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The second chapter of this book has already appeared in the pages of the June issue of the Nineteenth Century and After. At the time of its appearance numerous suggestions were made—notably by the Morning Post and the Daily Chronicle—that it should be republished in a cheaper and more accessible form. A similar suggestion has come to us from the Ministry of War in Paris, reinforced by the intimation that the review containing the article was not obtainable owing to its having immediately gone out of print. Since then an official reprint has been largely circulated in neutral countries by the British Government, and an abbreviated reprint of it has been published by the Parliamentary Recruiting Committee in the form of a pamphlet. The Secretary to the Committee informs me that considerably over a million and a half copies of this pamphlet have been circulated.

At the suggestion of Mr. Fisher Unwin, and by the courtesy of the editor of the Nineteenth Century, the article is now republished as a whole, but with it is published for the first time a documentary chapter containing a selection of illustrative documents, none of which have hitherto appeared in print. For permission to publish them I am chiefly indebted to the Home Office and the Foreign Office. Needless to say, the original article also was submitted to the Home Office authorities, by whom it was duly read and approved before publication. These documents by no means exhaust the unpublished evidence in my possession, but my object has been not to multiply proofs but to exemplify them, and, in particular, as is explained in the following chapter, to supplement the Bryce Report on matters which, owing to the exigencies of space and the pre-occupation with the case of Belgium, occupy a comparatively subordinate place in that document. This volume may, in fact, be regarded as a postscript to the Bryce Report—it does not pretend to be anything more.1

There is, however, an extremely important aspect of the question which has not yet been the subject of an official report in this country, and that is the German White Book.2 It has never been published in England, and is very difficult to obtain. There is some reason to believe that the German Government now entertain considerable misgivings about the expediency of its original publication, and are none too anxious to circulate it. The reason will, I think, be tolerably obvious to anyone who will do me the honour to read the critical analysis which follows.

I will not attempt to prejudice that analysis at this stage. I shall have something to say later in this chapter as to the credibility of the German Government in these matters. It is a rule of law that, when a defendant puts his character in issue, or makes imputations on the prosecutor or his witnesses, as the Germans have done, his character may legitimately be the subject of animadversion. To impeach it at this stage might appear, however, to beg the question of the value of the White Book, which is best examined as a matter of internal evidence without the importation of any reflections on the character of its authors.

As regards the value of the evidence on the other side—the English, Belgian, and French Reports—I doubt if any careful reader requires persuasion as to their authenticity. In the case of the Bryce Report, the studied sobriety of its tone—to say nothing of the known integrity and judiciousness of its authors—carried instant conviction to the minds of all honest and thoughtful men, and that conviction was assuredly not disturbed by the vituperative description of it by the Kölnische Zeitung as a “mean collection of official lies.” No attempt has ever been made to answer it. As regards the French Reports, which are not as fully known in this country as they might be,3 I had the honour of working in collaboration with M. Mollard, a member of the French Commission of Inquiry, and I was greatly impressed with their scrupulous regard for truth, and their inflexible insistence on corroboration. My own methods of inquiry are sufficiently indicated in the chapter which follows, but I may add two illustrations of what, I think, may fairly be described as the scrupulousness with which the inquiries at General Headquarters were conducted. The reader may remember that in May of last year a report as to the crucifixion of two Canadian soldiers obtained wide currency in this country. A Staff officer and myself immediately instituted inquiries by means of a visit to the Canadian Headquarters, at that time situated in the neighbourhood of Ypres, and by the cross-examination of wounded Canadians on the way to the base. We found that this atrocity was a matter of common belief among the Canadian soldiers, and at times we seemed to be on a hot scent, but eventually we failed to discover any one who had been an actual eye-witness of the atrocity in question. It may or may not have occurred—we have had irrefragable proof that such things have occurred—and it is conceivable that those who saw it had perished and their testimony with them. But it was felt that mere hearsay evidence, however strong, was not admissible, and, as a result, no report was ever issued.

In the other case a man in a Highland regiment, on discovering himself in hospital in the company of a wounded Prussian, attempted to assault the latter, swearing that he had seen him bayoneting a wounded British soldier as he lay helpless upon the field. He was positive as to the identification and there could be no doubt as to the sincerity of his statements. But as one Prussian Guardsman is very like another—the facial and cranial uniformity is remarkable—and there was no corroboration as to identity, no action was taken. As to the fact of the atrocity having occurred there could, however, be no doubt.

I may add that the numerous British officers whom I interrogated in the earlier stages of the war showed a marked disinclination—innate, I think, in the British character—to believe stories reflecting upon the honour of the foe to whom they were opposed in the field. But at a later stage I found that this indulgent scepticism had wholly disappeared. Facts had been too intractable, experience too harsh, disillusion too bitter. The lesson has been dearly learnt—many a brave and chivalrous officer has owed his death to the treachery of a mean and unscrupulous foe. But it has been learnt once and for all. And, indeed, judging by the information which reaches me from various sources, the enemy affords our men no chance of forgetting it.