Читать книгу German Atrocities: An Official Investigation - J. H. Morgan - Страница 19

Never since the Day of Pentecost was there such a confusion of tongues. One witness labours to prove that no executions took place without a most decorous court-martial in the station square, the same soldier combining apparently the office of prosecutor and judge (D 38); another says that of “a crowd” of persons taken out of a house, the males were “immediately shot” (D 44); yet a third says that a body of hostages were placed in front of a machine-gun with an intimation that they would be shot as a matter of course if there were any more disturbance (D 37). It is admitted that a hundred civilians were shot, “including ten or fifteen priests” (D 38). One German witness says it is all the fault of the priests (D 38); another says it’s the fault of the Garde Civique (D 45)—both being apparently at some pains to exculpate the unhappy civilians. The quality of the evidence against the priests (and the civil population) may be gathered from the following deposition (D 42) of Captain Hermansen. He interviewed a priest who, he says, had behaved well on one occasion:

“I rejoined that if his clerical brethren had acted in that [the same] manner, the Belgians and we would have been spared many unpleasant experiences. He did not contradict me.”—(D 42.)

In witness whereof Captain von Vethacke comes forward and says:

“In so far as priests were shot they too had been found guilty by the court. I came to know the priest mentioned by Captain Hermansen at the end of his declaration. He made an excellent impression on me also; and he did not contradict me either, when I expressed to him my opinion that certain of the clergy had stirred up the people and taken part in the attack.”—(D 43.)

Truly, a remarkable example of the argumentum ab silentio! Perhaps the unfortunate priest remembered what happened to Faithful when he contradicted Chief Justice Hategood.

All the evidence adduced, where it is not that of the German soldiers, is of this character. It is all hearsay, the Belgian witnesses quoted are invariably anonymous, and there are only five of them at that (D 30, 34, 37, 38, 42). At Bueken “the clergymen” are accused of having incited the population to attack the German troops. The proof adduced is that the priest “left the church” when the firing began!