diff options
| author | nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> | 2025-02-07 15:28:41 -0800 |
|---|---|---|
| committer | nfenwick <nfenwick@pglaf.org> | 2025-02-07 15:28:41 -0800 |
| commit | 3c3239eab0171b6230e1ee67c6646a86693c23dd (patch) | |
| tree | 07a5e41e85a5c4c5ae6f9c06ec84256fff9f6791 | |
| parent | 922ee25289c3cab17c23394cb472105f0b8d6d8a (diff) | |
76 files changed, 17 insertions, 21950 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..5d9d0db --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #55503 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/55503) diff --git a/old/55503-0.txt b/old/55503-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 7428aae..0000000 --- a/old/55503-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,9404 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Horrors and Atrocities of the Great War, by -Logan Marshall and Gilbert Parker and Vance Thompson and Philip Gibbs - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license - - -Title: Horrors and Atrocities of the Great War - Including the Tragic Destruction of the Lusitania - -Author: Logan Marshall - Gilbert Parker - Vance Thompson - Philip Gibbs - -Release Date: September 7, 2017 [EBook #55503] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HORRORS AND ATROCITIES *** - - - - -Produced by Brian Coe, Harry Lamé, Hathi Trust (for some -illustrations) and the Online Distributed Proofreading -Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from -images generously made available by The Internet Archive) - - - - - - - - Transcriber’s Notes - - The following transcription has been used: _text_ represents italics - text in the source document, ~text~ underlined text, ^text^ - blackletter, and =text= bold face text. Small capitals have been - replaced by ALL CAPITALS. - - More Transcriber’s Notes may be found at the end of this text. - - - - -[Illustration: MERCILESS MONSTER OF THE DEEP. - -The murderous German submarine sighting its prey. Sinking under water it -launched the fatal torpedo and its helpless victim, crowded with -innocent men, women and children, was doomed.] - - - - - =~HORRORS AND ATROCITIES - OF THE GREAT WAR~= - - =Including the Tragic Destruction of the Lusitania= - - =A NEW KIND OF WARFARE= - ----COMPRISING---- - The Desolation of Belgium, the Sacking of Louvain, the Shelling of - Defenseless Cities, the Wanton Destruction of Cathedrals and Works of - Art, the Horrors of Bomb Dropping - ----VIVIDLY PORTRAYING---- - The Grim Awfulness of this Greatest of All Wars Fought on Land and - Sea, in the Air and Under the Waves, Leaving in Its Wake a Dreadful - Trail of Famine and Pestilence - - =By LOGAN MARSHALL= - Author of “The Sinking of the Titanic,” “Myths and - Legends of All Nations,” etc. - - With Special Chapters by - - =SIR GILBERT PARKER= - Author of “The Right of Way” - - =VANCE THOMPSON= - Author of “Spinners of Life” - - =PHILIP GIBBS= - Author of “The Street of Adventure,” Special - Correspondent on _The London Daily Chronicle_. - - ^=Illustrated=^ - - - COPYRIGHT 1915 - By L. T. MYERS - - - - -INTRODUCTION - -“_Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my -brethren, ye have done it unto me._”--JESUS OF NAZARETH - - -The sight of all Europe engaged in the most terrific conflict in the -history of mankind is a heartrending spectacle. On the east, on the -south and on the west the blood-lust leaders have flung their deluded -millions upon unbending lines of steel, martyrs to the glorification of -Mars. - -We see millions of men taken from their homes, their shops and their -factories; we see them equipped and organized and mobilized for the -express purpose of devastating the homes of other men; we see them -making wreckage of property; we see them wasting, with fire and sword, -the accumulated efforts of generations in the field of things material; -we see the commerce of the world brought to a standstill, all its -transportation systems interrupted, and, still worse, the amenities of -life so placed in jeopardy for long generations to come that the -progress of the world is halted, its material and physical progress -turned to retrogression. - - “_Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my - brethren, ye have done it unto me!_” - -But this is not the worst. We see myriads of men banded together to -practice open violation of the very fundamental tenets of humanity; we -see the worst passions of mankind, murder, theft, lust, arson, -pillage--all the baser possibilities of human nature--coming to the -surface. Outside of the natural killing of war, hundreds of men have -been murdered, often with incidents of the most revolting brutality; -children have been slaughtered; women have been outraged, killed and -shamefully mutilated. And this we see among peoples who have no possible -cause for personal quarrel. - - “_Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my - brethren, ye have done it unto me!_” - -To all human beings of normal mentality it must have seemed that the -destruction of the Lusitania marked the apex of horror. There is, -indeed, nothing in modern history--nothing, at least, since the Black -Hole of Calcutta and some of the indescribable atrocities of Kurdish -fanatics--to supply the mind with a vantage ground from which to measure -the causeless and profitless savagery of this black deed of murder. - -To talk of “warning” having been given on the day the Lusitania sailed -is puerile. So does the Black Hand send its warnings. So does Jack the -Ripper write his defiant letters to the police. Nothing of this prevents -us from regarding such miscreants as wild beasts, against whom society -has to defend itself at all hazards. - -There are many reasons but not a single excuse for the war. When a man, -or a nation, wants what a rival holds and makes a violent effort to -enter into possession thereof, right and conscience and duty before God -and to one’s neighbor are forgotten in the struggle. Man reverts to the -brute. Loose rein is given to passion, and the worst appears. The fair -edifice of sobriety and amity and just dealing between man and man, -upreared by civilization in centuries of travail, is rent asunder, stone -from stone. The inner shrine of the inalienable sense of human -brotherhood is profaned. One cannot reconcile with any program for the -lasting accomplishment of good and the victory of the truth, this fever -of murder on a grand scale, this insensate madness of pillage and -slaughter that goes from alarum and counter-alarum to overt acts of -fiendish and sickening brutality, palliated because they are done by -anonymous thousands instead of by one man who can be named. - - “_Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my - brethren, ye have done it unto me!_” - -It is civilization that is being shot down by machine guns in Europe. -That great German host is not made up of mercenaries, nor of the type of -men that at one time composed armies. There are Ehrlichs serving as -privates in the ranks and in the French corps are Rostands. A bullet -does not kill a man; it destroys a generation of learning, annihilates -the mentality which was about to be humanity’s instrument in unearthing -another of nature’s secrets. The very vehicles of progress are the -victims. It will take years to train their equals, decades perhaps to -reproduce the intelligence that was ripe to do its work. The chances of -the acquisition of knowledge are being sacrificed. Far more than half of -the learning on which the world depends for progress is turned from -laboratories and workshops into the destructive arenas of battle. - -It is indeed a war against civilization. The personnel of the armies -makes it so. Every battle is the sacrifice of human assets that cannot -be replaced. That is the real tragedy of this stupendous conflict. - -Perhaps it is better that the inevitable has come so soon. The burden of -preparation was beginning to stagger Europe. There may emerge from the -whirlpool new dynasties, new methods, new purposes. This may be the -furnace necessary to purge humanity of its brutal perspective. The -French Revolution gave an impulse to democracy which it has never lost. -This conflict may teach men the folly of dying for trade or avarice. But -whatever it does, it is not too much to hope that the capital and energy -of humanity will become again manifest in justice and moral achievement, -until the place of a nation on the map becomes absolutely subordinate to -the place it occupies in the uplift of humanity. - - - - -CONTENTS - - - PAGE - INTRODUCTION 3 - I. THE SUPREME CRIME AGAINST CIVILIZATION: THE TRAGIC - DESTRUCTION OF THE LUSITANIA 9 - II. THE HEROES OF THE LUSITANIA AND THEIR HEROISM 22 - III. SOUL-STIRRING STORIES OF SURVIVORS OF THE LUSITANIA 34 - IV. A CANADIAN’S ACCOUNT OF THE LUSITANIA HORROR 50 - V. THE PLOT AGAINST THE RESCUE SHIPS 55 - VI. BRITISH JURY FINDS KAISER A MURDERER 61 - VII. THE WORLD-WIDE INDICTMENT OF GERMANY FOR THE LUSITANIA - ATROCITY 69 - VIII. AMERICA’S PROTEST AGAINST UNCIVILIZED WARFARE 81 - IX. THE GERMAN DEFENSE FOR THE DESTRUCTION OF THE LUSITANIA 91 - X. SWIFT REVERSAL TO BARBARISM 101 - By Vance Thompson, American Author and Journalist. - XI. BELGIUM’S BITTER NEED 112 - By Sir Gilbert Parker, M.P., British Novelist. - XII. JAMES BRYCE’S REPORT ON SYSTEMATIC MASSACRE IN BELGIUM 121 - XIII. A BELGIAN BOY’S STORY OF THE RUIN OF AERSCHOT 137 - XIV. THE UNSPEAKABLE ATROCITIES OF “CIVILIZED WARFARE” 144 - XV. DESTROYING THE PRICELESS MONUMENTS OF CIVILIZATION 159 - XVI. WANTON DESTRUCTION OF THE BEAUTIFUL CATHEDRAL OF RHEIMS 169 - XVII. CANADIANS’ GLORIOUS FEAT AT LANGEMARCK 177 - XVIII. PITIFUL FLIGHT OF A MILLION WOMEN 195 - By Philip Gibbs, English Author and Journalist. - XIX. FACING DEATH IN THE TRENCHES 207 - XX. A VIVID PICTURE OF WAR 221 - XXI. HARROWING SCENES ALONG THE BATTLE LINES 228 - XXII. WHAT THE MEN IN THE TRENCHES WRITE HOME 234 - XXIII. BOMBARDING UNDEFENDED CITIES 240 - XXIV. GERMANY’S FATAL WAR ZONE 246 - XXV. MULTITUDINOUS TRAGEDIES AT SEA 251 - XXVI. HOW “NEUTRAL” WATERS ARE VIOLATED 255 - XXVII. THE TERRIBLE DISTRESS OF POLAND 259 - XXVIII. THE GHASTLY HAVOC WROUGHT BY THE AIR-DEMONS 267 - XXIX. THE DEADLY SUBMARINE AND ITS STEALTHY DESTRUCTION 273 - XXX. THE TERRIBLE WORK OF ARTILLERY IN WAR 280 - XXXI. WHOLESALE SLAUGHTER BY POISONOUS GASES 286 - XXXII. “USAGES OF WAR ON LAND”: THE OFFICIAL GERMAN MANUAL 294 - XXXIII. THE SACRIFICE OF THE HORSE IN WARFARE 299 - XXXIV. SCOURGES THAT FOLLOW IN THE WAKE OF BATTLE 303 - XXXV. WAR’S REPAIR SHOP: CARING FOR THE WOUNDED 308 - XXXVI. WHAT WILL THE HORRORS AND ATROCITIES OF THE GREAT WAR - LEAD TO? 314 - -[Illustration: THE GIANT STEAMSHIP “LUSITANIA” TORPEDOED BY THE GERMANS -OFF THE COAST OF IRELAND. - -The English Cunarder, “Lusitania,” one of the largest and fastest -passenger vessels in the world, was torpedoed and sunk by a German -submarine in a few minutes with the loss of two-thirds of her passengers -and crew, among whom were more than one hundred American citizens. The -vessel was entirely unarmed and a noncombatant. (_Copyright by Underwood -and Underwood._)] - -[Illustration: THE GERMAN SUBMARINE AND HOW IT WORKS. - -Upper left picture shows a section at center of the vessel. Upper right -view shows the submarine at the surface with two torpedo tubes visible -at the stern. The large picture illustrates how this monster attacks a -vessel like the Lusitania by launching a torpedo beneath the water while -securing its observation through the periscope, just above the waves.] - - - - -CHAPTER I - -THE SUPREME CRIME AGAINST CIVILIZATION: THE TRAGIC DESTRUCTION OF THE -LUSITANIA - - AN UNPRECEDENTED CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY -- THE LUSITANIA: BUILT FOR - SAFETY -- GERMANY’S ANNOUNCED INTENTION TO SINK THE VESSEL -- LINER’S - SPEED INCREASED AS DANGER NEARED -- SUBMARINE’S PERISCOPE DIPS UNDER - SURFACE -- PASSENGERS OVERCOME BY POISONOUS FUMES -- BOAT CAPSIZES - WITH WOMEN AND CHILDREN -- HUNDREDS JUMP INTO THE SEA -- THE LUSITANIA - GOES TO HER DOOM -- INTERVIEW WITH CAPTAIN TURNER. - - -No thinking man--whether he believes or disbelieves in war--expects to -have war without the horrors and atrocities which accompany it. That -“war is hell” is as true now as when General Sherman so pronounced it. -It seems, indeed, to be truer today. And yet we have always -thought--perhaps because we hoped--that there was a limit at which even -war, with all its lust of blood, with all its passion of hatred, with -all its devilish zest for efficiency in the destruction of human life, -would stop. - -Now we know that there is no limit at which the makers of war, in their -frenzy to pile horror on horror, and atrocity on atrocity, will stop. We -have seen a nation despoiled and raped because it resisted an invader, -and we said that was war. But now out of the sun-lit waves has come a -venomous instrument of destruction, and without warning, without respite -for escape, has sent headlong to the bottom of the everlasting sea more -than a thousand unarmed, unresisting, peace-bent men, women and -children--even babes in arms. So the Lusitania was sunk. It may be war, -but it is something incalculably more sobering than merely that. It is -the difference between assassination and massacre. It is war’s supreme -crime against civilization. - - -AN UNPRECEDENTED CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY - -The horror of the deadly assault on the Lusitania does not lessen as the -first shock of the disaster recedes into the past. The world is aghast. -It had not taken the German threat at full value; it did not believe -that any civilized nation would be so wanton in its lust and passion of -war as to count a thousand non-combatant lives a mere unfortunate -incidental of the carnage. - -Nothing that can be said in mitigation of the destruction of the -Lusitania can alter the fact that an outrage unknown heretofore in the -warfare of civilized nations has been committed. Regardless of the -technicalities which may be offered as a defense in international law, -there are rights which must be asserted, must be defended and -maintained. If international law can be torn to shreds and converted -into scrap paper to serve the necessities of war, its obstructive letter -can be disregarded when it is necessary to serve the rights of -humanity. - -[Illustration: THE TRIUMPH OF HATE.] - - -THE LUSITANIA: BUILT FOR “SAFETY” - -The irony of the situation lies in the fact that from the ghastly -experience of great marine disasters the Lusitania was evolved as a -vessel that was “safe.” No such calamity as the attack of a torpedo was -foreseen by the builders of the giant ship, and yet, even after the -outbreak of the European war, and when upon the eve of her last voyage -the warning came that an attempt would be made to torpedo the Lusitania, -her owners confidently assured the world that the ship was safe because -her great speed would enable her to outstrip any submarine ever built. - -Limitation of language makes adequate word description of this mammoth -Cunarder impossible. The following figures show its immense dimensions: -Length, 790 feet; breadth, 88 feet; depth, to boat deck, 80 feet; -draught, fully loaded, 37 feet, 6 inches; displacement on load line, -45,000 tons; height to top of funnels, 155 feet; height to mastheads, -216 feet. The hull below draught line was divided into 175 water-tight -compartments, which made it--so the owners claimed--“unsinkable.” With -complete safety device equipment, including wireless telegraph, -Mundy-Gray improved method of submarine signaling, and with officers and -crew all trained and reliable men, the Lusitania was acclaimed as being -unexcelled from a standpoint of safety, as in all other respects. - -Size, however, was its least remarkable feature. The ship was propelled -by four screws rotated by turbine engines of 68,000 horse-power, capable -of developing a sea speed of more than twenty-five knots per hour -regardless of weather conditions, and of maintaining without driving a -schedule with the regularity of a railroad train, and thus establishing -its right to the title of “the fastest ocean greyhound.” - - -GERMANY’S ANNOUNCED INTENTION TO SINK THE VESSEL - -On Saturday May 1, 1915, the day on which the Cunard liner Lusitania, -carrying 2,000 passengers and crew, sailed from New York for Liverpool, -the following advertisement, over the name of the Imperial German -Embassy, was published in the leading newspapers of the United States: - - NOTICE! - - TRAVELERS intending to embark on the Atlantic voyage are reminded that - a state of war exists between Germany and her allies and Great Britain - and her allies; that the zone of war includes the waters adjacent to - the British Isles; that, in accordance with formal notice given by the - Imperial German Government, vessels flying the flag of Great Britain, - or of any of her allies, are liable to destruction in those waters and - that travelers sailing in the war zone on ships of Great Britain or - her allies do so at their own risk. - - IMPERIAL GERMAN EMBASSY. - WASHINGTON, D. C., April 22, 1915. - -The advertisement was commented upon by the passengers of the Lusitania, -but it did not cause any of them to cancel their bookings. No one took -the matter seriously. It was not conceivable that even the German -military lords could seriously plot so dastardly an attack on -non-combatants. - -When the attention of Captain W. T. Turner, commander of the Lusitania, -was called to the warning, he laughed and said: “It doesn’t seem as if -they had scared many people from going on the ship by the looks of the -passenger list.” - -Agents of the Cunard Line said there was no truth in reports that -several prominent passengers had received anonymous telegrams warning -them not to sail on the Lusitania. Charles T. Bowring, president of the -St. George’s Society, who was a passenger, said that it was a silly -performance for the German Embassy to do. - -Charles Klein, the American playwright, said he was going to devote his -time on the voyage to thinking of his new play, “Potash and Perlmutter -in Society,” and would not have time to worry about trifles. - -Alfred G. Vanderbilt was one of the last to go on board. - -Elbert Hubbard, publisher of the Philistine, who sailed with his wife, -said he believed the German Emperor had ordered the advertisement to be -placed in the newspapers, and added jokingly that if he was on board the -liner when she was torpedoed, he would be able to do the Kaiser justice -in the Philistine. - -The early days of the voyage were unmarked by incidents other than those -which have interested ocean passengers on countless previous trips, and -little apprehension was felt by those on the Lusitania of the fate which -lay ahead of the vessel. - -The ship was proceeding at a moderate speed, on Friday, May 7, when she -passed Fastnet Light, off Cape Clear, the extreme southwesterly point of -Ireland that is first sighted by east-bound liners. Captain Turner was -on the bridge, with his staff captain and other officers, maintaining a -close lookout. Fastnet left behind, the Lusitania’s course was brought -closer to shore, probably within twelve miles of the rock-bound coast. - - -LINER’S SPEED INCREASED AS DANGER NEARED - -Her speed was also increased to twenty knots or more, according to the -more observant passengers, and some declare that she worked a sort of -zigzag course, plainly ready to shift her helm whenever danger should -appear. Captain Turner, it is known, was watching closely for any -evidence of submarines. - -One of the passengers, Dr. Daniel Moore, of Yankton, S. D., declared -that before he went downstairs to luncheon shortly after one o’clock he -and others with him noticed, through a pair of marine glasses, a curious -object in the sea, possibly two miles or more away. What it was he could -not determine, but he jokingly referred to it later at luncheon as a -submarine. - -While the first cabin passengers were chatting over their coffee cups -they felt the ship give a great leap forward. Full speed ahead had -suddenly been signaled from the bridge. This was a few minutes after two -o’clock, and just about the time that Ellison Myers, of Stratford, -Ontario, a boy on his way to join the British Navy, noticed the -periscope of a submarine about a mile away to starboard. Myers and his -companions saw Captain Turner hurriedly give orders to the helmsman and -ring for full speed to the engine room. - -The Lusitania began to swerve to starboard, heading for the submarine, -but before she could really answer her helm a torpedo was flashing -through the water toward her at express speed. Myers and his companions, -like many others of the passengers, saw the white wake of the torpedo -and its metal casing gleaming in the bright sunlight. The weather was -ideal, light winds and a clear sky making the surface of the ocean as -calm and smooth as could be wished by any traveler. - - -SUBMARINE’S PERISCOPE DIPS UNDER SURFACE - -The torpedo came on, aimed apparently at the bow of the ship, but nicely -calculated to hit her amidships. Before its wake was seen the periscope -of the submarine had vanished beneath the surface. - -In far less time than it takes to tell, the torpedo had crashed into the -Lusitania’s starboard side, just abaft the first funnel, and exploded -with a dull boom in the forward stoke-hole. - -Captain Turner at once ordered the helm put over and the prow of the -ship headed for land, in the hope that she might strike shallow water -while still under way. The boats were ordered out, and the signals -calling the boat crews to their stations were flashed everywhere through -the vessel. - -Several of the life-boats were already swung out, according to some -survivors, there having been a life-saving drill earlier in the day -before the ship spoke Fastnet Light. - -Down in the dining saloon the passengers felt the ship reel from the -shock of the explosion and many were hurled from their chairs. Before -they could recover themselves, another explosion occurred. There is a -difference of opinion as to the number of torpedoes fired. Some say -there were two; others say only one torpedo struck the vessel, and that -the second explosion was internal. - - -PASSENGERS OVERCOME BY POISONOUS FUMES - -In any event, the passengers now realized their danger. The ship, torn -almost apart, was filled with fumes and smoke, the decks were covered -with débris that fell from the sky, and the great Lusitania began to -list quickly to starboard. Before the passengers below decks could make -their way above, the decks were beginning to slant ominously, and the -air was filled with the cries of terrified men and women, some of them -already injured by being hurled against the sides of the saloons. Many -passengers were stricken unconscious by the smoke and fumes from the -exploding torpedoes. - -The stewards and stewardesses, recognizing the too evident signs of a -sinking ship, rushed about urging and helping the passengers to put on -life-belts, of which more than 3,000 were aboard. - -On the boat deck attempts were being made to lower the life-boats, but -several causes combined to impede the efforts of the crew in this -direction. The port side of the vessel was already so far up that the -boats on that side were quite useless, and as the starboard boats were -lowered the plunging vessel--she was still under headway, for all -efforts to reverse the engines proved useless--swung back and forth, and -when they struck the water were dragged along through the sea, making it -almost impossible to get them away. - - -BOAT CAPSIZES WITH WOMEN AND CHILDREN - -The first life-boat that struck the water capsized with some sixty women -and children aboard her, and all of these must have been drowned almost -instantly. Ten more boats were lowered, the desperate expedient of -cutting away the ropes being resorted to to prevent them from being -dragged along by the now halting steamer. - -The great ship was sinking by the bow, foot by foot, and in ten minutes -after the first explosion she was already preparing to founder. Her -stern rose high in the air, so that those in the boats that got away -could see the whirring propellers, and even the boat deck was awash. - -Captain Turner urged the men to be calm, to take care of the women and -children, and megaphoned the passengers to seize life-belts, -chairs--anything they could lay hands on to save themselves from -drowning. There was never any question in the captain’s mind that the -ship was about to sink, and if, as reported, some of the stewards ran -about advising the passengers not to take to the boats, that there was -no danger of the vessel going down till she reached shore, it was done -without his orders. But many of the survivors have denied this, and -declared that all the crew, officers, stewards and sailors, even the -stokers, who dashed up from their flaming quarters below, showed the -utmost bravery and calmness in the face of the disaster, and sought in -every way to aid the panic-stricken passengers to get off the ship. - - -HUNDREDS JUMP INTO THE SEA - -When it was seen that most of the boats would be useless, hundreds of -passengers donned life-belts and jumped into the sea. Others seized deck -chairs, tubs, kegs, anything available, and hurled themselves into the -water, clinging to these articles. - -The first-cabin passengers fared worst, for the second- and third-cabin -travelers had long before finished their midday meal and were on deck -when the torpedo struck. But the first-cabin people on the D deck and in -the balcony, at luncheon, were at a terrible disadvantage, and those who -had already finished were in their staterooms resting or cleaning up -preparatory to the after luncheon day. - -The confusion on the stairways became terrible, and the great number of -little children, more than 150 of them under two years, a great many of -them infants in arms, made the plight of the women still more desperate. - - -LUSITANIA GOES TO HER DOOM - -After the life-boats had cut adrift it was plain that a few seconds -would see the end of the great ship. With a great shiver she bent her -bow down below the surface, and then her stern uprose, and with a -horrible sough the liner that had been the pride of the Cunard Line, -plunged down in sixty fathoms of water. In the last few seconds the -hundreds of women and men, a great many of them carrying children in -their arms, leaped overboard, but hundreds of others, delaying the jump -too long, were carried down in the suction that left a huge whirlpool -swirling about the spot where the last of the vessel was seen. - -Among these were Elbert Hubbard and his wife, Charles Frohman, who was -crippled with rheumatism and unable to move quickly; Justus Miles -Forman, Charles Klein, Alfred G. Vanderbilt and many others of the -best-known Americans and Englishmen aboard. - -Captain Turner stayed on the bridge as the ship went down, but before -the last plunge he bade his staff officer and the helmsman, who were -still with him, to save themselves. The helmsman leaped into the sea and -was saved, but the staff officer would not desert his superior, and went -down with the ship. He did not come to the surface again. - -Captain Turner, however, a strong swimmer, rose after the eddying -whirlpool had calmed down, and, seizing a couple of deck chairs, kept -himself afloat for three hours. The master-at-arms of the Lusitania, -named Williams, who was looking for survivors in a boat after he had -been picked up, saw the flash of the captain’s gold-braided uniform, and -rescued him, more dead than alive. - - -INTERVIEW WITH CAPTAIN TURNER - -Despite the doubt as to whether two torpedoes exploded, or whether the -first detonation caused the big liner’s boilers to let go, Captain -Turner stated that there was no doubt that at least two torpedoes -reached the ship. - -“I am not certain whether the two explosions--and there were -two--resulted from torpedoes, or whether one was a boiler explosion. I -am sure, however, that I saw the first torpedo strike the vessel on her -starboard side. I also saw a second torpedo apparently headed straight -for the steamship’s hull, directly below the suite occupied by Alfred G. -Vanderbilt.” - -When asked if the second explosion had been caused by the blowing up of -ammunition stored in the liner’s hull, Captain Turner said: - -“No; if ammunition had exploded that would probably have torn the ship -apart and the loss of life would have been much heavier than it was.” - -Captain Turner declared that, from the bridge, he saw the torpedo -streaking toward the Lusitania and tried to change the ship’s course to -avoid the missile, but was unable to do so in time. The only thing left -for him to do was to rush the liner ashore and beach her, and she was -headed for the Irish coast when she foundered. - -According to Captain Turner, the German submarine did not flee at once -after torpedoing the liner. - -“While I was swimming about after the ship had disappeared I saw the -periscope of the submarine rise amidst the débris,” said he. “Instead of -offering any help the submarine immediately submerged herself and I saw -nothing more of her. I did everything possible for my passengers. That -was all I could do.” - - - - -CHAPTER II - -THE HEROES OF THE LUSITANIA AND THEIR HEROISM - - ALFRED G. VANDERBILT GAVE LIFE FOR A WOMAN -- CHARLES FROHMAN DIED - WITHOUT FEAR -- SAVING THE BABIES -- TORONTO GIRL OF FOURTEEN PROVES - HEROINE -- HEROISM OF CAPTAIN TURNER AND HIS CREW -- WOMAN RESCUED - WITH DEAD BABY AT HER BREAST -- HEROIC WIRELESS OPERATORS -- SAVED HIS - WIFE AND HELPED IN RESCUE WORK--“SAVED ALL THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN WE - COULD.” - - -Every great calamity produces its great heroes. Particularly is this -true of marine disasters, where the opportunities of escape are limited, -and where the heroism of the strong often impels them to stand back and -give place to the weak. One cannot think of the Titanic disaster without -remembering Major Archibald Butt, Colonel John Jacob Astor, Henry B. -Harris, William T. Stead and others, nor of the sinking of the Empress -of Ireland without calling to mind Dr. James F. Grant, the ship’s -surgeon; Sir Henry Seton-Karr, Lawrence Irving, H. R. O’Hara of Toronto, -and the rest of the noble company of heroes. So the destruction of the -Lusitania brought uppermost in the breasts of many those qualities of -fortitude and self-sacrifice which will forever mark them in the -calendar of the world’s martyrs. - - -ALFRED G. VANDERBILT GAVE LIFE FOR A WOMAN - -Among the Lusitania’s heroes, one of the foremost was Alfred Gwynne -Vanderbilt, one of America’s wealthiest men. With everything to live -for, Mr. Vanderbilt sacrificed his one chance for escape from the doomed -Lusitania, in order that a woman might live. Details of the chivalry he -displayed in those last moments when he tore off a life-belt as he was -about to leap into the sea, and strapped it around a young woman, were -told by three of the survivors. - -Mr. Vanderbilt could not swim, and when he gave up his life-belt it was -with the virtual certainty that he was surrendering his only chance for -life. - -Thomas Slidell, of New York, said he saw Mr. Vanderbilt on the deck as -the Lusitania was sinking. He was equipped with a life-belt and was -climbing over the rail, when a young woman rushed onto the deck. Mr. -Vanderbilt saw her as he stood poised to leap into the sea. Without -hesitating a moment he jumped back to the deck, tore off the life-belt, -strapped it around the young woman and dropped her overboard. - -The Lusitania plunged under the waves a few minutes later and Mr. -Vanderbilt was seen to be drawn into the vortex. - -Norman Ratcliffe, of Gillingham, Kent, and Wallace B. Phillips, a -newspaper man, also saw Mr. Vanderbilt sink with the Lusitania. The -coolness and heroism he showed were marvelous, they said. - -Oliver P. Bernard, scenic artist at Covent Garden, saw Mr. Vanderbilt -standing near the entrance to the grand saloon soon after the vessel was -torpedoed. - -“He was the personification of sportsmanlike coolness,” Mr. Bernard -said. “In his right hand was grasped what looked to me like a large -purple leather jewel case. It may have belonged to Lady Mackworth, as -Mr. Vanderbilt had been much in the company of the Thomas party during -the trip and evidently had volunteered to do Lady Mackworth the service -of saving her gems for her.” - -Another touching incident was told of Mr. Vanderbilt by Mrs. Stanley L. -B. Lines, a Canadian, who said: “Mr. Vanderbilt will in the future be -remembered as the ‘children’s hero.’ I saw him standing outside the palm -saloon on the starboard side, with Ronald Denit. He looked upon the -scene before him, and then, turning to his valet, said: - -“‘Find all the kiddies you can and bring them here.’ The servant rushed -off and soon reappeared, herding a flock of little ones. Mr. Vanderbilt, -catching a child under each arm, ran with them to a life-boat and dumped -them in. He then threw in two more, and continued at his task until all -the young ones were in the boat. Then he turned his attention to aiding -the women into boats.” - - -CHARLES FROHMAN DIED WITHOUT FEAR - -“Why fear death? It is the most beautiful adventure in life,” were the -last words of Charles Frohman before he went down with the Lusitania, -according to Miss Rita Jolivet, an American actress, with whom he talked -calmly just before the end came. - -Miss Jolivet, who was among the survivors taken to Queenstown, said she -and Mr. Frohman were standing on deck as the Lusitania heeled over. They -decided not to trust themselves to life-boats, although Mr. Frohman -believed the ship was doomed. It was after reaching this decision that -he declared he had no fear of death. - -[Illustration: ESCAPING A TORPEDO BY RAPID MANEUVERING. - -This British destroyer escaped a torpedo from a hunted submarine by -quick turning. This incident took place at the naval fight off the -island of Heligoland, in October. (_Copyright, The Sun News Service._)] - -[Illustration: A NEW WEAPON IN WARFARE. - -One of the Belgian armored motor cars surprising a party of Uhlans. -Several of the enemy were killed by the rapid fire from swivel machine -gun and rifle, but the car driven at a furious pace was wrecked on a -fallen horse.] - -[Illustration: GERMANY’S OFFICIAL PAID ADVERTISEMENT FOREWARNING -AMERICANS AGAINST DISASTER; MAP SHOWING WHERE IT TOOK PLACE. - -This advertisement was wired to forty American newspapers by Count von -Bernstorff, German Ambassador at Washington. It was ordered inserted on -the morning of the day the Lusitania sailed.] - -Dr. F. Warren Pearl, of New York, who was saved, with his wife and two -of their four children, corroborated Miss Jolivet’s statement, saying: - -“After the first shock, as I made my way to the deck, I saw Charles -Frohman distributing life-belts. Mr. Frohman evidently did not expect to -escape, as he said to a woman passenger, ‘Why should we fear death? It -is the greatest adventure man can have.’” - -Sir James M. Barrie, in a tribute to Charles Frohman, published in the -London Daily Mail, describes him as “the man who never broke his word. - -“His companies were as children to him. He chided them as children, -soothed them as children and forgave them and certainly loved them as -children. He exulted in those who became great in that world, and gave -them beautiful toys to play with; but great as was their devotion to -him, it is not they who will miss him most, but rather the far greater -number who never made a hit, but set off like all the rest, and fell by -the way. He was of so sympathetic a nature; he understood so well the -dismalness to them of being failures, that he saw them as children, with -their knuckles to their eyes, and then he sat back cross-legged on his -chair, with his knuckles, as it were, to his eyes, and life had lost its -flavor for him until he invented a scheme for giving them another -chance. - -“Perhaps it is fitting that all those who only made for honest mirth and -happiness should now go out of the world; because it is too wicked for -them. It is strange to think that in America, Dernburg and Bernstorff, -who we must believe were once good men, too, have an extra smile with -their breakfast roll because they and theirs have drowned Charles -Frohman.” - - -SAVING THE BABIES - -The presence of so many babies on board the Lusitania was due to the -influx from Canada of the English-born wives of Canadians at the battle -front, who were coming to England to live with their own or their -husband’s parents during the war. - -No more pathetic loss has been recorded than that of F. G. Webster, a -Toronto contractor, who was traveling second class with his wife, their -six-year-old son Frederick and year-old twin sons William and Henry. -They reached the deck with others who were in the dining saloon when the -torpedo struck. Webster took his son by the hand and darted away to -bring life-belts. When he returned his wife and babies were not to be -seen, nor have they been since. - -W. Harkless, an assistant purser, busied himself helping others until -the Lusitania was about to founder. Then, seeing a life-boat striking -the water that was not overcrowded, he made a rush for it. The only -person he encountered was little Barbara Anderson, of Bridgeport, Conn., -who was standing alone, clinging to the rail. Gathering her up in his -arms he leaped over the rail and into the boat, doing this without -injuring the child. - -Francis J. Luker, a British subject, who had worked six years in the -United States as a postal clerk, and was going home to enlist, saved two -babies. He found the little passengers, bereft of their mother, in the -shelter of a deck-house. The Lusitania was nearing her last plunge. A -life-boat was swaying to the water below. Grabbing the babies he ran to -the rail and made a flying leap into the craft, and those babies did not -leave his arms until they were set safely ashore hours later. - -One woman, a passenger on the Lusitania, lost all three of her children -in the disaster, and gave the bodies of two of them to the sea herself. -When the ship went down she held up the three children in the water, -shrieking for help. When rescued two were dead. Their room was required -and the mother was brave enough to realize it. - -“Give them to me!” she shrieked. “Give them to me, my bonnie wee things. -I will bury them. They are mine to bury as they were mine to keep.” - -With her form shaking with sorrow she took hold of each little one from -the rescuers and reverently placed it in the water again, and the people -in the boat wept with her as she murmured a little sobbing prayer. - -Just as the rescuers were landing her third and only remaining child -died. - - -TORONTO GIRL OF FOURTEEN PROVES HEROINE - -Even the young girls and women on the Lusitania proved themselves -heroines during the last few moments and met their fate calmly or rose -to emergencies which called for great bravery and presence of mind. - -Fourteen-year-old Kathleen Kaye was returning from Toronto, where she -had been visiting relatives. With a merry smile on her lips and with a -steady patter of reassurance, she aided the stewards who were filling -one of the life-boats. - -Soon after the girl took her own place in the boat one of the sailors -fainted under the strain of the efforts to get the boat clear of the -maelstrom that marked where the liner went down. Miss Kaye took the -abandoned oar and rowed until the boat was out of danger. None among the -survivors bore fewer signs of their terrible experiences than Miss -Kaye, who spent most of her time comforting and assisting her sisters in -misfortune. - - -HEROISM OF CAPTAIN TURNER AND HIS CREW - -Ernest Cowper, a Toronto newspaper man, praised the work of the -Lusitania’s crew in their efforts to get the passengers into the boats. -Mr. Cowper told of having observed the ship watches keeping a strict -lookout for submarines as soon as the ship began to near the coast. - -“The crew proceeded to get the passengers into boats in an orderly, -prompt and efficient manner. Helen Smith, a child, begged me to save -her. I placed her in a boat and saw her safely away. I got into one of -the last boats to leave. - -“Some of the boats could not be launched, as the vessel was sinking. -There was a large number of women and children in the second cabin. -Forty of the children were less than a year old.” - - -WOMAN RESCUED WITH DEAD BABY AT HER BREAST - -R. J. Timmis, of Gainesville, Tex., a cotton buyer, who was saved after -he had given his life-belt to a woman steerage passenger who carried a -baby, told of the loss of his friend, R. T. Moodie, also of Gainesville. -Moodie could not swim, but he took off his life-belt also and put it on -a woman who had a six-months-old child in her arms. Timmis tried to help -Moodie, and they both clung to some wreckage for a while, but presently -Moodie could hold out no longer and sank. When Timmis was dragged into a -boat which he helped to right--it had been overturned in the suction of -the sinking vessel--one of the first persons he assisted into the boat -was the steerage woman to whom he had given his belt. She still carried -her baby at her breast, but it was dead from exposure. - - -HEROIC WIRELESS OPERATORS - -Oliver P. Brainard told of the bravery of the wireless operators who -stuck to their work of summoning help even after it was evident that -only a few minutes could elapse before the vessel must go down. He said: - -“The wireless operators were working the emergency outfit, the main -installation having been put out of gear instantaneously after the -torpedo exploded. They were still awaiting a reply and were sending out -the S. O. S. call. - -“I looked out to sea and saw a man, undressed, floating quietly on his -back in the water, evidently waiting to be picked up rather than to take -the chance of getting away in a boat. He gave me an idea and I took off -my jacket and waistcoat, put my money in my trousers pocket, unlaced my -boots and then returned to the Marconi men. - -“The assistant operator said, ‘Hush! we are still hoping for an answer. -We don’t know yet whether the S. O. S. calls have been picked up or -not.’ - -“At that moment the chief operator turned around, saying, ‘They’ve got -it!’ - -“At that very second the emergency apparatus also broke down. The -operator had left the room, but he dashed back and brought out a kodak. -He knelt on the deck, now listing at an angle of thirty-five degrees, -and took a photograph looking forward. - -“The assistant, a big, cheerful chap, lugged out the operator’s swivel -chair and offered it to me with a laugh, saying: ‘Take a seat and make -yourself comfortable.’ He let go the chair and it careened down the deck -and over into the sea.” - -F. J. Gauntlet, of New York and Washington, traveling in company with A. -L. Hopkins, president of the Newport News Shipbuilding Company, and S. -M. Knox, president of the New York Shipbuilding Company, of -Philadelphia, unconsciously told the story of his own heroism. He said: - -“I was lingering in the dining saloon chatting with friends when the -first explosion occurred. Some of us went to our staterooms and put on -life-belts. Going on deck we were informed that there was no danger, but -the bow of the vessel was gradually sinking. The work of launching the -boats was done in a few minutes. Fifty or sixty people entered the first -boat. As it swung from the davits it fell suddenly and I think most of -the occupants perished. The other boats were launched with the greatest -difficulty. - -“Swinging free from one of these as it descended, I grabbed what I -supposed was a piece of wreckage. I found it to be a collapsible boat, -however. I had great difficulty in getting it open, finally having to -rip the canvas with my knife. Soon another passenger came alongside and -entered the collapsible with me. We paddled around and between us we -rescued thirty people from the water.” - - -SAVED HIS WIFE AND HELPED IN RESCUE WORK - -George A. Kessler, of New York, said: - -“A list to starboard had set in as we were climbing the stairs and it -had so rapidly increased by the time we reached the deck, that we were -falling against the taffrail. I managed to get my wife onto the -first-class deck and there three boats were being got out. - -“I placed her in the third, kissed her good-by and saw the boat lowered -safely. Then I turned to look for a life-belt for myself. The ship now -started to go down. I fell into the water, some kind soul throwing me a -life-belt at the same time. Ten minutes later I found myself beside a -raft on which were some survivors, who pulled me onto it. We cruised -around looking for others and managed to pick up a few, making in all -perhaps sixteen or seventeen persons who were on the raft. In all -directions were scattered persons struggling for their lives and the -boats gave what help they could.” - - -“SAVED ALL THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN WE COULD” - -W. G. E. Meyers, of Stratford, Ont., a lad of sixteen years, who was on -his way to join the British navy as a cadet, told this story: - -“I went below to get a life-belt and met a woman who was frenzied with -fear. I tried to calm her and helped her into a boat. Then I saw a boat -which was nearly swamped. I got into it with other men and baled it out. -Then a crowd of men clambered into it and nearly swamped it. - -“We had got only two hundred yards away when the Lusitania sank, bow -first. Many persons sank with her, drawn down by the suction. Their -shrieks were appalling. We had to pull hard to get away, and, as it was, -we were almost dragged down. We saved all the women and children we -could, but a great many of them went down.” - -H. Smethhurst, a steerage passenger, put his wife into a life-boat, and -in spite of her urging refused to accompany her, saying the women and -children must go first. After the boat with his wife in it had pulled -away Smethhurst put on a life-belt, slipped down a rope into the water -and floated until he was picked up. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -SOUL-STIRRING STORIES OF SURVIVORS OF THE LUSITANIA - - COULD NOT LAUNCH BOATS -- SAYS SHIP SANK IN FIFTEEN MINUTES -- SCREAMS - INTENSIFY HORROR -- ON HUNT FOR THE LIFE-BELTS -- INJURED BOY SHOWS - PLUCK -- MANY CHILDREN DROWNED -- WOMEN RUSHED FOR THE BOATS -- - PATERSON, N. J., GIRLS AMONG RESCUED -- THREATENED SEAMEN WITH - REVOLVER -- RESCUED UNCONSCIOUS FROM THE WATER -- LIFE-BOAT SMASHED -- - REASSURED BY SHIP’S OFFICER. - - -Among the stories of the Lusitania horror told by the survivors were a -few that stand out from the rest for their clearness and vividness. One -of the most interesting of these, notable for the prominence of the man -who relates it as well as for its conciseness, was the description given -by Samuel M. Knox, president of the New York Shipbuilding Company. Mr. -Knox said: - -“Shortly after two, while we were finishing luncheon in a calm sea, a -heavy concussion was felt on the starboard side, throwing the vessel to -port. She immediately swung back and proceeded to take on a list to -starboard, which rapidly increased. - -“The passengers rapidly, but in good form, left the dining room, -proceeding mostly to the A or boat deck. There were preparations being -made to launch the boats. Order among the passengers was well -maintained, there being nothing approaching a panic. Many of the -passengers had gone to their staterooms and provided themselves with -life-belts. - -“The vessel reached an angle of about twenty-four degrees and at this -point there seemed to be a cessation in the listing, the vessel -maintaining this position for four or five minutes, when something -apparently gave way, and the list started anew and increased rapidly -until the end. - -“The greater number of passengers were congregated on the high side of -the ship, and when it became apparent that she was going to sink I made -my way to the lower side, where there appeared to be several boats only -partly filled and no passengers on that deck. At this juncture I found -the outside of the boat deck practically even with the water and the -ship was even farther down by the head. - - -COULD NOT LAUNCH BOATS - -“I stepped into a boat and a sailor in charge then attempted to cast her -off, but it was found that the boat-falls had fouled the boat and she -could not be released in the limited time available. I went overboard at -once and attempted to get clear of the ship, which was coming over -slowly. I was caught by one of the smokestacks and carried down a -considerable distance before being released. - -“On coming to the surface I floated about for a considerable time, when -I was picked up by a life-raft. This raft, with others, had floated free -when the vessel sank, and had been picked up and taken charge of by Mr. -Gauntlet, of Washington, and Mr. Lauriat, of Boston, who picked up -thirty-two persons in all. - -“It was equipped with oars, and we made our way to a fishing smack, -about five miles distant, which took us on board, although it was -already overloaded. We were finally taken off this boat by the Cunard -tender Flying Fish and brought to Queenstown at 9.30.” - -Some of the passengers, notably David A. Thomas, told of panicky -conditions on board the vessel before she sank, and one of the rescued -declared that the loss of life was due to some extent to the assurances -spread by the stewards among the passengers that there was no danger of -the Lusitania sinking. But all united in praising the courage and -steadiness of the officers and crew of the ship. - - -SAYS SHIP SANK IN FIFTEEN MINUTES - -Mr. Thomas, a Cardiff, Wales, coal magnate, who was rescued with his -daughter, Lady Mackworth, said that not more than fifteen minutes -elapsed between the first explosion and the sinking of the ship. Lady -Mackworth had put on a life-preserver and went down with the Lusitania. -When she arose to the surface, Mr. Thomas said, she was unconscious, and -floated around in the tumbling sea for three and a half hours before she -was picked up. - -“As soon as the explosions occurred,” said Mr. Thomas, “and the officers -learned what had happened, the ship’s course was directed toward the -shore, with the idea of beaching her. Captain Turner remained upon the -bridge until the ship went down, and he was swallowed up in the -maelstrom that followed. He wore a life-belt, which kept him afloat -when he arose to the surface, and remained in the water for three hours -before he was picked up by a life-boat. - -“During the last few minutes’ life of the Lusitania she was a ship of -panic and tumult. Excited men and terrified women ran shouting and -screaming about the decks. Lost children cried shrilly. Officers and -seamen rushed among the panic-stricken passengers, shouting orders and -helping the women and children into life-boats. Women clung desperately -to their husbands or knelt on the deck and prayed. Life-preservers were -distributed among the passengers, who hastily donned them and flung -themselves into the water. - -[Illustration: AS OTHERS SEE US.] - - -SCREAMS INTENSIFY HORROR - -“In their haste and excitement the seamen overloaded one life-boat and -the davit ropes broke while it was being lowered, the occupants being -thrown into the water. The screams of these terrified women and men -intensified the fright of those still on the ship. Altogether I counted -ten life-boats launched.” - -A German submarine was seen for an hour before the liner was sunk, -according to Dr. Daniel Moore, of Yankton, S. D., who said: - -“About 1 P. M. we noticed that the Lusitania was steering a zigzag -course. Land had been in sight for three hours, distinctly visible -twelve miles away. Looking through my glasses, I could see on the port -side of the Lusitania, between us and land, what appeared to be a black, -oblong object, with four dome-like projections. It was moving along -parallel to us, more than two miles away. At times it slowed down and -disappeared. But always it reappeared. All this time the Lusitania was -zigzagging along. Later the Lusitania kept a more even course, and we -generally agreed then that it was a friendly submarine we were watching. -We had seen no other vessels except one or two fishing boats. - -“At 1.40 we sat down to luncheon in the second saloon. We talked of the -curious object we had seen, but nobody seemed anxious or concerned. -About two o’clock a muffled, drum-like noise sounded from the forward -part of the Lusitania and she shivered and trembled. Almost immediately -she began to list to starboard. She had been struck on the starboard -side. Unless the first submarine seen had been speedy enough to make -rings around the Lusitania, this torpedo must have come from a second -submarine which had been lying hidden to starboard. - -“We heard no sound of explosion. There was general excitement among the -passengers at luncheon, but the women were soon quieted by assurances -that there was no danger and that the Lusitania had merely struck a -small mine. The passengers left the saloon in good order. - - -ON HUNT FOR THE LIFE-BELTS - -“As I reached the deck above I had difficulty in walking owing to the -tilt of the vessel. With most of the passengers I ran on to the -promenade deck. There was no crushing. Although the deck was crowded, I -looked over the side; but I could see no evidence of damage. I started -to return to my cabin, but the list of the liner was so marked that I -abandoned the idea and regained the deck. Looking over the starboard -rail, I saw that the water was now only about twelve feet from the rail -at one point. While searching for a life-belt I came upon a stewardess -struggling with a pile of life-belts in a rack below deck and helped her -put one on, afterward securing one for myself. I had tremendous -difficulty in reaching the promenade deck again. - -“The Lusitania now was on her side and sinking by the bow. I saw a woman -clinging to the rail near where a boat was being lowered. I pushed her -over the rail into the boat, afterward jumping down myself. - -“The boat fell bodily into the sea, but kept afloat, although so heavily -loaded that water was lapping in. We bailed with our hats, but could not -keep pace with the water, and I realized we must soon sink. - -“Seeing a keg, I threw it overboard and sprang after it. A young steward -named Freeman also used the keg as a support. Looking back, I saw the -boat I had left swamped. We clung to the keg for about an hour and a -half and then were picked up by a raft on which were twenty persons, -including two women. - -“We had oars and rowed toward land. At about four o’clock we were picked -up by the patrol boat Brook. She took us aboard and then cruised out to -where the Lusitania had gone down, picking up many survivors there, also -taking aboard many from boats and rafts. - - -INJURED BOY SHOWS PLUCK - -“A number of those picked up were injured, including a little boy, whose -left thigh was broken. I improvised splints for him and set his leg. He -was a plucky little chap, and was soon asking, ‘Is there a funny paper -aboard?’ - -“At the scene of the catastrophe the surface of the water had seemed -dotted with bodies. Only a few life-boats seemed to be doing good. Cries -of ‘Save us! Help!’ gradually grew weaker from all sides. Finally low -wailings made the heart sick. I saw many men die. - -“There was no suction when the ship settled. It went down steadily. The -life-boats were not in order and they were not manned. Weighing all the -facts soberly convinces me that it was only through the mercy of God -that any one was saved. Are there any bounds to this modern vandalism?” - -L. Tonner, a County Dublin man, and a stoker on the Lusitania, who was -one of the survivors landed at Kinsale, said: - -“There must have been two submarines attacking the Lusitania. The liner -was first torpedoed on the starboard side, and right through the engine -room a few minutes afterward the Lusitania received a second torpedo on -the port side. The Lusitania listed so heavily to starboard that it was -impossible to lower the boats on the port side.” - -[Illustration: PROMINENT AMERICAN VICTIMS OF THE LUSITANIA HORROR. - -Alfred G. Vanderbilt, New York Millionaire. (_C. Underwood & -Underwood._) - -Charles Frohman, Theatrical Magnate. (_C. Underwood & Underwood._) - -Elbert Hubbard, Editor and Lecturer. (_C. Int. News Service._) - -Charles Klein, well-known Playwright. (_C. Int. News Service._)] - -[Illustration: SORROWFUL BURIAL OF SOME OF THE LUSITANIA VICTIMS. - -Sixty-six coffins were placed in one grave at the Queenstown graveyard. -In the presence of a large crowd they were buried with full military -honors. The view shows a few of the caskets in the grave. (_C. Int. News -Service._)] - - -MANY CHILDREN DROWNED - -G. D. Lane, a youthful but cool-headed second-cabin passenger, who was -returning to Wales from New York, was in a life-boat which was capsized -by the davits as the Lusitania heeled over. - -“I was on the B deck,” he said, “when I saw the wake of a torpedo. I -hardly realized what it meant when the big ship seemed to stagger and -almost immediately listed to starboard. I rushed to get a life-belt, but -stopped to help get children on the boat deck. The second cabin was a -veritable nursery. - -“Many youngsters must have drowned, but I had the satisfaction of seeing -one boat get away filled with women and children. When the water reached -the deck I saw another life-boat with a vacant seat, which I took, as no -one else was in sight, but we were too late. The Lusitania reeled so -suddenly our boat was swamped, but we righted it again. - -“We now witnessed the most horrible scene of human futility it is -possible to imagine. When the Lusitania had turned almost over she -suddenly plunged bow foremost into the water, leaving her stern high in -the air. People on the aft deck were fighting with wild desperation to -retain a footing on the almost perpendicular deck while they fell over -the slippery stern like crippled flies. - -“Their cries and shrieks could be heard above the hiss of escaping steam -and the crash of bursting boilers. Then the water mercifully closed over -them and the big liner disappeared, leaving scarcely a ripple behind -her. - -“Twelve life-boats were all that were left of our floating home. In time -which could be measured by seconds swimmers, bodies and wreckage -appeared in the space where she went down. I was almost exhausted by the -work of rescue when taken aboard the trawler. It seems like a horrible -dream now.” - - -WOMEN RUSHED FOR THE BOATS - -According to another American survivor, W. H. Brooks, “there was a scene -of great confusion as women and children rushed for the boats which were -launched with the greatest difficulty and danger, owing to the tilting -of the ship. - -“I heard the captain order that no more boats be launched, so I leaped -into the sea. After I reached the water there was another explosion -which sent up a shower of wreckage.” - -Dr. J. T. Houghton, of Troy, N. Y., said: “It was believed there was no -reason to fear any danger after the first explosion, as it was said the -vessel would be headed for Queenstown and beached if necessary. -Meanwhile boats were being got ready for any emergency. - -“Just then the liner was again struck, evidently in a more vital spot, -for it began to settle rapidly. Orders then came from the bridge to -lower all boats. A near panic took possession of the women. People were -rushed into the boats, some of which were launched successfully, others -not so successfully.” - -Oscar F. Grab, of New York, said: “I was able to get hold of a -life-preserver and I remained on the starboard side until the water was -almost at my feet. Then I slid into the sea so easily that I did not -even wet my hair. I was soon picked up by a boat in which were twenty -women and some children. - -“We had to keep the women lying in the bottom so as to get room to pull -at the oars. The ship went down, as seen by me from the water, in this -fashion: - -“She had settled down well forward. She then listed to starboard, and -rose to a perpendicular until the stern with the propellers was sticking -straight out of the water. - -“An explosion then occurred as the water reached the boilers; one of the -funnels was blown clean out, and in half a minute there was nothing -visible of the Lusitania but a lot of wreckage mingled with a number of -dead bodies.” - - -PATERSON, N. J., GIRLS AMONG RESCUED - -The Misses Agnes and Evelyn Wilde, sisters, of Paterson, N. J., were at -lunch when the torpedo struck the vessel. They rushed on deck. Miss -Agnes Wilde said: - -“We clung to each other, determined not to be separated, even if we went -to the bottom. We were thrown into a boat, together with thirty-six -others, and after several hours were picked up by a fishing boat, which -towed us for several hours, intending to take us to Kinsale. Before we -arrived, however, a Government boat came along and took us to -Queenstown. - -“We were drenched to the skin, cold and penniless. We went into a shop, -where they fitted us out from head to foot without charge. We are only -beginning to realize what we have passed through.” - -Mrs. Martha Anna Wyatt, sixty years old, of New Bedford, Mass., said: “I -went down with the ship and spent four hours in a collapsible boat -before being picked up. I was going to England to live. - -“While the ship was sinking I found it impossible to get into any of the -life-boats. There seemed no help about. I simply stood still, clinging -to the rail, and went down. I seemed to go to the bottom. When I came to -the surface again I was pulled into the collapsible boat which brought -me to safety.” - -Mrs. C. Stewart, who was traveling from Toronto to Glasgow, said: - -“I was in my cabin with my eight-months-old baby, who was sleeping in -the berth, when I heard the crash. I snatched my baby up and went on -deck. A man yelled, ‘Come on with the baby.’ I handed him the infant and -he said, ‘Now for yourself.’ - -“We were two and a half hours in the boat before we were picked up by a -Greek steamer.” - -Robert C. Wright, of Cleveland, O., gave what may be the last word of -Elbert Hubbard. Mr. Wright said: - -“I don’t know who was saved, but I know that Elbert Hubbard must have -been drowned. He was a conspicuous person on account of his long hair. -I saw him and his wife start below, apparently for life-belts, but I -never saw either again. I am certain they were drowned.” - - -THREATENED SEAMEN WITH REVOLVER - -Isaac Lehmann, of New York, a first-cabin passenger, who described -himself as being engaged in the Department of Government Supplies, said -that after having witnessed an accident to one of the boats through the -snapping of the ropes while it was being lowered, he ran into his cabin -and seizing a revolver and a life-belt, returned to the deck and mounted -a collapsible boat and called to some of the crew to assist in launching -it. One sailor, he said, replied that the captain’s orders were that no -boats were to be put out. - -“I drew my revolver, which was loaded with ball cartridges,” said Mr. -Lehmann, “and shouted ‘I’ll shoot the first man who refuses to assist in -launching.’ The boat was then lowered. At least sixty persons were in -it. Unfortunately, the Lusitania lurched so badly that the boat -repeatedly struck the side of the sinking ship, and I think at least -twenty of its occupants were killed or injured. - -“At that instant we heard an explosion on the right up forward, and -within two minutes the liner disappeared. I was thrown clear of the -wreckage, and went down twice, but the life-belt that I had on brought -me up. I was in the water fully four hours and a half.” - -Asked as to the probable speed of the Lusitania when she was struck by -the torpedo, Mr. Lehmann said the boat was probably going at about -sixteen or seventeen knots. - -Julian de Ayala, Consul General for Cuba at Liverpool, said that he was -ill in his berth when the Lusitania was torpedoed. He was thrown against -the partition of his berth by the explosion and suffered an injury to -his head and had flesh torn off one of his legs. - -The boat Mr. de Ayala got into capsized and he was thrown into the -water, but later he was picked up. - -“Captain Turner,” said Mr. de Ayala, “thought he could bring the -crippled vessel into Queenstown, but she rapidly began to sink by the -head. - -“Her stern went up so high,” Mr. de Ayala added, “that we could see all -of her propellers, and she went down with a headlong plunge, volumes of -steam hissing from her funnels.” - - -RESCUED UNCONSCIOUS FROM THE WATER - -The experience of two New York girls, Miss Mary Barrett and Miss Kate -MacDonald, rescued at the last minute, may be taken as typical of the -experience of many others. Miss Barrett gives the following account of -her experiences: - -“We had gone into the second saloon and were just finishing lunch. I -heard a sound something like the smashing of big dishes and then there -came a second and louder crash. Miss MacDonald and I started to go -upstairs, but we were thrown back by the crowd when the ship stopped. -But we managed to get to the second deck, where we found sailors trying -to lower boats. - -“There was no panic and the ship’s officers and crew went about their -work quietly and steadily. I went to get two life-belts, but a man -standing by told us to remain where we were and he would fetch them for -us. He brought us two belts and we put them on. By this time the ship -was leaning right over to starboard and we were both thrown down. We -managed to scramble to the side of the liner. - -“Near us I saw a rope attached to one of the life-boats. I thought I -could catch it, so we murmured a few words of prayer and then jumped -into the water. I missed the rope, but floated about in the water for -some time. I did not lose consciousness at first, but the water got into -my eyes and mouth and I began to lose hope of ever seeing my friends -again. I could not see anybody near me. Then I must have lost -consciousness, for I remember nothing more until one of the Lusitania’s -life-boats came along. The crew was pulling on board another woman, who -was unconscious, and they shouted to me, ‘You hold on a little longer!’ - -“After a time they lifted me out of the water. Then I remembered nothing -more for a time. In the meantime our boat had picked up twenty others. -It was getting late in the evening when we were transferred to a trawler -and taken to Queenstown. - -“Miss MacDonald floated about nearly four hours in a dazed state. She -had little remembrance of what had passed until a boat saved her. She -remembered somebody saying, ‘Oh, the poor girl is dead!’ She had just -strength to raise her hand and they returned and pulled her on board.” - -Miss Conner, a cousin of Henry L. Stimson, formerly Secretary of War of -the United States, was standing beside Lady Mackworth when they were -flung into the water as the ship keeled over. Both women were provided -with life-belts and were picked up when at the point of exhaustion. - - -LIFE-BOAT SMASHED - -Doctor Howard Fisher of New York, who is a brother of Walter L. Fisher, -formerly Secretary of the Interior of the United States, was on his way -to Belgium for Red Cross duty. His story follows: - -“It is not true that those on board were unconcerned over the -possibility of being torpedoed. I took the big liner to save time and -also because in case of a floating mine I felt she would have more -chance of staying up. But like everybody else aboard, I felt sure in -case of being torpedoed that we would have ample time to take to the -boats. - -“When I heard the crash I rushed to the port side. No officer was in -sight. An effort was being made to lower the boat swinging just opposite -the grand entrance. Women, children and men made a mad scramble about -this boat, which was smashed against the side, throwing all the -occupants into the sea. - -“Then two big men, one a sailor and the other a passenger, succeeded in -launching a second boat. Much to my surprise this amateur effort was -successful. This boat got away and carried chiefly women and children. -This boat was successfully launched on the port side. - - -REASSURED BY SHIP’S OFFICER - -“We then saw our first glimpse of an officer, who came along the deck -and spoke to Lady Mackworth, Miss Conner and myself, who were standing -in a group. He said: - -“‘Don’t worry, the ship will right itself.’ He had hardly moved on -before the ship turned sideways and then seemed to plunge head foremost -into the sea. - -“I came up after what seemed to be an interminable time under water and -found myself surrounded by swimmers, dead bodies and wreckage. I got on -an upturned yawl, where I found thirty other people, among them Lady -Allan, whose collar-bone was broken while she was in the water. - -“Another passenger on the yawl, a man whose name I did not learn, had -his arm hanging by the skin. His injury probably was due to the -explosion which followed. His arm was amputated successfully with a -butcher knife by a little Italian surgeon aboard the tramp steamer which -picked me up.” - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -A CANADIAN’S ACCOUNT OF THE LUSITANIA HORROR - - PERCY ROGERS, OF CANADIAN NATIONAL EXHIBITION, TELLS GRAPHIC STORY -- - PASSENGERS WERE AGHAST -- OCCUPANTS OF LIFE-BOATS THROWN INTO SEA -- A - HEART-BREAKING SCENE. - - -Percy Rogers, assistant manager and secretary of the Canadian National -Exhibition, who went to England in connection with the Toronto Fair, -told a graphic story of his experiences after the Lusitania was struck. -He undoubtedly owed his life to the fact that he was a good swimmer. - -“It had been a splendid crossing,” he said, “with a calm sea and fine -weather contributing to a delightful trip. The Lusitania made nothing -like her maximum pace. Her speed probably was about five hundred miles -daily, which, as travelers know, is below her average. - -“Early Friday morning we sighted the Irish coast. Then we entered a -slight fog, and speed was reduced, but we soon came into a clear -atmosphere again, and the pace of the boat increased. The morning passed -and we went as usual down to lunch, although some were a little later -than others in taking the meal. I should think it would be about ten -minutes past two when I came from lunch. I immediately proceeded to my -stateroom, close to the dining-room, to get a letter which I had -written. While in there I heard a tremendous thud, and I came out -immediately. - - -PASSENGERS WERE AGHAST - -“There was no panic where I was, but the people were aghast. It was -realized that the boat had been struck, apparently on the side nearest -the land. The passengers hastened to the boat deck above. The life-boats -were hanging out, having been put into that position on the previous -day. The Lusitania soon began to list badly with the result that the -side on which I and several others were standing went up as the other -side dropped. This seemed to cause difficulty in launching the boats, -which seemed to get bound against the side of the liner. - -“It was impossible, of course, for me to see what was happening in other -places, but among the group where I was stationed there was no panic. -The order was given, ‘Women and children first,’ and was followed -implicitly. The first life-boat lowered with people at the spot where I -stood smacked upon the water, and as it did so the stern of this -life-boat seemed to part and the people were thrown into the sea. The -other boats were lowered more successfully. - -“We heard somebody say, ‘Get out of the boats; there is no danger,’ and -some people actually did get out, but the direction was not generally -acted upon. I entered a boat in which there were men, women and -children, I should say between twenty and twenty-five. There were no -other women or children standing on the liner where we were, our -position, I should think, being about the last boat but one from the -stern of the ship. - - -OCCUPANTS OF LIFE-BOATS THROWN INTO SEA - -“Our boat dropped into the water, and for a few minutes we were all -right. Then the liner went over. We were not far from her. Whatever the -cause may have been--perhaps the effect of suction--I don’t know, but we -were thrown into the sea. Some of the occupants were wearing life-belts, -but I was not. The only life-belts I knew about were in the cabins, and -it had not appeared to me that there was time to risk going there. It -must have been about 2.30 when I was thrown into the water. The watch I -was wearing stopped at that time. - -“What a terrible scene there was around me! It is harrowing to think -about the men, women and children struggling in the water. I had the -presence of mind to swim away from the boat and made towards a -collapsible boat, upon which was the captain and a number of others. For -this purpose I had to swim quite a distance. - -“I noticed three children among the group. Our collapsible boat began -rocking. Every moment it seemed we should be thrown again into the sea. -The captain appealed to the people in it to be careful, but the boat -continued to rock, and I came to the conclusion that it would be -dangerous to remain in it if all were to have a chance. I said, -‘Good-by, Captain; I’m going to swim,’ and jumped into the water. I -believe the captain did the same thing after me, although I did not see -him, but I understand he was picked up. - -[Illustration: “GOD IS WITH US”] - - -A HEART-BREAKING SCENE - -“The scene was now terrible. Particularly do I remember a young child -with a life-belt around her calling, ‘Mamma!’ She was not saved. I had -seen her on the liner, and her sister was on the collapsible boat, but I -could not reach her. I saw a cold-storage box or cupboard. I swam -towards it and clung to it. This supported me for a long time. At last I -saw a boat coming towards me and shouted. I was heard and taken in. From -this I was transferred to what I think was a trawler, which also picked -up three or four others. Eventually I was placed upon a ferry boat known -as the Flying Fish, in which, with others, I was taken to Queenstown. - -“It was quite possible that some people went down while in their cabins, -because after lunch it was the custom with some to go for a rest. A -friend of mine on the liner has told me he saw Alfred G. Vanderbilt on -deck with a life-belt and observed him give it to a lady. It seemed to -me the seriousness of the situation scarcely was realized when the boat -was torpedoed. It was all so sudden and so unexpected, and the -recollection of it all is terrible.” - - - - -CHAPTER V - -THE PLOT AGAINST THE RESCUE SHIPS - - GERMAN SUBMARINES PREVENTED RESCUE OF LUSITANIA PASSENGERS -- STORY OF - ETONIAN’S CAPTAIN -- DODGED TWO SUBMARINES -- NARRAGANSETT DRIVEN OFF - -- TORPEDO FIRED AT NARRAGANSETT. - - -From the lips of Captain Turner, of the Lusitania, and from several of -the survivors the world has heard the story of the sudden appearance -among the débris and the dead of the sunken liner, of the German -submarine that had fired the torpedo which sent almost 1,200 -non-combatants, hundreds of them helpless women and children, and among -them more than a hundred American citizens, to their deaths. But it -remained for the captain of the steamship Etonian, arriving at Boston on -May 18, to add the crowning touch to the tragedy. - -Captain William F. Wood, of the Etonian, specifically charged that two -German submarines deliberately prevented him from going to the rescue of -the Lusitania’s passengers after he had received the liner’s wireless S. -O. S. call, and when he was but forty miles or so away, and might have -rendered great assistance to the hundreds of victims. - -Captain Wood charged further that two other ships, both within the same -distance of the Lusitania when she sank, were warned off by submarines, -and that when the nearest one, the Narragansett, bound for New York, -persisted in the attempt to proceed to the rescue of the Lusitania’s -passengers, a submarine fired a torpedo at her, which missed the -Narragansett by only a few feet. - - -STORY OF ETONIAN’S CAPTAIN - -The Etonian is a freight-carrying steamship, owned by the -Wilson-Furness-Leyland lines, and under charter to the Cunard Line. She -sailed from Liverpool on May 6. Captain Wood’s story, as he told it -without embellishment and in the most positive terms, was as follows: - -“We had left Liverpool without unusual incident, and it was two o’clock -on the afternoon of Friday, May 7, that we received the S. O. S. call -from the Lusitania. Her wireless operator sent this message: ‘We are ten -miles south of Kinsale. Come at once.’ - -“I was then about forty-two miles from the position he gave me. Two -other steamships were ahead of me, going in the same direction. They -were the Narragansett and the City of Exeter. The Narragansett was -closer to the Lusitania, and she answered the S. O. S. call. - -“At 5 P. M. I observed the City of Exeter across our bow and she -signaled, ‘Have you heard anything of the disaster?’ - -“At that very moment I saw the periscope of a submarine between the -Etonian and the City of Exeter. The submarine was about a quarter of a -mile directly ahead of us. She immediately dived as soon as she saw us -coming for her. I distinctly saw the splash in the water caused by her -submerging. - -[Illustration: CHARGING THROUGH BARBED-WIRE ENTANGLEMENTS. - -The King’s Regiment of the British Army suffered heavily while trying to -penetrate the enemy’s wire entanglement at Givenchy. Three lines of a -perfect thicket of barbed-wire lay between them and the enemy. Only one -brave officer even managed to penetrate the wire. (_Il. L. News -copr._)] - -[Illustration: A LAND MINE EXPLODED UNDERNEATH A SECTION OF THE ENEMY’S -TRENCHES. - -A method which has been known to blow forty men to pieces at once. By -sapping and mining the gallery was dug almost to the enemy’s trenches -underground and explosives placed, which were then fired by electric -wire. The explosion hurled a piece of railroad iron weighing twenty-five -pounds a distance of over a mile. (_Il. L. News copr._)] - - -DODGED TWO SUBMARINES - -“I signaled to the engine room for every available inch of speed, and -there was a prompt response. Then we saw the submarine come up astern of -us with the periscope in line afterward. I now ordered full speed ahead, -and we left the submarine slowly behind. The periscope remained in sight -about twenty minutes. Our speed was perhaps two miles an hour better -than the submarine could do. - -“No sooner had we lost sight of the submarine astern than I made out -another on the starboard bow. This one was directly ahead and on the -surface, not submerged. I starboarded hard away from him, he swinging as -we did. About eight minutes later he submerged. I continued at top speed -for four hours, and saw no more of the submarines. It was the ship’s -speed that saved her. That’s all. - -“Both these submarines were long craft, and the second one had wireless -masts. There is no question in my mind that these two submarines were -acting in concert and were so placed as to torpedo any ship that might -attempt to go to the rescue of the passengers of the Lusitania. - -“As a matter of fact, the Narragansett, as soon as she heard the S. O. -S. call, went to the assistance of the Lusitania. One of the submarines -discharged a torpedo at her and missed her by a few feet. The -Narragansett then warned us not to attempt to go to the rescue of the -Lusitania, and I got her wireless call while I was dodging the two -submarines. You can see that three ships would have gone to the -assistance of the Lusitania had it not been for the two submarines. - -“These German craft were, it seems to me, deliberately stationed off Old -Head of Kinsale, at a point where all ships have got to pass, for the -express purpose of preventing any assistance being given to the -passengers of the Lusitania.” - - -NARRAGANSETT DRIVEN OFF - -That the British tank steamer Narragansett, one of the vessels that -caught the distress signal of the Lusitania, was also driven off her -rescue course by a torpedo from a submarine when she arrived within -seven miles of the spot where the Lusitania went down, an hour and -three-quarters after she caught the wireless call for help, was alleged -by the officers of the tanker, which arrived at Bayonne, N. J., on the -same day that the Etonian reached Boston. - -The story told by the officers of the Narragansett corroborated the -statements made by officers of the Etonian. They said that submarines -were apparently scouting the sea to drive back rescue vessels when the -Lusitania fell a victim to another undersea craft. - -The Lusitania’s call for help was received by the Narragansett at two -o’clock on the afternoon of May 7, according to wireless operator Talbot -Smith, who said the message read: “Strong list. Come quick.” - -When the Narragansett received the message she was thirty-five miles -southeast of the Lusitania, having sailed from Liverpool the preceding -afternoon at five o’clock for Bayonne. The message was delivered quickly -to Captain Charles Harwood, and he ordered the vessel to put on full -steam and increase her speed from eleven to fourteen knots. The -Narragansett changed her course and started in the direction of the -sinking ship. - - -TORPEDO FIRED AT NARRAGANSETT - -Second Officer John Letts, who was on the bridge, said he sighted the -periscope of a submarine at 3.35 o’clock, and almost at the same instant -he saw a torpedo shooting through the water. The torpedo, according to -the second officer, was traveling at great speed. - -It shot past the Narragansett, missing the stem by hardly thirty feet, -and disappeared. The periscope of the submarine went out of sight at the -same time, but the captain of the Narragansett decided not to take any -chance, changed the course of his vessel so that the stern pointed -directly toward the spot where the periscope was last sighted, and, -after steering straight ahead for some distance, followed a somewhat -zigzag course until he was out of the immediate submarine territories. - -Captain Harwood abandoned all thought of the Lusitania’s call for help, -because he thought it was a decoy message sent out to trap the -Narragansett into the submarine’s path. - -“My opinion,” said Second Officer Letts, “is that submarines were -scattered around that territory to prevent any vessel that received the -S. O. S. call of the Lusitania from going to her assistance.” - -When attacked by the submarine the Narragansett had out her log, -according to Second Officer Letts, and the torpedo passed under the line -to which it was attached. The torpedo was fired from the submarine when -the undersea boat was within two hundred yards of the tanker. - -The Narragansett when turned back had not sighted the wreck of the -Lusitania, and her officers, who were led to believe the S. O. S. was a -decoy, did not learn of the sinking of the Cunarder until the following -morning at two o’clock. - -The Narragansett, under charter to the Standard Oil Company, is one of -the largest tank steamships afloat. She is 540 feet long, has a -sixty-foot beam, and 12,500 tons displacement. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -BRITISH JURY FINDS KAISER A MURDERER - - “THE CRIME OF WHOLESALE MURDER”--CAPTAIN TURNER’S TESTIMONY -- SAW THE - TORPEDO -- DOUBLE LOOKOUTS ON LINER -- NO WARNING GIVEN -- OTHER - TESTIMONY -- CORONER HORGAN’S STATEMENT. - - -One of the first official acts with reference to the loss of the -Lusitania was the impaneling, on May 10, of a coroner’s jury at -Queenstown to fix the responsibility for the death of the passengers -whose bodies were recovered and taken to that place. The inquest was -conducted by Coroner John Horgan. The coroner’s proceedings were -comparatively brief, and were concluded with the return of the following -verdict of the jury: - - -“THE CRIME OF WHOLESALE MURDER” - -“We find that the deceased met death from prolonged immersion and -exhaustion in the sea eight miles south-southwest of Old Head of -Kinsale, Friday, May 7, 1915, owing to the sinking of the Lusitania by -torpedoes fired by a German submarine. - -“We find that this appalling crime was committed contrary to -international law and the conventions of all civilized nations. - -“We also charge the officers of said submarine and the Emperor and -Government of Germany, under whose orders they acted, with the crime of -wholesale murder before the tribunal of the civilized world. - -“We desire to express sincere condolences and sympathy with the -relatives of the deceased, the Cunard Company and the United States, -many of whose citizens perished in this murderous attack on an unarmed -liner.” - - -CAPTAIN TURNER’S TESTIMONY - -Captain W. T. Turner, the Lusitania’s commander, was the chief witness -at the inquest. - -The Coroner asked the captain whether he had received a message -concerning the sinking of a ship off Kinsale by a submarine. Captain -Turner replied that he had not. - -“Did you receive any special instructions as to the voyage?” - -“Yes, sir.” - -“Are you at liberty to tell us what they were?” - -“No, sir.” - -“Did you carry them out?” - -“Yes, to the best of my ability.” - -“You were aware threats had been made that the ship would be torpedoed?” - -“We were,” the captain replied. - -“Was she armed?” - -“No, sir.” - -“What precautions did you take?” - -“We had all the boats swung when we came within the danger zone, between -the passing of Fastnet and the time of the accident.” - -[Illustration: “UNCLEAN!”] - -“Tell us in your own words what happened after passing Fastnet.” - - -SAW THE TORPEDO - -“The weather was clear,” Captain Turner answered. “We were going at a -speed of eighteen knots. I was on the port side and heard Second Officer -Hefford call out, ‘Here’s a torpedo.’ - -“I ran to the other side and saw clearly the wake of a torpedo. Smoke -and steam came up between the last two funnels. There was a slight -shock. Immediately after the first explosion there was another report, -but that may possibly have been internal. - -“I at once gave the order to lower the boats down to the rails, and I -directed that women and children should get into them. I also had all -the bulkheads closed. - -“I also gave orders to stop the ship,” Captain Turner continued, “but we -could not stop. We found that the engines were out of commission. It was -not safe to lower boats until the speed was off the vessel. As a matter -of fact, there was a perceptible headway on her up to the time she went -down. - -“When she was struck she listed to starboard. I stood on the bridge when -she sank, and the Lusitania went down under me. She floated about -eighteen minutes after the torpedo struck her. My watch stopped at 2.36. -I was picked up from among the wreckage and afterward was brought aboard -a trawler. - -“No warship was convoying us. I saw no warship, and none was reported to -me as having been seen. At the time I was picked up I noticed bodies -floating on the surface, but saw no living persons.” - -“Eighteen knots was not the normal speed of the Lusitania, was it?” he -was asked. - -“At ordinary times,” answered Captain Turner, “she could make -twenty-five knots, but in war times her speed was reduced to twenty-one -knots. My reason for going eighteen knots was that I wanted to arrive at -Liverpool without stopping and within two or three hours of high water.” - - -DOUBLE LOOKOUTS ON LINER - -“Was there a lookout kept for submarines, having regard to previous -warnings?” - -“Yes; we had double lookouts.” - -“Were you going a zigzag course at the moment the torpedoing took -place?” - -“No; it was bright weather, and land was clearly visible.” - -“Was it possible for a submarine to approach without being seen?” - -“Oh, yes, quite possible.” - -“Something has been said regarding the impossibility of launching the -boats on the port side?” - -“Yes,” said Captain Turner, “owing to the listing of the ship.” - -“How many boats were launched safely?” - -“I cannot say.” - -“Were your orders promptly carried out?” - -“Yes.” - -“Was there any panic on board?” - -“No, there was no panic at all; it was all most calm.” - -By the foreman of the jury: - -“In the face of the warnings at New York that the Lusitania would be -torpedoed, did you make any application to the Admiralty for an escort?” - -“No, I left that to them. It is their business, not mine. I simply had -to carry out my orders to go, and I would do it again.” - -Captain Turner uttered the last words of this reply with great emphasis. - -By the coroner: - -“I am very glad to hear you say so, Captain.” - -By a juryman: - -“Did you get a wireless to steer your vessel in a northerly direction?” - -“No,” replied Captain Turner. - -“Was the course of the vessel altered after the torpedoes struck her?” - -“I headed straight for land, but it was useless. Previous to this the -water-tight bulkheads were closed. I suppose the explosion forced them -open. I don’t know the exact extent to which the Lusitania was damaged.” - -“There must have been serious damage done to the water-tight bulkheads.” - -“There certainly was, without doubt.” - -“Were the passengers supplied with life-belts?” - -“Yes.” - -“Were any special orders given that morning that life-belts be put on?” - -“No.” - - -NO WARNING GIVEN - -“Was any warning given you before you were torpedoed?” - -“None whatever. It was suddenly done and finished.” - -“If there had been a patrol boat aboard; might it have been of -assistance?” - -“It might, but it is one of those things one never knows.” - -With regard to the threats against his ship, Captain Turner said he saw -nothing except what appeared in the New York papers the day before the -Lusitania sailed. He never had heard the passengers talking about the -threats, he said. - -“Was a warning given to the lower decks after the ship had been struck?” -Captain Turner was asked. - -“All the passengers must have heard the explosion,” Captain Turner -replied. - -Captain Turner in answer to another question said he received no report -from the lookout before the torpedo struck the Lusitania. - - -OTHER TESTIMONY - -Cornelius Horrigan, a waiter aboard the Lusitania, testified that it was -impossible to launch boats on the starboard side because of the -steamer’s list. He went down with the ship, but came up and was rescued. -Horrigan gave a partial identification of one of the bodies, which he -thought to be that of Steward Cranston. - -The ship’s bugler, Vernon Livermore, gave evidence that the water-tight -compartments were closed, but thought that the explosion must have -opened them. No one was able to identify a man in whose pocket was found -a card bearing the name of John Wanamaker of New York, and in the -left-hand corner “Notary Public MacQuerrie, Bureau of Information.” - - -CORONER HORGAN’S STATEMENT - -Coroner Horgan said that the first torpedo fired by the German submarine -did serious damage to the Lusitania, but that, not satisfied with this, -the Germans had discharged another torpedo. The second torpedo, he said, -must have been more deadly, because it went right through the ship, -hastening the work of destruction. - -He charged that the responsibility “lay on the German government and the -whole people of Germany who collaborated in the terrible crime. - -“This is a case,” he said, “in which a powerful war-like engine attacked -an unarmed vessel without warning. It was simple barbarism and -cold-blooded murder. - -“I purpose to ask the jury to return the only verdict possible for a -self-respecting jury--that the men in charge of the German submarine -were guilty of willful murder.” - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -THE WORLD-WIDE INDICTMENT OF GERMANY FOR THE LUSITANIA ATROCITY - - VIEWS OF COLONEL ROOSEVELT, UNITED STATES SENATORS AND OTHER PROMINENT - MEN -- OPINIONS OF THE NEWSPAPERS OF THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA -- - VIEWS OF PROMINENT CANADIANS. - - -Not even the invasion of peaceful Belgium, nor any of the other -atrocities charged to the belligerent nations in the great war, stirred -such universal and emphatic condemnation as the destruction of the -Lusitania and over half its _human_ freight of _human_ lives. From all -quarters of the globe the cry of amazement, indignation and outrage -arose. - -One of the first to express his feelings was Colonel Theodore Roosevelt, -who said: “This represents not merely piracy, but piracy on a vaster -scale of murder than any old-time pirate ever practiced. - -“This is the warfare which destroyed Louvain and Dinant and hundreds of -men, women and children in Belgium carried out to innocent men, women -and children on the ocean and to our own fellow countrymen and -countrywomen who are among the sufferers. - -“It seems inconceivable that we should refrain from taking action in -this matter, for we owe it not only to humanity, but to our own national -self-respect.” - -Atlee Pomerene, U. S. Senator from Ohio, member of the Foreign Relations -Committee, said: “To Americans the sinking of the Lusitania is the most -deplorable incident of the European war. Every man with the milk of -human kindness in his breast condemns any policy by any nation that -leads to the slaughter without warning of babes, women and -non-combatants.” - -Morris Sheppard, U. S. Senator from Texas, said: “The sinking of the -Lusitania is an illustration of the unspeakable horror of modern -warfare, and will be a tremendous argument for general disarmament when -the war closes. Let us handle the present situation with patience and -calmness, trusting the President to take the proper course.” - -John W. Griggs, former Governor of New Jersey and at one time -Attorney-General of the United States, expressed himself emphatically on -the Lusitania tragedy. He said: “The time for watchful waiting has -passed. No investigating committee is needed. The facts are known. -Action is demanded. A demand should be made at once without waiting by -the government to get the finding of any investigations or inquests. -Would you hesitate to act if a man slapped you in the face? I do not say -what should be demanded. That is for the government to decide. But an -explanation should be demanded of Germany at once. The German submarine -violated a law that even savages would recognize. I would hold Germany -to account by proclaiming her an outlaw among the nations of the world. -If the German government pleads that it was justified in this -crime--which it will--it is then the duty of the United States to join -with other neutral nations and cut her off from the rest of the world.” - -[Illustration: “I’M NOT ARGUING WITH YOU, WILLIAM; I’M JUST TELLING -YOU!”] - -Jacob M. Dickinson, Secretary of War under President Taft, issued a -statement in which he said: “It is not likely that Germany will disavow -the purpose to destroy the Lusitania with full knowledge of the fact -that this involved many American lives. In view of the result and the -warning given by our government to Germany, some proper action must be -taken, or the American government will incur the contempt of the world -and the contempt of a vast number of its own people.” - -“An act of barbarity without justification,” was the expression of -Frederick R. Coudert, of New York, an authority on international law, in -referring to the torpedoing of the Lusitania. Mr. Coudert said: “I make -that statement on the supposition that lives of citizens of the United -States, a neutral nation, were destroyed by the sinking of the vessel. -There is no justification, however, for ruthlessly sinking a merchant -ship in the open seas when that vessel is not engaged in any manner as a -belligerent vessel, and when the lives of non-combatants depend upon its -safety. It would seem to be time for the government of this country to -determine whether it will sit idly by and accept explanations that -Americans were warned to keep off the steamer, or take a definite stand -upon the rights of our citizens on the seas.” - -The opinion of the nation on the sinking of the Lusitania is fairly -represented by the following extracts from the editorial columns of -leading newspapers throughout the United States: - - -THE EAST - -New York Evening Post: “Germany ought not to be left in a moment’s doubt -how the civilized world regards her latest display of ‘frightfulness.’ -It is a deed for which a Hun would blush, a Turk be ashamed and a -Barbary pirate apologize. To speak of technicalities and the rules of -war, in the face of such wholesale murder on the high seas, is a waste -of time. The law of nations and the law of God have been alike trampled -upon. The German government must be given to understand that no plea of -military necessity will now avail it before the tribunal on which sits -as judge the humane conscience of the world. As was declared by -Germany’s own representative at The Hague Congress, the late Marschall -von Bieberstein, there are some atrocities which international law does -not need to legislate against, since they fall under the instant and -universal condemnation of mankind.” - -[Illustration: NON-COMBATANTS HONORED WITH THEIR FLAGS. - -The upper picture shows the body of an American victim of the Lusitania -disaster carried through the streets of Queenstown covered with the -Stars and Stripes. Below, British soldiers laying the Union Jack over -the coffins of victims recovered after the sinking of the Lusitania. -(_C. Int. News Service._)] - -[Illustration: ONE AMERICAN FAMILY LOST ON THE LUSITANIA. - -Wife and children of Paul Crompton. Not only hundreds of non-combatant -men, but many women and children were intentionally sunk with the -Lusitania.] - -New York Tribune: “Failing these things, no American should -misunderstand the meaning of the present crisis; no American should -shrink from the facts that cannot be evaded or avoided. If Germany has -once and for all embarked upon a deliberate campaign of murder directed -against American citizens, there can be but one consequence--the end is -inescapable.” - -New York World: “The main thing that concerns the American government -today is not the subordinate question of reparation for the -assassination of American citizens who were traveling on the Lusitania. -It is the broader question of whether Germany can be brought to her -senses and induced to abandon methods of warfare that are a crime -against civilization and an affront to humanity.” - -New York Times: “Neither in law nor in custom is there any extenuation -for this act of monstrous inhumanity, no exception, no condition, can be -made to shield it from the full force and condemnation it deserves and -has received. And the warning advertisement published by the German -Embassy here, being notice of an intent to commit a crime, is of no more -avail for exculpation than a Black Hand letter of threat.” - -New York Globe: “The duty of this government is sufficiently clear. -In a formal and emphatic manner, not shrinking from explicit -characterization, it should denounce the greatest international outrage -that has occurred since the Boxer savages of China, with the countenance -of a treacherous government, attacked the women and children in the -legations at Pekin.” - -Philadelphia Public Ledger: “As it stands the horror is almost -inconceivable. There has been nothing like it before. One of the -consequences of this war ought to be that nothing like it can ever -happen again. Unless civilization is to relapse into barbarism, helpless -non-combatants must not be exposed in such a fashion to the worst -calamities of war.” - -Boston Transcript: “The torpedoing of the Lusitania was not battle--it -was massacre. To destroy an enemy ship, an unarmed merchant vessel of -great value and power, is an act of war; to sink her in such a manner as -to send hundreds of her passengers, among them many neutrals, to their -death, is morally murder, and no technical military plea will avail to -procure any other verdict at the bar of civilized public opinion.” - -Boston Post: “The sinking of the British liner Lusitania by the torpedo -of a German submarine with terrible loss of life, is the worst crime -against civilization and humanity that the modern world has ever known. -It is a reversion to barbarism that will set the whole world, save -perhaps the little world of its perpetrators, aflame with horror and -indignation.” - -Boston Traveler: “With the destruction of this queen of the ocean liners -and the hundreds of lives of non-combatant men, women and children, also -came the ruin of the last vestige of the structure of international law -and humane consideration that through the centuries mankind has been -striving to erect. The very life and honor of the nation depend upon -the manner in which this attack upon its integrity is adjudicated, even -if any adjudication of a civil nature will be deemed sufficient to -permit of a peaceful, to say nothing of a friendly, adjustment.” - -Hartford Courant: “It is hard to find in the dictionary the words strong -enough to fit such conduct, and the effect of the destruction of the -ship and the loss of lives will be to turn public sentiment more than -ever against the Germans.” - -Providence Journal: “Scores of Americans were murdered yesterday on the -high seas, by order of the German government. Men and women, citizens of -the United States, traveling peaceably on a merchant steamer, have been -sent to their death by the deliberately planned act of Emperor William -and his advisers.” - -Providence Evening Tribune: “The torpedoing of the Lusitania, in that it -destroyed innocent American lives, was a capital crime committed by -Germany against the United States. A capital crime is a crime punishable -by death. And in the case of a nation punitive death is usually -administered by the process of war.” - - -THE WEST - -Chicago Herald: “International law contemplates the capture of merchant -vessels. It contemplates their destruction under certain conditions. But -it does not contemplate, provide for or justify destruction of the crews -and passengers of such ships without giving them a chance for safety.” - -Minneapolis Journal: “Germany intends to become the outlaw of nations. -Perhaps we are yet to witness savagery carried to its ultimate -perfection.” - -Minneapolis Tribune: “The sinking of the Lusitania is outside the rules -of civilized warfare. The President will have the loyal support of the -people of this country in whatever course wise counsel may find it -necessary to pursue.” - -Denver Rocky Mountain News: “Mankind will hang its head in shame. It was -not war. It is not England that suffers; it is not the relatives and -friends of the dead that suffer only; the people of Germany will suffer -for the deed of yesterday.” - - -THE SOUTH - -Washington Post: “No warrant whatever, in law or morals, can be found -for the willful destruction of an unarmed vessel, neutral or enemy, -carrying passengers, without giving them an opportunity to leave the -vessel. Germany stands indicted on this charge, and if it is proved the -world will not exonerate that nation for the awful destruction of -innocent life.” - -Baltimore American: “Americans must and will resent the invasion of -their rights, and in this there can be no division of American -sentiment.” - -Charleston News and Courier: “The destruction of the Lusitania has been -accomplished, it now appears, with the most diabolically cruel -deliberation. If this shall be established as a fact, there can be no -question that the wrath of the American people will flame--and should -flame.” - -New Orleans Times-Picayune: “What is Washington going to do about it? -Slaughter of American citizens in contravention of all laws of warfare -has placed the United States in a position that is intolerable. Our -people were wantonly done to death.” - - -SENTIMENT OF THE CANADIAN PRESS - -Even sterner was the tone of the editorial opinion of the Canadian -press. In many cases the actual intervention of the United States in the -war was advocated. The following excerpts are characteristic of the -opinion of the newspapers of Canada: - -Toronto Daily News: “This fresh display of Teutonic Kultur raises anew -the question as to how long the Washington government is going to be -scorned and trampled upon by the most unscrupulous and barbarous race of -modern times. What effect will this deliberate destruction of hundreds -of American citizens in cold blood have upon public sentiment throughout -the United States? Can President Wilson forever stand aside while -international law and international moral standards are cast to the -winds by a brutal and infuriated people?” - -Toronto Mail and Empire: “The Washington government knows why the -American citizens whose names are on the passenger list of the Lusitania -trusted themselves to the ship despite the warnings of the Kaiser’s -agents and accomplices in New York. Those American men and women -disregarded the warnings, not because they believed the Germans -incapable of torpedoing a passenger vessel, but because they felt that -the neutrality and puissance of their nation would be respected. The -Washington government cannot let these American citizens who relied on -its protection go unavenged.” - -Toronto Globe: “But what of the United States. Does President Wilson -propose to let German submarines destroy the lives of American citizens -because they choose to cross the Atlantic in a passenger ship flying the -British flag? Does he still think the mad dog of Europe can be trusted -at large? Is it not almost time to join in hunting down the brute?” - -Toronto Daily Star: “The sinking of the Lusitania was not necessary to -prove what was already abundantly demonstrated--that there is no length -of vindictiveness to which Germany will not go. There is no lesson to be -drawn from it except that Germany must be fought to a finish, and that -all the resources of the allied countries must be marshalled for that -purpose. We are engaged in no ordinary war. The very existence of -civilization is at stake. The civilized world is threatened by a nation -that has deliberately gone back to barbarism and given a free rein to -criminal instincts. Denunciation and rebuke are of no avail in such a -case. The conflict is between a powerful criminal and those who desire -to live under the reign of law; and the time has come for every man who -believes in law, in every nation, to fight for the life of -civilization.” - - -VIEWS OF PROMINENT CANADIANS - -That the torpedoing of the Lusitania was not an act of war in the -technical sense committed by Germany as against the United States, was -the view expressed by Mr. McGregor Young, professor of international -law in Toronto University, who said in an interview: - -“Certain acts are acts of war in the technical sense--acts, that is to -say, which touch the state qua state. But the torpedoing of the -Lusitania does not come within that category, so far as the United -States is concerned. It is not an act such as is not compatible with -friendly relations between that country and Germany. The Lusitania was a -British ship, and the American passengers on board her were really an -incident, as it were. Whether it would be consistent with the United -States’ self-respect to put up with Germany’s action is another matter. -That is a question as to which a nation must judge for itself.” - -Mr. E. F. B. Johnston, K.C., gave his opinion as follows: - -“The Lusitania was a vessel owned by a British company, carrying on -business in England. It was not under the control of the United States. -Individual citizens choosing to travel by this boat would do so at their -own risk, and so far as loss is concerned, the United States as a nation -would not perhaps be legally affected. But if citizens of the United -States are not to be protected by their own Government, a wholesale -slaughter might be justified on the ground that the ship was English. It -seems to me to be a question of policy. And, as such, one would say that -it was the duty of the United States to protect, as far as possible, -their own citizens.” - -On the Sunday following the destruction of the Lusitania reference to -the disaster was made by countless clergymen throughout Canada. Varying -sentiments were expressed in their sermons, but perhaps the keynote was -sounded by the Rev. W. H. Hincks, D.D., pastor of Trinity Methodist -Church, Toronto, who alluded to the subject as follows: - -“Neutral nations headed by the President of the United States seven -months ago entered a united diplomatic protest against the violation of -the branch of The Hague Convention which has to do with the killing of -civilians. The greatest thinkers in Great Britain have taken the view -that the United States can do more good as a neutral by exerting her -influence in the interest of humanity and in accordance with The Hague -Convention than in entering unprepared into the war. Our duty is to pray -for the President of the United States, that, surrounded by the wisest -of his advisers, he may take action with other neutral nations to -prevent the repetition of such a crime.” - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -AMERICA’S PROTEST AGAINST UNCIVILIZED WARFARE - - PRESIDENT WILSON’S GREAT RESPONSIBILITY -- THE NOTE TO GERMANY -- - ATTACKS CALLED CONTRARY TO RULES OF WARFARE -- WARNING TO GERMANY - RECALLED -- SUBMARINE WARFARE ON COMMERCE CONDEMNED -- PUBLISHED - WARNING DECLARED NO EXCUSE FOR ATTACK -- PROMPT, JUST ACTION BY - GERMANY EXPECTED -- THE WHOLE NATION BEHIND THE PRESIDENT -- SOUTH AND - WEST RESOUNDED WITH APPROVAL. - - -Rarely has a man in any office of life had laid upon his shoulders so -great a responsibility as was thrust upon President Wilson by the -destruction of more than a hundred American lives in the Lusitania -disaster. No heart was more sorely stricken than his by the dastardly -calamity, and yet it is characteristic of the man, and to his -everlasting credit, that when impetuous minds were urging him to hasty -action, his reply was, - -“We must think first of humanity.” - -A man of lesser stature, mentally and spiritually, would have required a -host of counselors. In the great crisis which he faced President Wilson -assumed for himself full responsibility. There was the rare spectacle of -a man great enough and sure enough to determine wholly within his own -mind upon the action he should take. He sought no advice; he eschewed -advisers. In solitude he evolved his supreme duty. - -When, in the seclusion of his own soul, he had fixed upon his policy, he -proceeded in the same way to put it into words. It is a thing perhaps -without precedent before the administration of President Wilson that the -note to the German government, which has become a historic document, was -written originally by the President in shorthand. After he had set down -the communication in this way he transcribed it on his own typewriter. -No official or clerk of the White House had any part in the preparation -of the document until after it had been presented to the members of the -Cabinet. Not even Secretary Bryan saw it in advance of that time. - - -THE NOTE TO GERMANY - -The full text of President Wilson’s note, dated May 13, and communicated -over the name of Secretary of State Bryan, is as follows: - - _“The Secretary of State to the American Ambassador at Berlin_: - - “Please call on the Minister of Foreign Affairs, and after reading to - him this communication, leave with him a copy: - - “In view of the recent acts of the German authorities in violation of - American rights on the high seas, which culminated in the torpedoing - and sinking of the British steamship Lusitania on May 7, 1915, by - which over one hundred American citizens lost their lives, it is - clearly wise and desirable that the government of the United States - and the imperial German government should come to a clear and full - understanding as to the grave situation which has resulted. - - “The sinking of the British passenger steamship Falaba by a German - submarine on March 28, through which Leon C. Thresher, an American - citizen, was drowned; the attack on April 28 on the American vessel - Cushing by a German aeroplane; the torpedoing on May 1 of the American - vessel Gulflight by a German submarine, as a result of which two or - more American citizens met their death; and, finally, the torpedoing - and sinking of the steamship Lusitania, constitute a series of events - which the government of the United States has observed with growing - concern, distress and amazement. - - - ATTACKS CALLED CONTRARY TO RULES OF WARFARE - - “Recalling the humane and enlightened attitude hitherto assumed by the - imperial German government in matters of international right, and - particularly with regard to the freedom of the seas; having learned to - recognize the German views and the German influence in the field of - international obligation as always engaged upon the side of justice - and humanity; and having understood the instructions of the imperial - German government to its naval commanders to be upon the same plane of - humane action prescribed by the naval codes of other nations, the - government of the United States was loath to believe--it cannot now - bring itself to believe--that these acts, so absolutely contrary to - the rules, the practices and the spirit of modern warfare, could have - the countenance or sanction of that great government. It feels it to - be its duty, therefore, to address the imperial German government - concerning them with the utmost frankness and in the earnest hope that - it is not mistaken in expecting action on the part of the imperial - German government which will correct the unfortunate impressions which - have been created and vindicate once more the position of that - government with regard to the sacred freedom of the seas. - - - WARNING TO GERMANY RECALLED - - “The government of the United States has been apprised that the - imperial German government considered themselves to be obliged by the - extraordinary circumstances of the present war and the measures - adopted by their adversaries in seeking to cut Germany off from all - commerce, to adopt methods of retaliation which go much beyond the - ordinary methods of warfare at sea, in the proclamation of a war zone - from which they have warned neutral ships to keep away. This - government has already taken occasion to inform the imperial German - government that it cannot admit the adoption of such measures or such - a warning of danger to operate as in any degree an abbreviation of the - rights of American shipmasters or of American citizens bound on lawful - errands as passengers on merchant ships of belligerent nationality; - and that it must hold the imperial German government to a strict - accountability for any infringement of those rights, intentional or - incidental. It does not understand the imperial German government to - question those rights. It assumes, on the contrary, that the imperial - German government accept, as of course, the rule that the lives of - non-combatants, whether they be of neutral citizenship or citizens of - one of the nations at war, cannot lawfully or rightfully be put in - jeopardy by the capture or destruction of an unarmed merchantman, and - recognize, also, as all other nations do, the obligation to take the - usual precaution of visit and search to ascertain whether a suspected - merchantman is in fact of belligerent nationality or is in fact - carrying contraband of war under a neutral flag. - - - SUBMARINE WARFARE ON COMMERCE CONDEMNED - - “The government of the United States, therefore, desires to call the - attention of the imperial German government with the utmost - earnestness to the fact that the objection to their present method of - attack against the trade of their enemies lies in the practical - impossibility of employing submarines in the destruction of commerce - without disregarding those rules of fairness, reason, justice and - humanity, which all modern opinion regards as imperative. It is - practically impossible for the officers of a submarine to visit a - merchantman at sea and examine her papers and cargo. It is practically - impossible for them to make a prize of her; and, if they cannot put a - prize crew on board of her, they cannot sink her without leaving her - crew and all on board of her to the mercy of the sea in her small - boats. These facts, it is understood, the imperial German government - frankly admit. - - “We are informed that in the instances of which we have spoken time - enough for even that poor measure of safety was not given, and in at - least two of the cases cited not so much as a warning was received. - Manifestly, submarines cannot be used against merchantmen, as the last - few weeks have shown, without an inevitable violation of many sacred - principles of justice and humanity. - - “American citizens act within their indisputable rights in taking - their ships and in traveling wherever their legitimate business calls - them upon the high seas, and exercise those rights in what should be - the well-justified confidence that their lives will not be endangered - by acts done in clear violation of universally acknowledged - international obligations, and certainly in the confidence that their - own government will sustain them in the exercise of their rights. - - - PUBLISHED WARNING DECLARED NO EXCUSE FOR ATTACK - - “There was recently published in the newspapers of the United States, - I regret to inform the imperial German government, a formal warning, - purporting to come from the imperial German embassy at Washington, - addressed to the people of the United States, and stating in effect - that any citizen of the United States who exercised his right of free - travel upon the seas would do so at his peril if his journey should - take him within the zone of waters within which the imperial German - navy was using submarines against the commerce of Great Britain and - France, notwithstanding the respectful but very earnest protest of - this government, the government of the United States. I do not refer - to this for the purpose of calling the attention of the imperial - German government at this time to the surprising irregularity of a - communication from the imperial German embassy at Washington addressed - to the people of the United States through the newspapers, but only - for the purpose of pointing out that no warning that an unlawful and - inhumane act will be committed can possibly be accepted as an excuse - or palliation for that act, or as an abatement of the responsibility - for its commission. - - “Long acquainted as this government has been with the character of the - imperial German government and with the high principles of equity by - which they have in the past been actuated and guided, the government - of the United States cannot believe that the commanders of the vessels - which committed these acts of lawlessness did so except under a - misapprehension of the orders issued by the imperial German naval - authorities. It takes it for granted that, at least within the - practical possibilities of every such case, the commanders even of - submarines were expected to do nothing that would involve the lives of - non-combatants or the safety of neutral ships, even at the cost of - failing of their object of capture or destruction. - - “It confidently expects, therefore, that the imperial German - government will disavow the acts of which the government of the United - States complains; that they will make reparation so far as reparation - is possible for injuries which are without measure, and that they will - take immediate steps to prevent the recurrence of anything so - obviously subversive of the principles of warfare for which the - imperial German government have in the past so wisely and so firmly - contended. - - - PROMPT, JUST ACTION BY GERMANY EXPECTED - - “The government and people of the United States look to the imperial - German government for just, prompt and enlightened action in this - vital matter with the greater confidence because the United States and - Germany are bound together not only by special ties of friendship, but - also by the explicit stipulations of the treaty of 1828 between the - United States and the Kingdom of Prussia. - - “Expressions of regret and offers of reparation in case of the - destruction of neutral ships sunk by mistake, while they may satisfy - international obligations, if no loss of life results, cannot justify - or excuse a practice, the natural and necessary effect of which is to - subject neutral nations and neutral persons to new and immeasurable - risks. - - “The imperial German government will not expect the government of the - United States to omit any word or any act necessary to the performance - of its sacred duty of maintaining the rights of the United States and - its citizens and of safeguarding their free exercise and enjoyment. - - “BRYAN.” - - -THE WHOLE NATION BEHIND THE PRESIDENT - -With anxiety, even if with confidence, the American people waited the -publication of this note. Then they read, and the whole country -resounded with enthusiastic support. More than at almost any previous -period in the history of the United States, more certainly than at the -outbreak of any previous foreign war, the nation stood solidly behind -the President. According to the New York Tribune he “acted with calm -statesmanlike directness, deserved well of his own nation and earned the -respect of the world.” The New York Sun, commenting on the note, said: -“The President has spoken firmly. The country, supporting him as firmly, -awaits without passion the German reply,” and the New York Herald in an -editorial declared that President Wilson had “expressed the unanimous -voice of the great American republic.” “Everyone trusts the President -because he has shown himself worthy of trust,” was the comment of the -Philadelphia Public Ledger. “The Government’s position in this case is -the country’s position. It is not extreme, yet it covers the ground,” -spoke the Springfield Republican, and the Christian Science Monitor went -so far as to state that there was “probably no body of opinion in the -United States which will be dissatisfied either with the tone or temper -of the message.” - -[Illustration: ZEPPELIN DEVICE FOR DROPPING BOMBS. - -An armored car is suspended by three cables from the Zeppelin airship to -a distance of several thousand feet below the monster air-craft, which -is concealed in the clouds above. (_Sphere copr._)] - -[Illustration: FALLING TO EARTH LIKE A BLAZING METEOR. - -This stirring picture represents a German aeroplane of the type called -Aviatik, beaten in a fight high up in the air by the famous French -Aviator Garros, plunging to earth in flames, turning and turning like a -falling star.] - - -SOUTH AND WEST RESOUNDED WITH APPROVAL - -No less enthusiastic was the approval of the press in the South and -West. “The citizenry of this country is with Wilson,” stoutly declared -the Baltimore Sun, and the Louisville Post maintained: “There are no -neutrals in America now. We are all earnest supporters of the President, -who by patience and fortitude has established his right to lead a free -people.” The note, according to the Atlanta Journal, was “the voice of -the American people proclaiming in terms unmistakable their conscience -and their will.” - -“Whatever the fate of our relations with Germany, the President -undoubtedly has voiced the sentiment of the nation upon the use of the -submarine and as to the rights of neutrals on the high seas,” was the -comment of the Chicago Tribune. The note was described by the Cleveland -News as “all that Americans could wish,” and according to the San -Francisco Chronicle, it commended itself “to the common sense of people -unafflicted with inflammable hatreds.” “It is probable that no document -of state ever came nearer reflecting the sentiment of the American -people,” commented the Denver Times, and the Indianapolis News -proclaimed: “It is not simply the government, but the nation that speaks -through the document. There is no one who does not hope for a peaceful -adjustment of the difficulty.” The Minneapolis Journal, after analyzing -the note and especially the last strong paragraph of protest, declared: -“The American people will stand by these words.” - -If no president of the United States ever faced so grave a crisis, -certainly none ever received more unanimous support. If there were any -murmurs of dissatisfaction they were too faint to be heard above the -chorus of approval. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -THE GERMAN DEFENSE FOR THE DESTRUCTION OF THE LUSITANIA - - BLAMES BRITAIN FOR MISUSE OF FLAG -- INVESTIGATING CASES OF CUSHING - AND GULFLIGHT -- DECLARES SHIP CARRIED MOUNTED CANNON -- SAYS IT ACTED - IN JUSTIFIED SELF-DEFENSE -- FINAL DECISION ON DEMANDS DEFERRED -- - AMERICAN OPINION OF GERMAN EXCUSES -- EVASIVE AND INSINCERE -- ATTACKS - ON AMERICAN VESSELS MUST CEASE -- SUPPORT THE PRESIDENT. - - -The German defense for the destruction of the Lusitania and for other -marine atrocities committed against non-combatant vessels in the famous, -or infamous, war zone was contained in a note to the American -government, transmitted May 31, in reply to President Wilson’s note of -protest. The full text of the German note is as follows: - -“The undersigned has the honor to submit to Ambassador Gerard the -following answer to the communication of May 13 regarding the injury to -American interests through German submarine warfare. - -“The Imperial government has subjected the communication of the American -government to a thorough investigation. It entertains also a keen wish -to co-operate in a frank and friendly way in clearing up a possible -misunderstanding which may have arisen in the relations between the two -governments through the events mentioned by the American government. - -“Regarding, firstly, the cases of the American steamers Cushing and -Gulflight. The American embassy has already been informed that the -German government has no intention of submitting neutral ships in the -war zone, which are guilty of no hostile acts, to attacks by a submarine -or submarines or aviators. On the contrary, the German forces have -repeatedly been instructed most specifically to avoid attacks on such -ships. - - -BLAMES BRITAIN FOR MISUSE OF FLAGS - -“If neutral ships in recent months have suffered through the German -submarine warfare, owing to mistakes in identification, it is a question -only of quite isolated and exceptional cases, which can be attributed to -the British government’s abuse of flags, together with the suspicious or -culpable behavior of the masters of the ships. - -“The German government, in all cases in which it has been shown by its -investigations that a neutral ship, not itself at fault, was damaged by -German submarines or aviators, has expressed regret over the unfortunate -accident and, if justified by conditions, has offered indemnification. - - -INVESTIGATING CASES OF CUSHING AND GULFLIGHT - -“The cases of the Cushing and the Gulflight will be treated on the same -principles. An investigation of both cases is in progress, the result of -which will presently be communicated to the embassy. The investigation -can, if necessary, be supplemented by an international call on the -international commission of inquiry as provided by Article III of The -Hague agreement of October 18, 1907. - -“When sinking the British steamer Falaba, the commander of the German -submarine had the intention of allowing the passengers and crew a full -opportunity for a safe escape. Only when the master did not obey the -order to heave-to, but fled and summoned help by rocket signals, did the -German commander order the crew and passengers by signals and megaphone -to leave the ship within ten minutes. He actually allowed them -twenty-three minutes time and fired the torpedo only when suspicious -craft were hastening to the assistance of the Falaba. - -“Regarding the loss of life by the sinking of the British passenger -steamer Lusitania, the German government has already expressed to the -neutral governments concerned its keen regret that citizens of their -states lost their lives. - -“On this occasion, the Imperial government, however, cannot escape the -impression that certain important facts having a direct bearing on the -sinking of the Lusitania may have escaped the attention of the American -government. - -“In the interest of a clear and complete understanding, which is the aim -of both governments, the Imperial government considers it first -necessary to convince itself that the information accessible to both -governments about the facts of the case is complete and in accord. - -“The government of the United States proceeds on the assumption that -the Lusitania could be regarded as an ordinary unarmed merchantman. The -Imperial government allows itself in this connection to point out that -the Lusitania was one of the largest and fastest British merchant ships, -built with government funds as an auxiliary cruiser and carried -expressly as such in the ‘navy list’ issued by the British admiralty. - - -DECLARES SHIP CARRIED MOUNTED CANNON - -“It is further known to the Imperial government from trustworthy reports -from its agents and neutral passengers, that for a considerable time -practically all the more valuable British merchantmen have been equipped -with cannon and ammunition and other weapons and manned with persons who -have been specially trained in serving guns. The Lusitania, too, -according to information received here, had cannon aboard, which were -mounted and concealed below decks. - -“The Imperial government, further, has the honor to direct the -particular attention of the American government to the fact that the -British admiralty in a confidential instruction issued in February, -1915, recommended its mercantile shipping not only to seek protection -under neutral flags and disguising marks, but also, while thus -disguised, to attack German submarines by ramming. As a special -incitation to merchantmen to destroy submarines, the British government -also offered high prizes and has already paid such rewards. - -“The Imperial government in view of these facts indubitably known to it, -is unable to regard British merchantmen in the zone of naval operations -specified by the admiralty staff of the German navy as ‘undefended.’ -German commanders consequently are no longer able to observe the -customary regulations of the prize law, which they always followed. - -“Finally the Imperial government must point out particularly that the -Lusitania on its last trip, as on earlier occasions, carried Canadian -troops and war material, including no less than 5,400 cases of -ammunition intended for the destruction of the brave German soldiers who -are fulfilling their duty with self-sacrifice and devotion in the -Fatherland’s service. - - -SAYS IT ACTED IN JUSTIFIED SELF-DEFENSE - -“The German government believes that it was acting in justified -self-defense in seeking with all the means of warfare at its disposition -to protect the lives of its soldiers by destroying ammunition intended -for the enemy. - -“The British shipping company must have been aware of the danger to -which the passengers aboard the Lusitania were exposed under these -conditions. The company, in embarking them notwithstanding this, -attempted deliberately to use the lives of American citizens as -protection for the ammunition aboard, and acted against the clear -provisions of the American law, which expressly prohibits the forwarding -of passengers on ships carrying ammunition, and provides a penalty -therefor. The company therefore is wantonly guilty of the death of so -many passengers. - -“There can be no doubt according to definite report of the submarine’s -commander, which is further confirmed by all other information, that the -quick sinking of the Lusitania is primarily attributed to the explosion -of the ammunition shipment caused by a torpedo. The Lusitania’s -passengers would otherwise, in all human probability, have been saved. - -“The Imperial government considers the above-mentioned facts important -enough to recommend them to the attentive examination of the American -government. - - -FINAL DECISION ON DEMANDS DEFERRED - -“The Imperial government, while withholding its final decision on the -demands advanced in connection with the sinking of the Lusitania until -receipt of an answer from the American government, feels impelled in -conclusion to recall here and now that it took cognizance with -satisfaction of the mediatory proposals submitted by the United States -government to Berlin and London as a basis for a modus vivendi for -conducting the maritime warfare between Germany and Great Britain. - -“The Imperial government by its readiness to enter upon a discussion of -these proposals, then demonstrated its good intentions in ample fashion. -The realization of these proposals was defeated, as is well known, by -the declinatory attitude of the British government. - -“The undersigned takes occasion, etc. - - “JAGOW.” - - -AMERICAN OPINION OF GERMAN EXCUSES - -The effect of the German note on American opinion was to create a sense -of angry disappointment. The newspapers were a unit in calling it -evasive. It “does not meet the issue,” declared the New York World, -while the New York Times viewed it as being “not responsive to our -demand. It tends rather to becloud understanding.” The Albany -Knickerbocker Press denounced it as “an answer which purposely does not -answer. Germany evidently is playing for time.” This thought was -reiterated by the Pittsburgh Gazette-Times, which pointed out that “it -is palpable that Germany proposes to consume time by raising points -which call for further correspondence, in the meanwhile continuing in -the course to which the United States has objected.” - -[Illustration: SURVIVORS OF THE LUSITANIA DISASTER. - -Mr. Cowper, a Canadian journalist, holding little Helen Smith, a -six-year-old American girl, who lost both father and mother. (_C. Int. -News Service._) - -“The Man Who Cannot Be Drowned.” This stoker was saved from the Titanic, -the Empress of Ireland and, lastly, from the Lusitania.] - -[Illustration: SAPPING AND MINING THE ENEMY’S TRENCHES. - -When the hostile trenches are near together an open zig-zag trench is -dug to a point very close to the enemy’s line, then a covered gallery is -excavated to a point almost under the hostile trench. - -GAINING A FOOT OF GROUND PER HOUR. - -Here a charge of explosive is placed and fired from a distance by an -electric wire. At the same instant the men charge over the ground and -occupy the ruined trench of the enemy. (_Il. L. News copr._)] - -[Illustration: BELGIAN REFUGEES FIND SAFETY IN HOLLAND. - -This photograph, made at Putte, a Holland frontier town, shows some of -the three hundred thousand refugees who sought safety in Holland. -(_Copyright by Underwood and Underwood._)] - - - United States’ Note of Protest and Germany’s Reply Compared - - - _President Wilson Demanded_: - - Practical cessation of submarine attacks on non-combatant vessels. - - Observance of the rule of visit and search in the case of all - suspected merchantmen before any such ship shall be subjected to - capture or destruction. - - Protection of non-combatants who may be on suspected merchantmen. - - Disavowal of official German responsibility for injury to Americans in - the Cushing, Gulflight and Lusitania cases. - - Reparation, so far as reparation is possible, for irreparable damage. - - Immediate steps by Germany to prevent the recurrence of incidents “so - obviously subversive of the principles of warfare.” - - The first three items, as noted above, were stated not as actual - demands, but as assumptions of what Germany would agree to in view of - previous communications from this country in the matter of what is - allowable in maritime warfare according to previously acknowledged - international law and the dictates of humanity. - - - _Germany Conceded_: - - No intention of attacking neutral ships not guilty of hostile acts in - “war zone.” - - Regrets and indemnity where neutral ship, not itself at fault, is - damaged. - - Attacks on the American ships Gulflight and Cushing unintentional, the - circumstances being rigidly investigated. - - Keen regret at loss of lives of neutral citizens on Lusitania. - - - _Germany Evaded_: - - Issue as to humanitarian aspect and facts in Lusitania case. - - Giving of any direct promise to abandon submarine warfare. - - Any attempt to justify such warfare, except as “self-defense.” - - - _Germany Countered_: - - By raising question as to Lusitania being an “auxiliary armed - cruiser,” and not of the “undefended merchantmen” class. - - By accusing Cunard company of using American citizens to protect the - “ammunition” carried by Lusitania, and of being guilty of their death. - -The Chicago Herald more specifically pointed out the evasiveness of the -German reply, claiming that it “fails wholly to meet the main points at -issue, both the specific point of the slaughter of American citizens on -the Lusitania and the general point of the impossibility of employing -submarines in the destruction of commerce without disregarding rules of -fairness, reason, justice and humanity--established principles of -international law.” - - -EVASIVE AND INSINCERE - -The Philadelphia Public Ledger also criticized it for ignoring -altogether “the protest in the name of humanity against submarine -warfare upon non-combatants,” and the Cincinnati Commercial Tribune laid -bare the “absolute ignoring of the vital principles set forth in the -Wilson letter,” adding that “there is a half contemptuous, albeit -entirely courteous, suggestion of ‘Well, they are still dead; now, what -do you propose to do about it?’” - -[Illustration: NO USE.] - -The German claim that the Lusitania was in effect a warship, with -mounted guns, and carried ammunition and Canadian soldiers, was -emphatically denied in a public statement by Dudley Field Malone, -collector of the port of New York, and the New York World vehemently -answered the German claim by declaring that “the Lusitania was a warship -in the same way that Belgium was an aggressor against Germany; in the -same way that the University of Louvain and Rheims Cathedral were -‘fortifications’; in the same way that various seaside resorts in -England, raided by Germans, were ‘defended.’” - - -ATTACKS ON AMERICAN VESSELS MUST CEASE - -Many newspapers joined in calling for more drastic action on the part of -the United States government. “We have but one thing in mind,” announced -the New York Tribune, “that these crimes shall cease. Any answer, -therefore, which fails to guarantee their stoppage as a condition -precedent to diplomatic rectification cannot be expected to satisfy the -just expectation of the United States.” The Washington Herald followed -this by saying: “The patience of the American people in the face of -contemptuous disregard of their rights and a series of outrages against -their countrymen has been sublime, but surely it has a limit. Surely a -way will be found, without much longer delay, to compel Germany to cease -her attacks on American vessels engaged in neutral commerce and to -guarantee the safety of American lives and property.” - - -SUPPORT THE PRESIDENT - -On the other hand there was a strong element that counseled coolness and -restraint. “This is not a time,” declared the Albany Knickerbocker -Press, “to suggest to President Wilson what ought to be done. It is not -a time to become impatient. It is a time for restraint. Nothing can be -gained now by playing upon the strings of excitable public opinion in -America. The President must find his way out and every true American -must support him loyally.” Echoing this sentiment, the Springfield -Republican added, “but the German government may fairly be required to -give definite assurances that during the period of the negotiations no -more torpedo attacks on passenger ships which may be carrying American -citizens will be permitted.” - - - - -CHAPTER X - -SWIFT REVERSAL TO BARBARISM - -BY VANCE THOMPSON - - CULTURE SWEPT AWAY -- BREAKING POINT OF CIVILIZATION -- BARBARISM AND - WOMEN -- AFTER BARBARISM, WHAT? - - [The following article is reproduced by the courtesy of the New York - Times.] - - -There is in Brussels--if the Uhlans have spared it--a mad and monstrous -picture. It is called “A Scene in Hell,” and hangs in the Musée Wiertz. -And what you see on the canvas are the fierce and blinding flames of -hell; and amid them looms the dark figure of Napoleon, and around him -the wives and mothers and maids of Belgium scream and surge and clutch -and curse--taking their posthumous vengeance. - -And since Napoleon was a notable emperor in his time, the picture is not -without significance today. Paint in another face, and let it go at -that. - -War is a bad thing. Even hell is the worse for it. - -War is a bad thing; it is a reversal, sudden and complete, to barbarism. -That is what I would get at in this article. One day there is -civilization, authentic, complex, triumphant; comes war, and in a moment -the entire fabric sinks down into a slime of mud and blood. In a day, -in an hour, a cycle of civilization is canceled. What you saw in the -morning was suave and ordered life; and the sun sets on howling -savagery. In the morning black-coated men lifted their hats to women. -Ere nightfall they are slashing them with sabres and burning the houses -over their heads. And the grave old professors who were droning -platitudes of peace and progress and humanitarianism are screaming, ere -today is done, shrill senile clamors for blood and ravage and rapine. - -A reversal to barbarism. - -Here; it is in the tea-room of the smartest hotel in Munich; war has -come; high-voiced women of title chatter over their teacups; comes -swaggering in the Crown Prince Ruprecht of Bavaria; he has just had his -sabre sharpened and has girt his abdomen for war. His wife runs to him. -And she kisses the sabre and shouts: “Bring it back to me covered with -blood--that I may kiss it again!” And the other high-voiced women flock -to kiss the sword. - -A reversal to barbarism. - -It has taken place in an hour; but yesterday these were sweet patrician -ladies, who prattled of humanity and love and the fair graces of life; -and now they would fain wet their mouths with blood--laughingly, as -harlots wet their mouths with wine. - -The unclean and vampirish spirit of war has swept them back to the -habits of the cave-dwelling ages of the race. In an hour the culture so -painfully acquired in slow generations has been swept away. Royalty, in -the tea-room of the “Four Seasons,” is one with the blonde nude female -who romped and fought in the dark Teutonic forests ere Caesar came -through Gaul. - -Reversal to barbarism. - -War is declared; and in Berlin the Emperor of Germany rides in an open -motor car down Unter den Linden; he is in full uniform, sworded, erect, -hieratic; and at his side sits the Empress--she the good mother, the -housewife, the fond grandmother--garmented from head to foot in cloth -the color of blood. - -Theatricalism? No. The symbolism is more significant. The symbol bears a -savage significance. It marks, as a red sunset, the going down of -civilization and the coming of the dark barbarism of war. - - -BREAKING POINT OF CIVILIZATION - -There was war; and the whole machinery of civilization stopped. - -Modern civilization is the most complex machine imaginable; its infinite -cogged wheels turn endlessly upon each other; and perfectly it -accomplishes its multifarious purposes; but smash one wheel and it all -falls apart into muddle and ruin. The declaration of war was like -thrusting a mailed fist into the intricate works of a clock. There was -an end of the perfected machine of civilization. Everything stopped. - -That was a queer world we woke in. A world that seemed new, so old it -was. - -Money had ceased to exist. It seemed at that moment an appalling thing. -I was on the edge and frontier of a neutral state. I had money in a -bank. It ceased to be money. A thousand-franc note was paper. A -hundred-mark note was rubbish. British sovereigns were refused at the -railway station. The Swiss shopkeeper would not change a Swiss note. -What had seemed money was not money. - -Values were told in terms of bread. - -It was a swift and immediate return to the economic conditions of -barbarism. Metals were hoarded; and where there had been trade there was -barter. And it all happened in an hour, in that first fierce panic of -war. - -Traffic stopped with a clang as of rusty iron. The mailed fist had -dislocated the complex machinery of European traffic. Frontiers which -had been mere landmarks of travel became suddenly formidable and -impassable barriers, guarded by harsh, hysterical men with bayonets. - -War makes men brave and courageous? Rubbish! It fills them with the -cruelty of hysteria and the panic of the unknown. I am not talking of -battle, which is a different thing. But I say the men who guarded the -German frontier--and I dare say every other frontier--in the first -stress of war, were wrenched and shaken with veritable hysteria. At St. -Ludwig and Constance those husky soldiers in iron-mongery, with shaved -heads and beards and outstanding ears, fell into sheer savagery, not -because they were bad and savage men, but simply because they were -hysterical. The fact is worth noting. - -It explains many a bloody and infamous deed in the tragic history of sad -Alsace and of little Belgium. The war-begotten reversal to savagery -brought with it all the hysteria of the savage man. The sentries at St. -Ludwig struck with muskets and sabres because they were hysterical with -terror of the new, unknown state into which they had been plunged, not -because they were not men like you and me. Surely the savage Uhlan who -ravaged the cottages of Alsace was your brother and mine, as were the -Magyar beyond the Danube and the Cossack at Kovna. Only they had gone -back to the terrors of the man who dwelt in a cave. - -Traffic stopped; and when it stopped civilization fell away from the -travelers. That was strange. Take the afternoon of the day war was -declared, the date being Aug. 1, in the year of our Lord 1914, and the -hour 7.30 P. M., Berlin time. It was the last train that reached the -frontier from Paris. Between Delle and Bicourt lies a neutral zone about -three kilometers--say, nearly two and a half miles--in extent. On one -side France and invasion and terror and war; on the other side of the -zone the relative safety of Switzerland. Six hundred passengers poured -out of the French train at noon into that neutral zone and started to -walk to Swiss safety. A blazing August sun; a road of pebbles and -stinging, upblown dust. - -The passengers had been permitted to bring on the train only what -luggage they could carry; so they were laden with bags and coats, -dressing bags and jewel cases--all they had deemed most valuable. Mostly -women. German ladies fleeing for refuge; Russian ladies; English, -American; and a crowd of men, urgent to reach their armies, German, -Swiss, Russian, Austrian, Servian, Italian; withal many of the kind of -American men who go to Switzerland in August. - -And the caravan started in the dust and heat of a desert. A woman let -fall her heavy bag and plodded on. Another threw away her coats. Men -shook off their bundles. The heat was stifling. And through the clouds -of dust a panic terror crept. It was the antique terror of the God -Pan--the God All; it was a fear as immense as the sky. - -A woman screamed and began to run, throwing away everything she had -safeguarded so she might run with empty hands. A score followed her. Men -began to run. They thrust the women aside, cursing; and ran. And for -over two miles the road was covered thick with coats and bags, with -packages and jewel cases. The greed of possession died out in the -causeless fear. - -These hoarse, pushing men, these sweating, shameless women had gone back -10,000 years into prehistoric savagery. Lightly they threw away all the -baubles and gewgaws civilization had fashioned for adorning and -disguising their raw humanity, and the habits of civilization as well. - -They had touched but the outermost edge of war, and their very clothes -fell off them. - - -BARBARISM AND WOMEN - -War; and it takes eighty-four hours to make a twelve-hour journey from -the Alps to Paris; the cable is dead; the telegraph is dumb; letters go -only when smuggled over the frontiers by couriers; you look about you -and find you are in a mediæval and mysterious world. You stand amid the -melancholy ruins of canceled cycles. The mailed fist of war has smashed -your world to pieces. You do not know it. - -The man you thought of as a brother looks at you with eyes of passionate -hatred; you have eaten bread and salt together; you have drunk together; -you have been uplifted by the same books; you have been sublimed by the -same music; but he is a German, and your blood was made in another land, -and he looks at you with suspicion and hate--perhaps you are a spy. (The -spy mania! Dear Lord, what absurd, bloody, and abominable stories I -could write of this madness which has Europe by the throat, this madness -which is only another form of war hysteria!) A reversal to barbarism; -you and the man who was your friend have gone back to the fear and -hatred of primitive savages, meeting at the corner of a dark wood. All -of humanity we have acquired in the slow way of evolution sloughs off -us. - -We are savages once more. For science is dead. All the laboratories are -shut, save those where poison is brewed and destruction is put up in -packages. Education has ceased, save that fierce Nietzschean education -which declares: “The weak and helpless must go to the wall; and we shall -help them go.” All that made life humanly fair is hidden in the fetid -clouds of war where savages (in terror and hysteria) grope for each -other’s throats. - -The glory of war--rot! The heroism of war--rot! The scarlet and -beneficent energies of war--rot! When you look at it close what you see -are hulking masses of brutes with fear behind them prodding them on, or -wild and splendid savages, hysterical with hate, battling to save their -hearth fires and women from the oncoming horde. Reversal to barbarism. - -Think it over. Upon whom falls the stress of war? Not upon the soldier. -He is killed and fattens the soil where he falls; or he is maimed and -hobbles off toward a pension or beggary--both tolerable things; anyway -he has drunk deep of cruelty and terror and may go his way. By rare good -grace he may have been a hero. In other words, he may have been a -Belgian--which is a word like a decoration, a name to make one strut -like a Greek of Thermopylae--and become thus a permanent part of the -world’s finest history. - - * * * * * - -I would like to write here the name of a friend, Charles Flamache of -Brussels. He was twenty-one years old. He was an artist who had already -tasted fame. He had known the love of woman. That his destiny might be -fulfilled he died, the blithe, brave boy, in front of Liège. It was the -right death at the right time--ere yet the massed Prussians had rolled -in fire and blood over his fair small land. Wherefore, hail and -farewell, young hero! - - * * * * * - -But upon whom falls the stress of war? - -In a time of barbarism those who suffer are always the weak. War is in -its essence (as said Nietzsche, the German philosopher of “world power”) -an attack upon weakness. The weakest suffer most. - -I saw children born on cinder heaps, and I saw them die; and the mothers -die gasping like she dogs in a smother of flies. - -Some day the story of what was done in Alsace will be written and the -stories of Visé and Aerschot and Orsmael and Louvain will seem pale and -negligible; but not now--five generations to come will whisper them in -the Vosges. - -What I would emphasize is that in the natural state of barbarism induced -by the war the woman falls back to her antique state of she animal. In -thousands of years she has been made into a thing of exquisite and -mysterious femininity; in a day she is thrown back to kinship with the -she dog. Slashed with sabres, pricked with lances, she is a mere thing -of prey. - -Surely not the dear Countess and Baroness? Of course not. War is made in -the palaces, but it does not attack the palaces. The worth of every -nation dwells in the cottage; and it is upon the cottage that war works -its worst infamy. Go to Alsace and see. - -Pillage, loot, incendiarism, “indemnity”--you can read that in the -records of the invasion of Belgium; that is war; it is all right if war -is to be, for all this talk of chivalrous consideration for foes and -regard for international law is all nonsense; necessity, as -Bethmann-Hollweg said, knows no law, and necessity has always been the -tyrant’s plea; it is the business of a soldier to kill and terrify; if -he restricts his killing and terrifying he is a bad soldier and bad at -his work of barbarism; but-- - -There is a more sinister side to Europe’s lapse into barbarism. The -women are paying too dear. And to make them pay dear is not really the -business of a soldier, not even a bad soldier. Yet the woman is paying, -God knows. A tragic payment. - - -AFTER BARBARISM WHAT? - -One morning at dawn--it was at Ambérieu--I saw the long trains go by -carrying the German wounded and the German prisoners, who had been taken -in the battles of the Vosges. There were 2,400 taken on toward the -south. There were French nurses with the wounded. I saw water and fruit -and chocolate given to the prisoners. - -This was early in the war. The sheer lapse into barbarism had not yet -come. Soon the German newspapers announced: - -“Great concern is expressed in press and public utterances lest -prisoners of war receive anything in the line of favored treatment. -Newspapers have conducted an angry campaign against women who have -ventured at the railway station to give coffee or food to prisoners of -war passing through; commanding officers have ordered that persons -‘demeaning themselves by such unworthy conduct’ are to be immediately -ejected from the stations, and in response to public clamor official -announcements have been issued that such prisoners in transport receive -only bread and water.” - -And the French followed suit; no “coddling” of prisoners; back to -barbarism, the lessons of humanity forgot and savagery come again. - -Civilization in the old world is smashed. I have traversed the ruins; -and my feet are still dirty with mud and blood. But I can tell you what -is going to come out of that welter of ruin. There will come a sane and -righteous hatred of militarism. What will be surely destroyed is -Cæsarism. Prophecy? This is not prophecy; I am stating an assured fact. -Even at this hour of hysterical and relentless warfare there lies deep -in the heart of the democracy of Europe a consuming hatred of -militarism. - -Drops of water (or blood) do not more naturally flow into each than did -the English hatred of Cæsarism blend with the high French hatred of the -evil thing; and when the palaces have done fighting, the cottages of -Europe, from the Baltic to the Mediterranean and from the Black Sea to -the Hebrides, will proclaim its destruction. - -And you will see it; you will see Cæsarism drowned in the very blood it -has shed. And the German, mark you, will not be the least bitter of the -foes of militarism. He will be indeed a relentless foe. - -Reversal to barbarism, say you? A shuddering lapse into savagery? - -Quite true; that is the state of Europe over the fairest and most highly -civilized provinces. The picture of Sir John French strolling up and -down the battle line smoking a cigarette does not give a fair idea of -it; nor do you get it from the Kaiser on a hilltop surveying his massed -war bullocks surging forth patiently to battle; all that belongs to the -picture books of war. - -The real thing is dirtier. - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -BELGIUM’S BITTER NEED - -BY SIR GILBERT PARKER - - THE MARTYRDOM OF BELGIUM -- ABYSS OF WANT AND WOE -- NO WORK AND HEAVY - WAR TAXES -- PATIENCE OF BELGIANS -- CRYING NEED OF FOOD -- BELGIAN - PEOPLE WARDS OF THE WORLD. - - [Sir Gilbert Parker went abroad at the request of the American - Committee for the Relief of Belgium, and the following graphic - statement and appeal to the American people, dated December 5, 1914, - appeared in the New York Times.] - - -Since the beginning of the war the hearts of all humane people have been -tortured by the sufferings of Belgium. For myself the martyrdom of -Belgium had been a nightmare since the fall of Liège. Whoever or -whatever country is to blame for this war, Belgium is innocent. Her -hands are free from stain. She has kept the faith. She saw it with the -eyes of duty and honor. Her government is carried on in another land. -Her king is in the trenches. Her army is decimated, but the last -decimals fight on. - -Her people wander in foreign lands, the highest and lowest looking for -work and bread; they cannot look for homes. Those left behind huddle -near the ruins of their shattered villages or take refuge in towns which -cannot feed their own citizens. - - -ABYSS OF WANT AND WOE - -Many cities and towns have been completely destroyed; others, reduced or -shattered, struggle in vain to feed their poor and broken populations. -Stones and ashes mark the places where small communities lived their -peaceful lives before the invasion. The Belgian people live now in the -abyss of want and woe. - -All this I knew in England, but knew it from the reports of others. I -did not, could not, know what the destitution, the desolation of Belgium -was, what were the imperative needs of this people, until I got to -Holland and to the borders of Belgian territory. Inside that territory I -could not pass because I was a Britisher, but there I could see German -soldiers, the Landwehr, keeping guard over what they call their new -German province. Belgium a German province! - -There at Maastricht I saw fugitives crossing the frontier into Holland -with all their worldly goods on their shoulders or in their hands, or -with nothing at all, seeking hospitality of a little land which itself -feels, though it is neutral, the painful stress and cost of the war. -There, on the frontier, I was standing between Dutch soldiers and German -soldiers, so near the Germans that I could almost have touched them, so -near three German officers that their conversation as they saluted me -reached my ears. - -I begin to understand what the sufferings and needs of Belgium are. They -are such that the horror of it almost paralyzes expression. I met at -Maastricht Belgians, representatives of municipalities, who said that -they had food for only a fortnight longer. And what was the food they -had? No meat, no vegetables, but only one-third of a soldier’s rations -of bread for each person per day. At Liège, as I write, there is food -for only three days. - -What is it the people of Belgium ask for? They ask for bread and salt, -no more, and it is not forthcoming. They do not ask for meat; they -cannot get it. They have no fires for cooking, and they do not beg for -petrol. Money is of little use to them, because there is no food to be -bought with money. - -Belgium under ordinary circumstances imports five-sixths of the food she -eats. The ordinary channels of sale and purchase are closed. They cannot -buy and sell if they would. Representatives of Belgian communities told -me at Maastricht that the crops were taken from their fields--the wheat -and potatoes--and were sent into Germany. - - -NO WORK, AND HEAVY WAR TAXES - -There is no work. The factories are closed because they have not raw -material, coal, or petrol, because they have no markets. - -And yet war taxes are falling with hideous pressure upon a people whose -hands are empty, whose workshops are closed, whose fields are idle, -whose cattle have been taken, or compulsorily purchased without value -received. - -In Belgium itself the misery of the populace is greater than the misery -of the Belgian fugitives in other countries, such as Holland, where -there have come since the fall of Liège one and a half million of -fugitives. To gauge what that misery in Belgium is, think of what even -the fugitives suffer. I have seen in a room without fire, the walls -damp, the floor without covering, not even straw, a family of nine women -and eight children, one on an improvised bunk seriously ill. Their home -in Belgium was leveled with the ground, the father killed in battle. - -Their food is coffee and bread for breakfast, potatoes for dinner, with -salt--and in having the salt they were lucky--bread and coffee for -supper. Insufficiently clothed, there by the North Sea, they watched the -bleak hours pass, with nothing to do except cling together in a vain -attempt to keep warm. - -Multiply this case by hundreds of thousands and you will have some hint -of the people’s sufferings. - -In a lighter on the River Maas at Rotterdam, without windows, without -doors, with only an open hatchway from which a ladder descends, several -hundred fugitives spend their nights and the best parts of their days in -the iron hold, forever covered with moisture, leaky when rain comes, -with the floor never dry, and pervasive with a perpetual smell like the -smell of a cave which never gets the light of day. Here men, women, and -children were huddled together in a promiscuous communion of misery, -made infinitely more pathetic and heartrending because none complained. - -At Rosendaal, at Scheveningen, Eysden, and Flushing, at a dozen other -places, these ghastly things are repeated in one form or another. -Holland has sheltered hundreds of thousands, but she could not in a -moment organize even adequate shelter, much less comforts. - -In Bergen-op-Zoom, where I write these words, there have come since the -fall of Antwerp 300,000 hungry marchers, with no resources except what -they carry with them. This little town of 15,000 people did its best to -meet the terrible pressure, and its citizens went without bread -themselves to feed the refugees. How can a small municipality suddenly -deal with so vast a catastrophe? Yet slowly some sort of order was -organized out of chaos, and when the Government was able to establish -refugee camps through the military the worst conditions were moderated, -and now, in tents and in vans on a fortunately situated piece of land, -over 3,000 people live, so far as comforts are concerned, like Kaffirs -in Karoo or aborigines in a camp in the back blocks of Australia. The -tents are crammed with people, and life is reduced to its barest -elements. Straw, boards, and a few blankets and dishes for rations--that -constitutes the ménage. - -Children are born in the hugger-mugger of such conditions, but the good -Holland citizens see that the children are cared for and that the babies -have milk. Devoted priests teach the children, and the value of military -organization illuminates the whole panoply of misery. Yet the best of -the refugee camps would seem to American citizens like the dark and -dreadful life of an underworld, in which is neither work, purpose, nor -opportunity. It is a sight repugnant to civilization. - - -PATIENCE OF BELGIANS - -The saddest, most heartrending thing I have ever seen has been the -patience of every Belgian, whatever his state, I have met. Among the -thousands of refugees I have seen in Holland, in the long stream that -crossed the frontier at Maastricht and besieged the doors of the Belgian -Consul while I was there, no man, no woman railed or declaimed against -the horror of their situation. The pathos of lonely, staring, apathetic -endurance is tragic beyond words. So grateful, so simply grateful, are -they, every one, for whatever is done for them. - -None begs, none asks for money, and yet on the faces of these frontier -refugees I saw stark hunger, the weakness come of long weeks of famine. -One man, one fortunate man from Verviers, told me he could purchase as -much as 2s. 8d. worth of food for himself, his wife and child for a -week. - -Think of it, American citizens! Sixty-six cents’ worth of food for a -man, his wife, and child for a whole week, if he were permitted to -purchase that much! Sixty-six cents! That is what an average American -citizen pays for his dinner in his own home. He cannot get breakfast, he -can only get half a breakfast, for that at the Waldorf or the Plaza in -New York. - -This man was only allowed to purchase that much food if he could, -because if he purchased more he would be taking from some one else, and -they were living on rations for the week which would represent the food -of an ordinary man for a day. A rich man can have no more than a poor -man. It is a democracy of famine. - - -CRYING NEED OF FOOD - -There is enough food wasted in the average American household in one day -to keep a Belgian for a fortnight in health and strength. They want in -Belgium 30,000 tons of food a month. That is their normal requirement. -The American Relief Committee is asking for 8,000 tons a month, -one-quarter of the normal requirements, one-half of a soldier’s rations -for each Belgian. The American Committee needs $5,000,000 a month until -next harvest. It is a huge sum, but it must be forthcoming. - -Of all the great powers of the world the United States is the only one -not at war or in peril of war. Of all the foremost nations of the world -the United States is the only one that can save Belgium from starvation -if she will. She was the only nation that Germany would allow a foothold -for humanity’s and for Christ’s sake in Belgium. Such an opportunity, -such responsibility, no nation ever had before in the history of the -world. Spain and Italy join with her, but the initiative and resources -and organization are hers. - -Around Belgium is a ring of steel. Within that ring of steel is a -disappearing and forever disappearing population. Towns like -Dendermonde, that were of 10,000 people, have now 4,000, and in -Dendermonde 1,200 houses have fallen under the iron and fire of war. -Into that vast graveyard and camp of the desolate only the United States -enters with an adequate and responsible organization upon the mission of -humanity. - -No such opportunity was ever given to a people, no such test ever came -to a Christian people in all the records of time. Will the American -nation rise to the chance given to it to prove that its civilization is -a real thing and that its acts measure up with its inherent and -professed Christianity? - -I am a profound believer in the great-heartedness of the United States, -and there is not an American of German origin who ought not gladly and -freely give to the relief of people who, unless the world feeds them, -must be the remnant of a nation; and the world in this case is the -United States. She can give most. - -[Illustration: BRINGING UP REINFORCEMENTS.] - -The price of one good meal a week for a family in an American home will -keep a Belgian alive for a fortnight. - -Probably the United States has 18,000,000 homes. How many of them will -deny themselves a meal for martyred Belgium? The mass of the American -people do not need to deny themselves anything to give to Belgium. The -whole standard of living on the American continent, in the United States -and Canada, is so much higher than the European standard that if they -lowered the scale by one-tenth just for one six months the Belgian -problem would be solved. - -I say to the American people that they cannot conceive what this strain -upon the populations of Europe is at this moment, and, in the cruel grip -of winter, hundreds of thousands will agonize till death or relief -comes. In Australia in drought times vast flocks of sheep go traveling -with shepherds looking for food and water, and no flock ever comes back -as it went forth. Not in flocks guided by shepherds, but lonely, -hopeless units, the Belgian people take flight, looking for food and -shelter, or remain paralyzed by the tragedy fallen upon them in their -own land. - - -BELGIAN PEOPLE WARDS OF THE WORLD - -Their sufferings are majestic in simple heroism and uncomplaining -endurance. So majestic in proportion ought the relief to be. The Belgian -people are wards of the world. In the circumstances the Belgian people -are special wards of the one great country that is secure in its peace -and that by its natural instincts of human sympathy and love of freedom -is best suited to do the work that should be done for Belgium. If every -millionaire would give a thousand, if every man with $100 a month would -give $10, the American Committee for the Relief of Belgium, with its -splendid organization, its unrivaled efficiency, through which flows a -tide of human sympathy, would be able to report at the end of the war -that a small nation in misfortune had been saved from famine and despair -by a great people far away, who had responded to the call, “Come over -and help us!” - - - - -CHAPTER XII - -JAMES BRYCE’S REPORT ON SYSTEMATIC MASSACRE IN BELGIUM - - REPORT OF COMMISSION TO INVESTIGATE GERMAN OUTRAGES -- A HARROWING - RECITAL -- TELLS OF MASSACRES--“KILLED IN MASSES”--THE TALE OF LOUVAIN - -- TREATMENT OF WOMEN AND CHILDREN -- CALLS KILLING - DELIBERATE--“SPIRIT OF WAR DEIFIED”--THE COMMISSION’S CONCLUSIONS. - - -Viscount Bryce, former British Ambassador at Washington, was appointed -chairman of a special government commission to investigate and report on -“outrages alleged to have been committed by German troops.” Associated -with Lord Bryce on the commission were Sir Frederick Pollock, Sir Edward -Clarke, Sir Alfred Hopkinson, H. A. L. Fisher, Vice-Chancellor of the -University of Sheffield; Harold Cox, and Kenelm E. Digby. The commission -was appointed by Premier Asquith on January 22, 1915. The document is -considered as probably the most severe arraignment made of the German -military sweep across Belgium, mainly because of the position of -Viscount Bryce as a historian, and also because of the care with which -the investigation was made, the great number of witnesses whose -testimony was examined, and the mass of evidence submitted with the -report of the commission. - -The report makes an official document of sixty-one printed pages, or -upward of 30,000 words, accompanied by maps showing the various routes -of the army and the chief scenes of desolation. It states at the outset -that 1,200 witnesses have been examined, the depositions being taken by -examiners of legal knowledge and experience, though without authority to -administer an oath. The examiners were instructed not to “lead” the -witnesses, and to seek to bring out the truth by cross-examination and -otherwise. The commission also submitted extracts from a number of -diaries taken from the German dead, chiefly German soldiers and in some -cases officers. - - -A HARROWING RECITAL - -Taking up conditions at Liège at the outset of the war, the report gives -a harrowing recital of occurrences at various points in the devastated -territory. At Herve on August 4, 1914, the report says, “the murder of -an innocent fugitive civilian was a prelude to the burning and pillage -of the town and of other villages in the neighborhood; to the -indiscriminate shooting of civilians of both sexes and to the organized -military execution of batches of selected males. Thus some fifty men -escaping from burning houses were seized, taken outside the town and -shot. At Melen, in one household alone the father and mother (names -given) were shot, the daughter died after being repeatedly attacked and -the son was wounded. - -“In Soumagne and Micheroux very many civilians were summarily shot. In a -field belonging to a man named E----, fifty-six or fifty-seven were put -to death. A German officer said, ‘You have shot at us.’ One of the -villagers asked to be allowed to speak, and said, ‘If you think these -people fired, kill me, but let them go.’ The answer was three volleys. -The survivors were bayoneted. Their corpses were seen in the field that -night by another witness. One at least had been mutilated. These were -not the only victims in Soumagne. The eye-witness of the massacre saw, -on his way home, twenty bodies, one that of a girl of thirteen. Another -witness saw nineteen corpses in a meadow. - -“At Heure le Romain all the male inhabitants, including some bed-ridden -old men, were imprisoned in the church. The burgomaster’s brother and -the priest were bayoneted. The village of Visé was completely destroyed. -Officers directed the incendiaries. Antiques and china were removed from -the houses before their destruction, by officers, who guarded the -plunder, revolver in hand. - - -TELLS OF MASSACRES - -“Entries in a German diary show that on August 10 the German soldiers -gave themselves up to debauchery in the streets of Liège, and on the -night of the 20th a massacre took place in the streets. . . . Though the -cause of the massacre is in dispute, the results are known with -certainty. The Rue des Pitteurs and houses in the Place de l’Université -and the Quai des Pêcheurs were systematically fired with benzine; and -many inhabitants were burned alive in their houses, their efforts to -escape being prevented by rifle fire. Twenty people were shot while -trying to escape, before the eyes of one of the witnesses. The Liège -Fire Brigade turned out, but was not allowed to extinguish the fire. Its -carts, however, were usefully employed in removing heaps of civilian -corpses to the Town Hall.” - -Taking up the Valleys of the Meuse and Sambre, the report gives lengthy -details of terrible conditions described by witnesses at Andenne, and -says: - -“About four hundred people lost their lives in this massacre, some on -the banks of the Meuse, where they were shot according to orders given, -and some in the cellars of the houses where they had taken refuge. Eight -men belonging to one family were murdered. Another man was placed close -to a machine gun which was fired through him. His wife brought his body -home on a wheelbarrow. The Germans broke into her house and ransacked -it. - -“A hair-dresser was murdered in his kitchen where he was sitting with a -child on each knee. A paralytic was murdered in his garden. After this -came the general sack of the town. Many of the inhabitants who escaped -the massacre were kept as prisoners and compelled to clear the houses of -corpses and bury them in trenches. These prisoners were subsequently -used as a shelter and protection for a pontoon bridge which the Germans -had built across the river and were so used to prevent the Belgian forts -from firing upon it. - -“A few days later the Germans celebrated a ‘fête nocturne’ in the -square. Hot wine, located in the town, was drunk, and the women were -compelled to give three cheers for the Kaiser and to sing ‘Deutschland -über Alles.’” - - -“KILLED IN MASSES” - -Similar details are recited at much length in reference to the districts -of Namur, Charleroi and the town of Dinant. At the latter point, the -report says, “Unarmed civilians were killed in masses. We have no reason -to believe that the civilian population of Dinant gave any provocation -or that any other defense can be put forward to justify the treatment -inflicted upon its citizens.” - -The commission stated that it had received a great mass of evidence on -“scenes of chronic outrage” in the territory bounded by the towns -Aerschot, Malines, Vilvorde and Louvain. It stated that the total number -of outrages was so great that the commission could not refer to them -all. - -“The commission is specially impressed by the character of the outrages -committed in the smaller villages. Many of these are exceptionally -shocking and cannot be regarded as contemplated or prescribed by -responsible commanders of the troops by whom they were commanded. -Evidence goes to show that deaths in these villages were due not to -accident but to deliberate purpose. The wounds were generally stabs or -cuts, and for the most part appear to have been inflicted with a -bayonet. - -“In Sempst the corpse of a man with his legs cut off, who was partly -bound, was seen by a witness, who also saw a girl of seventeen in great -distress dressed only in a chemise. She alleged that she herself and -other girls had been dragged into a field, stripped naked and attacked, -and that some of them had been killed with a bayonet.” - -Taking up conditions at Aerschot and the surrounding district during -September, the report says: - -“At Haecht several children had been murdered; one of two or three years -old was found nailed to the door of a farmhouse by its hands and feet, a -crime which seems almost incredible, but the evidence for which we feel -bound to accept. At Eppeghem the body of a child of two was seen pinned -to the ground with a German lance. The same witness saw a mutilated -woman alive near Weerde on the same day.” - -A chapter is given to the terrible conditions at Louvain, where the -report states, “massacre, fire and destruction went on. . . . Citizens -were shot and others taken prisoners and compelled to go with the -troops. Soldiers went through the streets saying, ‘Man hat geschossen’ -(some one has fired on us). - - -THE TALE OF LOUVAIN - -“The massacre of civilians at Louvain was not confined to its citizens. -Large crowds of people were brought into Louvain from the surrounding -districts, not only from Aerschot and Gelrod, but also from other -places. For example, a witness describes how many women and children -were taken in carts to Louvain, and there placed in a stable. Of the -hundreds of people thus taken from the various villages and brought to -Louvain as prisoners, some were massacred there, others were forced to -march along with citizens of Louvain through various places, some being -ultimately sent to the Belgian lines at Malines, others were taken in -trucks to Cologne, others were released. - -“Ropes were put around the necks of some and they were told they would -be hanged. An order then came that they were to be shot instead of -hanged. A firing squad was prepared, and five or six prisoners were put -up, but were not shot. . . . This taking of the inhabitants in groups -and marching them to various places must evidently have been done under -the direction of a higher military authority. The ill-treatment of the -prisoners was under the eyes and often under the direction or sanction -of officers, and officers themselves took part in it. . . . - -“It is to be noticed that cases occur in the depositions in which humane -acts by individual officers and soldiers are mentioned, or in which -officers are said to have expressed regret at being obliged to carry out -orders for cruel action against the civilians. Similarly, we find -entries in diaries which reveal a genuine pity for the population and -disgust at the conduct of the enemy. It appears that a German -non-commissioned officer stated definitely that he ‘was acting under -orders and executing them with great unwillingness.’ A commissioned -officer on being asked at Louvain by a witness, a highly educated man, -about the horrible acts committed by the soldiers, said he ‘was merely -executing orders,’ and that he himself would be shot if he did not -execute them.” - -Another division of the report is on the “killing of non-combatants in -France.” This is not as detailed as the case of Belgium, as the -commission states that the French official report gives the most -complete account as to the invaded districts in France. It adds: - -“The evidence before us proves that, in the parts of France referred -to, murder of unoffending civilians and other acts of cruelty, including -aggravated cases of felonious attack, carried out under threat of death, -and sometimes actually followed by murder of the victim, were committed -by some of the German troops.” - - -TREATMENT OF WOMEN AND CHILDREN - -A special chapter is given to the treatment of women and children. The -latter, it is said, frequently received milder treatment than the men. -But many instances are given of “calculated cruelty, often going the -length of murder, towards the women and children.” A witness gives a -story, very circumstantial in its details, of how women were publicly -attacked in the market place of the city, five young German officers -assisting. The report goes on: “In the evidence before us there are -cases tending to show that aggravated crimes against women were -sometimes severely punished. These instances are sufficient to show that -the maltreatment of women was not part of the military scheme of the -invaders, however much it may appear to have been the inevitable result -of the system of terror deliberately adopted in certain regions. - -“It is clearly shown that many offences were committed against infants -and quite young children. On one occasion children were even roped -together and used as a military screen against the enemy, on another -three soldiers went into action carrying small children to protect -themselves from flank fire. It is difficult to imagine the motives which -may have prompted such acts. Whether or not Belgian civilians fired on -German soldiers, young children at any rate did not fire.” - -Many instances are given of the use of civilians as screens during the -military operation. Cases of the Red Cross being misused for offensive -military purposes, and of abuse of the white flag are also given. As to -the latter the report says: “There is in our opinion sufficient evidence -that these offences have been frequent, deliberate and in many cases -committed by whole units under orders. All the facts mentioned are in -contravention of The Hague Convention, signed by the Great Powers, -including France, Germany, Great Britain and the United States, in -1907.” - -A division of the report is given to diaries of German soldiers. The -entry of a sergeant of the First Guards Regiment, who received the Iron -Cross, says, under date of August 10: “A transport of 300 Belgians came -through Duisburg in the morning. Of these, eighty, including the -Oberburgomaster, were shot according to martial law.” The diary of a -member of the Fourth Company of Jägers says, under date of August 23: -“About 220 inhabitants and the village were burned.” Another diary, by a -member of the Second Mounted Battery, First Kurhessian Field Artillery -Regiment, No. 11, records an incident which happened in French territory -near Lille on October 11: “We had no fight, but we caught about twenty -men and shot them.” The commission says of this last diary: “By this -time killing not in a fight would seem to have passed into a habit.” - -The report adds that the most important entry was contained in diary No. -19. This contained no name and address, but names referred to in the -diary indicate that the entries were made by an officer of the First -Regiment of Foot Guards. The entry made at Bermeton on August 24 says: -“We took about 1,000 prisoners; at least 500 were shot. The village was -burned because inhabitants had also shot. Two civilians were shot at -once.” - -“If a line is drawn on a map from the Belgian frontier to Liège and -continued to Charleroi, and a second line drawn from Liège to Malines, a -sort of figure resembling an irregular Y will be formed. It is along -this ‘Y’ that most of the systematic (as opposed to isolated) outrages -were committed. If the period from August 4 to August 30 is taken it -will be found to cover most of these organized outrages. Termonde and -Alost extend, it is true, beyond the ‘Y’ lines, and they belong to the -month of September. Murder, assault, arson and pillage began from the -moment when the German army crossed the frontier. For the first -fortnight of the war the towns and villages near Liège were the chief -sufferers. From August 19 to the end of the month outrages spread in the -direction of Charleroi and Malines and reached their period of greatest -intensity. - -“There is a certain significance in the fact that the outrages around -Liège coincide with the unexpected resistance of the Belgian army in -that district, and that the slaughter which reigned from August 19 to -the end of the month is contemporaneous with the period when the German -army’s need for a quick passage through Belgium at all costs was deemed -imperative. - -“In all wars occur many shocking and outrageous acts of men of criminal -instincts whose worst passions are unloosed by the immunity which the -conditions of warfare afford. Drunkenness, moreover, may turn even a -soldier who has no criminal habits into a brute, and there is evidence -that intoxication was extremely prevalent among the German army, both in -Belgium and in France. Unfortunately little seems to have been done to -repress this source of danger. - - -CALLS KILLING DELIBERATE - -“In the present war, however--and this is the gravest charge against the -German army--the evidence shows that the killing of non-combatants was -carried out to an extent for which no previous war between nations -claiming to be civilized (for such cases as the atrocities perpetrated -by the Turks on the Bulgarian Christians in 1876, and on the Armenian -Christians in 1895 and 1896, do not belong to that category) furnishes -any precedent. That this killing was done as part of a deliberate plan -is clear from the facts hereinbefore set forth regarding Louvain, -Aerschot, Dinant and other towns. The killing was done under orders in -each place. It began at a certain fixed date. Some of the officers who -carried out the work did it reluctantly, and said they were obeying -directions from their chiefs. The same remarks apply to the destruction -of property. House burning was part of the program; and villages, even -large parts of a city, were given to the flames as part of the -terrorizing policy. - -“Citizens of neutral states who visited Belgium in December and January -report that the German authorities do not deny that non-combatants were -systematically killed in large numbers during the first weeks of the -invasion, and this, so far as we know, has never been officially denied. - -“The German government has, however, sought to justify these severities -on the grounds of military necessity and has excused them as retaliation -for cases in which civilians fired on German troops. There may have been -cases in which such firing occurred, but no proof has ever been given, -or, to our knowledge, attempted to be given, of such cases, nor of the -stories of shocking outrages perpetrated by Belgian men and women on -German soldiers. . . . - -“We gladly record the instances where the evidence shows that humanity -has not wholly disappeared from some members of the German army and that -they realized that the responsible heads of that organization were -employing them not in war but in butchery: ‘I am merely executing -orders, and I should be shot if I did not execute them,’ said an officer -to a witness at Louvain. At Brussels another officer said, ‘I have not -done one hundredth part of what we have been ordered to do by the high -German military authorities.’ - -“That these acts should have been perpetrated on the peaceful population -of an unoffending country which was not at war with its invaders, but -merely defending its own neutrality, guaranteed by the invading power, -may excite amazement and even incredulity. It was with amazement and -almost with incredulity that the commission first read the depositions -relating to such acts. But when the evidence regarding Liège was -followed by that regarding Aerschot, Louvain, Andenne, Dinant, and the -other towns and villages, the cumulative effect of such a mass of -concurrent testimony became irresistible, and we were driven to the -conclusion that the things described had really happened. The question -then arose how they could have happened. - -“The explanation seems to be that these excesses were committed--in some -cases ordered, in others allowed--on a system and in pursuance of a set -purpose. That purpose was to strike terror into the civil population and -dishearten the Belgian troops, so as to crush down resistance and -extinguish the very spirit of self-defense. The pretext that civilians -had fired upon the invading troops was used to justify not merely the -shooting of individual franc-tireurs, but the murder of large numbers of -innocent civilians, an act absolutely forbidden by the rules of -civilized warfare. - - -“SPIRIT OF WAR DEIFIED” - -“In the minds of Prussian officers war seems to have become a sort of -sacred mission, one of the highest functions of the omnipotent state, -which is itself as much an army as a state. Ordinary morality and the -ordinary sentiment of pity vanish in its presence, superseded by a new -standard which justifies to the soldier every means that can conduce to -success, however shocking to a natural sense of justice and humanity, -however revolting to his own feelings. The spirit of war is deified. -Obedience to the state and its war lord leaves no room for any other -duty or feeling. Cruelty becomes legitimate when it promises victory. -Proclaimed by the heads of the army, this doctrine would seem to have -permeated the officers and affected even the private soldiers, leading -them to justify the killing of non-combatants as an act of war, and so -accustoming them to slaughter that even women and children become at -last the victims. - -“It cannot be supposed to be a national doctrine, for it neither springs -from nor reflects the mind and feelings of the German people as they -have heretofore been known to other nations. It is specifically military -doctrine, the outcome of a theory held by a ruling caste who have -brooded and thought, written and talked and dreamed about war until they -have fallen under its obsession and been hypnotized by its spirit. - -“The doctrine is plainly set forth in the German official monograph on -the usages of war on land, issued under the direction of the German -staff. This book is pervaded throughout by the view that whatever -military needs suggest becomes thereby lawful, and upon this principle, -as the diaries show, the German officers acted. - -“If this explanation be the true one, the mystery is solved, and that -which seemed scarcely credible becomes more intelligible though not less -pernicious. This is not the only case that history records in which a -false theory, disguising itself as loyalty to a state or to a church, -has perverted the conception of duty and become a source of danger to -the world.” - - -THE COMMISSION’S CONCLUSIONS - -The conclusions of the commission, as to the various detailed recitals, -are as follows: - -“We may now sum up and endeavor to explain the character and -significance of the wrongful acts done by the German army in Belgium. - -“It is proved, first, that there were in many parts of Belgium -deliberate and systematically organized massacres of the civil -population accompanied by many isolated murders and other outrages. - -“Second--That in the conduct of the war generally innocent civilians, -both men and women, were murdered in large numbers, women attacked and -children murdered. - -[Illustration: “THEIR FIRST SUCCESS.” - -“At Morfontaine, near Longwy, the Germans shot two fifteen-year-old -children who had warned the French gendarmes of the enemy’s -arrival.”--The Newspapers.] - -“Third--That looting, house burning and the wanton destruction of -property were ordered and countenanced by the officers of the German -army, that elaborate provision had been made for systematic incendiarism -at the very outbreak of the war, and that the burning and destruction -were frequently where no military necessity could be alleged, being, -indeed, part of a system of general terrorization. - -“Fourth--That the rules and usages of war were frequently broken, -particularly by the using of civilians, including women and children, as -a shield for advancing forces exposed to fire, to a less degree by -killing the wounded and prisoners, and in the frequent abuse of the Red -Cross and the white flag. - -“Sensible as they are of the gravity of these conclusions, the -commission conceive that they would be doing less than their duty if -they failed to record them as fully established by the evidence. Murder, -lust and pillage prevailed over many parts of Belgium on a scale -unparalleled in any war between civilized nations during the last three -centuries. - -“Our function is ended when we have stated what the evidence -establishes, but we may be permitted to express our belief that these -disclosures will not have been made in vain if they touch and rouse the -conscience of mankind, and we venture to hope that as soon as the -present war is over, the nations of the world in council will consider -what means can be provided and sanctions devised to prevent the -recurrence of such horrors as our generation is now witnessing.” - -[Illustration: THE MOST BEAUTIFUL CITY IN EUROPE DESTROYED BY THE -GERMANS. - -Scene of desolation in Louvain. On the right is the magnificent Town -Hall, considered one of the most marvelous pieces of architecture in -Europe’s which escaped almost untouched. In the center, however, the -famous St. Peter’s Cathedral has only the walls standing. (_Copyright by -the International News Service._)] - -[Illustration: RUINS OF YPRES AFTER THE BOMBARDMENT. - -The old Flemish town was the center of hot fighting between the Allies -and the German troops in the battles for the possession of Belgium. At -the right of the picture are seen the ruins of the famous Cloth Hall, -one of the most famous medieval buildings in Europe. (_Copyright by the -International News Service._)] - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - -A BELGIAN BOY’S STORY OF THE RUIN OF AERSCHOT - - PITIABLE PLIGHT OF BOY OF SIXTEEN STRANDED IN ANTWERP -- HIS ARREST -- - A TOWN IN RUINS -- BURYING THE DEAD -- THE LEVELED GUNS -- MARCHING - AMONG GERMAN CAMPS -- NO MONEY AND NO WORK. - - -To the thousands of unhappy Belgian refugees driven from their homes by -the advancing Germans and transported to England the pity of the whole -world has gone out; yet even more deplorable than the condition of these -was the fate of those who were left behind to suffer at the hands of a -relentless enemy. The story of a delicate boy of sixteen, as told in the -following letter which he himself wrote from Antwerp to his former -employer, an American living at the time in England, is typical. - -When this boy, fleeing from Aerschot, arrived in Antwerp, without -friends, money or papers, there was no agency to help him. If he had -been a smaller child somebody doubtless would have taken pity on him and -carried him with them as they fled; if he had been able to preserve his -legitimatization papers the Belgian authorities would have given him -some support; and, of course, if he had been older, he would have been -immediately enlisted in the service of his country. As it was he could -only drift before the foe, and suffer. - - “ANTWERP, Sept. 23, 1914. - -“DEAR SIR: As you correctly said in my testimonial when you were closing -the office, the war has isolated Belgium. Really I can well say that I -have been painfully struck by this scourge, and I permit myself, dear -sir, to give you a little description of my Calvary. - -“Your offices were closed in the beginning of August. As I did not know -what to do and as the fatherland had not enough men to defend its -territory I tried to get myself accepted as a volunteer. - -“On Aug. 10 I went to Aerschot, my native town, to get my certificate of -good conduct. Then I went to Louvain to have same signed by the -commander of the place. This gentleman sent me to St. Nicholas and -thence to Hemixem, where I was rejected as too young. I then decided to -return to Brussels, passing through Aerschot. Here my aunt asked me to -stay with her, saying that she was afraid of the Germans. - -“I remained at Aerschot. This was Aug. 15. Suddenly, on the 19th, at -nine o’clock in the morning, after a terrible bombardment, the Germans -made their entry into Aerschot. In the first street which they passed -through they broke into the houses. They brought out six men whom I knew -very well and immediately shot them. Learning of this, I fled to -Louvain, where I arrived on Aug. 19 at one o’clock. - - -HIS ARREST - -“At 1.30 P. M. the Germans entered Louvain. They did not do anything to -the people in the beginning. On the following Saturday, Aug. 22, I -started to return to Aerschot, as I had no money. (All my money was -still in Brussels.) The whole distance from Louvain to Aerschot I saw -nothing but German armies, always Germans. They did not say a word to me -until I suddenly found myself alone with three of the “Todeshusaren” -(Death’s-head Hussars), the vanguard of their regiment. They arrested me -at the point of the revolver, demanded where I was going and why I had -run away from Aerschot. They said that the whole of Aerschot was now on -fire, because the son of the burgomaster had killed a general. Finally -they searched me from head to foot, and I heard them discuss the -question of my fate. - -“Finally the non-commissioned officer told me that I could continue on -my way; that they would certainly take care of me in Aerschot, as I had -been firing at Germans, and they would shoot me when I arrived. I would -have liked better to return to Louvain, but with an imperious gesture he -pointed out my road to Aerschot, and I continued. On arriving within a -few hundred meters of the town I was arrested once more. - -“I forgot to tell you that of all the houses which I passed between -Louvain and Aerschot, there were only a few left intact. Upon these the -Germans had written in chalk in the German language: ‘Please spare. Good -people. Do not burn.’ Lying along the road I saw many dead horses -putrefying. There were also to be seen pigs, goats, and cows which had -nothing to eat, and which were howling like wild beasts. Not a soul was -to be seen in the houses or in the streets. Everything was empty. - -[Illustration: IN BELGIUM. - -_Jean_--“Do you think St. Nicholas will find us, now that we haven’t a -chimney?”] - -“I was then arrested when a short distance from Aerschot. There were -with me two or three families from Sichem, a village between Diest and -Aerschot. We remained in the fields alongside the road, while the -Prussian regiments with their artillery continued to pass by. When the -artillery had passed we were marched at the point of the bayonet to the -church in Aerschot. On arrival at the church the families of Sichem -(there were at least twenty small children) were permitted to continue -on their way, and the non-commissioned officer, delighted that I could -speak German, permitted me to go to my aunt’s house. - - -A TOWN IN RUINS - -“The aspect of the town was terrible. Not more than half the houses were -standing. In the first three streets which the Germans traversed there -was not a single house left. There was not a house in the town but had -been pillaged. All doors had been burst open. There was nothing, -nothing left. The stench in the streets was insupportable. - -“I then went home, or, rather, I should say, I went to the house where -my father had always been boarding. You know, perhaps, that my mother -died twelve years ago. I did not find my father, but according to what -the people told me he had been arrested, and, with five other Aerschot -men, taken to Germany--I do not know for what purpose. - -“I got into this house without any difficulty, because the door was -smashed in. I stayed there from Saturday, Aug. 22, up to Wednesday, the -26th, a little more comfortable. There was nothing to eat left in the -house. I lived on what a few women who remained in Aerschot could give -me. I was forced to go with the soldiers into the cellars of M. X., -director of a large factory, to hunt for wine. As recompense I got a -loaf. It was not much, but at this moment it meant very much for me. - - -BURYING THE DEAD - -“On Wednesday, Aug. 26, we were all once more locked up in the church. -It was then half-past four in the afternoon. We could not get out, even -for our necessities. On Thursday, about nine o’clock, each of us was -given a piece of bread and a glass of water. This was to last the whole -day. At ten o’clock a lieutenant came in, accompanied by fifteen -soldiers. He placed all the men who were left in a square, selected -seventy of us and ordered us out to bury the corpses of Germans and -Belgians around the town, which had been lying there since the battle of -the 19th. That was a week that these bodies had remained there, and it -is no use to ask if there was a stench. Afterward we had to clean the -streets, and then it was evening. - - -THE LEVELED GUNS - -“They just got ready to shoot us. There were then ten of us. The guns -had already been leveled at us, when suddenly a German soldier ran out -shouting that we had not fired on them. A few minutes before we had -heard rifle-firing and the Germans said it was the Aerschot people who -were shooting, though all these had been locked up in the church and we -were the only inhabitants then in the streets, cleaning them, under -surveillance of Germans. It was this German who saved our lives. - -“Picture to yourself what we have suffered! It is impossible to -describe. On Aug. 28 we were brought to Louvain, always guarded by -German soldiers. There were with us about twenty old men, over eighty -years of age. These were placed in two carts, tied to one another in -pairs. I and about twenty of my unfortunate compatriots had then to pull -the carts all the way to Louvain. It was hard, but that could be -supported all the same. - -“On arriving at Louvain I saw with my own eyes a German who shot at us. -The Germans who were at the station shouted ‘The civilians have been -shooting,’ and commenced a fusillade against us. Many of us fell dead, -others wounded, but I had the chance to run away. - - -MARCHING AMONG GERMAN CAMPS - -“I now took the road to Tirlemont, marching all the time among German -camps. Once I was arrested. Again they wanted to shoot me, insisting -that I was a student of the University of Louvain. The Germans pretend -it was the students who caused the population in Louvain to shoot at -them. However, my youth saved me, and I was set at liberty. - - -NO MONEY AND NO WORK - -“All my money, the twenty francs which you presented me and my salary -for five weeks, as well as my little savings, are lying in Brussels, and -I cannot get at them. . . I cannot work, because there is no work to be -got. I cannot cross over to England, as, to do this, it is necessary -that there should be a whole family. In these horrible circumstances, I -respectfully take the liberty of addressing you, and I hope you will aid -me as best you can. I swear to you that I shall pay you back all that -you give me. I have here in Antwerp no place, no family. The town will -not give me any aid, because I have no papers to prove my identity. I -threw all my papers away for fear of the Germans. I count then on you -with a firm hope to pay you back later. - -“Please accept, dear sir, my respectful greetings.” - - ---- ----. - - - - -CHAPTER XIV - -THE UNSPEAKABLE ATROCITIES OF “CIVILIZED” WARFARE - - DISCLOSURES MADE IN FRENCH OFFICIAL REPORTS AND NOTEBOOKS OF GERMAN - SOLDIERS -- NOTHING SACRED -- HIDEOUS FACES OF THE DEAD -- WOMEN - FORCED TO DIG GRAVES -- GETTING HARDENED -- WHOLESALE PILLAGE -- - MUTILATIONS OF THE DEAD AND WOUNDED -- THE FRENCH REPORT. - - -The French official report on German atrocities contained records of -such horror that the whole civilized world stood aghast. Here at last -was war with all its multitudinous attendant crimes, more horrible than -the actual warfare itself because so causeless and so bestial. Many -stories of atrocities had been told by travelers and war correspondents -abroad; the official report from France verified these earlier accounts, -though there was still a vestige of doubt because it was a French report -of German atrocities; and then to back up this record and remove the -last shadow of disbelief, came the testimony of the Germans against -themselves, through the “War Diaries” of German soldiers, many of which -naturally fell into the hands of the enemy. Paragraphs selected from -these notebooks follow: - -“In this way we destroyed eight dwellings and their inhabitants. In one -of the houses we bayoneted two men, with their wives and a young girl -eighteen years old. The young one almost unmanned me, her look was so -innocent! But we could not master the excited troop, for at such times -they are no longer men--they are beasts.” - - -NOTHING SACRED - -“Unfortunately, I am forced to make note of a fact which should not have -occurred, but there are to be found, even in our own army, creatures who -are no longer men, but hogs, to whom nothing is sacred. One of these -broke into a sacristy; it was locked, and there the Blessed Sacrament -was kept. A Protestant, out of respect, had refused to sleep there. This -man used it as a deposit for his excrements. How is it possible there -should be such creatures? Last night one of the men of the landwehr, -more than thirty-five years of age, married, tried to rape the daughter -of the inhabitant where he had taken up his quarters--a mere girl--and -when the father intervened he pressed his bayonet against his breast.” - -“Langeviller, Aug. 22.