Читать книгу German Atrocities. A Record of Shameless Deeds - Le Queux William - Страница 5

Our own Press Bureau issued on the 25th August the following statement to the English Press: —

“The Belgian Minister has made the following statement: —

“In spite of solemn assurances of good will and long-standing treaty obligations, Germany has made a sudden savage and utterly unwarranted attack on Belgium.

“However sorely pressed she may be, Belgium will never fight unfairly and never stoop to infringe the laws and customs of legitimate warfare. She is putting up a brave fight against overwhelming odds; she may be beaten, she may be crushed, but, to quote our noble King’s words, ‘She will never be enslaved.’

“When German troops invaded our country, the Belgian Government issued public statements, which were placarded in every town, village, and hamlet, warning all civilians to abstain scrupulously from hostile acts against the enemy’s troops. The Belgian Press daily published similar notices broadcast through the land. Nevertheless, the German authorities have issued lately statements containing grave imputations against the attitude of the Belgian civilian population, threatening us at the same time with dire reprisals. These imputations are contrary to the real facts of the case, and as to threats of further vengeance, no menace of odious reprisals on the part of the German troops will deter the Belgian Government from protesting before the civilized world against the fearful and atrocious crimes committed wilfully and deliberately by the invading hosts against helpless non-combatants, old men, women, and children.

“Long is the list of outrages committed by the German troops and appalling the details of atrocities, as vouched for by the Committee of Inquiry recently formed by the Belgian Minister of Justice and presided over by him. This committee comprises the highest judicial and University authorities of Belgium, such as Chief Justice Van Iseghem, Judge Nys, Professors Cottier, Wodon, etc.

“The following instances and particulars have been established by careful investigations, based in each case on the evidence of reliable eye-witnesses: —

“German cavalry occupying the village of Linsmeau were attacked by some Belgian infantry and two gendarmes. A German officer was killed by our troops during the fight and subsequently buried at the request of the Belgian officer in command. No one of the civilian population took part in the fighting at Linsmeau. Nevertheless, the village was invaded at dusk on August 10th by a strong force of German cavalry, artillery, and machine guns.

“In spite of the formal assurances given by the Burgomaster of Linsmeau that none of the peasants had taken part in the previous fight, two farms and six outlying houses were destroyed by gun fire and burnt. All the male inhabitants were then compelled to come forward and hand over whatever arms they possessed. No recently discharged firearms were found.

“Nevertheless, the invaders divided these peasants into three groups; those in one group were bound, and eleven of them placed in a ditch, where they were afterwards found dead, their skulls fractured by the butts of German rifles.

“During the night of August 10th German cavalry entered Velm in great numbers. The inhabitants were asleep. The Germans, without provocation, fired on M. Deglimme Gevers’ house, broke into it, destroyed furniture, looted money, burnt barns, hay and corn stacks, farm implements, six oxen, and the contents of the farmyard. They carried off Mrs. Deglimme, half naked, to a place two miles away. She was then let go, and was fired upon as she fled, without being hit. Her husband was carried away in another direction and fired upon. He is dying. The same troops sacked and burned the house of a railway watchman.

“Farmer Jef Dierick, of Neerhespen, bears witness to the following acts of cruelty committed by German cavalry at Orsmael and Neerhespen on August 10th, 11th, and 12th: —

“An old man of the latter village had his arm sliced in three longitudinal cuts; he was then hanged head downwards and burned alive. Young girls have been raped and little children outraged at Orsmael, where several inhabitants suffered mutilations too horrible to describe. A Belgian soldier belonging to a battalion of cyclist carabiniers, who had been wounded and made prisoner, was hanged; whilst another, who was tending his comrade, was bound to a telegraph pole on the St. Trond road and shot.

“On Wednesday, August 12th, after an engagement at Haelen, Commandant Van Damme, so severely wounded that he was lying prone on his back, was finally murdered by German infantrymen firing their revolvers into his mouth.

“On Monday, August 10th, at Orsmael, the Germans picked up Commandant Knapen, very seriously wounded, propped him up against a tree, and shot him. Finally they hacked his corpse with swords.

“In different places, notably at Hollogue sur Geer, Barchon, Pontisse, Haelen, and Zelck, German troops have fired on doctors, ambulance bearers, ambulances, and ambulance wagons carrying the Red Cross.

