‘Look at these officers about you,’ he said; ‘they are gentlemen like yourselves. Look at the soldiers marching past in the road out there. They are most of them the fathers of families. Surely you do not believe that they would do the things they have been accused of.’
“ ‘Three days ago, General,’ I said, ‘I was in Aerschot. The whole town is now but a ghastly, blackened, bloodstained ruin!’
“ ‘When we entered Aerschot,’ he replied, ‘the son of the Burgomaster came into the room, drew a revolver, and assassinated my Chief of Staff. What followed was only retribution. The townspeople only got what they deserved!’
“ ‘But why wreak your vengeance on women and children?’
“ ‘None have been killed,’ the General asserted positively.
“ ‘I’m sorry to contradict you, General,’ I asserted, with equal positiveness, ‘but I have myself seen their mutilated bodies. So has Mr. Gibson, Secretary of the American Legation at Brussels, who was present during the destruction of Louvain.’
“It is War!”
“ ‘Of course, there is always danger of women and children being killed during street fighting,’ said the General, ‘if they insist on coming into the street. It is unfortunate, but it is war.’
“ ‘But how about the woman whose body I saw with the hands and feet cut off? How about the white-haired man and his son whom I helped to bury outside of Sempst, and who had been killed merely because the retreating Belgians had shot a German soldier outside their house? There were 22 bayonet wounds in the old man’s face. I counted them. How about the little girl, two years old, shot while in her mother’s arms by a Uhlan, and whose funeral I attended at Heyst-op-den-Berg? How about the old man that was hung from the rafters of his house by the hands and roasted to death by a bonfire being built under him?’
“The General seemed somewhat taken aback by the amount and exactness of my data. ‘Such things are horrible if they are true,’ he said. ‘Of course, our soldiers, like soldiers in all armies, sometimes get out of hand, and do things which we would never tolerate if we knew it. At Louvain, for example, I sentenced two soldiers to 12 years’ penal servitude apiece for assaulting a woman.’
“ ‘Apropos of Louvain,’ I remarked, ‘why did you destroy the library? It was one of the literary store-houses of the world.’
“ ‘We regretted that as much as anyone else,’ answered the General. ‘It caught fire from the burning houses, and we could not save it.’
“ ‘But why did you burn Louvain at all?’ I asked.
“ ‘Because the townspeople fired on our troops. We actually found machine-guns in some of the houses; and,’ smashing his fist down upon the table, ‘whenever civilians fire upon our troops we will teach them a lasting lesson. If the women and children insist on getting in the way of bullets, so much the worse for women and children.’
“ ‘How do you explain the bombardment of Antwerp by Zeppelins?’ I queried.
“ ‘The Zeppelins have orders to drop their bombs only on fortifications and soldiers,’ he answered.
“ ‘As a matter of fact,’ I remarked, ‘they destroyed only private houses and innocent civilians, several of them women. If one of those bombs had dropped 200 yards nearer my hotel I wouldn’t be smoking one of your excellent cigars to-day.’
“ ‘That is a calamity which, thank God, didn’t happen,’ he replied.
“ ‘If you feel for my safety as deeply as that, General,’ I said earnestly, ‘you can make quite sure of my coming to no harm by sending no more Zeppelins.’
“ ‘Well, Herr Powell,’ said he, laughing, ‘we will think about it, and,’ he continued gravely, ‘I trust that you will tell the American people through your great paper what I have told you to-day. Let them hear our side of this atrocity business. It is only justice that they should be made familiar with both sides of the question.’
“I have quoted my conversation with General von Boehn as nearly verbatim as I can remember it. I have no comments to make.
“I will leave it to the readers of the World to decide for themselves just how convincing are the answers of the German General to the Belgian accusations.”
“We cannot doubt their (the Belgian Commission) competency for the task entrusted to them; nor can we mistrust their good faith. And of what nature is the story which their report, item by item, unrolls? They recount a series of acts committed by the German soldiery which, if even a half or a quarter be true, are enough to condemn them to everlasting shame as barbarians grosser and more criminal than Huns or Visigoths, or the hordes led by Yenghis Khan or Tamerlane the Great.”
– From the Daily Telegraph.