--Village destroyed by the eleventh battalion of -Pioneers. Three women hanged to trees; the first dead I have seen.” - - -HIDEOUS FACES OF THE DEAD - -“The inhabitants fled through the village. It was horrible. The walls of -houses are bespattered with blood and the faces of the dead are hideous -to look upon. They were buried at once, some sixty of them. Among them -many old women, old men, and one woman pregnant--the whole a dreadful -sight. Three children huddled together--all dead. Altar and arches of -the church shattered. Telephone communication with the enemy was found -there. This morning, Sept. 2, all the survivors were driven out; I saw -four little boys carrying on two poles a cradle with a child some five -or six months old. The whole makes a fearful sight. Blow upon blow! -Thunderbolt on thunderbolt! Everything given over to plunder. I saw a -mother with her two little ones--one of them had a great wound in the -head and an eye put out.” - -“At the entrance to the village lay the bodies of some fifty citizens, -shot for having fired upon our troops from ambush. In the course of the -night many others were shot down in like manner, so that we counted more -than two hundred. Women and children, holding their lamps, were -compelled to assist at this horrible spectacle. We then sat down midst -the corpses to eat our rice, as we had eaten nothing since morning.” - - -WOMEN FORCED TO DIG GRAVES - -“Aug. 25 (in Belgium).--We shot 300 of the inhabitants of the town. -Those that survived the salvo were requisitioned as grave-diggers. You -should have seen the women at that time! But it was impossible to do -otherwise. In our march upon Wilot things went better; the inhabitants -who wished to leave were allowed to do so. But whoever fired was shot. -Upon our leaving Owele the rifles rang out, and with that, flames, women -and all the rest.” - - -GETTING HARDENED - -“We arrested three civilians, and a bright idea struck me. We furnished -them with chairs and made them seat themselves in the middle of the -street. There were supplications on one part, and some blows with the -stocks of our guns on the other. One, little by little, gets terribly -hardened. Finally, there they were sitting in the street. How many -anguished prayers they may have muttered, I cannot say, but during the -whole time their hands were joined in nervous contraction. I am sorry -for them, but the stratagem was of immediate effect. The enfilading -directed from the houses diminished at once; we were able then to take -possession of the house opposite, and thus became masters of the -principal street. From that moment every one that showed his face in the -street was shot. And the artillery meanwhile kept up vigorous work, so -that at about seven o’clock in the evening, when the brigade advanced to -rescue us, I could report ‘Saint-Dié has been emptied of all enemies.’ - -[Illustration: THE ROAD TO YESTERDAY.] - -“As I learned later, the ---- regiment of reserves, which came into -Saint-Dié further north, had experiences entirely similar to our own. -The four civilians whom they had placed on chairs in the middle of the -street were killed by French bullets. I saw them myself stretched out in -the street near the hospital.” - - -WHOLESALE PILLAGE - -“Aug. 8, 1914. Gouvy (Belgium).--There, the Belgians having fired on -some German soldiers, we started at once pillaging the merchandise -warehouse. Several cases--eggs, shirts, and everything that could be -eaten was carried off. The safe was forced and the gold distributed -among the men. As to the securities, they were torn up.” - -“The enemy occupied the village of Bièvre and the edge of the wood -behind it. The third company advanced in first line. We carried the -village, and then pillaged and burned almost all the houses.” - -“The first village we burned was Parux (Meurthe-et-Moselle). After this -the dance began, throughout the villages, one after the other; over the -fields and pastures we went on our bicycles up to the ditches at the -edge of the road, and there sat down to eat our cherries.” - -“Our first fight was at Haybes (Belgium) on the 24th of August. The -second battalion entered the village, ransacked the houses, pillaged -them, and burned those from which shots had been fired.” - -“They do not behave as soldiers, but rather as highwaymen, bandits and -brigands, and are a dishonor to our regiment and to our army.” - -“No discipline, . . . the Pioneers are well nigh worthless; as to the -artillery, it is a band of robbers.” - -“Aug. 12, 1914, in Belgium.--One can get an idea of the fury of our -soldiers in seeing the destroyed villages. Not one house left untouched. -Everything eatable is requisitioned by the unofficered soldiers. Several -heaps of men and women put to execution. Young pigs are running about -looking for their mothers.” - - -MUTILATIONS OF THE DEAD - -“On the 22d, in the evening, I learned that in the woods, about one -hundred and fifty meters north of the square formed by the intersection -of the great Calonne trench with the road from Vaux-les-Palameis to -Saint-Rémy, there were corpses of French soldiers shot by the Germans. I -went to the spot and found the bodies of about thirty soldiers within a -small space, most of them prone, but several still kneeling, and _all -having a precisely similar wound_--a bullet through the ear. One only, -seriously wounded in his lower parts, could still speak, and told me -that the Germans before leaving had ordered them to lie down and that -they had them shot through the head; that he, already wounded, had -secured indulgence by stating that he was the father of three small -children. The skulls of these unfortunates were scattered; the guns, -broken at the stock, were scattered here and there; and the blood had -besprinkled the bushes to such an extent that in coming out of the woods -my cape was spattered with it; it was a veritable shambles.” - -“Dogs chained, without food or drink. And the houses about them on fire. -But the just anger of our soldiers is accompanied also by pure -vandalism. In the villages, already emptied of their inhabitants, the -houses are set on fire. I feel sorry for this population. If they have -made use of disloyal weapons, after all, they are only defending their -own country. The atrocities which these non-combatants are still -committing are revenged after a savage fashion. Mutilations of the -wounded are the order of the day.” - -This order was addressed by General Stenger, in command of the -fifty-eighth German brigade, on the 26th of August, to the troops under -his orders: - -“From this day forward no further prisoners will be taken. All prisoners -will be massacred. The wounded, whether in arms or not in arms, shall be -massacred. Even the prisoners already gathered in convoys will be -massacred. No living enemy must remain behind us.” - - -THE FRENCH REPORT - -Having been instructed to investigate atrocities said to have been -committed by the Germans in portions of French territory which had been -occupied by them, a commission composed of four representatives of the -French Government repaired to these districts in order to make a -thorough investigation. The commission was composed of M. Georges -Payelle, First President of the Cour des Comptes; Armand Mollard, -Minister Plenipotentiary; Georges Maringer, Counselor of State, and -Edmond Paillot, Counselor of the Cour de Cassation. - -They started on their mission late in September, 1914, and visited the -Departments of Seine-et-Marne, Marne, Meuse, Meurthe-et-Moselle, Oise, -and Aisne. According to the report, they made note only of those -accusations against the invaders which were backed up by reliable -testimony and discarded everything that might have been occasioned by -the exigencies of war. - -The statement, which extends over many pages and contains over 25,000 -words, is a record of the most fiendish crimes imaginable. “On every -side our eyes rested on ruin. Whole villages have been destroyed by -bombardment or fire; towns formerly full of life are now nothing but -deserts full of ruins; and, in visiting the scenes of desolation where -the invader’s torch has done its work, one feels continually as though -one were walking among the remains of one of those cities of antiquity -which have been annihilated by the great cataclysms of nature. - -“In truth it can be stated that never has a war carried on between -civilized nations assumed the savage and ferocious character of the one -which at this moment is being waged on our soil by an implacable -adversary. Pillage, rape, arson, and murder are the common practice of -our enemies; and the facts which have been revealed to us day by day at -once constitute definite crimes against common rights, punished by the -codes of every country with the most severe and the most dishonoring -penalties, and which prove an astonishing degeneration in German habits -of thought since 1870. - -“Crimes against women and young girls have been of appalling frequency. -We have proved a great number of them, but they only represent an -infinitesimal proportion of those which we could have taken up. Owing to -a sense of decency, which is deserving of every respect, the victims of -these hateful acts usually refuse to disclose them. Doubtless fewer -would have been committed if the leaders of an army whose discipline is -most rigorous had taken any trouble to prevent them; yet, strictly -speaking, they can only be considered as the individual and spontaneous -acts of uncaged beasts. But with regard to arson, theft, and murder the -case is very different; the officers, even those of the highest station, -will bear before humanity the overwhelming responsibility for these -crimes. - -“In the greater part of the places where we carried on our inquiry we -came to the conclusion that the German Army constantly professes the -most complete contempt for human life, that its soldiers, and even its -officers, do not hesitate to finish off the wounded, that they kill -without pity the inoffensive inhabitants of the territories which they -have invaded, and they do not spare in their murderous rage women, old -men, or children. The wholesale shootings at Lunéville, Gerbéviller, -Nomeny, and Senlis are terrible examples of this; and in the course of -this report you will read the story of scenes of carnage in which -officers themselves have not been ashamed to take part.” - - -HORRIBLE CASES OF RAPE - -Of the criminal attempts on women cited in the report two of the most -horrible occurred in the Department of Seine-et-Marne. - -“Frightful scenes occurred at the Château de ---- in the neighborhood of -La Ferté-Gaucher. There lived there an old gentleman, M. X., with his -servant, Mlle. Y., 54 years old. On Sept. 5 several Germans, among whom -was a non-commissioned officer, were in occupation of this property. -After they had been supplied with food, the non-commissioned officer -proposed to a refugee, a Mme. Z., that she should sleep with him; she -refused. M. X., to save her from the designs of which she was the -object, sent her to his farm, which was in the neighborhood. The German -ran there to fetch her, dragged her back to the château and led her to -the attic; then, having completely undressed her, he tried to violate -her. At this moment M. X., wishing to protect her, fired revolver shots -on the staircase and was immediately shot. - -[Illustration: THE BOMBARDMENT OF THE EAST COAST OF ENGLAND. - -This scene, painted in Hartlepool, shows the effect of a bursting German -shell in the unfortified British town. Several women and many other -civilians were killed by the German raiders.] - -[Illustration: PRUSSIAN SOLDIER KIDNAPPING A RED CROSS NURSE. - -In spite of her prayer he seized her roughly, tied her hands together -and throwing her across his saddle rode away. Fortunately, a Cossack -appeared, pierced the scoundrel with his lance and rescued the woman. -(_Graphic copr._)] - -“The non-commissioned officer then made Mme. X. come out of the attic, -obliged her to step over the corpse of the old man, and led her to a -closet, where he again made two unsuccessful attempts upon her. Leaving -her at last, he threw himself upon Mlle. Y., having first handed Mme. Z. -over to two soldiers, who, after having violated her, one once and the -other twice, in the dead man’s room, made her pass the night in a barn -near them, where one of them twice again had sexual connection with her. - -“As for Mlle. Y., she was obliged by threats of being shot, to strip -herself completely naked and lie on a mattress with the non-commissioned -officer, who kept her there until morning. - -[Illustration: “AT LEAST THEY ONLY _DROWN_ YOUR WOMEN.”] - -“It is generally believed at Coulommiers that criminal attempts have -been made on many women of that town, but only one crime of this nature -has been proved for certain. A charwoman, Mme. X., was the victim. A -soldier came to her house on the 6th of September, toward 9.30 in the -evening, and sent away her husband to go and search for one of his -comrades in the street. Then, in spite of the fact that two small -children were present, he tried to rape the young woman. X., when he -heard his wife’s cries, rushed back, but was driven off with blows of -the butt of the man’s rifle into a neighboring room, of which the door -was left open, and his wife was forced to suffer the consummation of the -outrage. The rape took place almost under the eyes of the husband, who, -being terrorized, did not dare to intervene, and used his efforts only -to calm the terror of his children. - - -ARSON AND MURDER RAMPANT - -“Personal liberty, like human life, is the object of complete scorn on -the part of the German military authorities. Almost everywhere citizens -of every age have been dragged from their homes and led into captivity, -many have died or been killed on the way. - -“Arson, still more than murder, forms the usual procedure of our -adversaries. It is employed by them either as a means of systematic -devastation or as a means of terrorism. The German Army, in order to -provide for it, possesses a complete outfit, which comprises torches, -grenades, rockets, petrol pumps, fuse sticks, and little bags of -pastilles made of compressed powder which are very inflammable. The -lust for arson is manifested chiefly against churches and against -monuments which have some special interest, either artistic or -historical. - -“Thousands of houses in the ground covered by the investigators had been -completely destroyed by fire. In the Department of Marne a great many -villages, as well as important country towns, were burned without any -reason whatever. Without doubt these crimes were committed by order, as -German detachments arrived in the neighborhood with their torches, their -grenades, and their usual outfit for arson. - -“At Lépine, a laborer named Caqué, in whose house two German cyclists -were billeted, asked the latter if the grenades which he saw in their -possession were destined for his house. They answered: ‘No. Lépine is -finished with.’ At that moment nine houses in the village were burned -out. - -“At Marfaux nineteen private houses were burned. - -“Of the commune of Glannes practically nothing remains. At Somme-Tourbe -the entire village has been destroyed, with the exception of the -mayoralty house, the church, and two private buildings. - -“At Auve nearly the whole town has been destroyed. At Etrepy sixty-three -families out of seventy are homeless. At Huiron all the houses, with the -exception of five, have been burned. At Sermaize-les-Bains only about -forty houses out of nine hundred remain. At Bignicourt-sur-Saultz thirty -houses out of thirty-three are in ruins. - -“At Suippes, the big market town which has been practically burned out, -German soldiers carrying straw and cans of petrol have been seen in the -streets. While the mayor’s house was burning, six sentinels with fixed -bayonets were under orders to forbid any one to approach and to prevent -any help being given. - -“All this destruction by arson, which only represents a small proportion -of the acts of the same kind in the Department of Seine-et-Marne, was -accomplished without the least tendency to rebellion or the smallest act -of resistance being recorded against the inhabitants of the localities -which are today more or less completely destroyed. In some villages the -Germans, before setting fire to them, made one of their soldiers fire a -shot from his rifle so as to be able to pretend afterward that the -civilian population had attacked them, an allegation which is all the -more absurd since at the time when the enemy arrived the only -inhabitants left were old men, sick persons, or people absolutely -without any means of aggression. - - -UNCONTROLLED SAVAGERY - -“On the 6th of September at Champguyon, Mme. Louvet was present at the -martyrdom of her husband. She saw him in the hands of ten or fifteen -soldiers, who were beating him to death before his own house, and ran up -and kissed him through the bars of the gate. She was brutally pushed -back and fell, while the murderers dragged along the unhappy man covered -with blood, begging them to spare his life and protesting that he had -done nothing to be treated thus. He was finished off at the end of the -village. When his wife found his body it was horribly disfigured. His -head was beaten in, one of his eyes hung from the socket, and one of his -wrists was broken. - -“At Montmirail a scene of real savagery was enacted. On the 5th of -September a non-commissioned officer flung himself almost naked on the -widow Naudé, on whom he was billeted, and carried her into his room. -This woman’s father, François Fontaine, rushed up on hearing his -daughter’s cry. At once fifteen or twenty Germans broke through the door -of the house, pushed the old man into the street, and shot him without -mercy. Little Juliette Naudé opened the window at this moment and was -struck in the stomach by a bullet, which went through her body. The poor -child died after twenty-four hours of most dreadful suffering. - - -CONSTANT EVIDENCE OF THEFT - -“We have constantly found definite evidence of theft,” states the report -further, “and we do not hesitate to state that where a body of the enemy -has passed it has given itself up to a systematically organized pillage, -in the presence of its leaders, who have even themselves often taken -part in it. Cellars have been emptied to the last bottle, safes have -been gutted, considerable sums of money have been stolen or extorted; a -great quantity of plate and jewelry, as well as pictures, furniture, -‘objets d’art,’ linen, bicycles, women’s dresses, sewing machines, even -down to children’s toys, after having been taken away, have been loaded -on vehicles to be taken toward the frontier.” - -Space forbids further quotation from the harrowing document, in which -one frightful tale succeeds another, until with a wave of sickening -horror the reader cries out, “Can such things really be?” - - -GERMANY DENIES ATROCITIES - -“A chain of baseless fabrications” is the phrase used by Germany to -characterize the charges brought against the German armies by the French -government, claiming that “German army officers have, by every means and -with full success, effected the maintenance of discipline and the strict -observance of all the rules of war in each and all the spheres of -operation.” - -The demolished villages and pitiful victims must tell their own tale of -terror. Doubtless many of the crimes committed have been without the -sanction of the German government or even without the authority of a -superior officer, but, even allowing for the partisanship that is -natural on the part of afflicted inhabitants, the testimony of the -French commission together with that of former Ambassador Bryce must -deeply affect the attitude of all thinking people toward warfare. - - - - -CHAPTER XV - -DESTROYING THE PRICELESS MONUMENTS OF CIVILIZATION - - THE INEXPIABLE GERMAN CRIME, LOUVAIN -- ART TREASURES OF HISTORIC CITY - -- REDUCED TO A HEAP OF ASHES -- PITILESS DESTRUCTION AS TOLD BY TOWN - TREASURER -- A MODERN POMPEII -- BURNING OF CITY SYSTEMATIC -- - INDIGNANT PROTEST AGAINST MODERN HUNS. - - -All through Belgium and all through the country of the Franco-German -border line are towns and cities filled with treasures of art and -history--some of the richest, indeed, that centuries of civilization -have amassed. Under the guns of both sides of the mighty conflict these -paintings and shrines and storied buildings have been exposed to -destruction, and many of them have been wantonly sacrificed, shattered -beyond hope of restoration. - -Under the latest Hague proposals, Article XXVIII, historic monuments are -supposed to be respected even by warring nations, yet both Germany and -France have accused each other of violating this convention. The whole -of civilized humanity rises in protest against such sacrilege. - -Among all the black crimes of the German invasion of Belgium none is -blacker than the sack and burning of Louvain, the fairest city of -Belgium and the intellectual metropolis of the Low Countries. According -to a bitter statement of Frank Jewett Mather, the well-known American -art critic, “Louvain contained more beautiful works of art than the -Prussian nation has produced in its entire history.” - - -ART TREASURES OF HISTORIC CITY - -There was hardly a building within the ramparts but breathed the air of -some romance of the Middle Ages or marked a stepping-stone in its -stirring history. Once before war robbed it of its commercial prestige, -only to permit it to rise, phœnix-like, as the center of learning during -the sixteenth century. At the opening of the present war it still -boasted of the largest university in Belgium, in which thousands of -antique volumes and prints were stored. Its museums and its churches -housed scores of paintings of the old Flemish masters. - -Louvain has passed through successive periods of culture and barbarity -ever since Julius Caesar established a permanent camp there during his -campaigns against the Belgians and the Germans. In the eleventh century -it became the residence of the long line of Dukes of Brabant, and was -the capital until Brussels wrested this distinction from it during an -uprising of weavers against their feudal masters. In the fourteenth -century it had gained a population of between 100,000 and 150,000, and -there were no fewer than 2,400 woolen manufactories. The weavers were a -turbulent lot, however, and when they rose against the Duke Wencelaus he -conquered them and forced thousands of them to flee to Holland and -England. It was then that Brussels became the capital and Louvain lost -its prestige as a center of the cloth-making industry. - -[Illustration: THE VOICE OF THE COLOGNE CHURCH SPEAKS: - -“Louvain, thou wast built on my foundations, spirit of my spirit, heart -of my heart.”] - -Scholars began to pour into the town, however, to glean what learning -they could from the old parchments and books which its castles -contained. In 1423 Duke John IV of Brabant founded Louvain University. -Students flocked there from all over the world. In the sixteenth century -it had 4,000 students and forty-three colleges. - -The library occupied a large room with fine wood panels, carved in -intricate designs. It held 150,000 volumes and thousands of manuscripts, -valuable beyond price. It contained a colossal group representing a -scene from the Flood, sculptured by Geerts in 1839. - -One block to the north of the university is the Grande Place, on which -faced the Hôtel de Ville, one of the finest examples of the late Gothic -style of architecture in Europe. It surpassed the town halls of Bruges, -Brussels, and Ghent in elegance of detail and harmony of design. It was -erected in 1448 by Mathieu de Layens, and it was from the upper windows -of this building that thirteen magistrates of noble birth were hurled to -their death on the spears of the populace in the streets below during -the weavers’ uprising. - -Across the Grande Place stood the church of St. Pierre, a magnificent -type of the Gothic style built on a cruciform plan and flanked by -chapels holding reliquaries of the saints, life-sized wooden figures, -and priceless carvings and paintings. There might have been seen the -works of Van Papenhoven, Roger van der Weyden, Dierick Bouts, and De -Layens. - - -REDUCED TO A HEAP OF ASHES - -The notification of the sacking of Louvain was contained in the notice -issued by the British Press Bureau on Friday, August 28, 1914, which -read as follows: “On Tuesday evening a German corps, after receiving a -check, withdrew in disorder into the town of Louvain. A German guard at -the entrance to the town mistook the nature of this incursion and fired -on their routed fellow-countrymen, mistaking them for Belgians. In spite -of all denials from the authorities the Germans, in order to cover their -mistake, pretended that it was the inhabitants who had fired on them, -whereas the inhabitants, including the police, had been disarmed more -than a week before. Without inquiry and without listening to any -protests the German commander-in-chief announced that the town would be -immediately destroyed. The inhabitants were ordered to leave their -dwellings; a party of the men were made prisoners and the women and -children put into trains, the destination of which is unknown. Soldiers -furnished with bombs set fire to all parts of the town. The splendid -church of St. Pierre, the University buildings, the library, and the -scientific establishment were delivered to the flames. Several notable -citizens were shot. A town of 45,000 inhabitants, the intellectual -metropolis of the Low Countries since the fifteenth century, is now no -more than a heap of ashes.” - - -PITILESS DESTRUCTION AS TOLD BY TOWN TREASURER - -The town treasurer of Louvain, who managed to escape from the sacked -city, gave in the London Times the following account of the destruction: - -“At last, on Tuesday night, there took place the unspeakable crime, the -shame of which can be understood only by those who followed and watched -the different phases of the German occupation of Louvain. - -“It is a significant fact that the German wounded and sick, including -their Red Cross nurses, were all removed from the hospitals. The Germans -meanwhile proceeded methodically to make a last and supreme requisition, -although they knew the town could not satisfy it. Toward six o’clock the -bugle sounded, and officers lodging in private houses left at once with -arms and luggage. At the same time thousands of additional soldiers, -with numerous field pieces and cannon, marched into the town to their -allotted positions. The gas factory, which had been idle, had been -worked through the previous night and day by Germans, so that during -this premeditated outrage the people could not take advantage of -darkness to escape from the town. A further fact that proves their -premeditation is that the attack took place at eight o’clock, the exact -time at which the population entered their homes in conformity with the -German orders--consequently escape became well-nigh impossible. At 8.20 -the full fusillade with the roar of the cannons came from all sides of -the town at once. - -“The cavalry charged through the streets sabring fugitives, while the -infantry, posted on the foot-paths, had their fingers on the triggers of -their guns waiting for the unfortunate people to rush from the houses or -appear at the windows, the soldiers praising and complimenting each -other on their marksmanship as they fired at the unhappy fugitives. -Those whose houses were not yet destroyed were ordered to quit and -follow the soldiers to the railway station. There the men were separated -from mothers, wives, and children, and thrown, some bound, into trains -leaving in the direction of Germany. They saw their carefully-collected -art and other treasures being shared out by the soldiers, the officers -looking on. Those who attempted to appeal to their tormentors’ better -feelings were immediately shot. A few were let loose, but most of them -were sent to Germany. - -“On Wednesday at daybreak the remaining women and children were driven -out of the town--a lamentable spectacle--with uplifted arms and under -the menace of bayonets and revolvers. The day was practically calm. The -destruction of the most beautiful part of the town seemed momentarily to -have soothed the barbarian rage of the invaders. On Thursday the remnant -of the Civil Guard was called up on the pretext of extinguishing the -conflagration; those who demurred were chained and sent with some -wounded Germans to the Fatherland, whilst the population had to quit.” - - -A MODERN POMPEII - -Fair Louvain is now a place of desolation and ashes. Its treasures have -been madly sacrificed to the god of war. A graphic description of the -ruin has been written by Professor E. Gilson, of the University of -Louvain, in the form of a letter to the Belgian Minister of Justice. It -says in part: - -“At the ‘Seven Corners’ Louvain reveals itself to my eyes like a -luminous panorama in the glade of a forest. The center of the city is a -smoking heap of ruins. Houses are caved in, nothing remains but smoking -ruins, and a mass of brick. It is a veritable Pompeii. But how much more -tragic and vivid is the sight of this new Pompeii! An oppressive silence -everywhere. Everybody has fled; at the windows of cellars I see -frightened faces, and at the street corners Prussian sentinels, sordid, -immovable and silent. - -“In the center stand the walls of St. Pierre, now a grinning silhouette, -roof and belfry gone, the walls blackened and caved in. In front stands -the Hôtel de Ville, dominating everything and almost intact. Further on, -the remains of Les Hales, entirely destroyed, except for the arcade of -big pillars of the Salle des Pas Perdus. The library and its treasures -are entirely gone. - -“In the Petite Rue Louis Nelsens everything is destroyed. At the foot of -the statue, in a flower bed all tramped underfoot, there is an irregular -hillock covered with a few dead leaves. An old woman, recognizing me, -comes out of her cellar and tells me: ‘Monsieur, this is the grave of -Monsieur David and his son, the best people that ever lived.’ She cries. -They were killed by shrapnel fired upon them as they were leaving their -house. The Capuchin brothers made temporary graves for the dead. - -“Graves were found nearly everywhere. In front of the statue, near a -house, I find traces of fire. ‘In this place,’ the old woman tells me, -‘the Prussians burned a body after soaking it in petroleum. Some men -buried the charred remains.’ I pick up a key which must have belonged to -the dead man--a memento of this monstrous incident. - -“In the center of the city the sight is extraordinarily -picturesque--gloomy, abominable, and more so in the evening when the -full moon is shining over the mass of ruins, it is really fantastic, -diabolical. - -“The center of old Louvain, the old city of the Dukes of Brabant, exists -no longer; a new city will have to be built in the center of the -quarters spared by the torch. - - -BURNING OF CITY SYSTEMATIC - -“A villager told me that the soldiers had two ways of setting fire to -the houses: One was to break the windows of the first floor, to throw -petroleum on the floor, and throw in torches of burning straw, while -others were engaged in shooting at the upper-story windows to prevent -the inhabitants from throwing missiles on those setting fire to their -homes.” - - -INDIGNANT PROTEST AGAINST MODERN HUNS - -Indignant protest against the outrageous sacrifice of Louvain arose from -every quarter of the civilized world. The London Tablet, commenting on -the desolation of Belgium and the sacrifice of her temples, said: - -“The irreparable crime of Louvain and the ruthless damage done to the -Cathedral of Malines while Cardinal Mercier was absent in Rome have left -Belgium’s cup of bitterness still unfilled. We do not understand the -reason of these remorseless attacks upon venerable places of worship, -and particularly upon Roman Catholic churches. We do not fully discern -why even the modern Huns should be so eager to violate these peaceful -sanctuaries, destroying one, bombarding another with zest, stabling -their horses in a third, as they have undoubtedly done. One would almost -fancy that the late Professor Cramb was right after all, that Germany -regards the Christian creed as outworn, and that she dreams, when she -has imposed her will upon the world (if she can), of founding a new -religion, with the Kaiser as its inspired expositor. We wonder what the -pious people of Bavaria and Austria-Hungary think of this persistent -desecration of Catholic shrines. The meaning of the sack of Dinant is, -however, sufficiently clear. Thousands of travelers know that pleasant -little town, which clustered beneath the old citadel on the banks of the -Meuse. They will learn with horror and distress that it has shared the -fate of Louvain, that it has been shelled and burned, that many of its -defenseless men have been shot, and that its women are hunted and -homeless. We have not yet been told, but doubtless shall hear in due -course, that the splendid thirteenth-century church of Notre Dame, the -most complete example of pointed Gothic architecture in Belgium, has -perished amid the general destruction. The reason of this sack and -pillage of town after town in Belgium, with every accompaniment of -murderous barbarity--Termonde is another melancholy case in point--is -becoming obvious. It is due to the resolute resistance of Antwerp. The -Germans want to capture Antwerp, but can not spare enough men to invest -the fortress, and in any case hope to obtain it without paying the -price. They seek to terrorize Antwerp into submission by laying Belgium -waste, by razing her undefended cities to the ground, and by shedding -the blood of innocent Belgian citizens of both sexes. . . . The wilful -devastation of Belgium will have only one definite result. It will -increase the chorus of indignant denunciation of German methods of -warfare which now rises from every civilized country in the world.” - -[Illustration: BURNING OF THE CATHEDRAL OF RHEIMS. - -This noble building, one of the finest pieces of Gothic architecture in -the world, was bombarded by German shells and set on fire. Much of the -priceless statuary and the entire roof were destroyed.] - -[Illustration: THE SACKING OF LOUVAIN. - -According to the official report of the Commission of Inquiry into the -German atrocities at Louvain and other places, men were brutally -separated from their wives and children, and after having been subjected -to abominable treatment by the Germans were herded out of the town. The -corpses of many a civilian encumbered the streets and squares.] - - - - -CHAPTER XVI - -WANTON DESTRUCTION OF THE BEAUTIFUL CATHEDRAL OF RHEIMS - - DESECRATION OF THE SHRINES OF HUMANITY -- THE “ROYAL CITY”--CATHEDRAL - OF NOTRE DAME -- ART TREASURES -- CATHEDRAL A TARGET -- ANGER OF CROWD - STILLED BY PRIESTS--“SUPREME SACRIFICE AGAINST THE SPIRIT OF - MAN”--BEAUTY IRREPARABLY GONE. - - -If the destruction of famous buildings, shrines of humanity as well as -of art and religion, were but put down to the unavoidable accidents of -war, after the first poignant sense of the irreparable loss, one would -rather sorrowfully accept the smoking ruins as further evidence of the -horrible, if unavoidable, waste of war. But to have Louvain’s atrocities -justified, to have the destruction of towns systematically brought about -in a spirit of fiendish reprisal or as part of a propaganda of military -terrorism, this is what revolts the world. It is this demoniacal -barbarism, raised to the ultimate power for evil by modern mechanism, -that staggers civilization. - -The sacking of Louvain had hardly ceased to be a matter of world-wide -outcry against such inexcusable barbarity when there came the official -report that the Cathedral of Rheims, one of the most glorious examples -of Gothic art in the world and an historic monument of first rank, had -fallen before the German guns in the bombardment of that historic city. - - -THE “ROYAL CITY” - -Rheims has been a city of importance since the time of the Romans. The -cathedral, wherein for nearly 1,000 years the kings of France were -crowned, has been fittingly described as “the most perfect example in -grandeur and grace of Gothic style in existence.” - -Hincmar, a mighty archbishop of the ninth century, once declared that -Rheims was “by the appointment of Heaven a royal city.” - -The words are at once historical and prophetic. Here Clovis was baptized -by St. Remigius, and here in the cathedral in 1429, Charles VII of -France was crowned through the efforts of Joan of Arc. - -According to the historians of art, Rheims is royal in another sense. In -no city in Europe have the life and thought of the Middle Ages and the -Renaissance found such perfect expression in architecture. From early -Gothic to Romanesque, and from Romanesque to Renaissance, the buildings -of Rheims reveal better than any records the city’s historical -development. Of all the buildings illustrative of their various periods -there were said to be no better examples than the cathedral and the -church of St. Jacques, fine monuments of early Gothic; the later Gothic -edifice of the archbishop’s palace, and, finally, the city hall, a -handsome work of the best period of French Renaissance. - - -CATHEDRAL OF NOTRE DAME - -No one really knows who designed and built the cathedral. The first -stones were laid in 1211, and the building, with the exception of the -superb west façade, was completed in the thirteenth century. The façade, -which dates from the fourteenth century, was adorned with three -exquisite recessed portals containing, in a more or less good state of -preservation, over five hundred statues. Of the entire structure, we -read in “Cathedrals of the Isle de France”: “Nothing can exceed the -majesty of its deeply recessed portals, the beauty of the rose window -that surmounts them, or the elegance of the gallery that completes the -façade.” - -[Illustration: THE CHRISTIAN WORLD!] - - -ART TREASURES - -The interior, which was cruciform, was 455 feet long and 99 feet wide; -the distance from the middle isle to the highest point in the roof was -125 feet. Here in niches in the walls was another multitude of statues, -and in the nave and transepts were preserved valuable tapestry, -representing biblical scenes and scenes from the history of medieval -France. Here also hung a treasure of paintings, including canvases by -Tintoretto, Nicolas Poussin, and others, and some fine old tapestries. - -In the treasury were reliquaries, one said to contain a thorn from the -Holy Crown, the skull of St. Remi and a collection of valuable vessels -in gold, the most remarkable in France. The treasures included not only -the coronation ornaments of various kings, but the vase of St. Ursula, -the massive chalice of St. Remigius, and countless crucifixes in gold, -silver and precious woods. - -In the treasury was also preserved the Sainte Ampoule--the vessel in -which the oil used to anoint the kings of France was preserved--a -successor to the famous ampulla, which a dove was said to have brought -from heaven filled with inexhaustible holy oil at the time of the -baptism of Clovis, in 496. During the Revolution the sacred vessel was -shattered, but a fragment was piously preserved, in which some of the -oil was said still to remain. - - -CATHEDRAL A TARGET - -The Cathedral of Notre Dame is now no more than an empty shell of -charred and blackened walls. The fire started between four and five -o’clock Sunday afternoon, September 20, 1914, after shells had been -crashing into the town all day. Over five hundred fell between early -morning and sunset. - -The cathedral had been turned into a hospital for the German wounded, to -secure for the building the protection of the Red Cross flag. When the -first shell struck the roof everyone believed it was a stray shot, but -later in the day a German battery four miles away, began making the -great Gothic pile its target. Shell after shell crashed its way into the -old masonry and stonework that had stood the storms of centuries. - -At 4.30 some scaffolding around the east end of the cathedral, where -repairs were going on, caught fire and soon the whole network of poles -and planks was ablaze. Then the roof of old oak timbers caught fire and -soon the ceilings of the nave and transepts were a roaring furnace. - -The blazing piers of carved woodwork crashed to the floor, where piles -of straw had been gathered in connection with the work of the field -hospital. As soon as this caught fire the paneling of the altars, the -chairs and other furniture were devoured. - -Twenty wounded Germans would have perished by the efforts of their own -countrymen if several French army doctors, with their bearers, had not -carried them one by one at their own risk out of the church by one of -the side doors. - - -ANGER OF CROWD STILLED BY PRIESTS - -There a grim scene was only prevented by the courage of the priests of -the cathedral. A crowd of about two hundred citizens had come out to -watch the terrible spectacle. As these Germans, in their uniforms, -appeared at the transept door howls of uncontrollable passion went up -from the crowd. “Kill them!” they shouted. Soldiers in the crowd -leveled their rifles, when Abbé Andrieux sprang forward between the -wounded men and the muzzles that threatened them. - -“Don’t fire,” he shouted, “you would make yourselves as guilty as they.” - -The reproach was enough, and amid fierce hooting and angry cries the -Germans were carried to shelter in the museum near by. - -From the hills the flaming cathedral was an even more impressive sight -than in the streets of the town. From the yawning roof the red glare -poured up into the dark sky and its windows flickered with dancing -flames. So night closed down. Not for long was its stillness -undisturbed. At two o’clock German batteries opened fire again. Then -from windows that looked toward Rheims across the plain one could watch -the lurid sight of night bombardment. - -At last daybreak came, a sad gray dawn, with cold, dispiriting rain -falling. When the shadows had lifted and enough light had filtered -through the low, lead-colored clouds for one to see across the plain, -the ravished city, with its ruined cathedral standing stark against the -background and a vast wall of smoke rising slowly from the still flaming -ruins, was as desolate a thing as the sun could well have found in its -journey round the world that morning. - - -“SUPREME SACRIFICE AGAINST THE SPIRIT OF MAN” - -“Will not every artist, every writer, every lover of the beautiful, -unite with us in a protestation of horror against the infamous -destruction of Rheims Cathedral?” wrote Emile Hovelaque, French -Inspector General of Public Instruction, in a letter to the London -Times. “It was the cradle of our kings, the high altar of our race, a -sanctuary and shrine dear from every memory, sacred in every thought, -loved as our remotest past, an ever-speaking witness to the permanence -through change of the ideals, aspirations and dreams of our country. - -“Can such deeds go unavenged? Will not the conscience of the whole world -rise against those nameless barbarians who shelled Red Cross flags -floating over that twice-sacred pile, who have committed this supreme -sacrifice against the spirit of man in seven hundred years? Those gray -cliffs of chiseled stone had risen above the furious tides of -innumerable invasions unhurt, spared by the most savage onsets. -Battered, by every storm of heaven and earth, the noblest sculpture of -the West remained until German culture came. - -“And then, deliberately, methodically, slowly, the princes and captains -of an accursed race mangled the sacred pile until all had fallen. -Fairest and most human images in all the world, a forest of gigantic -columns, a vast vaulted canopy of stone, majestic walls and -heaven-stained glass--it was murder in cold blood, the murder not of a -life but of immortality. Forty-eight long hours the inexplicable crime -dragged out. Louvain first, now Rheims. What next?” - - -BEAUTY IRREPARABLY GONE - -The artistic beauty of the cathedral of Rheims can never be restored, in -the opinion of Whitney Warren, the New York architect, who made a -thorough inspection of the structure. - -Mr. Warren, who is a corresponding member of the Institut de France, was -given the privilege of visiting the cathedral. His investigation had no -official character, but the result of his observations was communicated -to Myron T. Herrick, American Ambassador to Belgium. - -“That anything remains of the edifice,” said Mr. Warren, “is due to the -strong construction of the walls and vaults which are of a robustness -that can resist even modern implements of war.” - -The building was not battered by the heavier guns, as had been feared, -but it suffered most from shrapnel fire. The famous rose windows, the -sculpture and other details of the façade that were ruined are, however, -just the examples of art that can not be replaced. - -Statues, gargoyles, and other ornaments on the exterior of the cathedral -have been tumbled to the pavement and shattered, though at first glance -the outer walls of the cathedral do not show the ruin that has taken -place. These blackened walls yet stand as a monument to the glory of -France, but still more as a grim reminder of the barbarity of German -warfare. - - - - -CHAPTER XVII - -THE CANADIANS’ GLORIOUS FEAT AT LANGEMARCK - - THE CRUCIAL TEST OF CANADA’S MEN -- WONDERFUL STORY OF HEROISM AS TOLD - BY SIR MAX AITKEN -- A REMARKABLE PERFORMANCE -- QUIET PRECEDING STORM - -- SECOND BATTLE OF YPRES -- LINE NEVER WAVERED -- OFFICER FELL AT - HEAD OF TROOPS -- FORTUNES OF THIRD BRIGADE -- IN DIRE PERIL -- - OVERWHELMING NUMBERS -- PUT TO TEST -- CAPTURE OF ST. JULIEN -- A HERO - LEADING HEROES. - - -The fight of the Canadians at Langemarck and St. Julien in April, 1915, -makes such a battle story as has sufficed, in other nations, to inspire -song and tradition for centuries. In the words of Sir John French, the -Canadians, by holding their ground when it did not seem humanly possible -to hold it, “saved the situation,” kept the enemy out of Ypres, kept -closed the road to Calais, and made a failure of German plans that -otherwise were about to be successful. - -The Canadian soldiers have indeed shown that they are second to none. -They were put to as supreme a test as it would be possible for any army -to meet with, for they fought overwhelming numbers under conditions that -seemed to ensure annihilation. They fought on, and failed neither in -courage, discipline, nor tenacity, although thousands of them fell. - -The story of their unflinching heroism was told by Sir Max Aitken, the -record officer serving with the Canadian division in France: - -“The recent fighting in Flanders, in which the Canadians played so -glorious a part, cannot of course be described with precision of -military detail until time has made possible the co-ordination of -relevant facts, and the piecing together in a narrative both lucid and -exact of much which, so near the event, is confused and blurred. But it -is considered right that the mourning in Canada for husbands, sons or -brothers who have given their lives for the Empire should have with as -little reserve as military considerations allow the rare and precious -consolation which, in the agony of bereavement, the record of the valor -of their dead must bring, and indeed the mourning in Canada will be very -widely spread, for the battle which raged for so many days in the -neighborhood of Ypres was bloody, even as men appraise battles in this -callous and life-engulfing war. But as long as brave deeds retain the -power to fire the blood of Anglo-Saxons, the stand made by the Canadians -in those desperate days will be told by fathers to their sons. - - -A REMARKABLE PERFORMANCE - -“The Canadians have wrested the trenches over the bodies of the dead and -earned the right to stand side by side with the superb troops who, in -the first battle of Ypres, broke and drove before them the flower of the -Prussian Guards. Looked at from any point the performance would be -remarkable. It is amazing to soldiers when the genesis and composition -of the Canadian division are considered. It contained no doubt a -sprinkling of South African veterans, but it consisted in the main of -men who were admirable raw material, but who, at the outbreak of war, -were neither disciplined nor trained as men count discipline and -training in these days of scientific warfare. It was, it is true, -commanded by a distinguished English general. Its staff was -supplemented, without being replaced, by some brilliant British staff -officers. But in its higher and regimental commands were to be found -lawyers, college professors, business men and real estate agents, ready -with cool self-confidence to do battle against an organization in which -the study of military science is the exclusive pursuit of laborious -lives. - -“With what devotion, with a valor how desperate, with resourcefulness -how cool and how frightful, the amateur soldier of Canada confronted -overwhelming odds, may perhaps be made clear, even by a narrative so -incomplete as the present. - -“The salient of Ypres has become familiar to all students of the -campaign in Flanders. Like all salients it was, and was known to be, a -source of weakness to the forces holding it, but the reasons which have -led to its retention are apparent, and need not be explained. - -“On Thursday, April 22, 1915, the Canadian division held a line of -roughly five thousand yards, extending in a northwesterly direction from -the Ypres-Roulers railway, to the Ypres-Poekapelle road, and connecting -at its terminus with the French troops. The division consisted of three -infantry brigades in addition to the artillery brigades. Of the infantry -brigades the first was in reserve, the second was on the right, and the -third established contact with the allies at the point indicated above. - - -QUIET PRECEDING STORM - -“The day was a peaceful one, warm and sunny, and except that the -previous day had witnessed a further bombardment of the stricken town of -Ypres, everything seemed quiet in front of the Canadian line. At five -o’clock in the afternoon a plan carefully prepared was put into -execution against our French allies on the left. Asphyxiating gas of -great intensity was projected into their trenches, probably by means of -force pumps and pipes laid out under the parapets. The fumes, aided by a -favorable wind, floated backwards, poisoning and disabling over an -extended area those who fell under their effect. The result was that the -French were compelled to give ground for a considerable distance. The -glory which the French army has won in this war would make it -impertinent to labor on the compelling nature of the poisonous -discharges under which the trenches were lost. The French did, as -everyone knew they would do, all that stout soldiers could do, and the -Canadian division, officers and men, look forward to many occasions in -the future in which they will stand side by side with the brave armies -of France. - -“The immediate consequence of this enforced withdrawal was, of course, -extremely grave. The third brigade of the Canadian division was without -any left, or, in other words, its left was in the air. It became -imperatively necessary greatly to extend the Canadian lines to the left -rear. It was not, of course, practicable to move the first brigade from -reserve at a moment’s notice, and the line, extended from five to nine -thousand yards, was not naturally the line that had been held by the -allies at five o’clock, and a gap still existed on its left. - -[Illustration: MAP ILLUSTRATING THE BATTLE OF LANGEMARCK. - -Shaded Portion Indicates German Gain.] - -“The new line, of which our recent point of contact with the French -formed the apex, ran quite roughly to the south and west. As shown -above, it became necessary for Brigadier-General Turner, commanding the -third brigade, to throw back his left flank southward to protect his -rear. In the course of the confusion which followed upon the -readjustment of position, the enemy, who had advanced rapidly after his -initial successes, took four British 4.7 guns in a small wood to the -west of the village of St. Julien, two miles in the rear of the original -French trenches. - - -SECOND BATTLE OF YPRES - -“The story of the second battle of Ypres is the story of how the -Canadian division, enormously outnumbered, for they had in front of them -at least four divisions, supported by immensely heavy artillery, with a -gap still existing, though reduced, in their lines, and with -dispositions made hurriedly under the stimulus of critical danger, -fought through the day and through the night, and then through another -day and night; fought under their officers until, as happened to so -many, these perished gloriously, and then fought from the impulsion of -sheer valor because they came from fighting stock. - -“The enemy, of course, was aware, whether fully or not may perhaps be -doubted, of the advantage his breach in the line had given him, and -immediately began to push a formidable series of attacks upon the whole -of the newly-formed Canadian salient. - -“If it is possible to distinguish when the attack was everywhere so -fierce, it developed with particular intensity at this moment upon the -apex of the newly-formed line running in the direction of St. Julien. It -has already been stated that four British guns were taken in a wood -comparatively early in the evening of the 22d. In the course of that -night, and under the heaviest machine-gun fire, this wood was assaulted -by the Canadian Scottish, sixteenth battalion, of the third brigade, and -the tenth battalion of the second brigade, which was intercepted for -this purpose on its way to a reserve trench. The battalions were -respectively commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Leckie, and -Lieutenant-Colonel Boyle, and after a most fierce struggle in the light -of a misty moon they took the position at the point of the bayonet. At -midnight the second battalion, under Lieutenant-Colonel Watson -and the Toronto regiment, Queen’s Own (third battalion), under -Lieutenant-Colonel Rennie, both of the first brigade, brought up -much-needed reinforcements, and though not actually engaged in the -assault, were in reserve. - - -LINE NEVER WAVERED - -“All through the following days and nights these battalions shared the -fortunes and misfortunes of the third brigade. An officer, who took part -in the attack, describes how the men about him fell under the fire of -the machine guns, which, in his phrase, played upon them ‘like a -watering pot.’ He added quite simply, ‘I wrote my own life off,’ but the -line never wavered. When one man fell another took his place, and with a -final shout the survivors of the two battalions flung themselves into -the wood. - -“The German garrison was completely demoralized, and the impetuous -advance of the Canadians did not cease until they reached the far side -of the wood and entrenched themselves there in the position so dearly -gained. They had, however, the disappointment of finding that the guns -had been blown up by the enemy, and later on the same night, a most -formidable concentration of artillery fire, sweeping the wood as a -tropical storm sweeps the leaves from a forest, made it impossible for -them to hold the position for which they had sacrified so much. - -“The fighting continued without intermission all through the night and -to those who observed the indications that the attack was being pushed -with ever-growing strength, it hardly seemed possible that the -Canadians, fighting in positions so difficult to defend, and so little -the subject of deliberate choice, could maintain their resistance for -any long period. At 6 A. M. on Friday it became apparent that the left -was becoming more and more involved and a powerful German attempt to -outflank it developed rapidly. The consequences if it had been broken or -outflanked need not be insisted upon. They were not merely local. - -“It was therefore decided, formidable as the attempt undoubtedly was, to -try and give relief by a counter-attack upon the first line of German -trenches, now far, far advanced from those originally occupied by the -French. This was carried out by the Ontario first and fourth battalions -of the first brigade, under Brigadier-General Mercer, acting in -combination with a British brigade. It is safe to say that the youngest -private in the rank, as he set his teeth for the advance, knew the task -in front of him, and the youngest subaltern knew all that rested upon -its success. - -[Illustration: GERMAN ABUSE OF THE WHITE FLAG. - -An incident showing how a company of British soldiers were cut down by -an ambushed enemy. The front rank of Germans had been firing from behind -a small ridge. In apparent surrender they stood up in a long row and -held up the white flag. The British advanced to receive their guns and -take them prisoners, when suddenly the entire line fell down and a -second line arose from behind the ridge and immediately killed all the -British company. (_Sphere copr._)] - -[Illustration: TERRIBLE EFFECT OF A GERMAN SHELL ON WOUNDED BRITISH -SOLDIERS. - -A party of wounded Highlanders were resting in a house on the bank of -the Aisne River, where a doctor was attending them. A German shell came -through the window and the soldiers resting on the sofas and on the -floor were nearly all killed by flying fragments of shell. (_Sphere -copr._)] - - -OFFICER FELL AT HEAD OF TROOPS - -“It did not seem that any human being could live in the shower of shot -and shell which began to play upon the advancing troops. They suffered -terrible casualties. For a short time every man seemed to fall, but the -attack was pressed even closer and closer. The fourth Canadian battalion -at one moment came under a particularly withering fire. For a moment, -not more, it wavered. Its most gallant commanding officer, -Lieutenant-Colonel Birchall, carrying, after an old fashion, a light -cane, coolly and cheerfully rallied his men, and at the very moment when -his example had infected them fell dead at the head of his battalion. - -“With a hoarse cry of anger they sprang forward (for, indeed, they loved -him) as if to avenge his death. The astonishing attack which followed, -pushed home in the face of direct frontal fire, made in broad daylight -by battalions whose names should live forever in the memories of -soldiers, was carried to the first line of German trenches. After a -hand-to-hand struggle the last German who resisted was bayoneted, and -the trench was won. - -“The measure of this success may be taken when it is pointed out that -this trench represented in the German advance the apex in the breach -which the enemy had made in the original line of the allies, and that it -was two and a half miles south of that line. This charge, made by men -who looked death indifferently in the face, for no man who took part in -it could think that he was likely to live, saved the Canadian left. But -it did more; up to the point where the assailants conquered or died, it -secured and maintained during the most critical moment of all the -integrity of the allied line. For the trench was not only taken, it was -thereafter held against all comers, and in the teeth of every -conceivable projectile, until the night of Sunday, the 25th, when all -that remained of the war-broken but victorious battalions was relieved -by fresh troops. - - -FORTUNES OF THIRD BRIGADE - -“It is necessary now to return to the fortunes of the third brigade, -commanded by Brigadier-General Turner, which, as we have seen, at five -o’clock on Thursday was holding the Canadian left and after the first -attack assumed the defense of the new Canadian salient, at the same time -sparing all the men it could to form an extemporized line between the -wood and St. Julien. This brigade also was, at the first moment of the -German offensive, made the object of an attack by the discharge of -poisonous gas. The discharge was followed by two enemy assaults. -Although the fumes were extremely poisonous, they were not, perhaps, -having regard to the wind, so disabling as on the French lines (which -ran almost east to west), and the brigade, though affected by the fumes, -stoutly beat back the two German assaults. - -“Encouraged by this success, it rose to the supreme effort required by -the assault of the wood, which has already been described. At 4 A. M. -on the morning of Friday, the 23d, a fresh emission of gas was made both -upon the second brigade, which held the line running northeast, and upon -the third brigade, which, as has been fully explained, had continued the -line up to the pivotal point, as defined above, and had then spread down -in a southeasterly direction. It is perhaps worth mentioning, that two -privates of the forty-eighth Highlanders, who found their way into the -trenches commanded by Colonel Lipsett, ninetieth Winnipeg Rifles, eighth -battalion, perished of the fumes, and it was noticed that their faces -became blue immediately after dissolution. - -“The Royal Highlanders of Montreal, thirteenth battalion, and the -forty-eighth Highlanders, fifteenth battalion, were more especially -affected by the discharge. The Royal Highlanders, though considerably -shaken, remained immovable upon their ground. The forty-eighth -Highlanders, who no doubt received a more poisonous discharge, were for -the moment dismayed and indeed their trench, according to the testimony -of very hardened soldiers, became intolerable. The battalion retired -from the trench, but for a very short distance, and for an equally short -time. In a few moments they were again their own. They advanced upon and -occupied the trenches which they had momentarily abandoned. - - -IN DIRE PERIL - -“In the course of the same night the third brigade, which had already -displayed a resource, a gallantry, and a tenacity, for which no eulogy -could be excessive, was exposed (and with it the whole allied cause) to -a peril still more formidable. - -“It has been explained, and indeed the fundamental situation made the -peril clear, that several German divisions were attempting to crush, or -drive back this devoted brigade, and in any event to use their enormous -numerical superiority to sweep around and overwhelm our left wing at a -point in the line which cannot be precisely determined. The last attempt -partially succeeded, and in the course of this critical struggle, German -troops in considerable, though not in overwhelming, numbers swung past -the unsupported left to the brigade and, slipping in between the wood -and St. Julien, added to the torturing anxieties of the long-drawn-out -struggle by the appearance, and indeed for the moment the reality, of -isolation from the brigade base. - -“In the exertions made by the third brigade during this supreme crisis, -it is almost impossible to single out one battalion without injustice to -others, but though the efforts of the Royal Highlanders of Montreal, -thirteenth battalion, were only equal to those of the other battalions -who did such heroic service, it so happened by chance that the fate of -some of its officers attracted special attention. - -“Major Norsworthy, already almost disabled by a bullet wound, was -bayoneted and killed while he was rallying his men with easy -cheerfulness. The case of Captain McCuaig, of the same battalion, was -not less glorious, although his death can claim no witness. This most -gallant officer was seriously wounded in a hurriedly constructed trench. -At a moment when it would have been possible to remove him to safety, -he absolutely refused to move, and continued in the discharge of his -duty. But the situation grew instantly worse, and peremptory orders were -received for an immediate withdrawal. Those who were compelled to obey -them were most insistent to carry with them, at whatever risk to their -own mobility and safety, an officer to whom they were devotedly -attached. But he, knowing, it may be, better than they, the exertions -which still lay in front of them, and unwilling to inflict upon them the -disabilities of a maimed man, very resolutely refused, and asked of them -one thing only, that there should be given to him as he lay alone in the -trench, two loaded Colt revolvers to add to his own, which lay in his -right hand as he made his last request. And so, with three revolvers -ready to his hand for use, a very brave officer waited to sell his life, -wounded and racked with pain, in an abandoned trench. - -“On Friday afternoon the left of the Canadian line was strengthened by -important reinforcements of British troops, amounting to seven -battalions. From this time forward the Canadians also continued to -receive further assistance on the left from a series of French -counter-attacks pushed in a northeasterly direction from the canal bank. - - -OVERWHELMING NUMBERS - -“But the artillery fire of the enemy continually grew in intensity, and -it became more and more evident that the Canadian salient could no -longer be maintained against the overwhelming superiority of numbers by -which it was assailed. Slowly, stubbornly, and contesting every yard, -the defenders gave ground until the salient gradually receded from the -apex near the point where it had originally aligned with the French, and -fell back upon St. John. - -“Soon it became evident that even St. Julien, exposed from right and -left, was no longer tenable in the face of overwhelming numerical -superiority. The third brigade was therefore ordered to retreat further -south, selling every yard of ground as dearly as it had done since five -o’clock on Thursday. But it was found impossible, without hazarding far -larger forces, to disentangle the detachment of the Royal Highlanders of -Montreal, thirteenth battalion, and of the Royal Montreal Regiment, -fourteenth battalion. The brigade was ordered, and not a moment too -soon, to move back. It left these units with hearts as heavy as those of -his comrades who had said farewell to Captain McCuaig. - -“The German line rolled, indeed, over the deserted village, but for -several hours after the enemy had become master of the village the -sullen and persistent rifle fire which survived showed that they were -not yet master of the Canadian rear guard. If they died, they died -worthy of Canada. The enforced retirement of the third brigade (and to -have stayed longer would have been madness) reproduced for the second -brigade, commanded by Brigadier-General Curry, in a singularly exact -fashion the position of the third brigade itself at the moment of the -withdrawal of the French. - - -SECOND BRIGADE PUT TO TEST - -“The second brigade, it must be remembered, had retained the whole line -of trenches, roughly five hundred yards, which it was holding at five -o’clock on Thursday afternoon, supported by the incomparable exertions -of the third brigade, and by the highly hazardous deployment in which -necessity had involved that brigade. The second brigade had maintained -its lines. It now devolved upon General Curry, commanding this brigade, -to reproduce the tactical maneuvers by which earlier in the fight the -third brigade had adapted itself to the flank movement of overwhelming -numerical superiority. He flung his left flank round and his record is -that in the very crisis of this immense struggle he held his line of -trenches from Thursday at five o’clock until Sunday afternoon, and on -Sunday afternoon he had not abandoned his trenches. There were none -left. They had been obliterated by artillery. He withdrew his undefeated -troops from the fragments of his field fortifications, and the hearts of -his men were as completely unbroken as the parapets of his trenches were -completely broken. Such a brigade! - -“It is invidious to single out any battalion for special praise, but it -is perhaps necessary to the story to point out that Lieutenant-Colonel -Lipsett, commanding the ninetieth Winnipeg Rifles, eighth battalion, of -the second brigade, held the extreme left of the brigade position at the -most critical moment. - -“The battalion was expelled from the trenches early on Friday morning by -an emission of poisonous gas, but recovering in three-quarters of an -hour, it counter-attacked, retook the trenches it had abandoned and -bayoneted the enemy, and after the third brigade had been forced to -retire, Lieutenant-Colonel Lipsett held his position, though his left -was in the air, until two British regiments filled up the gap on -Saturday night. - - -CAPTURE OF ST. JULIEN - -“The individual fortunes of those two brigades have brought us to the -events of Sunday afternoon, but it is necessary, to make the story -complete, to recur for a moment to the events of the morning. - -“After a very formidable attack the enemy succeeded in capturing the -village of St. Julien, which has so often been referred to in describing -the fortunes of the Canadian left. This success opened up a new and -formidable line of advance, but by this time further reinforcements had -arrived. Here again it became evident that the tactical necessities of -the situation dictated an offensive movement, as the surest method of -arresting further progress. - -“General Alderson, who was in command of the reinforcements, accordingly -directed that an advance should be made by a British brigade which had -been brought up in support. The attack was thrust through the Canadian -left and center, and as the troops making it swept on, many of them -going to certain death, they paused an instant, and with deep-throated -cheers for Canada gave the first indication to the division of the warm -admiration which their exertions had excited in the British army. - -“The advance was indeed costly, but it could not be gainsaid. The story -is one of which the brigade may be proud, but it does not belong to the -special account of the fortunes of the Canadian contingent. It is -sufficient for our purpose to notice that the attack succeeded in its -object, and the German advance along the line, which was momentarily -threatened, was arrested. - -“We had reached, in describing the events of the afternoon, the points -at which the trenches of the second brigade had been completely -destroyed. This brigade and the third brigade, and the considerable -reinforcements which by this time filled the gap between the two -brigades, were gradually driven, fighting every yard, upon a line -running, roughly, from Fortuin, south of St. Julien, in a northeasterly -direction towards Passchendale. Here the two brigades were relieved by -two British brigades, after exertions as glorious, as fruitful, and, -alas! as costly, as soldiers have ever been called upon to make. - -“Monday morning broke bright and clear, and found the Canadians behind -the firing line. This day, too, was to bring its anxieties. The attack -was still pressed, and it became necessary to ask Brigadier-General -Curry whether he could once more call upon his shrunken brigade. - - -A HERO LEADING HEROES - -“‘The men are tired,’ this indomitable soldier replied, ‘but they are -ready and glad to go again to the trenches.’ And so once more, a hero -leading heroes, the general marched back the men of the second brigade, -reduced to a quarter of its original strength, to the apex of the line -as it existed at that moment. - -“This position he held all day Monday. On Tuesday he was still occupying -reserve trenches, and on Wednesday was relieved and retired to billets -in the rear. - -“Such, in the most general outline, is the story of a great and glorious -feat of arms. A story told so soon after the event, while tendering bare -justice to units whose doings fell under the eyes of particular -observers, must do less than justice to others who played their -part--and all did--as gloriously as those whose special activities it is -possible, even at this stage, to describe. But the friends of men who -fought in other battalions may be content in the knowledge that they, -too, shall learn, when time allows, the exact part which each unit -played in these unforgettable days.” - - - - -CHAPTER XVIII - -PITIFUL FLIGHT OF A MILLION WOMEN - -BY PHILIP GIBBS - -Of the London Daily Chronicle - - THE GERMAN ADVANCE UPON PARIS -- THE PRIZE OF PARIS -- HEROIC EFFORTS - OF FRENCH SOLDIERS -- GERMANS BALKED OF THEIR PRIZE -- SIXTY MILES OF - FUGITIVES -- TERROR IN EYES -- PARIS THE BEAUTIFUL. - - [The following article is reproduced by the courtesy of the New York - Times.] - - -At least a million German soldiers--that is no exaggeration of a light -pen, but the sober and actual truth--were advancing steadily upon the -capital of France. They were close to Beauvais when I escaped from what -was then a death-trap. They were fighting our British troops at Creil -when I came to that town. Upon the following days they were holding our -men in the Forest of Compiègne. They had been as near to Paris as -Senlis, almost within gunshot of the outer forts. - -“Nothing seems to stop them,” said many soldiers with whom I spoke. “We -kill them and kill them, but they come on.” - -The situation seemed to me almost ready for the supreme tragedy--the -capture or destruction of Paris. The northwest of France lay very open -to the enemy, abandoned as far south as Abbéville and Amiens, too -lightly held by a mixed army corps of French and Algerian troops with -their headquarters at Aumale. - -Here was an easy way to Paris. - -Always obsessed with the idea that the Germans must come from the east, -the almost fatal error of this war, the French had girdled Paris with -almost impenetrable forts on the east side, from those of Ecouen and -Montmorency, by the far-flung forts of Chelles and Champigny, to those -of Susy and Villeneuve, on the outer lines of the triple cordon; but on -the west side, between Pontoise and Versailles, the defenses of Paris -were weak. I say, “were,” because during the last days thousands of men -were digging trenches and throwing up ramparts. Only the snakelike -Seine, twining into a Pégoud loop, forms a natural defense to the -western approach to the city, none too secure against men who have -crossed many rivers in their desperate assaults. - - -THE PRIZE OF PARIS - -This, then, was the Germans’ chance; it was for this that they had -fought their way westward and southward through incessant battlefields -from Mons and Charleroi to St. Quentin and Amiens and down to Creil and -Compiègne, flinging away human life as though it were but rubbish for -death-pits. The prize of Paris, Paris the great and beautiful, seemed to -be within their grasp. - -It was their intention to smash their way into it by this western entry -and then to skin it alive. Holding this city at ransom, it was their -idea to force France to her knees under threat of making a vast and -desolate ruin of all those palaces and churches and noble buildings in -which the soul of French history is enshrined. - -I am not saying these things from rumor and hearsay, I am writing from -the evidence of my own eyes after traveling several hundreds of miles in -France along the main strategical lines, grim sentinels guarding the -last barriers to that approaching death which was sweeping on its way -through France to the rich harvest of Paris. - -There was only one thing to do to escape from the menace of this death. -By all the ways open, by any way, the population of Paris emptied itself -like rushing rivers of humanity along all the lines which promised -anything like safety. - -[Illustration: THE ANXIOUS HOUR.] - -Only those stayed behind to whom life means very little away from Paris -and who if death came desired to die in the city of their life. - -Again I write from what I saw and to tell the honest truth from what I -suffered, for the fatigue of this hunting for facts behind the screen -of war is exhausting to all but one’s moral strength, and even to that. - -I found myself in the midst of a new and extraordinary activity of the -French and English armies. Regiments were being rushed up to the center -of the allied forces toward Creil, Montdidier, and Noyon. - -This great movement continued for several days, putting to a severe test -the French railway system, which is so wonderfully organized that it -achieved this mighty transportation of troops with clockwork regularity. -Working to a time-table dictated by some great brain in the headquarters -of the French army, there were calculated with perfect precision the -conditions of a network of lines on which troop trains might be run to a -given point. It was an immense victory of organization, and a movement -which heartened one observer at least to believe that the German -death-blow would again be averted. - - -HEROIC EFFORTS OF FRENCH SOLDIERS - -I saw regiment after regiment entraining. Men from the Southern -Provinces, speaking the patois of the South; men from the Eastern -Departments whom I had seen a month before, at the beginning of the war, -at Châlons and Epernay and Nancy, and men from the southwest and center -of France, in garrisons along the Loire. They were all in splendid -spirits and utterly undaunted by the rapidity of the German advance. - -“It is nothing, my little one,” said a dirty, unshaved gentleman with -the laughing eyes of a D’Artagnan; “we shall bite their heads off. These -brutal ‘bosches’ are going to put themselves in a ‘guet-apens,’ a -veritable death-trap. We shall have them at last.” - -Many of them had fought at Longwy and along the heights of the Vosges. -The youngest of them had bristling beards, their blue coats with -turned-back flaps were war-worn and flanked with the dust of long -marches; their red trousers were sloppy and stained, but they had not -forgotten how to laugh, and the gallantry of their spirits was a joy to -see. - -They are very proud, these French soldiers, of fighting side by side -with their old foes. The English now, after long centuries of strife, -from Edward, the Black Prince, to Wellington, are their brothers-in-arms -upon the battle-fields, and because I am English they offered me their -cigarettes and made me one of them. But I realized even then that the -individual is of no account in this inhuman business of war. - -It is only masses of men that matter, moved by common obedience at the -dictation of mysterious far-off powers, and I thanked Heaven that masses -of men were on the move rapidly in vast numbers and in the right -direction to support the French lines which had fallen back from Amiens -a few hours before I left that town, and whom I had followed in their -retirement, back and back, with the English always strengthening their -left, but retiring with them almost to the outskirts of Paris itself. - -Only this could save Paris--the rapid strengthening of the allied front -by enormous reserves strong enough to hold back the arrow-shaped -battering ram of the enemy’s main army. - -Undoubtedly the French headquarters staff was working heroically and -with fine intelligence to save the situation at the very gates of Paris. -The country was being swept absolutely clean of troops in all parts of -France, where they had been waiting as reserves. - -It was astounding to me to see, after those three days of rushing troop -trains and of crowded stations not large enough to contain the -regiments, how an air of profound solitude and peace had taken -possession of all these routes. - -In my long journey through and about France and circling round Paris I -found myself wondering sometimes whether all this war had not been a -dreadful illusion without reality, and a transformation had taken place, -startling in its change, from military turmoil to rural peace. - -Dijon was emptied of its troops. The road to Châlons was deserted by all -but fugitives. The great armed camp at Châlons itself had been cleared -out except for a small garrison. The troops at Tours had gone northward -to the French center. All our English reserves had been rushed up to the -front from Havre and Rouen. - -There was only one deduction to be drawn from this great, swift -movement--the French and English lines had been supported by every -available battalion to save Paris from its menace of destruction, to -meet the weight of the enemy’s metal by a force strong enough to resist -its mighty mass. - - -GERMANS BALKED OF THEIR PRIZE - -It was still possible that the Germans might be smashed on their left -wing, hurled back to the west between Paris and the sea, and cut off -from their line of communications. It was undoubtedly this impending -peril which scared the enemy’s headquarters staff and upset all its -calculations. They had not anticipated the rapidity of the supporting -movement of the allied armies, and at the very gates of Paris they saw -themselves balked of their prize, the greatest prize of the war, by the -necessity of changing front. - -[Illustration: THE GREAT GERMAN HOWITZERS. - -Hauling a German twenty-one centimeter Howitzer on its firing mat with a -purchase on the wheels, which are fitted with caterpillar pads to -prevent sinking into soft mud.] - -[Illustration: FRIGHTFUL DESTRUCTION CAUSED BY GERMAN SIEGE GUNS. - -Ruins of the Fort Loncin at Liège, Belgium, after the German army had -bombarded it with their huge guns and reduced to fragments the strong -concrete fortifications. (_Copyright by International News Service._)] - -To do them justice, they realized instantly the new order of things, and -with quick and marvelous decision did not hesitate to alter the -direction of their main force. Instead of proceeding to the west of -Paris they swung round steadily to the southeast in order to keep their -armies away from the enveloping movement of the French and English and -drive their famous wedge-like formation southward for the purpose of -dividing the allied forces of the west from the French army of the east. -The miraculous had happened, and Paris, for a little time at least, was -unmolested. - -After wandering along the westerly and southerly roads I started for -Paris when thousands and scores of thousands were flying from it. At -that time I believed, as all France believed, that in a few hours German -shells would be crashing across the fortifications of the city and that -Paris the beautiful would be Paris the infernal. It needed a good deal -of resolution on my part to go deliberately to a city from which the -population was fleeing, and I confess quite honestly that I had a nasty -sensation in the neighborhood of my waistcoat buttons at the thought. - - -SIXTY MILES OF FUGITIVES - -Along the road from Tours to Paris there were sixty unbroken miles of -people--on my honor, I do not exaggerate, but write the absolute truth. -They were all people who had despaired of breaking through the dense -masses of their fellow-citizens camped around the railway stations, and -had decided to take the roads as the only way of escape. - -The vehicles were taxicabs, for which the rich paid fabulous prices; -motor cars which had escaped military requisition, farmers’ carts laden -with several families and piles of household goods, shop carts drawn by -horses already tired to the point of death because of the weight of the -people who crowded behind, pony traps and governess carts. - -Many persons, well dressed and belonging obviously to well-to-do -bourgeoisie, were wheeling barrows like costers, but instead of -trundling cabbages were pushing forward sleeping babies and little -children, who seemed on the first stage to find new amusement and -excitement in the journey from home; but for the most part they trudged -along bravely, carrying their babies and holding the hands of their -little ones. - -They were of all classes, rank and fortune being annihilated by the -common tragedy. Elegant women whose beauty is known in Paris salons, -whose frivolity, perhaps, in the past was the main purpose of their -life, were now on a level with the peasant mothers of the French suburbs -and with the “midinettes” of Montmartre, and their courage did not fail -them so quickly. - -I looked into many proud, brave faces of these delicate women, walking -in high-heeled shoes, all too frail for the hard, dusty roadways. They -belonged to the same race and breed as those ladies who defied death -with fine disdain upon the scaffold of the guillotine in the great -Revolution. - -They were leaving Paris now, not because of any fears for themselves--I -believe they were fearless--but because they had decided to save the -little sons and daughters of soldier fathers. - -This great army in retreat was made up of every type familiar in Paris. - -Here were women of the gay world, poor creatures whose painted faces had -been washed with tears, and whose tight skirts and white stockings were -never made for a long march down the highways of France. - -Here also were thousands of those poor old ladies who live on a few -francs a week in the top attics of the Paris streets which Balzac knew; -they had fled from their poor sanctuaries and some of them were still -carrying cats and canaries, as dear to them as their own lives. - -There was one young woman who walked with a pet monkey on her shoulder -while she carried a bird in a golden cage. Old men, who remembered 1870, -gave their arms to old ladies to whom they had made love when the -Prussians were at the gates of Paris then. - -It was pitiful to see these old people now hobbling along -together--pitiful, but beautiful also, because of their lasting love. - -Young boy students, with ties as black as their hats and rat-tail hair, -marched in small companies of comrades, singing brave songs, as though -they had no fear in their hearts, and very little food, I think, in -their stomachs. - -Shopgirls and concierges, city clerks, old aristocrats, young boys and -girls, who supported grandfathers and grandmothers and carried new-born -babies and gave pick-a-back rides to little brothers and sisters, came -along the way of retreat. - - -TERROR IN EYES - -Each human being in the vast torrent of life will have an unforgettable -story of adventure to tell if life remains. As a novelist I should have -been glad to get their narratives along this road for a great story of -suffering and strange adventure, but there was no time for that and no -excuse. - -When I met many of them they were almost beyond the power of words. The -hot sun of this September had beaten down upon them--scorching them as -in the glow of molten metal. Their tongues clave to their mouths with -thirst. - -Some of them had that wild look in their eyes which is the first sign of -the delirium of thirst and fatigue. - -Nothing to eat or drink could be found on the way from Paris. The little -roadside cafés had been cleared out by the preceding hordes. - -Unless these people carried their own food and drink they could have -none except of the charity of their comrades in misfortune, and that -charity has exceeded all other acts of heroism in this war. Women gave -their last biscuit, their last little drop of wine, to poor mothers -whose children were famishing with thirst and hunger; peasant women fed -other women’s babies when their own were satisfied. - -It was a tragic road. At every mile of it there were people who had -fainted on the roadside and poor old men and women who could go no -farther, but sat on the banks below the hedges, weeping silently or -bidding younger ones go forward and leave them to their fate. Young -women who had stepped out jauntily at first were so footsore and lame -that they limped along with lines of pain about their lips and eyes. - -Many of the taxicabs, bought at great prices, and many of the motor cars -had broken down as I passed, and had been abandoned by their owners, who -had decided to walk. Farmers’ carts had bolted into ditches and lost -their wheels. Wheelbarrows, too heavy to be trundled, had been tilted -up, with all their household goods spilled into the roadway, and the -children had been carried farther, until at last darkness came, and -their only shelter was a haystack in a field under the harvest moon. - -For days also I have been wedged up with fugitives in railway trains -more dreadful than the open roads, stifling in their heat and -heart-racking in their cargoes of misery. Poor women have wept -hysterically clasping my hand, a stranger’s hand, for comfort in their -wretchedness and weakness. Yet on the whole they have shown amazing -courage, and, after their tears, have laughed at their own breakdown, -and, always the children of France have been superb, so that again and -again I have wondered at the gallantry with which they endured this -horror. Young boys have revealed the heroic strain in them and have -played the part of men in helping their mothers. And yet, when I came at -last into Paris against all this tide of retreat, it seemed a needless -fear that had driven these people away. - - -PARIS THE BEAUTIFUL - -Then I passed long lines of beautiful little villas on the Seine side, -utterly abandoned among their trees and flowers. A solitary fisherman -held his line above the water as though all the world were at peace, and -in a field close to the fortifications which I expected to see bursting -with shells, an old peasant bent above the furrows and planted cabbages. -Then, at last, I walked through the streets of Paris and found them -strangely quiet and tranquil. - -The people I met looked perfectly calm. There were a few children -playing in the gardens of Champs Elysées and under the Arc de Triomphe -symbolical of the glory of France. - -I looked back upon the beauty of Paris all golden in the light of the -setting sun, with its glinting spires and white gleaming palaces and -rays of light flashing in front of the golden trophies of its monuments. -Paris was still unbroken. No shell had come shattering into this city of -splendor, and I thanked Heaven that for a little while the peril had -passed. - - - - -CHAPTER XIX - -FACING DEATH IN THE TRENCHES - - CAVE-DWELLING THE LOT OF MODERN SOLDIERS -- GERMANS HAVE LEARNED MUCH - -- STANDARDIZED MODEL -- FRENCH STUDY OF GERMAN METHODS--“COMFORTS OF - HOME”--BRITISH REFUGES IN NORTHERN FRANCE--“PICNICKING” IN THE OPEN - AIR -- RAVAGES OF ARTILLERY FIRE -- THE COMMON ENEMY, THE WEATHER -- - WHY COOKS WEAR IRON CROSSES--“PUTTING ONE OVER” ON THE RUSSIANS. - - -“Other times, other manners” applies as accurately to the battle-field -as it does elsewhere. The cavalry charge is nearly extinct, mass -formation is going, hand-to-hand conflict is rarely found, and now, it -appears, the old-fashioned and romantic bivouac is no more. -Trench-fighting has been carried on to such an extent in France and -Belgium, and Poland, that the open camp, with its rows of little tents, -outposts, and sentry guard, becomes almost a forgotten picture of -warfare. Doubtless the military schools of the future will make -provision for special instruction in the construction of commodious -caverns on the battle-field, safe, warm, and containing all the comforts -of a barrack. - -The modern warrior, like a mole, lives under ground and displays his -greatest activity at night. With the coming of subterranean warfare, as -trench-fighting can be appropriately called, great armies have had to -adopt unique methods. They have been compelled to build peculiar little -forts--for a trench is a fort, in fact--wherever their soldiers meet the -enemy. In consequence these rectangular excavations have been improved -far beyond their original outline. - -The first trench was nothing more nor less than a hole in the ground, -deep enough to protect a man kneeling, standing, or sitting, as the case -might be. Before the advent of the modern rifle and modern cannon, these -defenses, with several feet of loose earth thrown up in front of them, -served admirably. In those days the question of head-cover was of minor -importance; today a protective roofing is the sine qua non of any -well-constructed trench. Early in the European war it was discovered -that the trench offered the safest haven from the bursting shells of the -enemy’s field artillery. To all intents and purposes, shrapnel, or, as -its inventor termed it, the man-killing projectile--is practically -harmless in its effect upon entrenched troops. Unless a shell can be -placed absolutely within the two-feet wide excavation it wastes its -destructive powers on the inoffensive earth and air. This has led to a -modification of artillery methods, which, in turn, compels the -elaboration of the trench and emphasizes the importance of head-cover. - - -GERMANS HAVE LEARNED MUCH - -“The history of the great war,” to quote from a French paper, “will -show, among other things, how the Germans profited by the lessons of -recent conflicts. The South African, the Russo-Japanese, and the Balkan -wars were studied minutely by them, and their particular preparations, -their tactics, and their artifices result from the knowledge thus -acquired. They learned much, especially, as regards the formation of -trenches. - -“After 1870 we confined ourselves to three regulation types of trenches: -for men prone, kneeling, and standing. While in training, our soldiers -were taught how to take shelter momentarily between advances, by digging -up the soil a little and lying flat behind the smallest of mounds. They -were instructed, moreover, how to protect themselves from the enemy’s -fire by propping up their knapsacks in front of them. This meant -insufficient protection, and an extremely dangerous visibility, since -the foe, by simply counting the number of knapsacks, could know the -strength opposed to him. To insure the making of such shelter, a French -company was equipped with eighty picks and eighty spades; that is, 160 -tools for 250 men. These tools were fixed on to the knapsacks; and it -took some time to bring them into use.” - -The German methods for defensive and offensive trench-making are quite -different. Each man has a tool of his own, which is fixed on to the -scabbard of his sword-bayonet. When occasion for fighting arises, the -line conceals itself, and, as soon as it is engaged, it prepares for -possible retreat, making strong positions assuring an unrelenting -defensive and counter-attacks. - - -STANDARDIZED MODEL - -It is on these sound principles that all the German fighting-lines are -organized, on a more or less standardized model. The fighting-lines -consist generally of one, two, or three lines of shelter-trenches lying -parallel, measuring twenty or twenty-five inches in width, and varying -in length according to the number they hold; the trenches are joined -together by zigzag approaches and by a line of reinforced trenches -(armed with machine guns), which are almost completely proof against -rifle, machine gun, or gun fire. The ordinary German trenches are almost -invisible from 350 yards away, a distance which permits a very deadly -fire. It is easy to realize that if the enemy occupies three successive -lines and a line of reinforced entrenchments, the attacking line is -likely, at the lowest estimate, to be decimated during an advance of 650 -yards--by rifle-fire at a range of 350 yards’ distance, and by the -extremely quick fire of the machine guns, which can each deliver from -300 to 600 bullets a minute with absolute precision. In the -field-trench, it is obvious, a soldier enjoys far greater security than -he would if merely prone behind his knapsack in an excavation barely -fifteen inches deep. He has merely to stoop down a little to disappear -below the level of the ground and be immune from infantry fire; -moreover, his machine guns can fire without endangering him. In -addition, this stooping position brings the man’s knapsack on a level -with his helmet, thus forming some protection against shrapnel and -shell-splinters. - -At the back of the German trenches, shelters are dug for -non-commissioned officers and for the commander of the unit. The -latter’s shelter is connected with the communication trench; the others -are not. If one adds that the bank, or, rather, the earth that is dug -from the trenches and spread out in front, extends for five or six -yards, and is covered with grass, or appropriate vegetation, it will be -recognized that the works concealing the German lines can be seen only -when a near approach is made to them. - -[Illustration: REINFORCED TRENCHES. - -Upper view: Details of roofs, loop-holes, and the form of the -excavations. Lower left-hand view: Vertical section of trenches and -shelters. Lower right-hand view: A plan and section of trenches and -rest-room.] - -As to reinforced trenches, the drawings show clearly their conception -and arrangement. They are proof against ordinary bullets and shrapnel. -Only percussion-shells are able to destroy them and to decimate their -defenders. The interior details of the trenches vary according to the -ingenuity and spare time of the occupants and the nature of the ground. - - -FRENCH STUDY OF GERMAN METHODS - -The whole system, that of the rest-rooms more especially, is designed to -give the men the maximum of comfort and security. Doors and wooden -shutters wrenched from deserted houses are used for covers, or else -turf-covered branches. - -Ever since the outbreak of the war, the French troops in Lorraine, after -severe experiences, realized rapidly the advantages of the German -trenches, and began to study those they had taken gloriously. Officers, -non-commissioned officers, and men of the Engineers were straightway -detached in every unit to teach the infantry how to construct similar -shelters. The education was quick, and very soon they had completed the -work necessary for the protection of all. The tools of the enemy -“casualties,” the spades and picks left behind in deserted villages, -were all gladly piled on to the French soldiers’ knapsacks, to be -carried willingly by the very men who used to grumble at being loaded -with even the smallest regulation tool. As soon as night had set in on -the occasion of a lull in the fighting, the digging of the trenches was -begun. Sometimes, in the darkness, the men of each fighting -nation--less than 500 yards away from their enemy--would hear the noise -of the workers of the foe: the sounds of picks and axes; the officers’ -words of encouragement; and tacitly they would agree to an armistice -during which to dig shelters from which, in the morning, they would dash -out, to fight once more. - - -“COMFORTS OF HOME” - -Commodious, indeed, are some of the present trench barracks, if we may -believe the letters from the front. One French soldier writes: - -“In really up-to-date entrenchments you may find kitchens, dining-rooms, -bedrooms, and even stables. One regiment has first class cow-sheds. One -day a whimsical ‘piou-piou,’ finding a cow wandering about in the danger -zone, had the bright idea of finding shelter for it in the trenches. The -example was quickly followed, and at this moment the --th Infantry -possess an underground farm, in which fat kine, well cared for, give -such quantities of milk that regular distributions of butter are being -made--and very good butter, too.” - -But this is not all. An officer writes home a tale of yet another one of -the comforts of home added to the equipment of the trenches: - -“We are clean people here. Thanks to the ingenuity of ----, we are able -to take a warm bath every day from ten to twelve. We call this teasing -the ‘bosches,’ for this bathing-establishment of the latest type is -fitted up--would you believe it?--in the trenches!” - - -BRITISH REFUGES IN NORTHERN FRANCE - -Describing trenches occupied by the British in their protracted -“siege-warfare” in Northern France along and to the north of the Aisne -Valley, a British officer wrote: “In the firing-line the men sleep and -obtain shelter in the dugouts they have hollowed or ‘undercut’ in the -side of the trenches. These refuges are slightly raised above the bottom -of the trench, so as to remain dry in wet weather. The floor of the -trench is also sloped for purposes of draining. Some trenches are -provided with head-cover, and others with overhead cover, the latter, of -course, giving protection from the weather as well as from shrapnel -balls and splinters of shells. . . . At all points subject to -shell-fire access to the firing-line from behind is provided by -communication-trenches. These are now so good that it is possible to -cross in safety the fire-swept zone to the advanced trenches from the -billets in villages, the bivouacs in quarries, or the other places where -the headquarters of units happen to be.” - - -“PICNICKING” IN THE OPEN AIR - -A cavalry subaltern gave the following account of life in the trenches: -“Picnicking in the open air, day and night (you never see a roof now), -is the only real method of existence. There are loads of straw to bed -down on, and everyone sleeps like a log, in turn, even with shrapnel -bursting within fifty yards.” - - -RAVAGES OF ARTILLERY FIRE - -One English officer described the ravages of modern artillery fire, not -only upon all men, animals and buildings within its zone, but upon the -very face of nature itself: “In the trenches crouch lines of men, in -brown or gray or blue, coated with mud, unshaven, hollow-eyed with the -continual strain.” - -“The fighting is now taking place over ground where both sides have for -weeks past been excavating in all directions,” said another letter from -the front, “until it has become a perfect labyrinth. A trench runs -straight for a considerable distance, then it suddenly forks in three or -four directions. One branch merely leads into a ditch full of water, -used in drier weather as a means of communication; another ends abruptly -in a cul-de-sac, probably an abandoned sap-head; the third winds on, -leading into galleries and passages further forward. - -“Sometimes where new ground is broken the spade turns up the long-buried -dead, ghastly relics of former fights, and on all sides the surface of -the earth is ploughed and furrowed by fragments of shell and bombs and -distorted by mines. Seen from a distance, this apparently confused mass -of passages, crossing and recrossing one another, resembles an irregular -gridiron. - -“The life led by the infantry on both sides at close quarters is a -strange, cramped existence, with death always near, either by means of -some missile from above or some mine explosion from beneath--a life -which has one dull, monotonous background of mud and water. Even when -there is but little fighting the troops are kept hard at work -strengthening the existing defenses, constructing others, and -improvising the shelter imperative in such weather.” - - -THE COMMON ENEMY, THE WEATHER - -But it is not the guns or cannon of the enemy that affect the spirits of -the soldiers. It is the weather. A week of alternate rain and snow, when -the ill-drained dugouts are half-filled with a freezing viscid mud; -when, day after day, the feet are numbed by the frost until all -sensation in them is deadened; when the coarse, scanty ration is refused -by the tortured stomach--then it is that the spirits of the stoutest -falter. Let the enemy attack as he will, and he must fail. It is only in -fighting that the men find an outlet for their rancor. - -More than thirty years ago a well-known German general declared that a -book on “Seasonal Tactics” might as properly be written as those on the -tactics of weapons, and of geographical conditions; and in a recent -issue of the Deutsche Revue an unsigned article by a veteran of the -Franco-Prussian war recounts the difficulties that arise when the Frost -King holds sway. “To begin with, the precious hours of daylight are much -fewer, and even these may be shortened by overcast skies and heavy fogs. -Soft snow and mud seriously impede marching and at times it is -impossible to take cross-country cuts, even single horsemen having great -difficulty in crossing the frozen ridges of plowed fields or stubble. -Moreover, even regular highways may become so slippery that they -endanger both man and horse, and in hilly country such conditions make -it necessary to haul heavy artillery up steep ascents by man-power. Cold -head-winds also greatly impede progress. - -“The necessity of bringing the troops under cover enforces long marches -at the end of the day’s work, and again at its beginning, and therefore -makes extra demands on energy. . . . The early dark hinders the offense -from carrying out its plans completely and from utilizing any advantage -won by following it up energetically. Night battles become frequent. The -defense seeks to regain what it has lost by day, the offense to make use -of the long nights to win what it could not achieve in the daytime. -Then, too, the need of getting warmed-up makes the troops more -enterprising.” - -[Illustration: SINKING OF A TORPEDOED BATTLESHIP. - -As the British vessel “Aboukir” was sinking after being torpedoed by a -German submarine, one of the sailors described the last moment as -follows: “The captain sings out an order just like on any ordinary -occasion, ‘If any man wishes to leave the side of the ship he can do so, -every man for himself,’ then we gave a cheer and in we went.”] - -[Illustration: RESCUING SAILORS AFTER SINKING OF GERMAN BATTLESHIP. - -The conduct of the British fleet is well illustrated by this picture, -which shows life-boats and torpedo destroyers rescuing the drowning -sailors of a German battleship after the latter had been sunk. The heads -and shoulders of numerous unfortunate men are seen dotted about in the -water. (_Photo by Underwood and Underwood._)] - -All sorts of constructive work--fortification building, the erection of -stations for telegraphs, telephones and wireless, etc.--is naturally -much more difficult in frozen ground. General von der Goltz of the -German Army is said to have recommended many years ago that in view of -possible winter campaigns provision should be made in quantity of warm -winter clothing, materials for the building of barracks, making double -tents, etc. Another important preventive of suffering and the consequent -diminished efficiency is to provide plenty of good hot food for the men. - - -WHY COOKS WEAR IRON CROSSES - -“There isn’t anything heroic about cooks,” wrote Herbert Corey in the -New York Globe, “and when things go wrong one either apprehends a cook -as chasing a waiter with a bread-knife or giving way to tears.” Yet the -German army contains many a cook whose expansive apron is decorated with -the Iron Cross. “And the Iron Cross,” Mr. Corey reminds us, “is -conferred for one thing only--for 100 per cent courage.” - -“‘They’ve earned it,’ said the man who had seen them. ‘They are the -bravest men in the Kaiser’s four millions. I’ve seen generals salute -greasy, paunchy, sour-looking army cooks.’ - -“The cook’s job is to feed the men of his company. Each German company -is followed, or preceded, by a field-kitchen on wheels. Sometimes the -fires are kept going while the device trundles along. The cook stands on -the foot-board and thumps his bread. He is always the first man up in -the morning and the last to sleep at night. - -“When that company goes into the trenches the cook stays behind. There -is no place for a field-kitchen in a four-foot trench. But these men in -the trench must be fed. The Teuton insists that all soldiers must be -fed--but especially the men in the trench. The others may go hungry, but -these must have tight belts. Upon their staying power may depend the -safety of an army. - -“So, as the company can not go to the cook, the cook goes to the -company. When meal-hour comes he puts a yoke on his shoulders and a -cook’s cap on his head and, warning the second cook as to what will -happen if he lets the fires go out, puts a bucketful of hot veal stew on -either end of the yoke and goes to his men. Maybe the trench is under -fire. No matter. His men are in that trench and must be fed. - -“Sometimes the second cook gets his step right here. Sometimes the -apprentice cook--the dish-washer--is summoned to pick up the cook’s yoke -and refill the spilled buckets and tramp steadily forward to the line. -Sometimes the supply of assistant cooks, even, runs short. But the men -in the trenches always get their food. - -“‘That’s why so many cooks in the German Army have Iron Crosses dangling -from their breasts,’ said the man who knows. ‘No braver men ever lived. -The man in the trench can duck his head and light his pipe and be -relatively safe. No fat cook yoked to two buckets of veal stew ever can -be safe as he marches down the trench.’” - - -“PUTTING ONE OVER” ON THE RUSSIANS - -Granville Fortescue, who visited the Russian trenches in Poland, related -in the Illustrated London News a story of how the Germans, to use a -slang phrase, “put one over” on the too-confiding Russians. “This -happened,” he wrote, “at a portion of the line where the positions ran -so close that the men could communicate by shouting. It was around -Christmas, and the Germans invited the Russians to come over for a hot -cup of new coffee just received from home. The Russians replied to this -invitation, shouting: ‘Come over and try our tea. It’s a special gift -from the Czar.’ - -“The Germans then put up the white flag, and said that they would send -over fifteen men to try the tea if the Russians would send over the same -number to sample their coffee. The plan was carried out. When the -fifteen Germans appeared in the Russian trench, the hosts remarked to -one another that if these were a sample the enemy would not hold out -long. They were a sick-looking lot. Suddenly the Germans pulled down -their white flag and commenced firing. Then the Russians found that -they had exchanged fifteen good soldiers for fifteen typhus patients. - -“It is easy to believe that the Russian soldier could be imposed upon in -this way. Although extremely courageous, he is very simple-minded with -it all, and certainly trusting. He is a splendid physical specimen. In -the trail of trench warfare this is the great desideratum. Then, the -Russians of the type that are drafted into the army have all their life -been accustomed to privation and exposure. For this reason they are the -only troops that I have seen who can stick six days and nights on end in -a trench, under constant small arms and shell fire, with the temperature -below zero, and after a day’s rest be as good as ever. The Russians -never grumble.” - - - - -CHAPTER XX - -A VIVID PICTURE OF WAR - - THE BATTLE OF NEUVE CHAPELLE -- A SURPRISE PREPARED--“HELL BROKE - LOOSE”--A HORRIBLE THIRTY-FIVE MINUTES -- TRENCHES FILLED WITH DEAD -- - HOARSE SHOUTS AND THE GROANS OF THE WOUNDED -- INDESCRIBABLE MASS OF - RUINS RUINS--“SMEARED WITH DUST AND BLOOD.” - - -One of the most vivid word-pictures of what war means in all its horror -was told by an eye-witness of the battle of Neuve Chapelle in which the -British soldiers dislodged the Germans from an important position. He -said: - -“The dawn, which broke reluctantly through a veil of clouds on the -morning of Wednesday, March 10, 1915, seemed as any other to the Germans -behind the white and blue sandbags in their long line of trenches -curving in a hemicycle about the battered village of Neuve Chapelle. For -five months they had remained undisputed masters of the positions they -had here wrested from the British in October. Ensconced in their -comfortably-arranged trenches with but a thin outpost in their fire -trenches, they had watched day succeed day and night succeed night -without the least variation from the monotony of trench warfare, the -intermittent bark of the machine guns--rat-tat-tat-tat-tat--and the -perpetual rattle of rifle fire, with here and there a bomb, and now and -then an exploded mine. - - -A SURPRISE PREPARED - -“For weeks past the German airmen had grown strangely shy. On this -Wednesday morning none were aloft to spy out the strange doings which as -dawn broke might have been descried on the desolate roads behind the -British lines. - -“From ten o’clock of the preceding evening endless files of men marched -silently down the roads leading towards the German positions through -Laventie and Richebourg St. Vaast, poor shattered villages of the dead -where months of incessant bombardment have driven away the last -inhabitants and left roofless houses and rent roadways. . . . - -“Two days before, a quiet room, where Nelson’s Prayer stands on the -mantel-shelf, saw the ripening of the plans that sent these sturdy sons -of Britain’s four kingdoms marching all through the night. Sir John -French met the army corps commanders and unfolded to them his plans for -the offensive of the British Army against the German line at Neuve -Chapelle. - -“The onslaught was to be a surprise. That was its essence. The Germans -were to be battered with artillery, then rushed before they recovered -their wits. We had thirty-six clear hours before us. Thus long, it was -reckoned (with complete accuracy as afterwards appeared), must elapse -before the Germans, whose line before us had been weakened, could rush -up reinforcements. To ensure the enemy’s being pinned down right and -left of the ‘great push,’ an attack was to be delivered north and south -of the main thrust simultaneously with the assault on Neuve Chapelle.” - -After describing the impatience of the British soldiers as they awaited -the signal to open the attack, and the actual beginning of the -engagement, the narrator continues: - -[Illustration: “THERE IS NOTHING TO REPORT.”] - - -“HELL BROKE LOOSE” - -“Then hell broke loose. With a mighty, hideous, screeching burst of -noise, hundreds of guns spoke. The men in the front trenches were -deafened by the sharp reports of the field-guns spitting out their -shells at close range to cut through the Germans’ barbed wire -entanglements. In some cases the trajectory of these vicious missiles -was so flat that they passed only a few feet above the British trenches. - -“The din was continuous. An officer who had the curious idea of putting -his ear to the ground said it was as though the earth were being smitten -great blows with a Titan’s hammer. After the first few shells had -plunged screaming amid clouds of earth and dust into the German -trenches, a dense pall of smoke hung over the German lines. The -sickening fumes of lyddite blew back into the British trenches. In some -places the troops were smothered in earth and dust or even spattered -with blood from the hideous fragments of human bodies that went hurtling -through the air. At one point the upper half of a German officer, his -cap crammed on his head, was blown into one of our trenches. - - -A HORRIBLE THIRTY-FIVE MINUTES - -“Words will never convey any adequate idea of the horror of those five -and thirty minutes. When the hands of officers’ watches pointed to five -minutes past eight, whistles resounded along the British lines. At the -same moment the shells began to burst farther ahead, for, by previous -arrangement, the gunners, lengthening their fuses, were ‘lifting’ on to -the village of Neuve Chapelle so as to leave the road open for our -infantry to rush in and finish what the guns had begun. - -“The shells were now falling thick among the houses of Neuve Chapelle, a -confused mass of buildings seen reddish through the pillars of smoke and -flying earth and dust. At the sound of the whistle--alas for the bugle, -once the herald of victory, now banished from the fray!--our men -scrambled out of the trenches and hurried higgledy-piggledy into the -open. Their officers were in front. Many, wearing overcoats and carrying -rifles with fixed bayonets, closely resembled their men. - - -TRENCHES FILLED WITH DEAD - -“It was from the center of our attacking line that the assault was -pressed home soonest. The guns had done their work well. The trenches -were blown to irrecognizable pits dotted with dead. The barbed wire had -been cut like so much twine. Starting from the Rue Tilleloy the Lincolns -and the Berkshires were off the mark first, with orders to swerve to -right and left respectively as soon as they had captured the first line -of trenches, in order to let the Royal Irish Rifles and the Rifle -Brigade through to the village. The Germans left alive in the trenches, -half demented with fright, surrounded by a welter of dead and dying men, -mostly surrendered. The Berkshires were opposed with the utmost -gallantry by two German officers who had remained alone in a trench -serving a machine gun. But the lads from Berkshire made their way into -that trench and bayoneted the Germans where they stood, fighting to the -last. The Lincolns, against desperate resistance, eventually occupied -their section of the trench and then waited for the Irishmen and the -Rifle Brigade to come and take the village ahead of them. Meanwhile the -second thirty-ninth Garhwalis on the right had taken their trenches with -a rush and were away towards the village and the Biez Wood. - - -HOARSE SHOUTS AND THE GROANS OF THE WOUNDED - -“Things had moved so fast that by the time the troops were ready to -advance against the village the artillery had not finished its work. So, -while the Lincolns and the Berks assembled the prisoners who were -trooping out of the trenches in all directions, the infantry on whom -devolved the honor of capturing the village, waited. One saw them -standing out in the open, laughing and cracking jokes amid the terrific -din made by the huge howitzer shells screeching overhead and bursting -in the village, the rattle of machine guns all along the line, and the -popping of rifles. Over to the right where the Garhwalis had been -working with the bayonet, men were shouting hoarsely and wounded were -groaning as the stretcher-bearers, all heedless of bullets, moved -swiftly to and fro over the shell-torn ground. - -“There was bloody work in the village of Neuve Chapelle. The capture of -a place at the bayonet point is generally a grim business, in which -instant, unconditional surrender is the only means by which bloodshed, a -deal of bloodshed, can be prevented. If there is individual resistance -here and there the attacking troops cannot discriminate. They must go -through, slaying as they go such as oppose them (the Germans have a -monopoly of the finishing-off of wounded men), otherwise the enemy’s -resistance would not be broken, and the assailants would be sniped and -enfiladed from hastily prepared strongholds at half a dozen different -points. - - -INDESCRIBABLE MASS OF RUINS - -“The village was a sight that the men say they will never forget. It -looked as if an earthquake had struck it. The published photographs do -not give any idea of the indescribable mass of ruins to which our guns -reduced it. The chaos is so utter that the very line of the streets is -all but obliterated. - -“It was indeed a scene of desolation into which the Rifle Brigade--the -first regiment to enter the village, I believe--raced headlong. Of the -church only the bare shell remained, the interior lost to view beneath -a gigantic mound of debris. The little churchyard was devastated, the -very dead plucked from their graves, broken coffins and ancient bones -scattered about amid the fresher dead, the slain of that morning--grey -green forms asprawl athwart the tombs. Of all that once fair village but -two things remained intact--two great crucifixes reared aloft, one in -the churchyard, the other over against the château. From the cross that -is the emblem of our faith the figure of Christ, yet intact though all -pitted with bullet marks, looked down in mute agony on the slain in the -village. - - -“SMEARED WITH DUST AND BLOOD” - -“The din and confusion were indescribable. Through the thick pall of -shell smoke Germans were seen on all sides, some emerging hall dazed -from cellars and dugouts, their hands above their heads, others dodging -round the shattered houses, others firing from the windows, from behind -carts, even from behind the overturned tombstones. Machine guns were -firing from the houses on the outskirts, rapping out their nerve-racking -note above the noise of the rifles. - -“Just outside the village there was a scene of tremendous enthusiasm. -The Rifle Brigade, smeared with dust and blood, fell in with the Third -Gurkhas with whom they had been brigaded in India. The little brown men -were dirty but radiant. Kukri in hand they had very thoroughly gone -through some houses at the cross-roads on the Rue du Bois and silenced a -party of Germans who were making themselves a nuisance there with some -machine guns. Riflemen and Gurkhas cheered themselves hoarse.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXI - -HARROWING SCENES ALONG THE BATTLE LINES - - DRIVING BACK THE GERMANS UNDER FIRE -- ON THE FIRING LINE -- AMONG - MANGLED HORSES AND MEN -- GERMAN LOSSES FRIGHTFUL -- DIXMUDE A PLACE - OF DEATH AND HORROR. - - -Some idea of the ruin wrought day after day as the battle raged in -Flanders may be gained from the occasional reports of war correspondents -who shared the fortunes of battle. - -“The battle rages along the Yser with frightful destruction of life,” -wrote a correspondent of the London Daily News in October. “Air engines, -sea engines, and land engines death-sweep this desolate country, -vertically, horizontally, and transversely. Through it the frail little -human engines crawl and dig, walk and run, skirmishing, charging, and -blundering in little individual fights and tussles, tired and puzzled, -ordered here and there, sleeping where they can, never washing, and -dying unnoticed. A friend may find himself firing on a friendly force, -and few are to blame. - -“Thursday the Germans were driven back over the Yser; Friday they -secured a footing again, and Saturday they were again hurled back. Now a -bridge blown up by one side is repaired by the other; it is again blown -up by the first, or left as a death trap till the enemy is actually -crossing. - -[Illustration: THESE ALWAYS SURVIVE.] - -“Actions by armored trains, some of them the most reckless adventures, -are attempted daily. Each day accumulates an unwritten record of -individual daring feats, accepted as part of the daily work. Day by day -our men push out on these dangerous explorations, attacked by shell -fire, in danger of cross-fire, dynamite, and ambuscades, bringing a -priceless support to the threatened lines. As the armored train -approaches the river under shell fire the car cracks with the constant -thunder of guns aboard. It is amazing to see the angle at which the guns -can be swung. - -“And overhead the airmen are busy venturing through fog and puffs of -exploding shells to get one small fact of information. We used to regard -the looping of the loop of the Germans overhead as a hare-brained piece -of impudent defiance to our infantry fire. Now we know it means early -trouble for the infantry. - -“Besides us, as we crawl up snuffing the lines like dogs on a scent, -grim train-loads of wounded wait soundlessly in the sidings. Further up -the line ambulances are coming slowly back. The bullets of machine guns -begin to rattle on our armored coats. Shells we learned to disregard, -but the machine gun is the master in this war. - -“Now we near the river at a flat country farm. The territory is scarred -with trenches, and it is impossible to say at first who is in them, so -incidental and separate are the fortunes of this riverside battle. The -Germans are on our bank enfilading the lines of the Allies’ trenches. We -creep up and the Germans come into sight out of the trenches, rush to -the bank, and are scattered and mashed. The Allies follow with a fierce -bayonet charge. - -“The Germans do not wait. They rush to the bridges and are swept away by -the deadliest destroyer of all, the machine gun. The bridge is blown up, -but who can say by whom? Quickly the train runs back. - -“‘A brisk day,’ remarks the correspondent. ‘Not so bad,’ replies the -officer. So the days pass.” - - -ON THE FIRING LINE - -Another correspondent who, accompanied by a son of the Belgian War -Minister, M. de Broqueville, made a tour of the battleground in the -Dixmude district wrote: - -“No pen could do justice to the grandeur and horror of the scene. As far -as the eye could reach nothing could be seen but burning villages and -bursting shells. - -“Arriving at the firing line, a terrible scene presented itself. The -shell fire from the German batteries was so terrific that Belgian -soldiers and French marines were continually being blown out of their -dugouts and sent scattering to cover. Elsewhere, also, little groups of -peasants were forced to flee because their cellars began to fall in. -These unfortunates had to make their way as best they could on foot to -the rear. They were frightened to death by the bursting shells, and the -sight of crying children among them was most pathetic. - -“Dixmude was the objective of the German attack, and shells were -bursting all over it, crashing among the roofs and blowing whole streets -to pieces. From a distance of three miles we could hear them crashing -down, but the town itself was invisible, except for the flames and the -smoke and clouds rising above it. The Belgians had only a few field -batteries, so that the enemy’s howitzers simply dominated the field, and -the infantry trenches around the town had to rely upon their own unaided -efforts. - - -AMONG MANGLED HORSES AND MEN - -“Our progress along the road was suddenly stopped by one of the most -horrible sights I have ever seen. A heavy howitzer shell had fallen and -burst right in the midst of a Belgian battery which was making its way -to the front, causing terrible destruction. The mangled horses and men -among the debris presented a shocking spectacle. - -“Eventually, we got into Dixmude itself, and every time a shell came -crashing among the roofs we thought our end had come. The Hôtel de Ville -(town hall) was a sad sight. The roof was completely riddled by shell, -while inside was a scene of chaos. It was piled with loaves of bread, -bicycles, and dead soldiers. - -“The battle redoubled in fury, and by seven o’clock in the evening -Dixmude was a furnace, presenting a scene of terrible grandeur. The -horizon was red with burning homes. - -“Our return journey was a melancholy one, owing to the constant trains -of wounded that were passing.” - - -GERMAN LOSSES FRIGHTFUL - -“The German losses are frightful” wrote another correspondent. “Three -meadows near Ostend are heaped with dead. The wounded are now installed -in private houses in Bruges, where large wooden sheds are being rushed -up to receive additional injured. Thirty-seven farm wagons containing -wounded, dying, and dead passed in one hour near Middelkerke.” - - -DIXMUDE A PLACE OF DEATH AND HORROR - -From Fumes, Belgium, members of the staff of the English hospital -traveled to Dixmude to search for wounded men on the firing line. Philip -Gibbs, of the London Daily Chronicle, who traveled with them in -reporting his experiences, said: - -“I was in one of the ambulances, and Mr. Gleeson sat behind me in the -narrow space between the stretchers. Over his shoulder he talked in a -quiet voice of the job that lay before us. I was glad of that quiet -voice, so placid in its courage. We went forward at what seemed to me a -crawl, though I think it was a fair pace, shells bursting around us now -on all sides, while shrapnel bullets sprayed the earth about us. It -appeared to me an odd thing that we were still alive. Then we came into -Dixmude. - -[Illustration: DESTRUCTION OF THE SEA-RAIDER “EMDEN.” - -The Australian cruiser “Sydney” came up with the German cruiser “Emden” -off the Cocos Keeling Island on November 9. After the “Sydney” had fired -six hundred rounds of ammunition and covered fifty-six miles in -maneuvering, she forced the “Emden” to run ashore owing to the breaking -of her steering gear. The German vessel ran at a speed of nineteen knots -upon the beach, the shock killing the man at the wheel. (_From a direct -camera picture taken on board the “Sydney.”_)] - -[Illustration: SINKING OF THE GERMAN CRUISER “BLUECHER.” - -This most dramatic photograph of the Great North Sea Battle, in which -the British fleet was victor, January 24, 1915, shows the death agony of -the German cruiser “Bluecher” just as she turned turtle and sank. The -ship is shown lying on her side, with her machinery and armament shot -into masses of twisted iron and steel, great fires raging forward, -amidship and aft. The officers and men can be seen ranged along the side -of the vessel: many of them have slipped into the water and may be seen -swimming about. (_Copyright by the International News Service._)] - -“When I saw it for the first and last time it was a place of death and -horror. The streets through which we passed were utterly deserted and -wrecked from end to end, as though by an earthquake. Incessant -explosions of shell fire crashed down upon the walls which still stood. -Great gashes opened in the walls, which then toppled and fell. A roof -came tumbling down with an appalling clatter. Like a house of cards -blown by a puff of wind, a little shop suddenly collapsed into a mass of -ruins. Here and there, further into the town, we saw living figures. -They ran swiftly for a moment and then disappeared into dark caverns -under toppling porticoes. They were Belgian soldiers. . . . - -“We stood on some steps, looking down into that cellar. It was a dark -hole, illumined dimly by a lantern, I think. I caught sight of a little -heap of huddled bodies. Two soldiers, still unwounded, dragged three of -them out and handed them up to us. The work of getting those three men -into the first ambulance seemed to us interminable; it was really no -more than fifteen or twenty minutes. - -“I had lost consciousness of myself. Something outside myself, as it -seemed, was saying that there was no way of escape; that it was -monstrous to suppose that all these bursting shells would not smash the -ambulance to bits and finish the agony of the wounded, and that death -was very hideous. I remember thinking also how ridiculous it was for men -to kill one another like this and to make such hells on earth.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXII - -WHAT THE MEN IN THE TRENCHES WRITE HOME - - SOBERING REALITIES OF BATTLE--“WAR IS TERRIBLE”--THE COMMON ENEMY, - DEATH--“A WASTEFUL WAR”--“SAME PAIR OF BLUE EYES”--FIGHTING WITHOUT - HATE. - - -Life at the front is not all marching and fighting by any means: there -are long days and nights of waiting in which though it be - - “Theirs not to reason why” - -the soldiers have abundant time to reflect upon the grim fatality of war -and the hideousness of the carnage. They are continually facing death, -and though many of them, perhaps most of them, become inured to the -sights of human slaughter, others cannot fail to be impressed by the -stark, white faces of the fallen--friends and foes alike. Sights more -horrible than perhaps they could have imagined are burned into their -minds, never to be effaced. - -Naturally some of their reflections find expression in the letters home, -when the soldier is more or less off guard. There we get an “inside -view” of the war which does much to offset the ruthlessness of rulers -and restore one’s faith in the essential humanity of men. - - -“WAR IS TERRIBLE” - -The following letter, which Refers to the fighting along the Aisne, was -found on a German officer of the Seventh Reserve Corp: - - “Cerny, South of Laon, Sept. 14, 1914. - -“My dear Parents: Our corps has the task of holding the heights south of -Cerny in all circumstances until the fourteenth corps on our left flank -can grip the enemy’s flank. On our right are other corps. We are -fighting with the English Guards, Highlanders, and Zouaves. The losses -on both sides have been enormous. For the most part this is due to the -too brilliant French artillery. - -[Illustration: THE MOTHER.] - -“The English are marvelously trained in making use of ground. One never -sees them, and one is constantly under fire. The French airmen perform -wonderful feats. We cannot get rid of them. As soon as an airman has -flown over us, ten minutes later we get their shrapnel fire in our -positions. We have little artillery in our corps; without it we cannot -get forward. - -“Three days ago our division took possession of these heights and dug -itself in. Two days ago, early in the morning, we were attacked by an -immensely superior English force, one brigade and two battalions, and -were turned out of our positions. The fellows took five guns from us. It -was a tremendous hand-to-hand fight. - -“How I escaped myself I am not clear. I then had to bring up supports on -foot. My horse was wounded, and the others were too far in the rear. -Then came up the guards jäger battalion, fourth jäger, sixth regiment, -reserve regiment thirteen, and landwehr regiments thirteen and sixteen, -and with the help of the artillery we drove the fellows out of the -position again. Our machine guns did excellent work; the English fell in -heaps. - -“In our battalion three Iron Crosses have been given, one to C. O., one -to Captain ----, and one to Surgeon ----. [Names probably deleted.] Let -us hope that we shall be the lucky ones next time. - -“During the first two days of the battle I had only one piece of bread -and no water. I spent the night in the rain without my overcoat. The -rest of my kit was on the horses which had been left behind with the -baggage and which cannot come up into the battle because as soon as you -put your nose up from behind cover the bullets whistle. - -“War is terrible. We are all hoping that a decisive battle will end the -war, as our troops already have got round Paris. If we beat the English -the French resistance will soon be broken. Russia will be very quickly -dealt with; of this there is no doubt. - -“Yesterday evening, about six, in the valley in which our reserves stood -there was such a terrible cannonade that we saw nothing of the sky but a -cloud of smoke. We had few casualties.” - - -THE COMMON ENEMY, DEATH - -How foe helps foe when the last grim hour comes is revealed in the -letter which a French cavalry officer sent to his fiancée in Paris: - -“There are two other men lying near me, and I do not think there is much -hope for them either. One is an officer of a Scottish regiment and the -other a private in the Uhlans. They were struck down after me, and when -I came to myself, I found them bending over me, rendering first aid. - -“The Britisher was pouring water down my throat from his flask, while -the German was endeavoring to stanch my wound with an antiseptic -preparation served out to them by their medical corps. The Highlander -had one of his legs shattered, and the German had several pieces of -shrapnel buried in his side. - -“In spite of their own sufferings they were trying to help me, and when -I was fully conscious again the German gave us a morphia injection and -took one himself. His medical corps had also provided him with the -injection and the needle, together with printed instructions for its -use. - -“After the injection, feeling wonderfully at ease, we spoke of the lives -we had lived before the war. We all spoke English, and we talked of the -women we had left at home. Both the German and the Britisher had only -been married a year. . . . - -“I wonder, and I supposed the others did, why we had fought each other -at all. I looked at the Highlander, who was falling to sleep, exhausted, -and in spite of his drawn face and mud-stained uniform, he looked the -embodiment of freedom. Then I thought of the Tri-color of France, and -all that France had done for liberty. Then I watched the German, who had -ceased to speak. He had taken a prayer book from his knapsack and was -trying to read a service for soldiers wounded in battle.” - - -“SAME PAIR OF BLUE EYES” - -Sergeant Gabriel David, of the French infantry, who saw seven months of -continuous service in the trenches of the Argonne Forest, described the -odd effect of peeping over the top of a trench for weeks into the same -pair of German blue eyes. - -“I don’t know who this man was or what he might have been,” he said, -“but wherever I go I can yet see those sad-looking eyes. He and I gazed -at each other for three weeks in one stretch; his watch seemed to always -be the same as mine. We came to respect each other. I am sure that I -would always know those blue eyes, and I would like to meet that man -when the war has ended.” - - -FIGHTING WITHOUT HATE - -There is yet to appear an authentic letter from a private or officer on -either side that contains a tithe of the virulence and bitterness shown -in the statements and writings of many non-combatants. - -“One wonders,” runs a letter of a British officer, “when one sees a -German face to face, is this really one of those devils who wrought such -devastation--for devastation they have surely wrought. You can hardly -believe it, for he seems much the same as other soldiers. I can assure -you that out here there is none of that insensate hatred that one hears -about. - -“Just to give you some idea of what I mean, the other night four German -snipers were shot on our wire. The next night our men went out and -brought one in who was near and get-at-able and buried him. They did it -with just the same reverence and sadness as they do to our own dear -fellows. I went to look at the grave the next morning, and one of the -most uncouth-looking men in my company had placed a cross at the head of -the grave, and had written on it: - - “‘Here lies a German. - We don’t know his name. - For he died bravely fighting - For his Fatherland.’ - -“And under that, ‘got mitt uns’ (sic), that being the highest effort of -all the men at German. Not bad for a bloodthirsty Briton, eh? Really -that shows the spirit.