“At Boncelles a body of German troops marched into battle carrying a Belgian flag.

WHY THE GERMANS COMMIT ATROCITIES

“True strategy consists in hitting your enemy, and hitting him hard. Above all you must inflict on the inhabitants of invaded towns the maximum of suffering, so that they may become sick of the struggle and may bring pressure to bear on their Government to discontinue it. You must leave the people through whom you march only their eyes to weep with.

“In every case the principle which guided our general was that war must be made terrible to the civil population, so that it may sue for peace.”

BISMARCK.

“On Thursday, August 6th, before a fort at Liége, German soldiers continued to fire on a party of Belgian soldiers (who were unarmed, and had been surrounded while digging a trench) after these had hoisted the white flag.

“On the same day, at Vottem, near the fort of Loncin, a group of German infantry hoisted the white flag. When Belgian soldiers approached to take them prisoners the Germans suddenly opened fire on them at close range.

“Harrowing reports of German savagery at Aerschot have reached the Belgian Government at Antwerp from official local sources. Thus on Tuesday, August 18th, the Belgian troops occupying a position in front of Aerschot received orders to retire without engaging the enemy. A small force was left behind to cover the retreat. This force resisted valiantly against overwhelming German forces, and inflicted serious losses on them. Meanwhile, practically the whole civilian population of Aerschot, terrorized by the atrocities committed by the Germans in the neighbouring villages, had fled from the town.

“Next day, Wednesday, August 19th, German troops entered Aerschot, without a shot having been fired from the town and without any resistance whatever having been made. The few inhabitants that remained had closed their doors and windows in compliance with the general orders issued by the Belgian Government. Nevertheless, the Germans broke into the houses and told the inhabitants to quit.

“In one single street the first six male inhabitants who crossed their thresholds were seized and shot at once, under the very eyes of their wives and children.

“The German troops then retired for the day, only to return in greater numbers on the next day, Thursday, August 20th.

“They then compelled the inhabitants to leave their houses and marched them to a place two hundred yards from the town. There, without more ado, they shot M. Thielemans, the Burgomaster, his fifteen-year-old son, the clerk of the local judicial board, and ten prominent citizens. They then set fire to the town and destroyed it.

“The following statement was made by Commandant Georges Gilson, of the 9th Infantry of the Line, now lying in hospital at Antwerp: —

“I was told to cover the retreat of our troops in front of Aerschot. During the action fought there on Wednesday, August 19th, between six and eight o’clock in the morning, suddenly I saw on the high road, between the German and Belgian forces, which were fighting at close range, a group of four women, with babies in their arms, and two little girls clinging to their skirts. Our men stopped firing till the women got through our lines, but the German machine guns went on firing all the time, and one of the women was wounded in the arm.

“These women could not have got through the neighbouring German lines and been on the high road unless with the consent of the enemy.

“All the evidence and circumstances seem to point to the fact that these women had been deliberately pushed forward by the Germans to act as a shield for their advance guard, and in the hope that the Belgians would cease firing for fear of killing the women and children.

“This statement was made and duly certified in the Antwerp hospital on August 22nd by Commandant Gilson in the presence of the Chevalier Ernst N. Bunswyck, Chief Secretary to the Belgian Minister of Justice, and M. de Cartier de Marchienne, Belgian Minister to China.

“Further German atrocities were continuously being brought to notice and made the subject of official and expert inquiry by the proper authorities.

“In publishing the above statements the only comment the Press Bureau can offer is, that these atrocities appear to be committed in villages and throughout the countryside with the deliberate intention of terrorizing the people, and so making it unnecessary to leave troops in occupation of small places, or to protect lines of communication. In larger places, like Brussels, where the diplomatic representatives of neutral Powers are eye-witnesses, there appear to have been no excesses.”

Such was the document issued by the Press Bureau. I have quoted it word for word (emphasizing only in italics or in heavy type certain passages).

PRIMITIVE SAVAGERY

“Their utter contempt for the established usages of international intercourse, and even for the ordinary decencies of life, was displayed in their brutal treatment of the French and Russian Ambassadors, in the stripping naked of the wives of Russian officials, in the atrocities they have since committed in Belgium, in their seizure of hostages, in their homicidal mine-laying in the North Sea. In all these matters one seems to discern a sudden lapse into primitive savagery.”

– Dr. Dillon in the Contemporary Review.