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXIII - -BOMBARDING UNDEFENDED CITIES - - THE GERMAN RAID ON THE ENGLISH COAST -- MRS. KAUFFMAN’S DESCRIPTION -- - CANNONADING AT WHITBY -- FREAKISH EFFECT OF SHELLS -- FLIGHT OF SCHOOL - CHILDREN. - - -The Ninth Hague Convention of 1907, to which both Germany and Great -Britain gave their assent upon identical conditions, expressly forbids -“the bombardment by naval forces of undefended ports, towns, villages, -dwellings or buildings,” and by inference requires notice to be given -previous to any such operations. Neither of these stipulations was -observed by the German naval raiders who on December 16, 1914, bombarded -the historic English towns of Hartlepool, Whitby and Scarborough. -Appearing in the early morning, the Germans rained deadly shells upon -these coast towns, none of which was of strategic importance, and only -one protected by fortifications. The immediate result was the useless -slaughter of many non-combatants--men and women and children, and the -ruin of buildings, churches and historic monuments, including the -ancient abbey of St. Hilda at Whitby. - -The raid on Scarborough was described by Ruth Kauffman, the wife of the -novelist, Reginald Wright Kauffman, in an interesting communication. -The Kauffmans had been living for several years just outside of -Cloughton, a village near Scarborough. - - -MRS. KAUFFMAN’S DESCRIPTION - -“It’s a very curious thing to watch a bombardment from your house. - -[Illustration: WHERE THE WAR WAS BROUGHT HOME TO ENGLAND.] - -“Everybody knew the Kaiser would do it. But there was a little doubt -about the date, and then somehow the spy-hunting sport took up general -attention. When the Kaiser did send his card it was quite as much of a -surprise as most Christmas cards--from a friend forgotten. - -“Eighteen people were killed in the morning between eight and -eight-thirty o’clock in the streets and houses of Scarborough by German -shrapnel, two hundred were wounded and more than two hundred houses were -damaged or demolished. - -“From our windows we could not quite make out the contours of the -ruined castle, which is generally plainly visible. Our attention was -called to the fact that there was “practicing” going on and we could at -8.07 see quick flashes. That these flashes pointed directly at -Scarborough we did not for a few moments comprehend, then the fog slowly -lifting, we saw a fog that was partly smoke. The castle grew into its -place in the six miles distance. - -“It seemed for a moment that the eight-foot thick Norman walls tottered, -but no, whatever tottered was behind the keep. Curiously enough, we -could barely hear the cannonading, for the wind was keen in the opposite -direction, yet we could, as the minutes crept by and the air cleared, -see distinctly the flashes from the boats and the flashes in the city. - -“After about fifteen minutes there was a cessation, or perhaps a -hesitation, that lasted two minutes; then the flashes continued. Ten -minutes more and the boats began to move again. One cruiser disappeared -from sight, sailing south by east. - - -CANNONADING AT WHITBY - -“The other two rushed like fast trains north again, close to our cliffs, -and in another half hour we heard all too plainly the cannonading which -had almost escaped our ears from Scarborough. We thought it was Robin -Hood’s Bay, as far north of us as Scarborough is south, but afterward we -learned that the boats omitted this pretty red-roofed town and -concentrated their remaining energy on Whitby, fifteen miles north; the -wind blowing toward us brought us the vibrating boom. - -“We drove to Scarborough. We had not gone one mile of the distance when -we began to meet people coming in the opposite direction. A small -white-faced boy in a milk cart that early every morning makes its -Scarborough rounds showed us a piece of shell he had picked up, and said -it had first struck a man a few yards from him and killed the man. A -woman carrying a basket told us, with trembling lips, that men and women -were lying about the streets dead. - -“We did not meet a deserted city when we entered. The streets were -thronging. There was a Sunday hush over everything, without the -accompanying Sunday clothes, but people moved about or stood at their -doorways. Many of the shop fronts were boarded up and shop windows were -empty of display. The main street, a narrow passage-way that clambers up -from the sea and points due west, was filled with a procession that -slowly marched down one side and up the other. People hardly spoke. They -made room automatically for a group of silent Boy Scouts, who carried an -unconscious woman past us to the hospital. There was the insistent honk -of a motor-car. As it pushed its way through, all that struck me about -the car was the set face of the old man rising above improvised bandages -about his neck, part of the price of the Kaiser’s Christmas card. - -“The damage to property did not first reach our attention. But as we -walked down the main street and then up it with the procession we saw -that shops and houses all along had windows smashed next to windows -unhurt. At first we thought the broken windows were from concussion; but -apparently very few were so broken; there was not much concussion, but -the shells, splintering as they exploded, had flown red hot in every -direction, The smoke, we had seen, had come from fires quickly -extinguished. - - -FREAKISH EFFECTS OF SHELLS - -“We left the main business street and picked our way toward the -foreshore and the South Cliff, the more fashionable part of the town as -well as the school section. Here there was a great deal of havoc, and we -had to climb over some of the debris. Roofs were half torn off and -balancing in mid-air; shells had shot through chimneys and some chimneys -tottered, while several had merely round holes through the brick work; -mortar, brick and glass lay about the streets; here a third-story room -was bare to the view, the wall lifted as for a child’s doll house and -disclosing a single bedroom with shaving materials on the bureau still -secure; there a drug-store front lay fallen into the street, and the -iron railing about it was torn and twisted out of shape. - -“A man and a boy had just been carried away dead. All around small -pieces of iron rail and ripped asphalt lay scattered. Iron bars were -driven into the woodwork of houses. There were great gaps in walls and -roofs. The attack had not spent itself on any one section of the city, -but had scattered itself in different wards. The freaks of the shells -were as inexplicable as those of a great fire that destroys everything -in a house except a piano and a mantelpiece with its bric-a-brac, or a -flood that carries away a log cabin and leaves a rosebush unharmed and -blooming. - -“Silent pedestrians walked along and searched the ground for souvenirs, -of which there were plenty. Sentries guarded houses and streets where it -was dangerous to explore and park benches were used as barriers to the -public. All the cabs were requisitioned to take away luggage and -frightened inhabitants. During the shelling hundreds of women and -children, breakfastless, their hair hanging, hatless and even penniless, -except for their mere railway fares, had rushed to the station and taken -tickets to the first safe town they could think of. There was no panic, -these hatless, penniless women all asserted, when they arrived in York -and Leeds. - - -FLIGHT OF SCHOOL CHILDREN - -“A friend of mine hurried into Scarborough by motor to rescue her -sister, who was a pupil at one of the boarding schools. But it appeared -that when the windows of the school began to crash the teachers hurried -from prayers, ordered the pupils to gather hats and coats and sweet -chocolate that happened to be on hand as a substitute for breakfast and -made them run for a mile and a half, with shells exploding about them, -through the streets to the nearest out-of-Scarborough railway station. -My friend, after unbelievable difficulties, finally found her sister in -a private house of a village near by, the girl in tears and pleading not -to be sent to London; she had been told that her family’s house was -probably destroyed, as it was actually on the sea-coast.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXIV - -GERMANY’S FATAL WAR ZONE - - THE WARNING TO NEUTRAL NATIONS -- UNITED STATES REFUSED TO RECOGNIZE - WAR ZONE -- A VIOLATION OF INTERNATIONAL RIGHTS -- AIMED AT NEUTRAL - SHIPPING -- AN INHUMAN POLICY. - - -The German imperial decree making all of the waters surrounding the -British Isles a war zone and threatening to destroy ships and crews -found therein after February 18, 1915, whether they were English or -neutral, raised a storm of protest in the United States. The decree -read: - -“The waters around Great Britain and Ireland, including the whole -English Channel, are declared a war zone from and after February 18, -1915. - -“Every enemy ship found in this war zone will be destroyed, even if it -is impossible to avert dangers which threaten the crew and passengers. - -“Also, neutral ships in the war zone are in danger, as in consequence of -the misuse of neutral flags ordered by the British government on January -31 and in view of the hazards of naval warfare it cannot always be -avoided that attacks meant for enemy ships shall endanger neutral ships. - -“Shipping northward, around the Shetland Islands, in the eastern basin -of the North Sea, and in a strip of at least thirty nautical miles in -breadth along the Dutch coast, is endangered in the same way.” - -As plainly as words could state it, this was a warning that American and -other neutral vessels might be sunk by German submarines and that -Germany would repudiate responsibility for such action. The American -press denounced the declaration and its intent, and the United States -government made public a note to Germany, containing the following -paragraph: - - -UNITED STATES REFUSED TO RECOGNIZE WAR ZONE - -“If the commanders of German vessels of war should act upon the -presumption that the flag of the United States was not being used in -good faith and should destroy on the high seas an American vessel, or -the lives of American citizens, it would be difficult for the government -of the United States to view the act in any other light than as an -indefensible violation of neutral rights which it would be very hard -indeed to reconcile with the friendly relations now happily subsisting -between the two governments.” - -Frederick R. Coudert, of New York, an authority on international law, -said in discussing the war zone: - -“From the beginning the United States government always maintained the -right to treat the open sea as a public highway, and refused to -acquiesce in one attempt after another to establish a closed sea. It -refused to submit to an imposition of the Sound dues by Denmark, or to -recognize the Baltic as a closed sea. It refused to pay tribute to the -Barbary powers for the privilege of navigating the Mediterranean, and -gave notice to Russia that it would disregard the claim to make the -North Pacific a closed sea. - - -A VIOLATION OF INTERNATIONAL RIGHTS - -“No one has ever pretended to assert a claim to control the navigation -of the North Sea, and Germany has no more right to plant mines in the -open sea between Great Britain and Belgium and France than she would -have to do so in Delaware Bay, or than a property owner, who was annoyed -by automobiles, would have to plant torpedoes in a turnpike. - -“The right to plant mines as a defense to a harbor, from which all -vessels might lawfully be excluded, is one thing, but to destroy the use -of the open sea as a highway, by sowing mines which might indeed destroy -British ships, but might also destroy American ships, is an act of -hostility which, if persisted in, would constitute a casus belli, and if -we had Mr. Webster, or Mr. Marcey, or Mr. Evarts in Washington as -Secretary of State, prompt notice would be given that for any damage -done Germany would be held responsible.” - -A representative quotation from the newspapers of the United States is -the following: - -“The imperial decree making all of the waters surrounding the British -isles a ‘war zone,’ and threatening to destroy ships and crews found -therein after February 18, whether they be English or neutral, is surely -the maddest proposal ever put forth by a civilized nation. - - -AIMED AT NEUTRAL SHIPPING - -“This excessively efficient method of warfare, however, is one that most -concerns England and France. The interest of the United States lies in -the fact that the threat is aimed emphatically at neutral shipping. - -[Illustration: THREE BRITISH CRUISERS SUNK BY SUBMARINES. - -The “Aboukir,” “Hogue” and “Cressy” sunk by torpedoes on September 22. -The horrors of modern warfare are illustrated by the notice issued after -this disaster by the British Admiralty, which reads in part, “No act of -humanity, whether to friend or foe, should lead to neglect of the proper -precautions and dispositions of war, and no measure can be taken to save -life which prejudice the military situation.” (_Copyright by the Sun -News Service._)] - -[Illustration: THE LOSS OF THE “IRRESISTIBLE” IN THE DARDANELLES. - -On March 18 the “Irresistible” quit the line of the French and English -fleet, which was bombarding the Turkish forts in the narrows of the -Dardanelles, and sank in deep water. The whole ship was lifted up in the -explosion, and to increase the horror of the situation the Turks -commenced bombarding the vessel with their big guns.] - -“Neutral nations were loath to accept the sinister meaning of the order -when it was first published; but its intent was emphasized by Bismarck’s -old organ, the Hamburger Nachrichten: - -“‘Beginning on February 18 everybody must take the consequences. The -hate and envy of the whole world concern us not at all. If neutrals do -not protect their flags against England, they do not deserve Germany’s -respect.’ - -“The misuse of the American flag is annoying to this country as well as -exasperating to Germany, but no government in its senses would seriously -threaten to make that an excuse for piratical operations. A merchant -ship has a right to fly any flag the skipper has in his locker, -particularly if thereby he can deceive an enemy and evade capture. The -custom is as old as maritime warfare, and has been resorted to -numberless times by every nation. - -“But this issue is trifling compared to the German effort to exclude -neutral shipping from an arbitrarily decreed ‘war zone.’ It is -officially admitted that this does not comprise a formal blockade, but -it is clear that Germany is attempting to achieve the benefits of a -blockade without its heavy responsibilities. - - -AN INHUMAN POLICY - -“It is understood that she has a perfect right to hold up and search -neutral ships in her declared ‘war zone,’ and to make prizes of such as -carry contraband. But it is the possession of this very right which -forbids the inhuman policy she proclaims. She cannot plead ignorance of -a vessel’s identity, or attack it unless it refuses to stop when -signaled. The burden of proof is upon the submarine, and to torpedo a -vessel on suspicion merely would be unredeemed piracy and murder. - -“This is distinctly a case in which the convenient doctrine of ‘military -necessity’ is not to be invoked. Nor would an occasional misuse of a -neutral flag by belligerent vessels, as a ruse of war, justify a -mistaken act of destruction. If every British merchantman approaching -England flew the American colors, that would not excuse the torpedoing -of one American ship. - -“These facts are stated with convincing clearness in the official -protest sent from Washington to Berlin. We do not know who framed this -document, although it bears distinct literary marks of revision by -President Wilson. But whoever the men actually responsible for it, they -produced a state paper which is a model of terseness, lucidity, -dignified courtesy and force, an irrefutable presentation of the -relevant principles of international law and justice. No loyal American -wants trouble, but the blood of the most pacific citizen must move a -little faster on reading the German decree and the restrained but -perfectly straightforward reply sent by our government.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXV - -MULTITUDINOUS TRAGEDIES AT SEA - - TWENTY-NINE VESSELS SUNK IN ONE WEEK -- EIGHTY-TWO NON-COMBATANT - VESSELS DESTROYED IN GERMAN WAR ZONE -- THE ATTACK ON THE GULFLIGHT. - - -The fact that the Lusitania was the twenty-ninth vessel to be sunk or -damaged in one week in May in the war zone established by Germany around -the British Isles throws into grim relief the ruthlessness of modern -war. The naval battles of the past were engagements of dignity in which, -when a vessel was lost, it went down with a certain tragic magnificence -after a fair fight; but most of the vessels lost in the European war -have been the victims of torpedoes, struck by stealthy blows in the -dark. In less than three months, from February 18 to May 7, 1915, no -less than eighty-two merchant vessels belonging either to the Allies or -to neutral nations were torpedoed or mined in the war zone, with a loss -of life estimated at 1,704 non-combatants--a terrible sacrifice to -modern warfare. - -Naturally the greater number of these merchant ships were British, but -the fact that the war zone was proclaimed by Germany with a view to -stopping neutral shipping as well is established by the figures which -show that among the eighty-two non-combatant vessels destroyed there -were French, Russian, Norwegian, Swedish, Dutch, Danish, Greek and three -American vessels, the latter being the Evelyn, sunk by a mine explosion -February 20; the Carib, sunk by a mine explosion February 22, and the -Gulflight, torpedoed May 1. - -In addition to these eighty-two cases of non-combatant vessels -destroyed, there have been innumerable instances of unsuccessful -attacks, of which a notable example was the double attempt to sink the -American tank steamship Cushing, once by a Zeppelin which aimed three -bombs at the vessel, and once by a submarine which placed a contact mine -directly in the path of the ship; her bow narrowly missed the mine, and -her stern struck it a glancing blow, but not with sufficient force to -explode it. - - -THE ATTACK ON THE GULFLIGHT - -It would require many hundreds of pages to recount the details of all of -these crimes against non-combatant merchant ships, and to show the -relentless severity with which neutral commerce has been attacked, but -the organized military measures even against neutral ships are well -illustrated by the case of the American ship Gulflight, as described by -the second officer, Paul Bower: - -“When the Gulflight left Port Arthur, Texas, on April 10, bound for -Rouen, France,” said Bower, “we were followed by a warship of some -description, which kept out of sight, but in touch by wireless and -warned us not to disclose our position to any one. - -“At noon Saturday, May 1, we were twenty-five miles west of the Scilly -Islands, a small group about thirty miles southwest of England. The -weather was hazy, but not thick. About two and one-half miles ahead I -saw a submarine. - -[Illustration: WHERE LUSITANIA WAS TORPEDOED. - -Kinsale, on South Coast of Ireland, close to Cork Harbor.] - -“Twenty-five minutes later we were struck by a torpedo on the starboard -side, and there was a tremendous shock. The submarine had not reappeared -on the surface before discharging the torpedo. - -“Previous to this, we had been met by two patrol boats, which -accompanied us on either side. The boat on our starboard side was so -badly shaken by the explosion that her crew imagined that she also had -been torpedoed. We immediately lowered the boats and left our ship and -were quickly taken on board the patrol boats. But the fog increased and -we drifted about all night and did not land at Scilly until 10.30 -o’clock Sunday morning. - -“At midnight of Saturday, while still on board the patrol boat, Captain -Gunter summoned me. I found him in bed and he said he wanted some one to -roll a cigarette for him. He then tossed up his arms and fainted. From -then until the time of his death, which occurred about 3.30 o’clock -Sunday morning, he remained unconscious. - -“Captain Gunter’s speech was thick and indistinct, but we could -distinguish that he wished some one to take care of his wife. The crew -had always regarded Captain Gunter as a healthy man and had never heard -him complain.” - -Second Assistant Engineer Crist, of the Gulflight, said: - -“I was on watch in the engine room when we were torpedoed, and so -terrible was the blow that the Gulflight seemed to be tumbling to -pieces. She appeared to be lifted high in the air and then to descend -rapidly. I told the boys to beat it as quickly as possible and shut the -engines down. - -“Reaching the deck, I found them launching both life-boats. We got -safely into them, with the exception of wireless operator Short and a -Spanish seaman, who had dived overboard when they felt the shock, and -were drowned.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXVI - -HOW “NEUTRAL” WATERS ARE VIOLATED - - THE THREE-MILE LIMIT -- BELLIGERENTS’ RIGHTS -- NOTICE IN LEAVING - NEUTRAL WATERS -- EVASIONS OF NEUTRALITY. - - -“A neutral has a perilous part to sustain.” So says Louis XI to his -treacherous minister, Cardinal Balue, in Scott’s famous novel. The -dictum is true enough even when a strong state is in question. For Great -Britain the question of neutrality is of great importance in so far as -it affects her on the sea. Historically, of course, neutrality is rather -a modern development. Small and weak states in the earlier ages of the -world had little hope of keeping themselves free from the havoc of a -great world conflict. Great naval powers, such as the Hanseatic League, -Genoa, and Venice, did, during the Middle Ages, succeed at times in -inspiring respect for their neutrality, but it was at best precarious, -and strong states rarely paid much respect to neutral waters. Early in -the reign of Charles I the Dutch destroyed a Spanish fleet in the very -Downs; and though Charles was master of a strong naval power he made no -attempt to resent the insult. In this case, of course, there were -special reasons for England’s apathy, but the incident is significant. -Roughly speaking, it may be laid down as an axiom that in all the ages -of history the neutrality of a state, on sea as on land, has been -respected only in so far as it has possessed the power to make it so. - - -THE THREE-MILE LIMIT - -During the Napoleonic wars, Great Britain was in constant trouble with -the United States owing to the fashion in which British naval commanders -exercised, and sometimes abused, the right of searching American ships -for contraband of war. The British-American quarrels had the good effect -that attempts were made to standardize and establish on a firm basis the -laws of neutrality at sea. The naval portion of the Neutrality -Conference of 1907 contains twenty-eight clauses, of which the first -provides that belligerents must respect neutral waters. Where the coast -borders the open sea the neutral zone extends to three miles from the -shore. As this is well within the range of even small naval guns it is -clear that an opportunity is afforded to an unscrupulous captain of -sinking vessels which have crossed the neutral line. In the case of a -power controlling the entrance to inland seas the provision becomes of -enormous importance. - - -BELLIGERENTS’ RIGHTS - -Within neutral waters belligerents may not take prizes, hold prize -courts, nor establish warlike bases, nor may they obtain supplies -therein. At the same time neutrality is not held to be compromised by -the simple passage through neutral waters of belligerent ships and -prizes. Belligerent vessels may also obtain the help of pilots. The -neutral state must use all its endeavor to be impartial and must expel -or warn off vessels guilty of breaches of neutrality. - -Except in special cases a belligerent warship may make a stay of only -twenty-four hours in neutral waters. The special cases would usually be -those of vessels disabled or otherwise in distress or storm-bound. When -damaged a warship may remain long enough in a neutral port to effect -necessary repairs, but it must not take on board extra armament, -ammunition, or reinforcements of men. If out of coal it must only take -on board sufficient to carry it to its nearest home port. Nor is it -supposed to fill up with food stores beyond its ordinary supply in time -of peace. In all these cases the neutral authorities are the judges. It -must be obvious that a weak neutral state will be in a terrible quandary -if the vessel be a powerful one and the country to which it belongs a -powerful one. - - -NOTICE IN LEAVING NEUTRAL WATERS - -The belligerent ship must give twenty-four hours’ notice before leaving, -and must not visit the same port again until three months have elapsed. -Should it break the neutrality laws the neutral state authorities may -incapacitate it for immediate service and detain it, leaving on board -just as many of the crew as are necessary to keep it clean and in order. -The steps taken would generally be to remove the vitally necessary -engine and gun fittings. Should two hostile ships enter a neutral port -they must, while there, observe its neutrality, and must leave at an -interval of twenty-four hours. - - -EVASIONS OF NEUTRALITY - -It must be obvious from all this that the inviolability of neutrality -will always depend very much upon the ability of the state concerned to -keep it so. - -It is not difficult, either, to imagine various methods by which the -neutrality, which is supposed to govern within the three-mile limit, may -be evaded. It is only necessary to cite the case of a war vessel unable -to overtake a fast merchant-man until the latter reaches neutral waters, -but successful in sinking it by long-range gun-fire from a point outside -the three-mile limit. - - - - -CHAPTER XXVII - -THE TERRIBLE DISTRESS OF POLAND - - A LONG-TORTURED NATION AGAIN BLIGHTED BY WAR -- DESOLATION AND FAMINE - THROUGHOUT LAND -- RICH AND POOR ALIKE DESTITUTE -- PLIGHT OF RUSSIAN - POLAND -- NO BREAD FOR WEEKS IN LODZ -- THREE TIMES A BATTLE-FIELD -- - UNABLE TO HELP HERSELF -- NO SEED AND NO DRAFT ANIMALS. - - -“If you imagined all the people of New York State deprived of everything -they owned, left a prey to starvation and disease, and hopelessly -crushed under the iron heels of contending armies, you might form a -slight idea of what the Poles are enduring at present,” declared the -great pianist, Paderewski, while visiting America in 1915 in the -interests of the afflicted nation. “One of the worst phases of the -situation lies in the inability of the inhabitants of one-half of the -country to communicate with those in the other. Compared with their lot, -even that of the Belgians loses some of its horror, for my unhappy -countrymen have no France, Holland, or England in which they can seek -refuge.” - -Girt by a ring of war, Poland in the winter and spring of 1915 was in -the most terrible straits. Her cities and villages had been captured and -recaptured by both Germans and Russians, her fields had been laid waste, -and her inhabitants were slowly dying of starvation. - - -DESOLATION AND FAMINE THROUGHOUT LAND - -“If figures can give any idea of the immensity of this disaster,” -pleaded the great musician, “then these may convey a slight impression -of what has gone on in Poland: An area equal in size to the states of -Pennsylvania and New York has been laid waste. The mere money losses, -due to the destruction of property and the means of agriculture and -industry, are $2,500,000,000. A whole nation of 18,000,000 people, -including 2,000,000 Jews, are carrying the burden of the war in the east -on their backs, and their backs are breaking under the load. The great -majority of the whole Polish people, about 11,000,000 men, women and -children, peasants and workmen, have been driven into the open, their -homes taken from them or burned, and they flee, terror-stricken, hungry -and in confusion, whither they know not. In ruins, in woods or in -hollows they are hiding, feeding on roots and the bark of trees. It is -Christian humanity that calls for help for succumbing Poland.” - -“From the banks of the Niemen to the summits of the Carpathians,” wrote -the novelist, Henryk Sienkiewicz, in his plea to the American people, -“fire has destroyed the towns and villages, and over the whole of this -huge, desolated country the specter of famine has spread its wings; all -labor and industry have been swept away; the ploughshare is rusted; the -peasant has neither grain nor cattle; the artisan is idle; all works and -factories have been destroyed; the tradesman cannot sell his wares; the -hearth fire is extinguished, and disease and misery prevail. To such -starving people, crying out for aid, listen, Christian nations.” - - -RICH AND POOR ALIKE DESTITUTE - -The Polish Relief Committee, headed by Madame Sembrich, published this -word from the great tenor, Jean de Reszké, whose home is in Paris: - -[Illustration: THE HARVEST-MOON IN EUROPE.] - -“My poor brother was unable to get away from the war zone in time. He -wrote this letter several weeks ago, and now I fear he may never survive -the terrible hardships. He had plenty of money and a splendid estate, -but all were swept away.” - -The letter referred to shows that there is no leveler like war. It runs: - -“My dear brother, whether this will ever get through the lines and reach -you I do not know. I am sure no man could get through alive, with all -this fighting and the continual bombardment going on on every hand. - -“The war broke with such suddenness that it was impossible to escape. I -was forced to remain here on my estate in Garnesk. This part of Poland -has been reduced to worse than a desert. All is desolate and every one -is suffering. My beautiful estate has met the common fate and been -reduced to ashes. I am now living in a cellar with scanty covering. If -a shell should drop in it would afford no protection. So fierce has -been the fighting here that there have been days when I could not -venture forth. We have been between two fires. All Poland needs relief. - -“I have no coal, oil, coffee, and only a handful of grain left. Through -the cold and the rain I have had but poor shelter, but my lot is the -same as that of my fellow countrymen here. Every one is in want; every -one is suffering. Many are dead, and many more will die unless aid -reaches them soon. Prince Lukouirski and his wife recently reached here -and are sharing my cellar with me. Their own beautiful estate has been -destroyed, and even the cellar blown to atoms by the shells.” - - -PLIGHT OF RUSSIAN POLAND - -Mr. Herbert Corey, writing from Berlin to the New York Globe, in the -spring of 1915, declared that unless something was done the world would -be horrified--if the world had not lost its capacity for horror--by the -sufferings of the Poles. “Soon cholera will come to Poland. Famine is -there now. Scarlet fever and typhoid and smallpox and enteric and typhus -are old settlers.” The million now in utter want only live at all -because “humanity has a wonderful capacity for adjustment to -wretchedness. - -“There are 6,000,000 Poles in the portion of Russian Poland that is -being fought over. Of these, according to the Red Cross men, 1,000,000 -are absolutely destitute. They are without food or the means to buy -food. They are living on the charity of others who are but slightly -better off. That charity must come to an end soon--because food is -coming to an end. It is not merely that money is lacking. Flour is -lacking. It must be imported or starvation follows. - -“Russian Poland is a conspicuous example of Russian rule. No measure of -self-government is permitted the people. All governing officials are -appointed from Petrograd. Lodz, for example, a city which contains from -500,000 to 750,000 people--all statistics in Poland are mere guesses--is -ruled by a mayor and four assistants, all sent out from Russia. No city -may expend more than $150, American money, for its own purposes, except -permission is secured from Petrograd. That permission is rarely given. -Petrograd needs the taxes that Lodz pays. When permission is given it is -long delayed. Therefore, Lodz, a town as large as St. Louis, has unpaved -streets that are ankle-deep in mud in winter and ankle-deep in dust in -summer. It has a privately owned and paid fire department that responds -only to calls from its own clients. Ninety per cent of its residents -live in sties on streets that are mere stenches. - -“And yet Lodz is the second cotton-manufacturing town in Europe. It is -excelled only by Manchester in its manufacturing totals. Isolated on the -bleak plains of Poland, at a distance from a seaport, served by two -railroads only, it is an anomaly in the commercial world. - - -NO BREAD FOR WEEKS IN LODZ - -“For two weeks Lodz had no bread at all. For months it has had no meat -at all--so far as the poorer classes are concerned. During those two -weeks the mass of the population lived on potatoes. - -“Conditions were slightly worse in Czenstochow, the second city in -Russian Poland. Here 90,000 people live. It has no street-lights. It has -no attempt at street-paving. It has no sewers. It has no city water. It -has no publicly maintained fire department, though a few of the -merchants have a department of their own. It is pre-middle-ages in -everything--morals, discomfort, filth, darkness, disease, death-rate. -Cholera is there all the time. Most of its people exist in reeking -hovels, smoke-filled when they can afford fires, wet and cold at other -times. - -“As the towns grow smaller, conditions grow worse.” - - -THREE TIMES A BATTLE-FIELD - -If the war had not come, these people would have prospered after a -fashion. Potatoes were plentiful, and they had few other wants. A woman -earned thirty cents a day in the mills and a man three cents more. -Children worked as soon as they were old enough. Sixty-five per cent are -wholly illiterate. Then-- - -“Russia struck at Germany. The German armies invaded Poland in -retaliation. They swept almost to Warsaw--and an invading army sweeps -fairly clean. There were some things left when they passed over. They -were driven back, and the Russian armies covered this territory--and -they gleaned what was left. Then the Russians were driven back--sacking -as they went--and the Germans covered the ground once more. Three times -unhappy Poland has been fought over. It had little at the beginning. It -has nothing now. For months Poland has been starving, not merely going -hungry. That is a commonplace of war. Poles have been dying because they -cannot get food. - - -UNABLE TO HELP HERSELF - -“Poland is quite unable to help herself. Most of the mills--probably all -of the mills--are owned by Russian and German and French capitalists. -The banks are all branches of foreign institutions. These concerns are -all conducted by resident managers. Some of the managers have--on their -own responsibility--given their work people two and a half and three -cents a day each for food. Some have added a trifle for the children -also. But this has practically come to an end. The managers have -exhausted their supply of cash. They cannot get more. There are no -mails. The towns of Poland are each printing their own paper money--not -by consent of the Russian bureaucrats, but in defiance of them--but this -money circulates only within the town’s borders. It is highly improbable -it will ever be redeemed in real money. Meanwhile the price of food -commodities has risen fifty per cent in two months. By the time this -reaches America the prices may have doubled. - - -NO SEED AND NO DRAFT ANIMALS - -“Conditions are slightly better in the agricultural sections. The -farmers have no seed and no draft animals, it is true. But they have -fairly good supplies of potatoes. Last year’s potato-crop was an -enormous one. - -“There is a Jewish question in every city of Poland. Where there is a -Jewish question in Russia there are riots. There will be more rioting -in Poland unless Providence intervenes. Russia has always confined her -Jews to the pale. Being forced to make their living by trading, their -naturally sharp wits have been whetted. Today they are--broadly -speaking--owners of every shop in Poland. There may be Christian -shopkeepers here and there. People who know Poland doubt it. - -“Beggars follow the stranger in the Polish cities. Some of them are -mute. They only look at the stranger through hollow eyes and hold out -skinny hands. Others are vociferous. They cling to the garments of the -passer-by. They cry for aid in an uncouth dialect. They run out from -darkened doorways. The man who gives is pursued by a cue of them.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXVIII - -THE GHASTLY HAVOC WROUGHT BY THE AIR-DEMONS - - THE HORROR OF BOMB-DROPPING -- ANTI-AIRCRAFT GUNS -- KINDS OF BOMBS -- - STEEL DARTS--“ARROW BULLETS” AND AERIAL TORPEDOES -- MACHINE GUNS IN - AIRCRAFT -- ACCURACY IN DROPPING BOMBS. - - -Ten years ago the dropping of bombs from balloons was still considered -an illegitimate form of warfare, involving danger to non-combatants, and -was under the ban of the Geneva Convention. At the Hague Peace -Conference the Germans refused to abstain from bomb-dropping, and other -nations followed suit. According to the German conception of war, -civilians in the theater of operations must take their chance of being -killed, but must not shoot back under pain of summary execution. The -horrors which this theory has added to war have proved only too real, -but, so far as bomb-dropping is concerned, the reality has so far fallen -short of anticipations. The great Zeppelins, capable of carrying a ton -of explosives, have practically been frightened out of the air by the -new anti-aircraft guns; and, except for one instance at Antwerp, -bomb-dropping has been confined to aeroplanes. Now, in the first place, -an aeroplane can carry only a limited weight of bombs--say, two hundred -pounds; and in the second place, it is extraordinarily difficult to hit -anything with them. If the airman could hover over his target and take -deliberate aim, he might be more dangerous; as it is, the German airman -finds a cathedral hardly a big enough mark. The British airmen, at -Düsseldorf and Lake Constance, adopted a different plan from the -Germans; instead of dropping bombs from a great height, they made a -steep “vol piqué” down on to the target, turned sharply up again, and -dropped the bomb at the moment when the plane was checked by the -elevator. This plan is more dangerous, but affords a better chance of -hitting. - -[Illustration: TYPES OF AIR-CRAFT WEAPONS. - -Fig. 1.--An aeroplane bomb containing 12 lbs. of tetranitranilin, with a -screw stem up which the vanes travel in flight and thus “arm” the fuse. -Fig. 2.--Steel dart and boxes of darts used by Taube aeroplanes over -Paris, showing how they are inverted and released. Fig. 3.--A French -“arrow bullet”; very light, but able to kill a man from a height of -1,800 feet. Fig. 4.--A French aerial torpedo used by aeroplanes against -Zeppelins, exploding when it has pierced an air-ship’s envelope and is -suddenly arrested by the wooden cross.] - - -KINDS OF BOMBS - -Various kinds of bombs are used for dropping from aeroplanes. A simple -pattern shown in Fig. 1 consists of a thin spherical shell of steel, -containing twelve pounds of tetranitranilin, which is an explosive more -powerful than melinite. The stem of the bomb, by which it is handled, -has an external screw-thread, and carries a pair of vanes. While in the -position shown, the bomb is harmless, but as it drops, the vanes screw -themselves up to the top of the stem till they press against the stop. -This, by means of a rod passing down the center of the stem, “arms” or -prepares the fuse seen at the bottom of the bomb, so that it acts at the -slightest touch, even on the wing of another aeroplane. The fuse effects -the explosion of the burster by means of a primer of azide of lead, -which causes the tetranitranilin to detonate with great violence. The -whole bomb weighs twenty-two pounds, and an aeroplane usually carries -six of them. - -The Italians, in their campaign in Tripoli, used similar bombs, but -without the special device for rendering the fuse sensitive. These were -not a success, as many of them failed to explode in the desert sand, and -the Arabs used to collect them and throw them into the Italian trenches -at night. - - -STEEL DARTS - -The Taube aeroplanes, when they flew over Paris, used sometimes to drop -steel darts pointed at one end and flattened and feathered at the other, -as shown in Fig. 2. These were put up in boxes of a hundred, so that -when the box was released from its hook, it turned over and released the -darts. - - -“ARROW BULLETS” AND AERIAL TORPEDOES - -The “arrow bullet” shown in Fig. 3 is a French device; though weighing -only three-quarters of an ounce, its peculiar shape enables it to -acquire a high velocity, so that it will kill a man when dropped from a -height of six hundred yards. An aerial torpedo carried by French -aeroplanes for the destruction of Zeppelins is shown in Fig. 4; it -contains a powerful charge of explosive and a fuse, to which the -suspending-wire is connected. When dropped on a Zeppelin, the -needle-pointed torpedo pierces the envelope and gas-chamber, but the -wooden cross is arrested and the sudden jerk on the suspending-wire sets -the fuse in action, causing the certain destruction of the airship. The -torpedo would be too dangerous to handle, but the French have an -ingenious device which renders it perfectly safe until it is dropped. - - -MACHINE GUNS IN AIRCRAFT - -Various attempts have been made to mount machine guns on aeroplanes, but -the operator, in his narrow seat, has hardly space to point a machine -gun in any direction except straight to his front. The American Curtis -machine gun exhibited at Olympia is the most efficient form yet -produced, but at present the airman seems to prefer an automatic rifle. -Even in the early days of the war, Sir John French was able to report -that British airmen had disposed of no less than five of the enemy’s -aircraft with this weapon. - -The Zeppelins are well armed with machine guns, carrying one in each of -the two cars, and one on top of the structure. Access is had to the -latter by means of a shaft and ladder which passes up through the -gas-chambers. - - -ACCURACY IN DROPPING BOMBS - -The Zeppelins have elaborate bomb-dropping apparatus with which it -should be theoretically possible to drop a bomb with great accuracy, but -on the occasion when it was tried at Antwerp, the Germans met with no -great success. The principle of the bomb-dropping device is as follows: -A sort of camera, pointed vertically downwards, is used, and an observer -notes the speed with which an object on the ground passes across the -field, and the direction in which it appears to move. He then reads the -height of the airship from the barometer, which gives the time taken by -the bomb to fall, say fifteen seconds for 3,500 feet. He has now to -calculate, from the data given by the camera-observation, the allowance -to be made for speed and leeway for fifteen seconds of fall, and to -point his sighting-tube accordingly. The air-ship is steered to windward -of the target, and at the moment when the target (say, the second funnel -of a dreadnaught) appears on the cross wires, the nine hundred-pound -bomb is dropped, and the ship goes to the bottom. - -[Illustration: SCENE OF AIR RAID ON ENGLAND. - -Leigh, shown on the map, is only twenty-five miles from the British -capital, and South End just five miles further on. The fleet of -Zeppelins, or aeroplanes, or both, it will be seen, got uncomfortably -close to the British metropolis.] - - - - -CHAPTER XXIX - -THE DEADLY SUBMARINE AND ITS STEALTHY DESTRUCTION - - NEW COMPLICATIONS IN NAVAL ATTACK -- ATTACK ON LINER DESCRIBED -- - OPERATION OF TORPEDOES -- NETS TO TRAP SUBMARINES -- HOW CRAFT - SUBMERGE. - - -What is the value of the submarine in war? Is it so great that all our -theories of naval attack and defense will have to be revised? Are the -great battles of the future to be fought under water? Is a little vessel -of a few hundred tons to make the dreadnaught useless? German naval -tactics in the present war have made these questions interesting alike -to the expert, who has his answers to them, and to the layman, who is -profoundly ignorant on the whole subject. - -Simon Lake, an inventor who has done much to bring the submarine to its -present degree of efficiency, says that “it is the first weapon which -has a potential power to destroy an invading force, and also to prevent -an invading force from leaving its own harbors or roadsteads, but which -is itself useless for invading purposes.” This is at once an exaltation -and a limitation of its effectiveness. Yet Captain Lake believes that it -will be “the most potent influence that has been conceived to bring -about a permanent peace between maritime nations.” - -Heavy armament would have availed the Lusitania nothing, even if the -vessel had been so equipped, declared Captain Lake. Even if the Cunarder -had been bristling with guns from bow to stern, she could have done no -damage to the under-water craft that attacked her. She was doomed when -the submarine approached her. - -The submarine with its periscope three feet under water could not have -been seen fifty feet distant from the liner’s side, and the chances were -she was 1,000 yards distant. No shot from the vessel could have located -her, though aimed by trained officers. - - -ATTACK ON LINER DESCRIBED - -The scenes on both the vessel and the little submarine may be pictured -from a theoretical description given by Captain Lake as follows: “The -great ship, knowing the lurking danger, is traveling at her best speed -limit, changing the course from time to time in a zigzag manner. Waiting -beneath the surface of the calm sea a big submarine, now said to be -capable of discharging a torpedo at a distance of five miles, rolls idly -in the underground swell. Her crew is sleeping or talking in the -semi-fetid atmosphere that the compressed air tanks relieve from time to -time. An officer sits with his eye glued to a periscope, which -constantly revolves that he may discern the rising smoke of an -approaching vessel. - -“On the deck of the Lusitania passengers are lolling in steamer chairs -or leaning over the rails. They covertly fear attack, yet the horizon -shows no sign of the impending calamity. - -“Suddenly the submarine commander focuses his periscope upon a faint and -hazy line on the horizon. Closely he watches it move. An electric signal -is given and the submarine crew is in place. Another and the boat swings -silently and slowly on its course diagonal to that of the approaching -vessel. The electric engines turn without noise. - -“The vessels near each other. An order is transmitted from the conning -tower to the forward compartment of the submarine. The outside ports of -two bow torpedo tubes are closed; compressed air drives out all water. -Two inside ports are carefully opened and two one-ton torpedoes are -lifted by means of chain tackle and swung carefully into the tubes. The -inside ports are closed and the outside ports again opened. The air -chamber between the torpedo and the breaches is filled with air -compressed to nearly 1,200 pounds to the square inch--nearly the force -of exploding dynamite. - -“Both vessels are closing together at right angles. On the bigger one -all is gayety and hope of early and safe arrival at port. On the -submarine all are alert. The bow is carefully trained toward a direct -line over which the ship must travel. The speed and distance are -carefully gauged by trained officers. - -“The submarine sinks beneath the surface and men are stationed at the -firing levers on each of the forward tubes. An officer stands with a -watch in his hand, counting the seconds. A little bell tinkles over the -lever man on the port or starboard side of the submarine. He pulls the -lever which releases the trigger, and with a rush the enormous torpedo -forces itself in a direct line toward the vessel. Another second elapses -and the bell rings again. Similar action is observed on the submarine, -which a moment later rises with its periscope above the slight ripple of -the water. - -“There is a deadening crash, as the shock is transmitted through the -water and the resounding shell of the air-filled submarine. The officer -at the submarine periscope, or conning tower, is the only living person -on the submarine that sees a great vessel rise out of the water and -slowly settle back. He knows that the shots have taken effect and he can -offer no aid to the thousands who a moment later will be attempting to -save their lives. He turns his bow homeward, or cruises for other -victims of his mechanical ingenuity, as his sealed sailing orders may -direct. - - -OPERATION OF TORPEDOES - -“The course of the torpedo from the time it is released in the tube by -the lever trip is interesting,” said Captain Lake. “These torpedoes are -made at a cost of $5,000 each, much of which is spent in testing. With -their high charge of explosive placed well forward and a little plunger -on the nose, connecting with a percussion cap, their interior presents -the same view as that of a large steamship. The officer is a little -gyroscope, impelled by compressed air. This in turn may be set from the -outside to travel straight forward or on a curve, and by a timing device -to change its course after a certain distance. Usually it is set to -travel straight beneath the water at a depth of about fifteen feet. - -“To insure accuracy the torpedo without explosive charge must be fired -many times from a fixed torpedo tube. It is finally inspected and -passed. As it leaves the torpedo tube on its last journey the trip -releases the compressed air which turns its turbine engine. That in turn -revolves the propeller. The rudder, speed and depth of passage are -actuated by the gyroscope. - -“A torpedo has been fired accurately at a distance of five miles. The -distance for accuracy is between fifty yards and one thousand. Owing to -the concussion on the ear-drums of those in a submarine the greatest -distance compatible with accuracy is sought. As the plunger on the -torpedo strikes the vessel it explodes the charge almost directly -against the side of the vessel.” - - -NETS TO TRAP SUBMARINES - -The British naval authorities took measures to guard British shipping in -the English Channel by stretching nets over as much of the water, -particularly in the narrows, as possible. The nets are made of links of -steel. These links are about six or eight inches in diameter and made of -one-half inch steel. The nets are similar to those formerly used to -guard battleships and large cruisers, but which have now been discarded -because a torpedo will puncture the net and the second torpedo, which is -fired only a second or two after the first, will go through the hole -made by the first and reach the hull of the vessel. - -These chain nets are moored very securely and have buoys at the upper -edges to hold them in position. Often they are set just as a fisherman -sets his nets. When the submarine, like a fish, gets in the pound it -cannot get out, and those in the vessel must either die there or take -chances on reaching the surface and swimming to shore. - -It takes very little to disable a submarine. The hull is of -comparatively thin steel which is easily punctured and the propeller -when caught is absolutely useless. Even an ordinary fisherman’s net will -disable a submarine, and should one get foul of such a net the chances -of getting clear are very slim. - -According to the German naval press, the latest submarines are fitted -with double acting Diesel oil engines of 1,000 horse power or more. -These engines are as simple and run as smoothly as marine steam engines -and are as easily controlled. So strongly built are these craft that -they can plunge to a depth of 150 feet, at which the water pressure is -enormous. - - -HOW CRAFT SUBMERGE - -A security weight, as it is called, of about five tons is carried. This -can be released from the inside of the vessel at a moment’s notice, and -the effect is like that of dropping a mass of ballast from an airship. -When in diving trim, that is to say, when the boat is awash, an -up-to-date submarine can disappear under water in fifteen seconds and -re-emerge in twenty seconds. It can remain under water for a whole day -and night, or even longer. - -A submarine when submerged is handled mechanically. Those in charge -cannot see where the vessel is going. The officer in charge steers -according to the ranges he has taken when on the surface, and it is -absolutely impossible to see obstructions that may be ahead. It is -impossible to see another submarine unless the two are floating near the -surface and in bright daylight. For this reason it is impossible for one -submarine to fight another when submerged. - - - - -CHAPTER XXX - -THE TERRIBLE WORK OF ARTILLERY IN WAR - - SEVENTY PER CENT OF CASUALTIES DUE TO ARTILLERY FIRE -- INCREASED - RANGE -- MODERN GUNS -- RAPID FIRING -- HOW A BIG GUN IS AIMED -- - AWFUL DESTRUCTIVENESS OF MODERN GUNS. - - -A full century ago, Napoleon the Great, himself an artillery officer, -had developed the fighting power of artillery of his day so as to make -its fire a dominant factor on the battle-field. In the present war its -action is even more important, since we learn from the front that -seventy per cent of the casualties are due to artillery fire. It was the -gun that took Liège and Antwerp, and it is the gun which held the -contending armies pent up within a semicircle of fire. Once massed -formations were abandoned, the gun lost its terrors to a great extent, -and did not regain its place in military estimation till the -introduction of the shrapnel shell. - -This is a hollow steel projectile, packed with bullets, and containing a -charge of powder in the base. (See Fig. 1.) It is exploded by a -time-fuse, containing a ring of slowly burning composition which can be -set so as to fire the powder during the flight of the shell, when it has -traveled to within fifty yards of the enemy. The head is blown off, and -the bullets are projected forward in a sheaf, spreading outwards as -they go. The British eighteen-pounder shell covers a space of ground -some three hundred yards long by thirty-five yards wide with its 365 -heavy bullets. - -[Illustration: TYPES OF SHELLS - -Fig. 1.--Shrapnel shell, packed with bullets that spread. Fig. 2.--A -French quick-firer shell, like an enlarged rifle cartridge. Fig. 3.--The -“Universal” shell, combining the action of shrapnel and high explosives. -Fig. 4.--A fuse-setting machine.] - - -INCREASED RANGE - -In 1885 the British brought out the twelve-pounder high-velocity -field-gun, which remained for some years the best gun in Europe. Its -power was afterwards increased by giving it a fifteen-pounder shell, -and, as a fifteen-pounder, it did good work in South Africa. Then came -another development, the quick-firing gun now being used in the war, -with a steel shield to protect the detachment. The quick-firing gun is -badly named; its high rate of fire is only incidental, and is rarely of -use in the combat. The essential feature of the “Q.F.” gun, as it is -generally styled, is that the carriage does not move on firing, so that -the gunners can remain safely crouched behind the shield. - - -MODERN GUNS - -The French gun as it was originally brought out has now been improved by -the addition of a steel plate which closes the gap between the shields; -and a steel shield is also provided to protect the officer standing on -the upturned ammunition-wagon. - -The carriage does not move, and the men remain in their positions behind -the shield while the gun recoils between them. The carriage is prevented -from sharing the movement of recoil by the spade at the end of the -trail, which digs into the ground so as to “anchor” it. - - -RAPID FIRING - -The gun-recoil carriage, as the new invention was called, increases the -rate of fire, since there is no delay in running up. The French were -quick to develop this new feature, and set to work to make the rate of -fire as high as possible. Up till then the ammunition fired from a -field-gun had consisted of a shell, a bag of powder, and a friction-tube -introduced through the vent to fire the charge. This was called a round -of ammunition, and its complexity was increased by the fuse, which was -carried separately and screwed into the shell when the round was -prepared for loading, and afterwards set with a key to burst the shell -at the required distance. The French combined the whole of these -separate parts into one, so that a round of “fixed” ammunition, as now -used, looks exactly like an enlarged rifle cartridge. (See Fig. 2.) - -Further, they did away with the cumbrous process of setting the fuse by -hand, and introduced a machine which sets fuses as fast as the shell can -be put into it. One of these machines is shown in Fig. 4. It is of a -later pattern than that of the French service gun, being the one used by -the Servians with their new gun made by the famous firm of Schneider of -Creusot. The machine is set to the range ordered by the battery -commander, the shell is dropped into it, and a turn of the handle sets -the fuse. - - -HOW A BIG GUN IS AIMED - -The independent line of sight is another modern device for facilitating -the service of a gun. With this the gear for giving the gun the -elevation necessary to carry a shell to the required distance is kept -entirely separate from that used for pointing the gun at the target. The -gun-layer has merely to keep his sighting telescope on the target, while -another man puts on the range-elevation ordered by the battery -commander. - -The result of all these improvements is that the best quick-firing guns -(among which the French gun is still reckoned) are capable of firing -twenty-five rounds a minute. The German field-gun is hardly capable of -twenty rounds a minute, being an inferior weapon converted from the old -breech-loader. - -But these high rates of fire are used only on emergency, as a gun -firing twenty-five rounds a minute would exhaust the whole of the -ammunition carried with it in the battery in three minutes. - -One of the first consequences of the introduction of the shielded gun -was the reappearance of the old common shell in an improved form. The -common shell is almost as old as Agincourt, and consisted simply of a -hollow shell filled with powder, which exploded on striking the object. -When shrapnel came into use most nations abandoned the common shell. But -shrapnel proved almost ineffective against the shielded gun, and the -gunners were indifferent to the bullets pattering on the steel shield in -front of them. The answer to this was the high-explosive shell, a steel -case filled with high explosive, such as melinite, which is the same as -lyddite, shimose, or picric acid. This, when detonated upon striking a -gun, can be relied upon to disable it and to kill the gunners behind it. - - -AWFUL DESTRUCTIVENESS OF MODERN GUNS - -Of late years a shell which combines the action of the shrapnel and the -high-explosive shell has been introduced. This is the “Universal” shell -(see Fig. 3) invented by Major van Essen, of the Dutch Artillery. It is -a shrapnel with a detachable head filled with high explosive. When burst -during flight it acts like an ordinary shrapnel, and the bullets fly -forward and sweep the ground in front of it; at the same time the head, -with its explosive burster, flies forward and acts as a small but -efficient high-explosive shell. These projectiles have been introduced -for howitzers and for anti-aircraft guns, and some of the nations with -new equipments, such as the Balkan States, have them for their -field-guns. Their introduction has, however, been delayed in Western -Europe, as they are less efficient as such than the ordinary shrapnel, -which is considered the principal field artillery projectile. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXI - -WHOLESALE SLAUGHTER BY POISONOUS GASES - - CANADIAN VICTIMS -- TRENCH GAS AT YPRES -- AWFUL FORM OF SCIENTIFIC - TORTURE -- REPORT OF MEDICAL EXPERT -- KIND OF GAS EMPLOYED -- ALLIES - FORCED TO USE SIMILAR METHODS. - - -Killing by noxious gases may be, as the Germans claim, no more barbarous -than slaughter by shrapnel, but it has been denounced in America as a -violation of all written and unwritten codes and as a backward step -toward savagery. Certainly the descriptions of responsible persons who -have witnessed the pernicious work of the gas only deepens the horror -with which all peace-loving citizens look upon “civilized” warfare. - -The following description of the effect is told by a responsible British -officer who visited some Canadians who were disabled by gas: - -“The whole of England and the civilized world ought to have the truth -fully brought before them in vivid detail, and not wrapped up as at -present. When we got to the hospital we had no difficulty in finding out -in which ward the men were, as the noise of the poor devils trying to -get breath was sufficient to direct us. - - -CANADIAN VICTIMS - -“There were about twenty of the worst cases in the ward, on mattresses, -all more or less in a sitting position, strapped up against the walls. -Their faces, arms, and hands were of a shiny, gray-black color. With -their mouths open and leaden-glazed eyes, all were swaying slightly -backward and forward trying to get breath. It was a most appalling -sight. All these poor black faces struggling for life, the groaning and -the noise of the efforts for breath was awful. - -“There was practically nothing to be done for them except to give them -salt and water and try to make them sick. The effect the gas has is to -fill the lungs with a watery frothy matter, which gradually increases -and rises until it fills up the whole lungs and comes to the mouth--then -they die. It is suffocation, slow drowning, taking in most cases one or -two days. Eight died last night out of twenty I saw, and the most of the -others I saw will die, while those who get over the gas invariably -develop acute pneumonia. - -“It is without doubt the most awful form of scientific torture. Not one -of the men I saw in the hospital had a scratch or wound. The Germans -have given out that it is a rapid, painless death--the liars. No torture -could be worse than to give them a dose of their own gas.” - - -“TRENCH GAS” AT YPRES - -Asphyxiating gases seem to have been first used by the Germans in the -fighting around Ypres in April, 1915. The strong northeast wind, which -was blowing from the German lines across the French trenches, became -charged with a sickening, suffocating odor which was recognized as -proceeding from some form of poisonous gas. The smoke moved like a vivid -green wall some four feet in height for several hundred yards, extending -to within two hundred yards of the extreme left of the Allies’ lines. -Gradually it rose higher and obscured the view from the level. - -Soon strange cries were heard, and through the green mist, now growing -thinner and patchy, there came a mass of dazed, reeling men who fell as -they passed through the ranks. The greater number were unwounded, but -they bore upon their faces the marks of agony. - -The retiring men were among the first soldiers of the world whose -sang-froid and courage have been proverbial throughout the war. All were -reeling like drunken men. - - -AWFUL FORM OF SCIENTIFIC TORTURE - -“The work of sending out the vapor was done from the advanced German -trenches. Men garbed in a dress resembling the harness of a diver and -armed with retorts or generators about three feet high and connected -with ordinary hose-pipe turned the vapor loose toward the French lines. -Some witnesses maintain that the Germans sprayed the earth before the -trenches with a fluid which, being ignited, sent up the fumes. The -German troops, who followed up this advantage with a direct attack, held -inspirators in their mouths, these preventing them from being overcome -by the fumes. - -In addition to this, the Germans appear to have fired ordinary -explosive shells loaded with some chemical which had a paralyzing effect -on all the men in the region of the explosion. Some chemical in the -composition of these shells produced violent watering of the eyes, so -that the men overcome by them were practically blinded for some hours. - -[Illustration: - -_Right-hand figure: British soldier wearing respirator with air valve on -top_. - -_Left-hand figure: German with respirator and goggles armed with -burning-oil-distributor_. - -USING DEADLY GAS AS A WEAPON IN WAR. - -The German use of poisonous gases that asphyxiate soldiers of the enemy -against whom they are directed, has made it necessary to devise a new -defense. The pictures show the devices used by those who direct the use -of the gases and those who have to meet their deadly vapors.] - -The effect of the noxious trench-gas seems to be slow in wearing away. -The men come out of their violent nausea in a state of utter collapse. -How many of the men left unconscious in the trenches when the French -broke died from the fumes it is impossible to say, since those trenches -were at once occupied by the Germans. - - -REPORT OF MEDICAL EXPERT - -Dr. John S. Haldane, an authority on the physiology of respiration, who -was sent by the British government to France to observe the effect of -the gases, examined several Canadians who had been incapacitated by the -gases. - -“These men,” he said, “were lying struggling for breath, and blue in the -face. On examining their blood with a spectroscope and by other means I -ascertained that the blueness was not due to the presence of any -abnormal pigment. There was nothing to account for the blueness and -their struggles for air but one fact, and that was that they were -suffering from acute bronchitis, such as is caused by the inhalation of -an irritant gas. Their statements were to the effect that when in the -trenches they had been overwhelmed by an irritant gas produced in front -of the German trenches and carried toward them by a gentle breeze. - -“One of the men died shortly after our arrival. A post-mortem -examination showed that death was due to acute bronchitis and its -secondary effect. There was no doubt that the bronchitis and -accompanying slow asphyxiation was due to irritant gas. - -“Captain Bertram, of the eighth Canadian battalion, who is suffering -from the effects of gas and from wounds, says that from a support -trench about six hundred yards from the German lines he observed the -gas. He saw first of all white smoke rising from the German trenches to -a height of about three feet. Then in front of the white smoke appeared -a green cloud which drifted along the ground to our trenches, not rising -more than about seven feet from the ground. - -“When it reached our first trenches, the men in these trenches were -obliged to leave, and a number of them were killed by the effects of the -gas. We made a counter-attack about fifteen minutes after the gas came -over, and saw twenty-four men lying dead from the effects of the gas on -a small stretch of road leading from the advanced trenches to the -supports. He, himself, was much affected by the gas, and felt as though -he could not breathe. - -“These symptoms and other facts so far ascertained point to the use by -the German troops of chlorine or bromide for the purpose of -asphyxiation. There also are facts pointing to the use in German shells -of other irritant substances. Still, the last of these agents are not of -the same brutality and barbarous character as was the gas used in the -attack on the Canadians. - -“The effects are not those of any of the ordinary products of combustion -of explosives. On this point the symptoms described left not the -slightest doubt in my mind.” - - -KIND OF GAS EMPLOYED - -Various have been the opinions of chemists as to the kind of gas -employed. Sir James Dewar, President of the Royal Institution, was of -the opinion that it was liquid chlorine. Dr. F. A. Mason, of the Royal -College of Science, considered it to have been bromine. Dr. Crocker, of -the South-Western Polytechnic, said it may have been either carbon -monoxide or liquid peroxide. Dr. W. J. Pope, Professor of Chemistry, -Cambridge, and Sir E. Rutherford, Professor of Physics, Manchester -University, agreed in thinking the gas to have been phosgene, a compound -of carbon monoxide and chlorine, largely used in dye production in -Germany. - -“For some years,” stated Sir James Dewar, “Germany has been -manufacturing chlorine in tremendous quantities. . . . The Germans -undoubtedly have hundreds of tons available. If several tons of liquid -are allowed to escape into the atmosphere, where it immediately -evaporates and forms a yellow gas, and if the wind is blowing in a -favorable direction, it is the easiest thing for the Germans to inundate -the country with poison for miles ahead of them. - -“The fact that the gas is three times heavier than air makes escape from -its disastrous effects almost impossible, for it drifts like a thick -fog-cloud along the surface of the ground, overwhelming all whom it -overtakes.” - - -ALLIES FORCED TO USE SIMILAR METHODS - -Of the German attack on the allied front near Ypres, Secretary of War, -Earl Kitchener, speaking in the House of Lords on May 18, said: - -“In this attack the enemy employed vast quantities of poisonous gases, -and our soldiers and our French allies were utterly unprepared for this -diabolical method of attack, which undoubtedly had been long and -carefully prepared.” - -It was at this point that Earl Kitchener announced the determination of -the Allies to resort to similar methods of warfare. - -“The Germans,” said Earl Kitchener, “have persisted in the use of these -asphyxiating gases whenever the wind favored or other opportunity -occurred, and His Majesty’s government, no less than the French -government, feel that our troops must be adequately protected by the -employment of similar methods, so as to remove the enormous and -unjustifiable disadvantage which must exist for them if we take no steps -to meet on his own ground the enemy who is responsible for the -introduction of this pernicious practice.” - - - - -CHAPTER XXXII - -“USAGES OF WAR ON LAND”: THE OFFICIAL GERMAN MANUAL - - CRIMES IN BELGIUM EXPLAINED BY INSTRUCTIONS TO GERMAN OFFICERS -- - UNLIMITED DESTRUCTION THE END OF WAR -- RULES OF CIVILIZED WARFARE - CLEARLY STATED -- OTHER EXCELLENT RULES. - - -The black crime of Louvain, the world-lamented destruction of the -cathedral of Rheims, the denudation of the fair land of Belgium, with -all its horrible attendant crimes, is explained, in part at least, by -“Usages of War on Land,” the official manual of instructions to military -officers compiled by the general staff of the German army. It is an -authoritative exposition of the rules of war as practiced by the -Germans. - -Two general principles bearing directly on the question of the invasion -of Belgium are clearly stated in this guide: - -“A war conducted with energy cannot be directed merely against the -combatants of the enemy state and the positions they occupy, but it will -and must in like manner seek to destroy the total intellectual and -material resources of the latter. Humanitarian claims, such as the -protection of men and their goods, can only be taken into consideration -in so far as the nature and object of the war permit. - -“The fact that such limitations of the unrestricted and reckless -application of all the available means for the conduct of war, and -thereby the humanization of the customary methods of pursuing war, -really exist, and are actually observed by the armies of all civilized -states, has in the course of the nineteenth century often led to -attempts to develop, to extend, and thus to make universally binding -these pre-existing usages of war; to elevate them to the level of laws -binding nations and armies; in other words, to create a law of war. All -these attempts have hitherto, with some few exceptions to be mentioned -later, completely failed. If, therefore, in the following work the -expression ‘the law of war’ is used, it must be understood that by it is -meant not a written law introduced by the international agreements, but -only a reciprocity of mutual agreement--a limitation of arbitrary -behavior, which custom and conventionality, human friendliness and a -calculating egotism have erected, but for the observance of which there -exists no express sanction, but only ‘the fear of reprisals’ decides.” - - -UNLIMITED DESTRUCTION THE END OF WAR - -Put in plain language, these passages mean that there is no law of war -which may not be broken at the dictates of interest. Unlimited -destruction is the end, and only fear of reprisals need limit the means. -The sentimental humanitarianism and flabby emotion which prevail -elsewhere have no place in the bright lexicon of the German officer. “By -steeping himself in military history,” the manual clearly states, “an -officer will be able to guard himself against excessive humanitarian -notions” and learn that “certain severities are indispensable in war,” -and that “the only true humanity often lies in a ruthless application of -them.” Then there is laid down this comprehensive general rule: - -“All means of warfare may be used without which the purpose of war -cannot be achieved. On the other hand, every act of violence and -destruction which is not demanded by the purpose of war must be -condemned.” - -Interpreted by other passages in the volume, this implies that the end -justifies the means. Barbarities may be forgiven if only they are -useful. Thus “international law is in no way opposed to the exploitation -of the crimes of third parties--assassination, incendiarism, robbery and -the like--to the prejudice of the enemy.” - - -RULES OF CIVILIZED WARFARE CLEARLY STATED - -It must not be assumed, of course, that the German war manual is a -defense of unlimited rapine. The rules of civilized warfare are usually -stated clearly enough. But there are so many exceptions to the -application of them that a zealous officer might well be pardoned if he -regarded them as not binding whenever it was to his interest to ignore -them. Thus, after a careful statement of the right of the inhabitants of -an invaded country to organize for its defense, the advantages of -“terrorism” are candidly set forth as outweighing these considerations -in many instances. That policy has been illustrated in Belgium very -significantly. The difference between precept and practice is also seen -in the prohibition of the bombardment of churches and unfortified towns. -Regarding the latter the manual says: - -“A prohibition by international law of the bombardment of open towns and -villages which are not occupied by the enemy or defended was, indeed, -put into words by The Hague regulations, but appears superfluous, since -modern military history knows of hardly any such case.” - -Military history has been made since then, particularly by the German -air raids on English seashore resorts. - - -OTHER EXCELLENT RULES - -Several other excellent rules in the manual may be contrasted with -German practice in the present war. - -“No damage, not even the smallest, must be done unless it is done for -military reasons. - -“Contributions of war are sums of money which are levied by force from -the people of an occupied country. They differ in character from -requisitions in kind because they do not serve an immediate requirement -of the army. Hence, requisitions in cash are only in the rarest cases -justified by the necessities of war. - -“The military government by the army of occupation carries with it only -a temporary right to enjoy the property of others. It must, therefore, -avoid every purposeless injury, it has no right to sell or dispose of -the property.” - -“Usages of War on Land” makes interesting reading throughout, though -the conclusions that the impartial reader will draw from it will not be -in every case those which the German military authorities would have him -draw. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXIII - -THE SACRIFICE OF THE HORSE IN WARFARE - - DUMB ANIMALS PRESSED INTO SERVICE -- PART PLAYED BY HORSE IN WAR -- - AMERICAN STOCK DEPLETED. - - -So overwhelming has been the thought of human suffering in Europe, so -anxious has the world been to relieve it, that little thought has been -bestowed on the dumb sufferers. Various war photographs have shown us -the novel sight of the dogs of Belgium impressed into service for -dragging the smaller guns; but all contestants use horses, and when we -reflect that the average life of a cavalry horse at the front is not -more than a week, if that, we gain some idea of the sacrifice of animals -which modern warfare demands. - -One of the pleaders for the horse is John Galsworthy, the English -novelist, who gives in the London Westminster Gazette this moral aspect -of the use of the horse in warfare, with the attendant obligation: - -“Man has only a certain capacity for feeling, and that has been strained -almost to breaking-point by human needs. But now that the wants of our -wounded are being seen to with hundreds of motor ambulances and -hospitals fully equipped, now that the situation is more in hand, we can -surely turn a little to the companions of man. They, poor things, have -no option in this business; they had no responsibility, however remote -and indirect, for its inception; get no benefit out of it of any kind -whatever; know none of the sustaining sentiments of heroism; feel no -satisfaction in duty done. They do not even--as the prayer for them -untruly says--‘offer their guileless lives for the well-being of their -countries.’ They know nothing of countries; they do not offer -themselves. Nothing so little pitiable as that. They are pressed into -this service, which cuts them down before their time.” - - -PART PLAYED BY HORSE IN WAR - -The horse still plays an important part in war, as every army service -corps officer who has had anything to do with them well knows. The men -love their mettlesome beasts, and much trouble and worry is pardoned and -lost sight of in the comradeship which arises between man and beast. The -great part played by motors and motor-driven vehicles in the present war -has tended to draw attention away from the work of horses at the front, -yet motor cavalry has not been evolved. While recognizing that for -moving big guns along a well-made road motor power is very valuable, it -is still equally true that once the roads are left it is found in -practice of little use. - -A remarkable feature of the European war, new, so far as we know, to -military experience, has been the use upon an extensive scale of the -heavy draught horse, whose stately pace admits of no hurrying, but whose -great strength permits of his hauling very heavy weights where the -nature of the road does not admit of the use of the motor. - - -AMERICAN STOCK DEPLETED - -That the European war threatened to deplete the stock of horses even in -the United States is emphasized by a careful computation which fixed at -185,023 the number of horses shipped to the warring nations from July 1, -1914, to March 31, 1915. The value of the animals, according to an -inventory compiled from the manifests of ships transporting the horses -is placed at $40,695,057. During that same period 26,976 mules, valued -at $5,143,270, were sent abroad. - -Buyers representing the British, French and Russian governments were -reported as searching the country for more, and, according to estimates -made by shippers, at least 120,000 animals were to be shipped to Europe -during the summer of 1915. - -Frank L. Neall, statistician, asserted that few persons realized the -extent of the raid made by European buyers on the horse market. -“Shipments,” he said, “have been made from New Orleans, Newport News, -Portland, Boston and New York. During the month of March, 33,694 horses -were shipped, representing a value of $8,088,974.” - -Shippers were deeply interested when it became known for a certainty -that the German government had representatives purchasing horses in the -West. Wood Brothers, the largest horse dealers in Nebraska, were asked -to bid on a 25,000-head shipment. Ruling prices for the grade of horses -desired by foreign buyers have ranged from $175 to $200 per head. - -The stockyards in New Orleans, where these animals were assembled, cover -about eight acres and shed 3,500 animals. Horses were thoroughly -examined as to their fitness for service, both at the point of purchase -and at New Orleans. - -The last step before placing the horses on shipboard was to adjust -special halters to them, so that, as in the case of many horses -purchased by France, it was only necessary, when the animal reached the -other side, to snap two straps to his head-stalls and make him instantly -ready to be hitched to a gun limber or a wagon of a transport train. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXIV - -SCOURGES THAT FOLLOW IN THE WAKE OF BATTLE - - THE COMMON ENEMY, DISEASE -- SCOURGES OF MODERN WARFARE -- RAVAGES OF - TYPHUS IN SERVIA -- NO WORD OF COMPLAINT -- AMERICA TO THE RESCUE. - - -In many campaigns of the past, disease has slain its thousands where -bullets and shells have killed hundreds, and even the twentieth century -with its marvelous science of sanitation has not defeated the direful -common enemies of allies and foes. Why disease should attack masses of -men in the prime of life, living in the open air, and on the whole well -fed and clothed, at first sight seems strange, but when we remember that -modern fighting begets an intolerable thirst, which the soldier is -naturally tempted to slake as best he can and when he can, at least one -reason is not hard to find. - -All modern armies, since the striking experience of Japan in the -Manchurian campaign, pay special attention to the drinking water, and -with good results. But an irremovable source of disease remains in the -typhus-carrying vermin, in the myriads of flies bred in the rotting -carcases of men and horses and in the filth that inevitably collects -around perpetually shifting camps and bivouacs. As everyone now knows, -these insects are ceaseless and tireless carriers of infection, and it -is difficult to see how, under conditions of war, the plague of them can -be utterly wiped out. - - -SCOURGES OF MODERN WARFARE - -Of the diseases which assail an army in the field, a few stand out so -prominently that all others may practically be neglected. These are -cholera, typhus, typhoid fever, dysentery, and pneumonia; and they have -this in common, that they are all caused by specific bacilli. Thus -cholera is the child, so to speak, of the dreaded vibrio, and pneumonia -that of the pneumococcus; while typhus, typhoid and dysentery have each -their own special microbe. The modes of attack are, however, different, -for the pneumococcus can enter the organism by the nose and mouth only; -typhoid and dysentery through the alimentary canal; while the way in -which cholera is propagated is at present unknown. All have this in -common, that while the microbes causing them are probably always -present--that of cholera being a doubtful exception--they seem only to -assault a subject previously weakened by exposure, bad food, or -intemperance. - - -RAVAGES OF TYPHUS IN SERVIA - -The dread aftermaths of war made their first visitations upon the -Servian nation. One read with dismay that Belgium was later outdone by -Poland, and Poland seemed almost fortunate beside Servia. The account -sent by Captain E. N. Bennett, Commissioner in Servia for the British -Red Cross Society, of the conditions prevailing in Servian hospitals and -prisoners’ camps filled the whole world with dread. “Fires are needed -to clear Servia of typhus, just as fires were needed to stop the great -plague in London,” reported Sir Thomas Lipton, who spent considerable -time in that country. He said: - -“I met on the country roads many victims too weak to crawl to a -hospital. Bullock-carts were gathering them up. Often a woman and her -children were leading the bullocks, while in the car the husband and -father was raving with fever. Scarcely enough people remain unstricken -to dig graves for the dead, whose bodies lie exposed in the cemeteries. - -“The situation is entirely beyond the control of the present force, -which imperatively needs all the help it can get--tents, hospitals, -doctors, nurses, modern appliances, and clothing to replace the garments -full of typhus-bearing vermin.” - -His picture of the hospital at Ghevgheli, where Dr. James F. Donnelly, -of the American Red Cross, died, is appalling. Sir Thomas called Dr. -Donnelly one of the greatest heroes of the war: - -“The place is a village in a barren, uncultivated country, the hospital -an old tobacco factory, formerly belonging to Abdul Hamid. In it were -crowded 1,400 persons, without blankets or mattresses, or even -straw--men lying in the clothes in which they had lived in the trenches -for months, clothes swarming with vermin, victims of different diseases, -typhus, typhoid, dysentery, and smallpox were herded together. In such a -state Dr. Donnelly found the hospital, where he had a force of six -American doctors, twelve American nurses, and three Servian doctors. -When I visited the hospital three of the American doctors, the three -Servian doctors, and nine of the nurses were themselves ill. - -“The patients were waited on by Austrian prisoners. The fumes of illness -were unbearable. The patients objected to the windows being opened, and -Dr. Donnelly was forced to break the panes. The first thing Dr. Donnelly -did on his arrival was to test the water, which he found infected. He -then improvised boilers of oil-drums, in which to boil water for use. -The boilers saved five hundred lives, said Dr. Donnelly. He also built -ovens in which to bake the clothes of the patients, but he was not -provided with proper sterilizing apparatus. - - -NO WORD OF COMPLAINT - -“No braver people exist than the Servians. They have never a word of -complaint. In one ward I saw a fever patient, his magnificent voice -booming songs to cheer his comrades. Some were in a delirium, calling -for ‘mother.’ - -“One source of infection is the army black bread, which is the only -ration of the troops. The patients in the hospital receive only a loaf -each, which they put in their bed or under their pillow. Later the -unused loaves are bought by pedlers and are resold, spreading disease -among the people, who are mediæval in so far as sanitation is concerned. -A Servian soldier receives a rifle, some hand-grenades, and perhaps part -of a uniform, but otherwise looks after himself. - -“The street-cleaning and hospital-waiting are done by Austrians, who are -rapidly thinning from typhus and other diseases. - - -AMERICA TO THE RESCUE - -“The best hospital in the Balkans is at Belgrade, under Dr. Edward W. -Ryan, of the American contingent, where there are 2,900 patients. Dr. -Ryan kept the hospital neutral during the Austrian occupation, and -accomplished wonders diplomatically at that time. He is worshiped by the -people. - -“Dr. Ryan says that the greatest task is to keep the hospital free from -vermin. The typhus affects men the most severely. Women come next, and -children for the most part recover. The symptoms begin like those of -grip. The disease lasts fifteen days, with fever and delirium.” - -In the spring of 1915, a large sanitary commission was organized by the -American Red Cross and the Rockefeller Foundation, each of these -organizations donating $25,000 to the prosecution of the work. The -commission included a group of distinguished bacteriologists and -physicians, among them William C. Gorgas, surgeon-general of the U. S. -A. An initial supply of 10,000 anti-cholera treatments was carried to -Servia by the commission, for there was danger not only of a spread of -typhus but also of an outbreak of Asiatic cholera or some other -infectious disease that might sweep across all Europe. Heavy indeed is -the price of warfare. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXV - -WAR’S REPAIR SHOP: CARING FOR THE WOUNDED - - EFFICIENCY OF THE RED CROSS SERVICE -- THE BANDAGING CAMP -- THE - SANITATION COMPANY -- THE HOSPITAL BARGE. - - -Amid the dreadful welter of carnage and its attendant agony which spells -modern warfare one ray of brightness appears in the universal gloom in -the shape of the highly organized efficiency of the Red Cross Service, -which waits upon battle. Die Umschau, of Berlin, printed an admirable -description of its activities from the pen of Professor Rupprecht, one -of the chief organizers of the German Military Hospital Service, of -which we give an abstract: - -“The stretcher-bearers of the infantry--four to each company--who bear -the Red Cross symbol on the arm, when a battle is on hand, gather at the -end of the battalion (sixteen men with four stretchers) and then proceed -to the Infantry Sanitation Car. As soon as the ‘bandaging camp’ is made -ready . . . they go to the front with stretchers and knapsacks in order -to be ready to give aid to the wounded as soon as possible. Musicians -and others are employed as assistant stretcher-bearers. These wear a red -band on the sleeve but do not come under the provisions of the Geneva -Treaty.” - - -THE BANDAGING CAMP - -Similar arrangements are made for the cavalry. The so-called “bandaging -camp” is for the purpose of gathering the wounded and examining and -classifying them. It should be both protected and accessible, and if -possible near a water supply. At the end of a battle it is the duty of -the troops to search trenches, woods, houses, etc., for the wounded, -protect them against plunderers and carry them to the bandaging camp, as -also to bury the dead. - -[Illustration: QUICKER AND EASIER THAN BANDAGES: THE “TABLOID” -ADJUSTABLE HEAD-DRESSING. - -This dressing for head-wounds in the form of a cap, can be applied in a -few seconds, and remains comfortably in position. It can be washed, -sterilized, and used repeatedly. The diagrams show the method of -adjusting and the dressing in position.] - -“At the bandaging camp the surgeons and their assistants must revive and -examine the men and make them ready for transport. Operations are seldom -practicable or necessary here. The chief concern is to bandage wounds of -bones, joints, and arteries carefully. . . . Severe hemorrhages usually -stop of themselves, on which account it is seldom desirable to bind the -limb tightly above the wound. The wound itself must never be touched, -washed, or probed. After the clothing is removed or cut away it must -merely be covered with the contents of the bandage package.” - -Every soldier carries two of these packages in a pocket on the lower -front corner of his left coat-tail. Each package contains a gauze -bandage enclosed in a waterproof cover. There is sewed to this bandage a -gauze compress saturated with sublimate and of a red color. It is so -arranged that the bandage can be taken hold of with both hands without -touching the red compress. - -It is strongly impressed upon the stretcher-bearers and all assistants -that cases having wounds in the abdomen are not transportable and must -on no account be given food or drink; also that bleeding usually stops -of itself. They are taught, too, that touching, washing, or probing the -wound is injurious, and that only _dry_ bandages must be placed on the -wound--never those that are damp or impervious. - -“The wounded who are capable of marching leave their ammunition, except -for a few cartridges, at the bandaging camp, are provided if need be -with a simple protective bandage, and march first to the nearest ‘camp -for the slightly wounded,’ or to the nearest ‘resting-camp.’ The rest of -the wounded are removed as soon as possible directly to the field -hospitals or lazarets. If obliged to remain for a while before removal -they are protected by portable tents, wind-screens, etc. . . . If it is -impossible to carry the wounded along in a retreat they are left in care -of the hospital staff under the protection of the Red Cross.” - - -THE SANITATION COMPANY - -In case of a big battle a sanitation company remains near the bandaging -camp. Every army corps has three of these companies, which, together -with the twelve field lazarets of the corps, form a sanitation -battalion. - -As soon as it is apparent that the troops will remain in one locality -for some length of time the smaller bandaging camps or stations are -supplemented by a chief bandaging station some distance in the rear, and -if possible, near a highway and near houses. At this spot there are -arranged places for the entry and exit of the wagons carrying the -wounded, for the unloading of the wounded, for the dying and the dead, -for cooking, and a “park” for wagons and horses. - -Each field lazaret is capable of caring for two hundred men, but this -capacity may be extended by making use of local aid. The supplies -carried are very comprehensive, including tents, straw mattresses and -woolen blankets, lighting materials, clothing and linen, tools, cooking -utensils, soap, writing materials, drugs and medical appliances, -sterilization ovens, bandages, instruments, and an operating-table. As -fast as possible the patients treated are sent home on furlough or -removed to permanent military hospitals. The very perfection of this -system but deepens the tragic irony that occasions it. - - -THE HOSPITAL BARGE - -One very important development in the care for the wounded is the -introduction of the hospital barge. The rivers and canals of France -offer splendid opportunities for conveying wounded from point to point. -This new method of transport was foreshadowed in an article in the -London Times, in which the writer, in describing the hospital barges, -said: - -“The north of France, as is well known, is exceedingly rich in -waterways--rivers and canals. The four great rivers, the Oise, the -Somme, the Sambre, and the Escaut (Scheldt), are connected by a network -of canals--quiet and comfortable waterways at present almost free of -traffic. So far as the reaching of any particular spot is concerned -these waterways may be said to be ubiquitous. They extend, too, right -into Belgium, and have connection with the coast at various points--for -example, Ostend. Here, then, is a system of ‘roads’ for the removal of -the wounded, a system which, if properly used, can be made to relieve -greatly the stress of work imposed upon the ambulance motor cars and -trains. Here also is the ideal method of removal. - -“The Ile de France is lying at present at the Quai de Grenelle, near the -Eiffel Tower. This is a Seine barge of the usual size and type, -blunt-nosed, heavily and roomily built. You enter the hold by a -step-ladder, which is part of the hospital equipment. This is a large -chamber not much less high from floor to ceiling than an ordinary room, -well lighted, and ventilated by means of skylights. The walls of the -hold have been painted white; the floor has been thoroughly scrubbed out -for the reception of beds, of which some forty to fifty will be -accommodated. - -“The forward portion of the barge can accommodate more beds, and there -is no reason why a portion of it should not be walled in and used as an -operating room, more especially since in the bow a useful washing -apparatus is fitted. The barge is heated by stoves, and a small electric -plant could easily be installed. The barges are used in groups of four, -and a small tug supplies the motive power. In favorable circumstances -about fifty kilometers a day can be traveled.” - -The barges employed are big, roomy barges one hundred and twenty feet -long, sixteen feet broad, and ten feet high. Care is taken to use only -fairly new and clean barges which have been used in the conveyance of -timber or stone or other clean and harmless cargoes. - - - - -CHAPTER XXXVI - -WHAT WILL THE HORRORS AND ATROCITIES OF THE GREAT WAR LEAD TO? - - WAR, A REVERSAL TO THE PRIMITIVE BRUTE IN MAN -- THE SPREAD OF - DEMOCRACY -- DECLINE OF THE WAR SPIRIT -- THE DAWN OF UNIVERSAL PEACE. - - -In the mobilization of armies, in the appropriation of colossal funds -and consequent imposition of intolerable taxes, in the disregard of the -neutrality of lesser nations, in the “emergency measures” that tear -apart a home to give its bread-winner to the reeking shambles--in all -these phenomena original incentives quickly are forgotten, as though -they had never been. - -What imperial chancellery now remembers, or now cares, that a -sovereign’s nephew and his morganatic wife were done to death in an -obscure dependency upon the Adriatic shores? Their hands and steel are -at each other’s throats on that pretext, but they improve the occasion -to settle all old scores that rancorous racial antagonism in an -interminable blood-feud have created. War has thrown down the barriers -of social restraint; it has abolished the delimitations of political -adjustment; international decorum, propriety, all that is signified in -the German tongue under the untranslatable name of “Sittlichkeit” are no -more; landmarks set in place with a thankful sense of achievement and a -pious aspiration are obliterated. - -None will deny to our heroes living, nor to those who after warfare rest -in peace, the sublimity of their utmost pattern of devotion and of the -sacrifice they made. But with all that selfless devotion implies and -patriotism means, with all that the bugle sings or flaunting pennons -inspire, with all that the sight of old and tattered battle-flags -conveys, with all that the histories tell, with all the exemplary -careers of conquerors that were not ruthless and armies that sang psalms -and nations whose quarrel was just and kings who laid their crowns -before the throne of God in prayer, and their laurels in the dust of the -profoundest self-abasement--the nature of war is not changed. - -With all the Te Deums that have risen in cathedrals, and hosannas that -were sung for conquering Caesars when earth and sky were shaken like a -carpet with their welcome at the gate; with all the splendor of shining -accoutrements of guardsmen and Uhlans and cuirassiers; with all the -investiture of romance that poet and painter and even the sensitive -historian have been able to confer upon it--war remains what it is: an -abysmal and sickening reversion to the primitive brute in man. It must -still be a sight “to grieve high heaven and make the angels mourn” that -men created in the image of their Maker, endowed with a diviner instinct -beyond the body’s need or transient existence, could sink so far, and in -the slough of primordial animality forget the very light of life and -their immortal destiny for the sake of the mere fiction of power on -land, sea and even in the throbbing and embattled air through which the -prayers of women ascend like silent flame to God. - - - The World’s Best Intellects on War - - JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU: War is the foulest fiend that ever vomited - forth from the mouth of hell. - - THOMAS JEFFERSON: I abhor war and view it as the greatest scourge of - mankind. - - BENJAMIN FRANKLIN: There never was a good war or a bad peace. - - WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON: My country is the world; my countrymen are all - mankind. - - NAPOLEON BONAPARTE: The more I study the world, the more am I - convinced of the inability of force to create anything durable. - - PAUL ON MARS HILL: God hath made of one blood all nations of men for - to dwell on all the face of the earth. - - ANDREW CARNEGIE: We have abolished slavery from civilized countries, - the owning of man by man. The next great step that the world can take - is to abolish war, the killing of man by man. - - GEORGE WASHINGTON: My first wish is to see the whole world at peace, - and the inhabitants of it as one band of brothers, striving which - should most contribute to the happiness of mankind. - - ABRAHAM LINCOLN: With malice toward none, with charity for all, with - firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive - * * * to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace - among ourselves and with all nations. - - EMANUEL KANT: The method by which states prosecute their rights cannot - under present conditions be a process of law, since no court exists - having jurisdiction over them, but only war. But through war, even if - it result in victory, the question of right is not decided. - - -THE SPREAD OF DEMOCRACY - -We are apt, in thinking of the consequences of the European war, to -consider the readjustment of national boundaries as of prime importance. -Such a thought betrays a wrong perspective, or a narrowness of vision, -or both. Territorial definition is a small, material factor. The larger, -spiritual considerations that affect all mankind are the momentous -things. And probably of all the consequences that are evolved out of the -horrors and atrocities of the great war, the spread of the democratic -spirit must be the most momentous. Despite the fact that the ambitions -of the people and the dynasties are in accord, the effect of the war -upon monarchical institutions must be momentous. The spirit of democracy -is abroad. It has practically abolished the British House of Lords. It -has forced the establishment of a parliament in Russia. It is so active -and alert in Germany that the Social Democratic party is the largest and -most powerful political organization in the empire. In France it -overturned the monarchy nearly half a century ago, and is now so firmly -established that only the wildest dreamers ever imagine that republican -institutions can be displaced. It is regnant in Portugal and nearly so -in Spain. A nation in arms, as Germany now is, will not long be content -to remain a nation without a ministry responsible to its Parliament. The -democratization of German institutions is inevitable after the war, -whatever the result. The people, even in Russia, are no longer driven -serfs. They think, they reason, and a demonstration of the power of -5,000,000 men on the battle-field will not be lost on the patriots who -wish also to demonstrate the power of the same number of millions in -deciding at first hand the causes for which they will take up arms. -Whether the kings and the emperors remain on their thrones matters -little. Great Britain, though it retains the fiction of a monarchy, is -as democratic as the United States, and its Parliament responds with -greater precision to popular sentiment than the American Congress. The -war means the end of autocracy whether the kings remain or not. - - -DECLINE OF THE WAR SPIRIT - -It is significant that the most democratic nations are likewise the most -peace-loving. With the spread of democracy must come the decline of the -war spirit. The teaching that war is a biological necessity for the -preservation of the heroic virtues in men has met its fate in this war, -for we have found men, whole regiments of them, who had only been in -warlike training a few months, showing just as cool courage and just as -stubborn fighting powers as men who had been trained to war from their -youth. Even from the standpoint of effectiveness in war the war spirit -is unnecessary. - -And we have a right to insist that the bravery of the battle-line is not -the highest bravery, and that the deliverance wrought by bayonet and -shrapnel is not the most necessary to the welfare of humanity. The -courage which is unmoved by the roar of great guns and undaunted by the -gleam of advancing bayonets is good, but it is no better than the -courage of the timid woman who faces death upon the operating-table -without shrinking or complaint; and it is in nothing superior to the -courage which, in the daily life of our people, takes up patiently the -burden of the day, and in the face of poverty, sorrow, and pain, and -bearing also the contempt of many, goes forward without bitterness and -even with cheerfulness to the end of the journey, faithful unto death. - - -THE DAWN OF UNIVERSAL PEACE - -Finally, as the spirit of democracy rises and the spirit of war -declines, the vision of universal peace begins to crystallize. While to -many it may seem that this must always remain a vision, the real seers -of the world do not doubt that, when the awful conflict in Europe is -ended, the warring nations, viewing their dead and their devastated -countries, will welcome a plan which promises an end of such disasters. -The practicability and feasibility of the idea of an international -tribunal is shown by the successful operation of the American -Constitutional Courts of Arbitration, which have settled controversies -between the states, and by the so-called general arbitration treaties to -submit justiciable disputes to arbitration. And if an international -arbitration court is feasible, an international police, to give force to -the decrees of the tribunal, is also feasible. We have only to come to -believe this and the plan itself can be formulated. All great -achievement in the world has been a matter of great faith. - -The hope of humanitarianism and civilization rests on the very enormity -of the present calamity. The horrors and atrocities of the war are so -great, its waste and devastation so enormous, its scars so deep, that -no one who is touched by it can want war again. The disaster is so -overwhelming that peace when it comes must be lasting. - - The 32 pages of illustrations contained in this book are not included - in the paging. Adding these 32 pages to the 320 pages of the text - makes a total of 352 pages. - - - - - Transcriber’s Notes - - - Inconsistent and unusual spelling and hyphenation have been retained, - except as listed below. - p. 139, Todeshusaren (Death’s-Head Hussars): either the English - translation should be Death’s Hussars, or the German name should be - Totenkopfhusaren. - p. 148, Haybes (Belgium): Haybes is in France (albeit close to the - border with Belgium). - p. 153, Mme. X.: probably an error for Mme. Z. - p. 155, Bignicourt-sur-Saultz: probably Bignicourt-sur-Saulx. - p. 234, “A WASTEFUL WAR”: there is no such section. - - - Changes made: - Some illustrations have been moved out of text paragraphs. - Some minor obvious typographical and punctuation errors have been - corrected silently. - Accents have been corrected and standardised on French and German - words (Châlons, château, Hôtel de Ville, Liège, Visé, Jäger, - Pêcheurs, Pégoud), but not on English words (debris/débris); the - capitalisation of German nouns has not been corrected. - p.34: several section titles added to the list of subjects cf. the - actual text - p.109: Onsmael changed to Orsmael - p. 159: BURNING OF CITY SYSTEMATIC added to list of subjects - p. 179: Poekappelle changed to Poekapelle - Illustration caption after page 200: Fort Loucin changed to Fort - Loncin - p. 280: RAPID FIRING added to list of subjects - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Horrors and Atrocities of the Great War, by -Logan Marshall and Gilbert Parker and Vance Thompson and Philip Gibbs - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HORRORS AND ATROCITIES *** - -***** This file should be named 55503-0.txt or 55503-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/5/5/0/55503/ - -Produced by Brian Coe, Harry Lamé, Hathi Trust (for some -illustrations) and the Online Distributed Proofreading -Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from -images generously made available by The Internet Archive) - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, -set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to -copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to -protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project -Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you -charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you -do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the -rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose -such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and -research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do -practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is -subject to the trademark license, especially commercial -redistribution. - - - -*** START: FULL LICENSE *** - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project -Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at -http://gutenberg.org/license). - - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy -all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. -If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the -terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or -entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement -and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic -works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" -or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the -collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an -individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are -located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from -copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative -works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg -are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project -Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by -freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of -this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with -the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by -keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project -Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in -a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check -the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement -before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or -creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project -Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning -the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United -States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate -access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently -whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, -copied or distributed: - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived -from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is -posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied -and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees -or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work -with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the -work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 -through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the -Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or -1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional -terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked -to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the -permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any -word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or -distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than -"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version -posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), -you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a -copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon -request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other -form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided -that - -- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is - owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he - has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the - Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments - must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you - prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax - returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and - sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the - address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to - the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." - -- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or - destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium - and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of - Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any - money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days - of receipt of the work. - -- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set -forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from -both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael -Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the -Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm -collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic -works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain -"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or -corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual -property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a -computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by -your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with -your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with -the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a -refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity -providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to -receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy -is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further -opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER -WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO -WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. -If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the -law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be -interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by -the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any -provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance -with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, -promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, -harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, -that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do -or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm -work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any -Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. - - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers -including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists -because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from -people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need, are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. -To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation -and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 -and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. - - -Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive -Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at -http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent -permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. -Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered -throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at -809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email -business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact -information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official -page at http://pglaf.org - -For additional contact information: - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To -SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any -particular state visit http://pglaf.org - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. -To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate - - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic -works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm -concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared -with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project -Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. - - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. -unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily -keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. - - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: - - http://www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/old/55503-0.zip b/old/55503-0.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 5b9a1ff..0000000 --- a/old/55503-0.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h.zip b/old/55503-h.zip Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 0a8ee1f..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h.zip +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/55503-h.htm b/old/55503-h/55503-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index 6eac858..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/55503-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,12546 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> - <title> - The Project Gutenberg eBook of Horrors and Atrocities of the Great War, by Logan Marshall. - </title> - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - <style type="text/css"> - - a - {text-decoration: none;} - a:hover - {text-decoration: underline;} - .allclear - {clear: both;} - body - {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; max-width: 65em;} - .caption - {font-size: .9em;} - .caption.main - {text-align: center; text-indent: 0; line-height: 1.5em;} - .caption.secondcenter - {text-align: center; line-height: .9em; margin-top: .5em; text-indent: 0;} - .caption.secondjust - {text-align: justify; line-height: .9em; margin-top: .5em;} - .center - {text-align: center; text-indent: 0;} - .centerblock - {text-align: center; margin: 0 auto;} - .centerblock p - {display: inline-block; text-indent: 0;} - .clearboth - {clear: both; line-height: .001em;} - .copyright - {float: right; padding-left: 1em; display: inline-block;} - @media handheld {.copyright {float: right; display: block;}} - .courtesy - {margin-top: .75em; margin-bottom: .75em; font-size: .9em;} - div.split5050 - {clear: both;} - @media handheld {div.split5050 {clear: both;}} - div.split5050 div.leftsplit5050 - {float: left; clear: left; width: 49%;} - @media handheld {div.split5050 div.leftsplit5050 {float: left; clear: left;}} - div.split5050 div.rightsplit5050 - {float: right; clear: right; width: 49%;} - @media handheld {div.split5050 div.rightsplit5050 {float: right; clear: right;}} - .figcenter - {margin: 1.5em auto; text-align: center;} - .fnanchor - {vertical-align: top; font-size: 1em; text-decoration: none; white-space: nowrap; color: black; padding-left: 0;} - @media handheld {.fnanchor {display: none;}} - .footnote - {margin: 1em 0 1em 10%; font-size: .9em;} - .footnote .label - {font-size: .9em; vertical-align: 10%;} - .footnote p - {margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent: 0; line-height: .9em;} - .fsize60 - {font-size: .6em;} - .fsize70 - {font-size: .7em;} - .fsize80 - {font-size: .8em;} - .fsize90 - {font-size: .9em;} - .fsize110 - {font-size: 1.1em;} - .fsize175 - {font-size: 1.75em;} - .fsize200 - {font-size: 2em;} - .germanynote - {margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em;} - .germanynote .sigright - {text-align: right; padding-right: 1em; margin-top: .5em;} - h1, - h2, - h3, - h4 - {text-align: center; margin-top: 1.5em; margin-bottom: 1.5em; page-break-after: avoid;} - h1 .gesp - {letter-spacing: .24em;} - @media handheld {h1 .gesp {letter-spacing: normal;}} - h2 - {font-size: 1.1em;} - h2 .chapauthor - {font-weight: normal; line-height: 2em;} - h2 .chapno - {font-weight: normal; line-height: 3em;} - h2 .chaptitle - {line-height: 1.5em;} - h3 - {font-weight: normal; font-size: .9em;} - h4 - {font-weight: normal; font-size: .9em;} - .hh - {display: none;} - @media handheld {.hh {display: block;}} - hr - {width: 34%; margin: 2em 33%; color: black; clear: none;} - hr.chap - {width: 26%; margin: 1em 37%; page-break-after: avoid; clear: both;} - .imagetext - {color: gray; font-size: .6em; margin: 0; padding: 0; text-indent: 0;} - .intellect - {text-align: center; margin: 2em auto; border: solid medium; padding: 1em; max-width: 22em;} - .intellect p.body - {margin-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em;} - .jesusquote - {margin-top: .75em; margin-bottom: .75em;} - .left - {text-align: left;} - .notice - {text-align: center; margin: 2em auto; max-width: 18em;} - .notice p.heading - {line-height: 3em; text-indent: 0; text-align: center;} - .notice p.sigleft - {line-height: 1.5em; text-align: left; text-indent: 0;} - .notice p.sigright - {line-height: 1.5em; text-align: right;} - .nowrap - {white-space: nowrap; display: inline-block; text-indent: 0;} - .oldtype - {font-family: "Old English Text MT",sans-serif;} - p - {margin-top: 0; text-align: justify; margin-bottom: 0; text-indent: 1em;} - p.blankbefore025 - {margin-top: .25em;} - p.blankbefore1 - {margin-top: 1em;} - p.blankbefore2 - {margin-top: 2em;} - p.center - {text-align: center; text-indent: 0;} - p.highline3 - {line-height: 3em;} - p.largeillo - {text-align: right; font-size: .9em; margin-bottom: .75em;} - @media handheld {p.largeillo {display: none;}} - p.noindent - {text-indent: 0;} - p.thinline - {line-height: .001em;} - .padl1 - {padding-left: .5em;} - .padl3 - {padding-left: 1.5em;} - .padr1 - {padding-right: .5em;} - .padr2 - {padding-right: 1em;} - .padr3 - {padding-right: 1.5em;} - .pagenum - {position: absolute; right: 2%; font-size: .75em; text-align: right; color: gray; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal; - font-style: normal; text-indent: 0;} - @media handheld {.pagenum {display: none;}} - .poem - {margin-left: 10%; text-align: left; font-size: .9em;} - .poem br - {display: none;} - .poem .stanza - {margin: 1em 0 1em 0;} - .poem span.i0 - {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} - .poem span.i00 - {display: block; margin-left: -.5em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} - .poemcenter - {text-align: center; margin: 0 auto; display: block;} - .poemcenter .poem - {display: inline-block; margin: 0; text-align: left;} - @media handheld {poemcenter .poem {display: block;}} - .protestnote - {text-align: center; margin: 2em auto; border: solid thin; padding: .25em; max-width: 37em;} - .protestnote .insidebox - {border: solid thin; padding: .5em; display: inline-block;} - .protestnote .american - {float: left; clear: left; width: 49%;} - @media handheld {protestnote .american {float: left; clear: left;}} - .protestnote .german - {float: right; clear: right; width: 49%;} - @media handheld {.protestnote .german {float: right; clear: right;}} - .right - {text-align: right;} - .smcap - {font-variant: small-caps;} - .smcapall - {font-size: .75em;} - .split4060 - {clear: both;} - @media handheld {div.split4060 {clear: both;}} - .split4060 div.leftsplit4060 - {float: left; clear: left; width: 39%;} - @media handheld {div.split4060 div.leftsplit4060 {float: left; clear: left;}} - .split4060 div.rightsplit4060 - {float: right; clear: right; width: 59%;} - @media handheld {div.split4060 div.rightsplit4060 {float: right; clear: right;}} - .starline - {text-align: center; text-indent: 0; line-height: 4em; letter-spacing: 3em; margin-right: -3em;} - .scr - {display: block;} - @media handheld {.scr {display: none;}} - .subjects - {text-indent: 0; margin: 1em 10% 2em 10%; font-size: .8em;} - table - {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: 1em; border-collapse: collapse;} - table.toc - {margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em;} - table.toc td.chapname - {text-align: justify; padding-left: 1em; text-indent: -1em; padding-right: 1em; vertical-align: top;} - table.toc td.chapname .author - {text-align: justify; padding-left: 2em; text-indent: -1em; padding-right: 1em; vertical-align: top;} - table.toc td.chapnr - {text-align: right; padding-right: 1em; vertical-align: top;} - table.toc td.pageno - {text-align: right; padding-right: .25em; vertical-align: bottom;} - .titpag - {margin: 2em auto; padding: 1em; text-align: center; width: 35em; border: solid thin;} - .titpag hr.ornament - {width: 10%; margin: 2em 45%;} - .tnbot - {border: dashed thin; margin: 1em 10%; padding: .5em;} - .tnbot h2 - {font-size: 1em;} - .tnbot p - {text-indent: -1em; margin-left: 1em;} - .tnbox - {border: dashed thin; margin: 1em 20%; padding: 1em;} - .underl - {text-decoration: underline;} - .w25m - {width: 24em;} - .w300 - {width: 300px;} - .w400 - {width: 400px;} - .w450 - {width: 450px;} - .w500 - {width: 500px;} - .w600 - {width: 600px;} - - </style> - </head> -<body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Horrors and Atrocities of the Great War, by -Logan Marshall and Gilbert Parker and Vance Thompson and Philip Gibbs - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license - - -Title: Horrors and Atrocities of the Great War - Including the Tragic Destruction of the Lusitania - -Author: Logan Marshall - Gilbert Parker - Vance Thompson - Philip Gibbs - -Release Date: September 7, 2017 [EBook #55503] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HORRORS AND ATROCITIES *** - - - - -Produced by Brian Coe, Harry Lam, Hathi Trust (for some -illustrations) and the Online Distributed Proofreading -Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from -images generously made available by The Internet Archive) - - - - - - -</pre> - - -<div class="tnbox"> -<p class="center">Please see the <a href="#TN">Transcriber’s Notes</a> at the end of this text.</p> -</div> - -<div class="scr"> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/cover_sm.jpg" alt="cover" width="416" height="600" /> -</div> - -</div><!--scr--> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter w500"> - -<img src="images/illo001.jpg" alt="frontispiece" width="500" height="592" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Merciless Monster of the Deep.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">The murderous German submarine sighting its prey. Sinking under water it -launched the fatal torpedo and its helpless victim, crowded with innocent men, -women and children, was doomed.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="titpag"> - -<h1><b><span class="underl">HORRORS AND ATROCITIES<br /> -<span class="gesp">OF THE GREAT WAR</span></span><br /> -<span class="fsize70">Including the Tragic Destruction of the Lusitania</span></b></h1> - -<div class="centerblock w25m"> - -<p class="center"><span class="fsize110"><b>A NEW KIND OF WARFARE</b></span><br /> -——<span class="fsize80">COMPRISING</span>——</p> - -<p class="noindent">The Desolation of Belgium, the Sacking of Louvain, the Shelling of -Defenseless Cities, the Wanton Destruction of Cathedrals and Works of -Art, the Horrors of Bomb Dropping</p> - -<p class="center">——<span class="fsize80">VIVIDLY PORTRAYING</span>——</p> - -<p class="noindent">The Grim Awfulness of this Greatest of All Wars Fought on Land and Sea, in -the Air and Under the Waves, Leaving in Its Wake a Dreadful Trail of -Famine and Pestilence</p> - -</div><!--centerblock--> - -<hr class="ornament" /> - -<p class="center fsize80"><b>By LOGAN MARSHALL</b><br /> -Author of “The Sinking of the Titanic,” “Myths and<br /> -Legends of All Nations,” etc.</p> - -<p class="center blankbefore2">With Special Chapters by</p> - -<div class="split5050"> - -<div class="leftsplit5050"> - -<p class="center fsize80"><b>SIR GILBERT PARKER</b><br /> -Author of “The Right of Way”</p> - -</div><!--leftsplit5050--> - -<div class="rightsplit5050"> - -<p class="center fsize80"><b>VANCE THOMPSON</b><br /> -Author of “Spinners of Life”</p> - -</div><!--rightsplit5050--> - -<p class="thinline allclear"> </p> - -</div><!--split5050--> - -<p class="thinline allclear"> </p> - -<p class="center fsize80"><b>PHILIP GIBBS</b><br /> -Author of “The Street of Adventure,” Special<br /> -Correspondent on <i>The London Daily Chronicle</i>.</p> - -<hr class="ornament" /> - -<p class="center highline3"><span class="oldtype"><b>Illustrated</b></span></p> - -<hr class="ornament" /> - -</div><!--titpag--> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p class="center"><span class="smcap">Copyright</span> 1915<br /> -By L. T. MYERS</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page3">[3]</a></span></p> - -<h2>INTRODUCTION</h2> - -<p class="jesusquote">“<i>Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of -these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.</i>”—<span class="smcap">Jesus of -Nazareth</span></p> - -<p>The sight of all Europe engaged in the most terrific -conflict in the history of mankind is a heartrending -spectacle. On the east, on the south and on the -west the blood-lust leaders have flung their deluded -millions upon unbending lines of steel, martyrs to the -glorification of Mars.</p> - -<p>We see millions of men taken from their homes, their -shops and their factories; we see them equipped and -organized and mobilized for the express purpose of -devastating the homes of other men; we see them -making wreckage of property; we see them wasting, -with fire and sword, the accumulated efforts of generations -in the field of things material; we see the commerce -of the world brought to a standstill, all its -transportation systems interrupted, and, still worse, the -amenities of life so placed in jeopardy for long generations -to come that the progress of the world is halted, -its material and physical progress turned to retrogression.</p> - -<p class="jesusquote">“<i>Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of -these my brethren, ye have done it unto me!</i>”</p> - -<p>But this is not the worst. We see myriads of men -banded together to practice open violation of the very<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page4">[4]</a></span> -fundamental tenets of humanity; we see the worst -passions of mankind, murder, theft, lust, arson, -pillage—all the baser possibilities of human nature—coming -to the surface. Outside of the natural killing -of war, hundreds of men have been murdered, often -with incidents of the most revolting brutality; children -have been slaughtered; women have been outraged, -killed and shamefully mutilated. And this we see -among peoples who have no possible cause for personal -quarrel.</p> - -<p class="jesusquote">“<i>Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of -these my brethren, ye have done it unto me!</i>”</p> - -<p>To all human beings of normal mentality it must -have seemed that the destruction of the Lusitania -marked the apex of horror. There is, indeed, nothing -in modern history—nothing, at least, since the Black -Hole of Calcutta and some of the indescribable atrocities -of Kurdish fanatics—to supply the mind with a vantage -ground from which to measure the causeless and profitless -savagery of this black deed of murder.</p> - -<p>To talk of “warning” having been given on the day -the Lusitania sailed is puerile. So does the Black Hand -send its warnings. So does Jack the Ripper write his -defiant letters to the police. Nothing of this prevents -us from regarding such miscreants as wild beasts, -against whom society has to defend itself at all hazards.</p> - -<p>There are many reasons but not a single excuse for -the war. When a man, or a nation, wants what a -rival holds and makes a violent effort to enter into -possession thereof, right and conscience and duty before -God and to one’s neighbor are forgotten in the struggle.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page5">[5]</a></span> -Man reverts to the brute. Loose rein is given to -passion, and the worst appears. The fair edifice of -sobriety and amity and just dealing between man and -man, upreared by civilization in centuries of travail, -is rent asunder, stone from stone. The inner shrine -of the inalienable sense of human brotherhood is -profaned. One cannot reconcile with any program for -the lasting accomplishment of good and the victory -of the truth, this fever of murder on a grand scale, -this insensate madness of pillage and slaughter that -goes from alarum and counter-alarum to overt acts -of fiendish and sickening brutality, palliated because -they are done by anonymous thousands instead of by -one man who can be named.</p> - -<p class="jesusquote">“<i>Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of -these my brethren, ye have done it unto me!</i>”</p> - -<p>It is civilization that is being shot down by machine -guns in Europe. That great German host is not made -up of mercenaries, nor of the type of men that at one -time composed armies. There are Ehrlichs serving as -privates in the ranks and in the French corps are -Rostands. A bullet does not kill a man; it destroys -a generation of learning, annihilates the mentality -which was about to be humanity’s instrument in -unearthing another of nature’s secrets. The very -vehicles of progress are the victims. It will take years -to train their equals, decades perhaps to reproduce -the intelligence that was ripe to do its work. The -chances of the acquisition of knowledge are being -sacrificed. Far more than half of the learning on which -the world depends for progress is turned from laboratories<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page6">[6]</a></span> -and workshops into the destructive arenas of -battle.</p> - -<p>It is indeed a war against civilization. The personnel -of the armies makes it so. Every battle is the -sacrifice of human assets that cannot be replaced. -That is the real tragedy of this stupendous conflict.</p> - -<p>Perhaps it is better that the inevitable has come so -soon. The burden of preparation was beginning to -stagger Europe. There may emerge from the whirlpool -new dynasties, new methods, new purposes. This may -be the furnace necessary to purge humanity of its -brutal perspective. The French Revolution gave an -impulse to democracy which it has never lost. This -conflict may teach men the folly of dying for trade or -avarice. But whatever it does, it is not too much to -hope that the capital and energy of humanity will -become again manifest in justice and moral achievement, -until the place of a nation on the map becomes -absolutely subordinate to the place it occupies in the -uplift of humanity.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page7">[7]</a></span></p> - -<h2>CONTENTS</h2> - -<table class="toc" summary="toc"> - -<tr> -<td colspan="3" class="right fsize60">PAGE</td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td> </td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Introduction</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page3">3</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">I.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">The Supreme Crime Against Civilization: The Tragic Destruction of the Lusitania</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page9">9</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">II.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">The Heroes of the Lusitania and Their Heroism</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page22">22</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">III.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Soul-Stirring Stories of Survivors of the Lusitania</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page34">34</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">IV.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">A Canadian’s Account of the Lusitania Horror</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page50">50</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">V.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">The Plot Against the Rescue Ships</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page55">55</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">VI.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">British Jury Finds Kaiser a Murderer</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page61">61</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">VII.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">The World-Wide Indictment of Germany for the Lusitania Atrocity</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page69">69</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">VIII.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">America’s Protest Against Uncivilized Warfare</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page81">81</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">IX.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">The German Defense for the Destruction of the Lusitania</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page91">91</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">X.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Swift Reversal to Barbarism</span><br /><span class="author">By Vance Thompson, -American Author and Journalist.</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page101">101</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XI.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Belgium’s Bitter Need</span><br /><span class="author">By Sir Gilbert Parker, -M.P., British Novelist.</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page112">112</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XII.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">James Bryce’s Report on Systematic Massacre in Belgium</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page121">121</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XIII.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">A Belgian Boy’s Story of the Ruin of Aerschot</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page137">137</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XIV.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">The Unspeakable Atrocities of “Civilized Warfare”</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page144">144</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XV.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Destroying the Priceless Monuments of Civilization</span><span -class="pagenum"><a id="Page8">[8]</a></span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page159">159</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XVI.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Wanton Destruction of the Beautiful Cathedral of Rheims</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page169">169</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XVII.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Canadians’ Glorious Feat at Langemarck</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page177">177</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XVIII.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Pitiful Flight of a Million Women</span><br /><span class="author">By Philip Gibbs, -English Author and Journalist.</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page195">195</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XIX.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Facing Death in the Trenches</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page207">207</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XX.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">A Vivid Picture of War</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page221">221</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXI.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Harrowing Scenes Along the Battle Lines</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page228">228</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXII.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">What the Men in the Trenches Write Home</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page234">234</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXIII.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Bombarding Undefended Cities</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page240">240</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXIV.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Germany’s Fatal War Zone</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page246">246</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXV.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Multitudinous Tragedies at Sea</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page251">251</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXVI.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">How “Neutral” Waters Are Violated</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page255">255</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXVII.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">The Terrible Distress of Poland</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page259">259</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXVIII.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">The Ghastly Havoc Wrought by the Air-Demons</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page267">267</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXIX.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">The Deadly Submarine and Its Stealthy Destruction</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page273">273</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXX.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">The Terrible Work of Artillery in War</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page280">280</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXXI.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Wholesale Slaughter by Poisonous Gases</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page286">286</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXXII.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">“Usages of War on Land”: The Official German Manual</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page294">294</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXXIII.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">The Sacrifice of the Horse in Warfare</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page299">299</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXXIV.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">Scourges That Follow in the Wake of Battle</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page303">303</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXXV.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">War’s Repair Shop: Caring for the Wounded</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page308">308</a></td> -</tr> - -<tr> -<td class="chapnr">XXXVI.</td> -<td class="chapname"><span class="smcap">What Will the Horrors and Atrocities of the Great War Lead to?</span></td> -<td class="pageno"><a href="#Page314">314</a></td> -</tr> - -</table> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo010.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="387" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Giant Steamship “Lusitania” Torpedoed by the -Germans off the Coast of Ireland</span>.</p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">The English Cunarder, “Lusitania,” one of the largest and fastest -passenger vessels in the world, was torpedoed -and sunk by a German submarine in a few minutes with the loss of two-thirds of her passengers and crew, among whom -were more than one hundred American citizens. The vessel was entirely unarmed and a noncombatant. <span class="copyright">(<i>Copyright -by Underwood and Underwood.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo011a.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="244" /> -<img src="images/illo011b.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="556" /> - -<p class="imagetext left">Top left: Persicope—Kiosque—Ballast—Machine—Ballast</p> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The German Submarine and How it Works.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">Upper left picture shows a section at center of the vessel. Upper -right view shows the submarine at the surface with two torpedo tubes -visible at the stern. The large picture illustrates how this monster attacks -a vessel like the Lusitania by launching a torpedo beneath the water while -securing its observation through the periscope, just above the waves.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page9">[9]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER I</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">THE SUPREME CRIME AGAINST CIVILIZATION:<br /> -THE TRAGIC DESTRUCTION -OF THE LUSITANIA</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef1_1">AN UNPRECEDENTED CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY</a> — <a href="#SecRef1_2">THE -LUSITANIA: BUILT FOR SAFETY</a>—<a href="#SecRef1_3">GERMANY’S -ANNOUNCED INTENTION TO SINK THE VESSEL</a> — <a href="#SecRef1_4">LINER’S -SPEED INCREASED AS DANGER NEARED</a> — <a href="#SecRef1_5">SUBMARINE’S -PERISCOPE DIPS UNDER SURFACE</a> — <a href="#SecRef1_6">PASSENGERS -OVERCOME BY POISONOUS FUMES</a> — <a href="#SecRef1_7">BOAT -CAPSIZES WITH WOMEN AND CHILDREN</a> — <a href="#SecRef1_8">HUNDREDS -JUMP INTO THE SEA</a> — <a href="#SecRef1_9">THE LUSITANIA -GOES TO HER DOOM</a> — <a href="#SecRef1_10">INTERVIEW WITH CAPTAIN -TURNER</a>.</p> - -<p>No thinking man—whether he believes or disbelieves -in war—expects to have war without the horrors -and atrocities which accompany it. That “war is -hell” is as true now as when General Sherman so -pronounced it. It seems, indeed, to be truer today. -And yet we have always thought—perhaps because -we hoped—that there was a limit at which even war, -with all its lust of blood, with all its passion of hatred, -with all its devilish zest for efficiency in the destruction -of human life, would stop.</p> - -<p>Now we know that there is no limit at which the -makers of war, in their frenzy to pile horror on horror, -and atrocity on atrocity, will stop. We have seen -a nation despoiled and raped because it resisted an<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page10">[10]</a></span> -invader, and we said that was war. But now out of -the sun-lit waves has come a venomous instrument -of destruction, and without warning, without respite -for escape, has sent headlong to the bottom of the -everlasting sea more than a thousand unarmed, unresisting, -peace-bent men, women and children—even -babes in arms. So the Lusitania was sunk. It may -be war, but it is something incalculably more sobering -than merely that. It is the difference between assassination -and massacre. It is war’s supreme crime -against civilization.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef1_1">AN UNPRECEDENTED CRIME AGAINST HUMANITY</h3> - -<p>The horror of the deadly assault on the Lusitania -does not lessen as the first shock of the disaster recedes -into the past. The world is aghast. It had not taken -the German threat at full value; it did not believe -that any civilized nation would be so wanton in its -lust and passion of war as to count a thousand non-combatant -lives a mere unfortunate incidental of the -carnage.</p> - -<p>Nothing that can be said in mitigation of the destruction -of the Lusitania can alter the fact that an outrage -unknown heretofore in the warfare of civilized nations -has been committed. Regardless of the technicalities -which may be offered as a defense in international -law, there are rights which must be asserted, must be -defended and maintained. If international law can be -torn to shreds and converted into scrap paper to serve -the necessities of war, its obstructive letter can be -disregarded when it is necessary to serve the rights of -humanity.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page11">[11]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> - -<img src="images/illo014.jpg" alt="Cartoon" width="406" height="600" /> -<p class="imagetext left">HATE<br /> -CIVILIZATION--ART--RELIGION</p> -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Triumph of Hate.</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page12">[12]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef1_2">THE LUSITANIA: BUILT FOR “SAFETY”</h3> - -<p>The irony of the situation lies in the fact that from -the ghastly experience of great marine disasters the -Lusitania was evolved as a vessel that was “safe.” -No such calamity as the attack of a torpedo was foreseen -by the builders of the giant ship, and yet, even -after the outbreak of the European war, and when -upon the eve of her last voyage the warning came -that an attempt would be made to torpedo the Lusitania, -her owners confidently assured the world that -the ship was safe because her great speed would enable -her to outstrip any submarine ever built.</p> - -<p>Limitation of language makes adequate word description -of this mammoth Cunarder impossible. The -following figures show its immense dimensions: Length, -790 feet; breadth, 88 feet; depth, to boat deck, 80 feet; -draught, fully loaded, 37 feet, 6 inches; displacement on -load line, 45,000 tons; height to top of funnels, 155 -feet; height to mastheads, 216 feet. The hull below -draught line was divided into 175 water-tight compartments, -which made it—so the owners claimed—“unsinkable.” -With complete safety device equipment, -including wireless telegraph, Mundy-Gray -improved method of submarine signaling, and with -officers and crew all trained and reliable men, the -Lusitania was acclaimed as being unexcelled from a -standpoint of safety, as in all other respects.</p> - -<p>Size, however, was its least remarkable feature. -The ship was propelled by four screws rotated by -turbine engines of 68,000 horse-power, capable of -developing a sea speed of more than twenty-five knots -per hour regardless of weather conditions, and of<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page13">[13]</a></span> -maintaining without driving a schedule with the -regularity of a railroad train, and thus establishing -its right to the title of “the fastest ocean greyhound.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef1_3">GERMANY’S ANNOUNCED INTENTION TO SINK THE -VESSEL</h3> - -<p>On Saturday May 1, 1915, the day on which the -Cunard liner Lusitania, carrying 2,000 passengers and -crew, sailed from New York for Liverpool, the following -advertisement, over the name of the Imperial German -Embassy, was published in the leading newspapers of -the United States:</p> - -<div class="notice"> - -<p class="heading">NOTICE!</p> - -<p>TRAVELERS intending to embark on the -Atlantic voyage are reminded that a state of -war exists between Germany and her allies -and Great Britain and her allies; that the -zone of war includes the waters adjacent to -the British Isles; that, in accordance with -formal notice given by the Imperial German -Government, vessels flying the flag of Great -Britain, or of any of her allies, are liable to -destruction in those waters and that travelers -sailing in the war zone on ships of Great Britain -or her allies do so at their own risk.</p> - -<p class="sigright">IMPERIAL GERMAN EMBASSY.</p> - -<p class="sigleft"><span class="smcap">Washington</span>, D. C., April 22, 1915.</p> - -</div><!--notice--> - -<p>The advertisement was commented upon by the -passengers of the Lusitania, but it did not cause any -of them to cancel their bookings. No one took the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page14">[14]</a></span> -matter seriously. It was not conceivable that even -the German military lords could seriously plot so -dastardly an attack on non-combatants.</p> - -<p>When the attention of Captain W. T. Turner, -commander of the Lusitania, was called to the warning, -he laughed and said: “It doesn’t seem as if they had -scared many people from going on the ship by the -looks of the passenger list.”</p> - -<p>Agents of the Cunard Line said there was no truth in -reports that several prominent passengers had received -anonymous telegrams warning them not to sail on -the Lusitania. Charles T. Bowring, president of the -St. George’s Society, who was a passenger, said that -it was a silly performance for the German Embassy -to do.</p> - -<p>Charles Klein, the American playwright, said he was -going to devote his time on the voyage to thinking of -his new play, “Potash and Perlmutter in Society,” -and would not have time to worry about trifles.</p> - -<p>Alfred G. Vanderbilt was one of the last to go on -board.</p> - -<p>Elbert Hubbard, publisher of the Philistine, who -sailed with his wife, said he believed the German -Emperor had ordered the advertisement to be placed -in the newspapers, and added jokingly that if he was -on board the liner when she was torpedoed, he would -be able to do the Kaiser justice in the Philistine.</p> - -<p>The early days of the voyage were unmarked by -incidents other than those which have interested ocean -passengers on countless previous trips, and little -apprehension was felt by those on the Lusitania of the -fate which lay ahead of the vessel.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page15">[15]</a></span></p> - -<p>The ship was proceeding at a moderate speed, -on Friday, May 7, when she passed Fastnet Light, off -Cape Clear, the extreme southwesterly point of Ireland -that is first sighted by east-bound liners. Captain -Turner was on the bridge, with his staff captain and -other officers, maintaining a close lookout. Fastnet -left behind, the Lusitania’s course was brought closer -to shore, probably within twelve miles of the rock-bound -coast.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef1_4">LINER’S SPEED INCREASED AS DANGER NEARED</h3> - -<p>Her speed was also increased to twenty knots or -more, according to the more observant passengers, -and some declare that she worked a sort of zigzag -course, plainly ready to shift her helm whenever danger -should appear. Captain Turner, it is known, was -watching closely for any evidence of submarines.</p> - -<p>One of the passengers, Dr. Daniel Moore, of Yankton, -S. D., declared that before he went downstairs to -luncheon shortly after one o’clock he and others with -him noticed, through a pair of marine glasses, a curious -object in the sea, possibly two miles or more away. -What it was he could not determine, but he jokingly -referred to it later at luncheon as a submarine.</p> - -<p>While the first cabin passengers were chatting over -their coffee cups they felt the ship give a great leap -forward. Full speed ahead had suddenly been signaled -from the bridge. This was a few minutes after two -o’clock, and just about the time that Ellison Myers, -of Stratford, Ontario, a boy on his way to join the -British Navy, noticed the periscope of a submarine -about a mile away to starboard. Myers and his<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page16">[16]</a></span> -companions saw Captain Turner hurriedly give orders -to the helmsman and ring for full speed to the engine -room.</p> - -<p>The Lusitania began to swerve to starboard, heading -for the submarine, but before she could really answer -her helm a torpedo was flashing through the water -toward her at express speed. Myers and his companions, -like many others of the passengers, saw the white -wake of the torpedo and its metal casing gleaming in -the bright sunlight. The weather was ideal, light -winds and a clear sky making the surface of the ocean as -calm and smooth as could be wished by any traveler.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef1_5">SUBMARINE’S PERISCOPE DIPS UNDER SURFACE</h3> - -<p>The torpedo came on, aimed apparently at the bow -of the ship, but nicely calculated to hit her amidships. -Before its wake was seen the periscope of the submarine -had vanished beneath the surface.</p> - -<p>In far less time than it takes to tell, the torpedo had -crashed into the Lusitania’s starboard side, just abaft -the first funnel, and exploded with a dull boom in the -forward stoke-hole.</p> - -<p>Captain Turner at once ordered the helm put over -and the prow of the ship headed for land, in the hope -that she might strike shallow water while still under -way. The boats were ordered out, and the signals -calling the boat crews to their stations were flashed -everywhere through the vessel.</p> - -<p>Several of the life-boats were already swung out, -according to some survivors, there having been a life-saving -drill earlier in the day before the ship spoke -Fastnet Light.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page17">[17]</a></span></p> - -<p>Down in the dining saloon the passengers felt the -ship reel from the shock of the explosion and many were -hurled from their chairs. Before they could recover -themselves, another explosion occurred. There is a -difference of opinion as to the number of torpedoes -fired. Some say there were two; others say only one -torpedo struck the vessel, and that the second explosion -was internal.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef1_6">PASSENGERS OVERCOME BY POISONOUS FUMES</h3> - -<p>In any event, the passengers now realized their -danger. The ship, torn almost apart, was filled with -fumes and smoke, the decks were covered with débris -that fell from the sky, and the great Lusitania began -to list quickly to starboard. Before the passengers -below decks could make their way above, the decks -were beginning to slant ominously, and the air was -filled with the cries of terrified men and women, some -of them already injured by being hurled against the -sides of the saloons. Many passengers were stricken -unconscious by the smoke and fumes from the exploding -torpedoes.</p> - -<p>The stewards and stewardesses, recognizing the too -evident signs of a sinking ship, rushed about urging -and helping the passengers to put on life-belts, of which -more than 3,000 were aboard.</p> - -<p>On the boat deck attempts were being made to -lower the life-boats, but several causes combined to -impede the efforts of the crew in this direction. The -port side of the vessel was already so far up that the -boats on that side were quite useless, and as the starboard -boats were lowered the plunging vessel—she was<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page18">[18]</a></span> -still under headway, for all efforts to reverse the engines -proved useless—swung back and forth, and when they -struck the water were dragged along through the sea, -making it almost impossible to get them away.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef1_7">BOAT CAPSIZES WITH WOMEN AND CHILDREN</h3> - -<p>The first life-boat that struck the water capsized -with some sixty women and children aboard her, and -all of these must have been drowned almost instantly. -Ten more boats were lowered, the desperate expedient -of cutting away the ropes being resorted to to prevent -them from being dragged along by the now halting -steamer.</p> - -<p>The great ship was sinking by the bow, foot by foot, -and in ten minutes after the first explosion she was -already preparing to founder. Her stern rose high -in the air, so that those in the boats that got away -could see the whirring propellers, and even the boat -deck was awash.</p> - -<p>Captain Turner urged the men to be calm, to take -care of the women and children, and megaphoned the -passengers to seize life-belts, chairs—anything they -could lay hands on to save themselves from drowning. -There was never any question in the captain’s mind -that the ship was about to sink, and if, as reported, -some of the stewards ran about advising the passengers -not to take to the boats, that there was no danger of -the vessel going down till she reached shore, it was done -without his orders. But many of the survivors have -denied this, and declared that all the crew, officers, -stewards and sailors, even the stokers, who dashed up -from their flaming quarters below, showed the utmost<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page19">[19]</a></span> -bravery and calmness in the face of the disaster, and -sought in every way to aid the panic-stricken passengers -to get off the ship.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef1_8">HUNDREDS JUMP INTO THE SEA</h3> - -<p>When it was seen that most of the boats would be -useless, hundreds of passengers donned life-belts and -jumped into the sea. Others seized deck chairs, -tubs, kegs, anything available, and hurled themselves -into the water, clinging to these articles.</p> - -<p>The first-cabin passengers fared worst, for the second- -and third-cabin travelers had long before finished their -midday meal and were on deck when the torpedo -struck. But the first-cabin people on the D deck and -in the balcony, at luncheon, were at a terrible disadvantage, -and those who had already finished were in -their staterooms resting or cleaning up preparatory -to the after luncheon day.</p> - -<p>The confusion on the stairways became terrible, and -the great number of little children, more than 150 -of them under two years, a great many of them infants -in arms, made the plight of the women still more -desperate.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef1_9">LUSITANIA GOES TO HER DOOM</h3> - -<p>After the life-boats had cut adrift it was plain that -a few seconds would see the end of the great ship. -With a great shiver she bent her bow down below the -surface, and then her stern uprose, and with a horrible -sough the liner that had been the pride of the Cunard -Line, plunged down in sixty fathoms of water. In -the last few seconds the hundreds of women and men,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page20">[20]</a></span> -a great many of them carrying children in their arms, -leaped overboard, but hundreds of others, delaying -the jump too long, were carried down in the suction -that left a huge whirlpool swirling about the spot where -the last of the vessel was seen.</p> - -<p>Among these were Elbert Hubbard and his wife, -Charles Frohman, who was crippled with rheumatism -and unable to move quickly; Justus Miles Forman, -Charles Klein, Alfred G. Vanderbilt and many others -of the best-known Americans and Englishmen aboard.</p> - -<p>Captain Turner stayed on the bridge as the ship -went down, but before the last plunge he bade his -staff officer and the helmsman, who were still with him, -to save themselves. The helmsman leaped into the -sea and was saved, but the staff officer would not -desert his superior, and went down with the ship. He -did not come to the surface again.</p> - -<p>Captain Turner, however, a strong swimmer, rose -after the eddying whirlpool had calmed down, and, -seizing a couple of deck chairs, kept himself afloat -for three hours. The master-at-arms of the Lusitania, -named Williams, who was looking for survivors in a -boat after he had been picked up, saw the flash of the -captain’s gold-braided uniform, and rescued him, more -dead than alive.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef1_10">INTERVIEW WITH CAPTAIN TURNER</h3> - -<p>Despite the doubt as to whether two torpedoes -exploded, or whether the first detonation caused the -big liner’s boilers to let go, Captain Turner stated that -there was no doubt that at least two torpedoes reached -the ship.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page21">[21]</a></span></p> - -<p>“I am not certain whether the two explosions—and -there were two—resulted from torpedoes, or whether -one was a boiler explosion. I am sure, however, that -I saw the first torpedo strike the vessel on her starboard -side. I also saw a second torpedo apparently headed -straight for the steamship’s hull, directly below the -suite occupied by Alfred G. Vanderbilt.”</p> - -<p>When asked if the second explosion had been caused -by the blowing up of ammunition stored in the liner’s -hull, Captain Turner said:</p> - -<p>“No; if ammunition had exploded that would -probably have torn the ship apart and the loss of life -would have been much heavier than it was.”</p> - -<p>Captain Turner declared that, from the bridge, he -saw the torpedo streaking toward the Lusitania and -tried to change the ship’s course to avoid the missile, -but was unable to do so in time. The only thing left -for him to do was to rush the liner ashore and beach -her, and she was headed for the Irish coast when she -foundered.</p> - -<p>According to Captain Turner, the German submarine -did not flee at once after torpedoing the liner.</p> - -<p>“While I was swimming about after the ship had -disappeared I saw the periscope of the submarine rise -amidst the débris,” said he. “Instead of offering any -help the submarine immediately submerged herself and -I saw nothing more of her. I did everything possible -for my passengers. That was all I could do.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page22">[22]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER II</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">THE HEROES OF THE LUSITANIA AND -THEIR HEROISM</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef2_1">ALFRED G. VANDERBILT GAVE LIFE FOR A WOMAN</a> — <a href="#SecRef2_2">CHARLES -FROHMAN DIED WITHOUT FEAR</a> — <a href="#SecRef2_3">SAVING -THE BABIES</a> — <a href="#SecRef2_4">TORONTO GIRL OF FOURTEEN PROVES -HEROINE</a> — <a href="#SecRef2_5">HEROISM OF CAPTAIN TURNER AND HIS -CREW</a> — <a href="#SecRef2_6">WOMAN RESCUED WITH DEAD BABY AT -HER BREAST</a> — <a href="#SecRef2_7">HEROIC WIRELESS OPERATORS</a> — <a href="#SecRef2_8">SAVED -HIS WIFE AND HELPED IN RESCUE WORK</a> — <a href="#SecRef2_9">“SAVED -ALL THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN WE -COULD.”</a></p> - -<p>Every great calamity produces its great heroes. -Particularly is this true of marine disasters, where the -opportunities of escape are limited, and where the -heroism of the strong often impels them to stand back -and give place to the weak. One cannot think of the -Titanic disaster without remembering Major Archibald -Butt, Colonel John Jacob Astor, Henry B. Harris, -William T. Stead and others, nor of the sinking of the -Empress of Ireland without calling to mind Dr. James -F. Grant, the ship’s surgeon; Sir Henry Seton-Karr, -Lawrence Irving, H. R. O’Hara of Toronto, and the -rest of the noble company of heroes. So the destruction -of the Lusitania brought uppermost in the breasts -of many those qualities of fortitude and self-sacrifice -which will forever mark them in the calendar of the -world’s martyrs.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page23">[23]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef2_1">ALFRED G. VANDERBILT GAVE LIFE FOR A WOMAN</h3> - -<p>Among the Lusitania’s heroes, one of the foremost -was Alfred Gwynne Vanderbilt, one of America’s -wealthiest men. With everything to live for, Mr. -Vanderbilt sacrificed his one chance for escape from -the doomed Lusitania, in order that a woman might -live. Details of the chivalry he displayed in those -last moments when he tore off a life-belt as he was -about to leap into the sea, and strapped it around a -young woman, were told by three of the survivors.</p> - -<p>Mr. Vanderbilt could not swim, and when he gave -up his life-belt it was with the virtual certainty that -he was surrendering his only chance for life.</p> - -<p>Thomas Slidell, of New York, said he saw Mr. -Vanderbilt on the deck as the Lusitania was sinking. -He was equipped with a life-belt and was climbing over -the rail, when a young woman rushed onto the deck. -Mr. Vanderbilt saw her as he stood poised to leap into -the sea. Without hesitating a moment he jumped back -to the deck, tore off the life-belt, strapped it around the -young woman and dropped her overboard.</p> - -<p>The Lusitania plunged under the waves a few -minutes later and Mr. Vanderbilt was seen to be drawn -into the vortex.</p> - -<p>Norman Ratcliffe, of Gillingham, Kent, and Wallace -B. Phillips, a newspaper man, also saw Mr. Vanderbilt -sink with the Lusitania. The coolness and heroism -he showed were marvelous, they said.</p> - -<p>Oliver P. Bernard, scenic artist at Covent Garden, -saw Mr. Vanderbilt standing near the entrance to the -grand saloon soon after the vessel was torpedoed.</p> - -<p>“He was the personification of sportsmanlike coolness,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page24">[24]</a></span>” -Mr. Bernard said. “In his right hand was -grasped what looked to me like a large purple leather -jewel case. It may have belonged to Lady Mackworth, -as Mr. Vanderbilt had been much in the -company of the Thomas party during the trip and -evidently had volunteered to do Lady Mackworth the -service of saving her gems for her.”</p> - -<p>Another touching incident was told of Mr. Vanderbilt -by Mrs. Stanley L. B. Lines, a Canadian, who said: -“Mr. Vanderbilt will in the future be remembered as -the ‘children’s hero.’ I saw him standing outside the -palm saloon on the starboard side, with Ronald Denit. -He looked upon the scene before him, and then, turning -to his valet, said:</p> - -<p>“‘Find all the kiddies you can and bring them here.’ -The servant rushed off and soon reappeared, herding a -flock of little ones. Mr. Vanderbilt, catching a child -under each arm, ran with them to a life-boat and -dumped them in. He then threw in two more, and -continued at his task until all the young ones were in -the boat. Then he turned his attention to aiding -the women into boats.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef2_2">CHARLES FROHMAN DIED WITHOUT FEAR</h3> - -<p>“Why fear death? It is the most beautiful adventure -in life,” were the last words of Charles Frohman before -he went down with the Lusitania, according to Miss -Rita Jolivet, an American actress, with whom he talked -calmly just before the end came.</p> - -<p>Miss Jolivet, who was among the survivors taken -to Queenstown, said she and Mr. Frohman were -standing on deck as the Lusitania heeled over. They -decided not to trust themselves to life-boats, although -Mr. Frohman believed the ship was doomed. It was -after reaching this decision that he declared he had no -fear of death.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo028.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="387" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Escaping a Torpedo by Rapid Maneuvering.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">This British destroyer escaped a torpedo from a hunted submarine by -quick turning. This incident took place at -the naval fight off the island of Heligoland, in October. <span class="copyright">(<i>Copyright, The Sun News Service.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo029.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="386" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">A New Weapon in Warfare.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">One of the Belgian armored motor cars surprising a party of Uhlans. Several of the enemy were killed by the -rapid fire from swivel machine gun and rifle, but the car driven at a furious pace was wrecked on a fallen horse.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page25">[25]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo030.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="438" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Germany’s Official Paid <a href="#SecRef1_3">Advertisement</a> Forewarning Americans -Against Disaster; Map Showing Where It Took Place.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">This advertisement was wired to forty American newspapers by Count -von Bernstorff, German Ambassador at Washington. It was ordered inserted -on the morning of the day the Lusitania sailed.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p>Dr. F. Warren Pearl, of New York, who was saved, -with his wife and two of their four children, corroborated -Miss Jolivet’s statement, saying:</p> - -<p>“After the first shock, as I made my way to the deck, -I saw Charles Frohman distributing life-belts. Mr. -Frohman evidently did not expect to escape, as he<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page26">[26]</a></span> -said to a woman passenger, ‘Why should we fear death? -It is the greatest adventure man can have.’”</p> - -<p>Sir James M. Barrie, in a tribute to Charles Frohman, -published in the London Daily Mail, describes him -as “the man who never broke his word.</p> - -<p>“His companies were as children to him. He chided -them as children, soothed them as children and forgave -them and certainly loved them as children. He exulted -in those who became great in that world, and gave them -beautiful toys to play with; but great as was their -devotion to him, it is not they who will miss him most, -but rather the far greater number who never made a -hit, but set off like all the rest, and fell by the way. -He was of so sympathetic a nature; he understood so -well the dismalness to them of being failures, that he -saw them as children, with their knuckles to their -eyes, and then he sat back cross-legged on his chair, -with his knuckles, as it were, to his eyes, and life had -lost its flavor for him until he invented a scheme for -giving them another chance.</p> - -<p>“Perhaps it is fitting that all those who only made -for honest mirth and happiness should now go out of -the world; because it is too wicked for them. It is -strange to think that in America, Dernburg and -Bernstorff, who we must believe were once good men, -too, have an extra smile with their breakfast roll -because they and theirs have drowned Charles Frohman.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef2_3">SAVING THE BABIES</h3> - -<p>The presence of so many babies on board the Lusitania -was due to the influx from Canada of the English-born<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page27">[27]</a></span> -wives of Canadians at the battle front, who were -coming to England to live with their own or their -husband’s parents during the war.</p> - -<p>No more pathetic loss has been recorded than that -of F. G. Webster, a Toronto contractor, who was -traveling second class with his wife, their six-year-old -son Frederick and year-old twin sons William and -Henry. They reached the deck with others who were -in the dining saloon when the torpedo struck. Webster -took his son by the hand and darted away to bring -life-belts. When he returned his wife and babies were -not to be seen, nor have they been since.</p> - -<p>W. Harkless, an assistant purser, busied himself -helping others until the Lusitania was about to founder. -Then, seeing a life-boat striking the water that was not -overcrowded, he made a rush for it. The only person -he encountered was little Barbara Anderson, of Bridgeport, -Conn., who was standing alone, clinging to the -rail. Gathering her up in his arms he leaped over the -rail and into the boat, doing this without injuring the -child.</p> - -<p>Francis J. Luker, a British subject, who had worked -six years in the United States as a postal clerk, and -was going home to enlist, saved two babies. He -found the little passengers, bereft of their mother, in -the shelter of a deck-house. The Lusitania was nearing -her last plunge. A life-boat was swaying to the water -below. Grabbing the babies he ran to the rail and -made a flying leap into the craft, and those babies did -not leave his arms until they were set safely ashore -hours later.</p> - -<p>One woman, a passenger on the Lusitania, lost all<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page28">[28]</a></span> -three of her children in the disaster, and gave the -bodies of two of them to the sea herself. When the -ship went down she held up the three children in the -water, shrieking for help. When rescued two were -dead. Their room was required and the mother was -brave enough to realize it.</p> - -<p>“Give them to me!” she shrieked. “Give them to -me, my bonnie wee things. I will bury them. They -are mine to bury as they were mine to keep.”</p> - -<p>With her form shaking with sorrow she took hold -of each little one from the rescuers and reverently -placed it in the water again, and the people in the boat -wept with her as she murmured a little sobbing prayer.</p> - -<p>Just as the rescuers were landing her third and only -remaining child died.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef2_4">TORONTO GIRL OF FOURTEEN PROVES HEROINE</h3> - -<p>Even the young girls and women on the Lusitania -proved themselves heroines during the last few moments -and met their fate calmly or rose to emergencies which -called for great bravery and presence of mind.</p> - -<p>Fourteen-year-old Kathleen Kaye was returning -from Toronto, where she had been visiting relatives. -With a merry smile on her lips and with a steady patter -of reassurance, she aided the stewards who were filling -one of the life-boats.</p> - -<p>Soon after the girl took her own place in the boat one -of the sailors fainted under the strain of the efforts -to get the boat clear of the maelstrom that marked -where the liner went down. Miss Kaye took the -abandoned oar and rowed until the boat was out of -danger. None among the survivors bore fewer signs<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page29">[29]</a></span> -of their terrible experiences than Miss Kaye, who spent -most of her time comforting and assisting her sisters -in misfortune.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef2_5">HEROISM OF CAPTAIN TURNER AND HIS CREW</h3> - -<p>Ernest Cowper, a Toronto newspaper man, praised -the work of the Lusitania’s crew in their efforts to -get the passengers into the boats. Mr. Cowper told -of having observed the ship watches keeping a strict -lookout for submarines as soon as the ship began to -near the coast.</p> - -<p>“The crew proceeded to get the passengers into -boats in an orderly, prompt and efficient manner. -Helen Smith, a child, begged me to save her. I placed -her in a boat and saw her safely away. I got into one -of the last boats to leave.</p> - -<p>“Some of the boats could not be launched, as the -vessel was sinking. There was a large number of -women and children in the second cabin. Forty of -the children were less than a year old.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef2_6">WOMAN RESCUED WITH DEAD BABY AT HER BREAST</h3> - -<p>R. J. Timmis, of Gainesville, Tex., a cotton buyer, -who was saved after he had given his life-belt to a -woman steerage passenger who carried a baby, told -of the loss of his friend, R. T. Moodie, also of Gainesville. -Moodie could not swim, but he took off his -life-belt also and put it on a woman who had a six-months-old -child in her arms. Timmis tried to help -Moodie, and they both clung to some wreckage for a -while, but presently Moodie could hold out no longer -and sank. When Timmis was dragged into a boat<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page30">[30]</a></span> -which he helped to right—it had been overturned in -the suction of the sinking vessel—one of the first -persons he assisted into the boat was the steerage -woman to whom he had given his belt. She still -carried her baby at her breast, but it was dead from -exposure.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef2_7">HEROIC WIRELESS OPERATORS</h3> - -<p>Oliver P. Brainard told of the bravery of the wireless -operators who stuck to their work of summoning help -even after it was evident that only a few minutes could -elapse before the vessel must go down. He said:</p> - -<p>“The wireless operators were working the emergency -outfit, the main installation having been put out of gear -instantaneously after the torpedo exploded. They -were still awaiting a reply and were sending out the -S. O. S. call.</p> - -<p>“I looked out to sea and saw a man, undressed, -floating quietly on his back in the water, evidently -waiting to be picked up rather than to take the chance -of getting away in a boat. He gave me an idea and I -took off my jacket and waistcoat, put my money in my -trousers pocket, unlaced my boots and then returned -to the Marconi men.</p> - -<p>“The assistant operator said, ‘Hush! we are still -hoping for an answer. We don’t know yet whether -the S. O. S. calls have been picked up or not.’</p> - -<p>“At that moment the chief operator turned around, -saying, ‘They’ve got it!’</p> - -<p>“At that very second the emergency apparatus -also broke down. The operator had left the room, -but he dashed back and brought out a kodak. He<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page31">[31]</a></span> -knelt on the deck, now listing at an angle of thirty-five -degrees, and took a photograph looking forward.</p> - -<p>“The assistant, a big, cheerful chap, lugged out the -operator’s swivel chair and offered it to me with a -laugh, saying: ‘Take a seat and make yourself comfortable.’ -He let go the chair and it careened down the -deck and over into the sea.”</p> - -<p>F. J. Gauntlet, of New York and Washington, -traveling in company with A. L. Hopkins, president -of the Newport News Shipbuilding Company, and -S. M. Knox, president of the New York Shipbuilding -Company, of Philadelphia, unconsciously told the -story of his own heroism. He said:</p> - -<p>“I was lingering in the dining saloon chatting with -friends when the first explosion occurred. Some of us -went to our staterooms and put on life-belts. Going -on deck we were informed that there was no danger, -but the bow of the vessel was gradually sinking. The -work of launching the boats was done in a few minutes. -Fifty or sixty people entered the first boat. -As it swung from the davits it fell suddenly and I think -most of the occupants perished. The other boats -were launched with the greatest difficulty.</p> - -<p>“Swinging free from one of these as it descended, I -grabbed what I supposed was a piece of wreckage. -I found it to be a collapsible boat, however. I had -great difficulty in getting it open, finally having to rip -the canvas with my knife. Soon another passenger -came alongside and entered the collapsible with me. -We paddled around and between us we rescued thirty -people from the water.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page32">[32]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef2_8">SAVED HIS WIFE AND HELPED IN RESCUE WORK</h3> - -<p>George A. Kessler, of New York, said:</p> - -<p>“A list to starboard had set in as we were climbing -the stairs and it had so rapidly increased by the time -we reached the deck, that we were falling against the -taffrail. I managed to get my wife onto the first-class -deck and there three boats were being got out.</p> - -<p>“I placed her in the third, kissed her good-by and -saw the boat lowered safely. Then I turned to look -for a life-belt for myself. The ship now started to go -down. I fell into the water, some kind soul throwing -me a life-belt at the same time. Ten minutes later -I found myself beside a raft on which were some survivors, -who pulled me onto it. We cruised around looking -for others and managed to pick up a few, making -in all perhaps sixteen or seventeen persons who were -on the raft. In all directions were scattered persons -struggling for their lives and the boats gave what help -they could.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef2_9">“SAVED ALL THE WOMEN AND CHILDREN WE COULD”</h3> - -<p>W. G. E. Meyers, of Stratford, Ont., a lad of sixteen -years, who was on his way to join the British navy as a -cadet, told this story:</p> - -<p>“I went below to get a life-belt and met a woman -who was frenzied with fear. I tried to calm her and -helped her into a boat. Then I saw a boat which -was nearly swamped. I got into it with other men and -baled it out. Then a crowd of men clambered into it -and nearly swamped it.</p> - -<p>“We had got only two hundred yards away when -the Lusitania sank, bow first. Many persons sank with<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page33">[33]</a></span> -her, drawn down by the suction. Their shrieks were -appalling. We had to pull hard to get away, and, as it -was, we were almost dragged down. We saved all the -women and children we could, but a great many of -them went down.”</p> - -<p>H. Smethhurst, a steerage passenger, put his wife -into a life-boat, and in spite of her urging refused to -accompany her, saying the women and children must -go first. After the boat with his wife in it had pulled -away Smethhurst put on a life-belt, slipped down a -rope into the water and floated until he was picked up.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page34">[34]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER III</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">SOUL-STIRRING STORIES OF SURVIVORS OF -THE LUSITANIA</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef3_1">COULD NOT LAUNCH BOATS</a> — <a href="#SecRef3_2">SAYS SHIP SANK IN -FIFTEEN MINUTES</a> — <a href="#SecRef3_3">SCREAMS INTENSIFY HORROR</a> — <a href="#SecRef3_4">ON -HUNT FOR THE LIFE-BELTS</a> — <a href="#SecRef3_5">INJURED BOY -SHOWS PLUCK</a> — <a href="#SecRef3_6">MANY CHILDREN DROWNED</a> — <a href="#SecRef3_7">WOMEN -RUSHED FOR THE BOATS</a> — <a href="#SecRef3_8">PATERSON, N. J., GIRLS AMONG RESCUED</a> — <a href="#SecRef3_9">THREATENED -SEAMEN WITH REVOLVER</a> — <a href="#SecRef3_10">RESCUED UNCONSCIOUS FROM THE WATER</a> — <a href="#SecRef3_11">LIFE-BOAT -SMASHED</a> — <a href="#SecRef3_12">REASSURED BY SHIP’S OFFICER</a>.</p> - -<p>Among the stories of the Lusitania horror told by -the survivors were a few that stand out from the -rest for their clearness and vividness. One of the most -interesting of these, notable for the prominence of -the man who relates it as well as for its conciseness, -was the description given by Samuel M. Knox, president -of the New York Shipbuilding Company. Mr. -Knox said:</p> - -<p>“Shortly after two, while we were finishing luncheon -in a calm sea, a heavy concussion was felt on the -starboard side, throwing the vessel to port. She -immediately swung back and proceeded to take on a -list to starboard, which rapidly increased.</p> - -<p>“The passengers rapidly, but in good form, left -the dining room, proceeding mostly to the A or boat -deck. There were preparations being made to launch -the boats. Order among the passengers was well -maintained, there being nothing approaching a panic.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page35">[35]</a></span> -Many of the passengers had gone to their staterooms -and provided themselves with life-belts.</p> - -<p>“The vessel reached an angle of about twenty-four -degrees and at this point there seemed to be a cessation -in the listing, the vessel maintaining this position -for four or five minutes, when something apparently -gave way, and the list started anew and increased -rapidly until the end.</p> - -<p>“The greater number of passengers were congregated -on the high side of the ship, and when it became -apparent that she was going to sink I made my way -to the lower side, where there appeared to be several -boats only partly filled and no passengers on that -deck. At this juncture I found the outside of the -boat deck practically even with the water and the -ship was even farther down by the head.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef3_1">COULD NOT LAUNCH BOATS</h3> - -<p>“I stepped into a boat and a sailor in charge then -attempted to cast her off, but it was found that the -boat-falls had fouled the boat and she could not be -released in the limited time available. I went overboard -at once and attempted to get clear of the ship, -which was coming over slowly. I was caught by one -of the smokestacks and carried down a considerable -distance before being released.</p> - -<p>“On coming to the surface I floated about for a -considerable time, when I was picked up by a life-raft. -This raft, with others, had floated free when the -vessel sank, and had been picked up and taken charge -of by Mr. Gauntlet, of Washington, and Mr. Lauriat, -of Boston, who picked up thirty-two persons in all.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page36">[36]</a></span></p> - -<p>“It was equipped with oars, and we made our way -to a fishing smack, about five miles distant, which -took us on board, although it was already overloaded. -We were finally taken off this boat by the Cunard -tender Flying Fish and brought to Queenstown at -9.30.”</p> - -<p>Some of the passengers, notably David A. Thomas, -told of panicky conditions on board the vessel before -she sank, and one of the rescued declared that the loss -of life was due to some extent to the assurances spread -by the stewards among the passengers that there -was no danger of the Lusitania sinking. But all united -in praising the courage and steadiness of the officers -and crew of the ship.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef3_2">SAYS SHIP SANK IN FIFTEEN MINUTES</h3> - -<p>Mr. Thomas, a Cardiff, Wales, coal magnate, who -was rescued with his daughter, Lady Mackworth, -said that not more than fifteen minutes elapsed between -the first explosion and the sinking of the ship. -Lady Mackworth had put on a life-preserver and -went down with the Lusitania. When she arose to -the surface, Mr. Thomas said, she was unconscious, -and floated around in the tumbling sea for three and -a half hours before she was picked up.</p> - -<p>“As soon as the explosions occurred,” said Mr. -Thomas, “and the officers learned what had happened, -the ship’s course was directed toward the -shore, with the idea of beaching her. Captain Turner -remained upon the bridge until the ship went down, -and he was swallowed up in the maelstrom that followed. -He wore a life-belt, which kept him afloat<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page37">[37]</a></span> -when he arose to the surface, and remained in the -water for three hours before he was picked up by a -life-boat.</p> - -<p>“During the last few minutes’ life of the Lusitania -she was a ship of -panic and tumult. -Excited men and -terrified women -ran shouting and -screaming about -the decks. Lost -children cried -shrilly. Officers -and seamen rushed -among the panic-stricken -passengers, -shouting -orders and helping -the women and -children into life-boats. -Women -clung desperately -to their husbands -or knelt on the deck and prayed. Life-preservers -were distributed among the passengers, who hastily -donned them and flung themselves into the water.</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> - -<img src="images/illo042.jpg" alt="" width="450" height="582" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">As Others See Us.</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<h3 id="SecRef3_3">SCREAMS INTENSIFY HORROR</h3> - -<p>“In their haste and excitement the seamen overloaded -one life-boat and the davit ropes broke while -it was being lowered, the occupants being thrown -into the water. The screams of these terrified women<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page38">[38]</a></span> -and men intensified the fright of those still on the -ship. Altogether I counted ten life-boats launched.”</p> - -<p>A German submarine was seen for an hour before -the liner was sunk, according to Dr. Daniel Moore, -of Yankton, S. D., who said:</p> - -<p>“About 1 <span class="smcapall">P.M.</span> we noticed that the Lusitania was -steering a zigzag course. Land had been in sight -for three hours, distinctly visible twelve miles away. -Looking through my glasses, I could see on the port -side of the Lusitania, between us and land, what -appeared to be a black, oblong object, with four -dome-like projections. It was moving along parallel -to us, more than two miles away. At times it slowed -down and disappeared. But always it reappeared. -All this time the Lusitania was zigzagging along. -Later the Lusitania kept a more even course, and -we generally agreed then that it was a friendly submarine -we were watching. We had seen no other -vessels except one or two fishing boats.</p> - -<p>“At 1.40 we sat down to luncheon in the second -saloon. We talked of the curious object we had seen, -but nobody seemed anxious or concerned. About -two o’clock a muffled, drum-like noise sounded from -the forward part of the Lusitania and she shivered -and trembled. Almost immediately she began to -list to starboard. She had been struck on the starboard -side. Unless the first submarine seen had -been speedy enough to make rings around the Lusitania, -this torpedo must have come from a second -submarine which had been lying hidden to starboard.</p> - -<p>“We heard no sound of explosion. There was general -excitement among the passengers at luncheon,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page39">[39]</a></span> -but the women were soon quieted by assurances that -there was no danger and that the Lusitania had -merely struck a small mine. The passengers left the -saloon in good order.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef3_4">ON HUNT FOR THE LIFE-BELTS</h3> - -<p>“As I reached the deck above I had difficulty in -walking owing to the tilt of the vessel. With most -of the passengers I ran on to the promenade deck. -There was no crushing. Although the deck was -crowded, I looked over the side; but I could see no -evidence of damage. I started to return to my cabin, -but the list of the liner was so marked that I abandoned -the idea and regained the deck. Looking over -the starboard rail, I saw that the water was now only -about twelve feet from the rail at one point. While -searching for a life-belt I came upon a stewardess -struggling with a pile of life-belts in a rack below deck -and helped her put one on, afterward securing one for -myself. I had tremendous difficulty in reaching -the promenade deck again.</p> - -<p>“The Lusitania now was on her side and sinking -by the bow. I saw a woman clinging to the rail near -where a boat was being lowered. I pushed her over -the rail into the boat, afterward jumping down myself.</p> - -<p>“The boat fell bodily into the sea, but kept afloat, -although so heavily loaded that water was lapping -in. We bailed with our hats, but could not keep pace -with the water, and I realized we must soon sink.</p> - -<p>“Seeing a keg, I threw it overboard and sprang -after it. A young steward named Freeman also -used the keg as a support. Looking back, I saw the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page40">[40]</a></span> -boat I had left swamped. We clung to the keg for -about an hour and a half and then were picked up -by a raft on which were twenty persons, including two -women.</p> - -<p>“We had oars and rowed toward land. At about -four o’clock we were picked up by the patrol boat -Brook. She took us aboard and then cruised out to -where the Lusitania had gone down, picking up many -survivors there, also taking aboard many from boats -and rafts.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef3_5">INJURED BOY SHOWS PLUCK</h3> - -<p>“A number of those picked up were injured, including -a little boy, whose left thigh was broken. I improvised -splints for him and set his leg. He was -a plucky little chap, and was soon asking, ‘Is there a -funny paper aboard?’</p> - -<p>“At the scene of the catastrophe the surface of the -water had seemed dotted with bodies. Only a few -life-boats seemed to be doing good. Cries of ‘Save -us! Help!’ gradually grew weaker from all sides. -Finally low wailings made the heart sick. I saw -many men die.</p> - -<p>“There was no suction when the ship settled. It -went down steadily. The life-boats were not in order -and they were not manned. Weighing all the facts -soberly convinces me that it was only through the -mercy of God that any one was saved. Are there -any bounds to this modern vandalism?”</p> - -<p>L. Tonner, a County Dublin man, and a stoker on -the Lusitania, who was one of the survivors landed -at Kinsale, said:</p> - -<p>“There must have been two submarines attacking -the Lusitania. The liner was first torpedoed on -the starboard side, and right through the engine room -a few minutes afterward the Lusitania received a -second torpedo on the port side. The Lusitania listed -so heavily to starboard that it was impossible to lower -the boats on the port side.”</p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> - -<img src="images/illo046.jpg" alt="" width="387" height="600" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Prominent American Victims of the Lusitania Horror.</span></p> - -<div class="split5050"> - -<div class="leftsplit5050"> - -<p class="caption secondjust padr1">Alfred G. Vanderbilt, New York Millionaire. -(<i>C. Underwood & Underwood.</i>)</p> - -</div><!--leftsplit5050--> - -<div class="rightsplit5050"> - -<p class="caption secondjust padl1">Elbert Hubbard, Editor and Lecturer. -(<i>C. Int. News Service.</i>)</p> - -</div><!--rightsplit5050--> - -</div><!--split5050--> - -<p class="clearboth"> </p> - -<div class="split5050"> - -<div class="leftsplit5050"> - -<p class="caption secondjust padr1">Charles Frohman, Theatrical Magnate. -(<i>C. Underwood & Underwood.</i>)</p> - -</div><!--leftsplit5050--> - -<div class="rightsplit5050"> - -<p class="caption secondjust padl1">Charles Klein, well-known Playwright. -(<i>C. Int. News Service.</i>)</p> - -</div><!--rightsplit5050--> - -</div><!--split5050--> - -<p class="clearboth"> </p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo047.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="389" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Sorrowful Burial of Some of the Lusitania Victims.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">Sixty-six coffins were placed in one grave at the Queenstown graveyard. In the presence of a large crowd they -were buried with full military honors. The view shows a few of the caskets in the grave. -<span class="copyright">(<i>C. Int. News Service.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page41">[41]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef3_6">MANY CHILDREN DROWNED</h3> - -<p>G. D. Lane, a youthful but cool-headed second-cabin -passenger, who was returning to Wales from -New York, was in a life-boat which was capsized by -the davits as the Lusitania heeled over.</p> - -<p>“I was on the B deck,” he said, “when I saw the -wake of a torpedo. I hardly realized what it meant -when the big ship seemed to stagger and almost immediately -listed to starboard. I rushed to get a -life-belt, but stopped to help get children on the boat -deck. The second cabin was a veritable nursery.</p> - -<p>“Many youngsters must have drowned, but I had -the satisfaction of seeing one boat get away filled -with women and children. When the water reached -the deck I saw another life-boat with a vacant seat, -which I took, as no one else was in sight, but we were -too late. The Lusitania reeled so suddenly our boat -was swamped, but we righted it again.</p> - -<p>“We now witnessed the most horrible scene of -human futility it is possible to imagine. When the -Lusitania had turned almost over she suddenly plunged -bow foremost into the water, leaving her stern high -in the air. People on the aft deck were fighting with -wild desperation to retain a footing on the almost<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page42">[42]</a></span> -perpendicular deck while they fell over the slippery -stern like crippled flies.</p> - -<p>“Their cries and shrieks could be heard above the -hiss of escaping steam and the crash of bursting -boilers. Then the water mercifully closed over them -and the big liner disappeared, leaving scarcely a ripple -behind her.</p> - -<p>“Twelve life-boats were all that were left of our -floating home. In time which could be measured by -seconds swimmers, bodies and wreckage appeared -in the space where she went down. I was almost -exhausted by the work of rescue when taken aboard -the trawler. It seems like a horrible dream now.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef3_7">WOMEN RUSHED FOR THE BOATS</h3> - -<p>According to another American survivor, W. H. -Brooks, “there was a scene of great confusion as women -and children rushed for the boats which were launched -with the greatest difficulty and danger, owing to the -tilting of the ship.</p> - -<p>“I heard the captain order that no more boats -be launched, so I leaped into the sea. After I reached -the water there was another explosion which sent up -a shower of wreckage.”</p> - -<p>Dr. J. T. Houghton, of Troy, N. Y., said: “It was -believed there was no reason to fear any danger after -the first explosion, as it was said the vessel would -be headed for Queenstown and beached if necessary. -Meanwhile boats were being got ready for any emergency.</p> - -<p>“Just then the liner was again struck, evidently -in a more vital spot, for it began to settle rapidly.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page43">[43]</a></span> -Orders then came from the bridge to lower all boats. -A near panic took possession of the women. People -were rushed into the boats, some of which were launched -successfully, others not so successfully.”</p> - -<p>Oscar F. Grab, of New York, said: “I was able -to get hold of a life-preserver and I remained on the -starboard side until the water was almost at my feet. -Then I slid into the sea so easily that I did not even -wet my hair. I was soon picked up by a boat in -which were twenty women and some children.</p> - -<p>“We had to keep the women lying in the bottom -so as to get room to pull at the oars. The ship went -down, as seen by me from the water, in this fashion:</p> - -<p>“She had settled down well forward. She then -listed to starboard, and rose to a perpendicular until -the stern with the propellers was sticking straight -out of the water.</p> - -<p>“An explosion then occurred as the water reached -the boilers; one of the funnels was blown clean out, -and in half a minute there was nothing visible of the -Lusitania but a lot of wreckage mingled with a number -of dead bodies.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef3_8">PATERSON, N. J., GIRLS AMONG RESCUED</h3> - -<p>The Misses Agnes and Evelyn Wilde, sisters, of -Paterson, N. J., were at lunch when the torpedo -struck the vessel. They rushed on deck. Miss Agnes -Wilde said:</p> - -<p>“We clung to each other, determined not to be -separated, even if we went to the bottom. We were -thrown into a boat, together with thirty-six others, -and after several hours were picked up by a fishing<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page44">[44]</a></span> -boat, which towed us for several hours, intending to -take us to Kinsale. Before we arrived, however, -a Government boat came along and took us to Queenstown.</p> - -<p>“We were drenched to the skin, cold and penniless. -We went into a shop, where they fitted us out -from head to foot without charge. We are only beginning -to realize what we have passed through.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Martha Anna Wyatt, sixty years old, of New -Bedford, Mass., said: “I went down with the ship -and spent four hours in a collapsible boat before being -picked up. I was going to England to live.</p> - -<p>“While the ship was sinking I found it impossible -to get into any of the life-boats. There seemed no -help about. I simply stood still, clinging to the rail, -and went down. I seemed to go to the bottom. When -I came to the surface again I was pulled into the -collapsible boat which brought me to safety.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. C. Stewart, who was traveling from Toronto -to Glasgow, said:</p> - -<p>“I was in my cabin with my eight-months-old baby, -who was sleeping in the berth, when I heard the -crash. I snatched my baby up and went on deck. -A man yelled, ‘Come on with the baby.’ I handed -him the infant and he said, ‘Now for yourself.’</p> - -<p>“We were two and a half hours in the boat before -we were picked up by a Greek steamer.”</p> - -<p>Robert C. Wright, of Cleveland, O., gave what -may be the last word of Elbert Hubbard. Mr. Wright -said:</p> - -<p>“I don’t know who was saved, but I know that -Elbert Hubbard must have been drowned. He was a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page45">[45]</a></span> -conspicuous person on account of his long hair. I -saw him and his wife start below, apparently for life-belts, -but I never saw either again. I am certain -they were drowned.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef3_9">THREATENED SEAMEN WITH REVOLVER</h3> - -<p>Isaac Lehmann, of New York, a first-cabin passenger, -who described himself as being engaged in the -Department of Government Supplies, said that after -having witnessed an accident to one of the boats -through the snapping of the ropes while it was being -lowered, he ran into his cabin and seizing a revolver -and a life-belt, returned to the deck and mounted -a collapsible boat and called to some of the crew to -assist in launching it. One sailor, he said, replied -that the captain’s orders were that no boats were to -be put out.</p> - -<p>“I drew my revolver, which was loaded with ball -cartridges,” said Mr. Lehmann, “and shouted ‘I’ll -shoot the first man who refuses to assist in launching.’ -The boat was then lowered. At least sixty persons -were in it. Unfortunately, the Lusitania lurched so -badly that the boat repeatedly struck the side of -the sinking ship, and I think at least twenty of its -occupants were killed or injured.</p> - -<p>“At that instant we heard an explosion on the right -up forward, and within two minutes the liner disappeared. -I was thrown clear of the wreckage, and -went down twice, but the life-belt that I had on -brought me up. I was in the water fully four hours -and a half.”</p> - -<p>Asked as to the probable speed of the Lusitania<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page46">[46]</a></span> -when she was struck by the torpedo, Mr. Lehmann -said the boat was probably going at about sixteen or -seventeen knots.</p> - -<p>Julian de Ayala, Consul General for Cuba at Liverpool, -said that he was ill in his berth when the Lusitania -was torpedoed. He was thrown against the -partition of his berth by the explosion and suffered an -injury to his head and had flesh torn off one of his legs.</p> - -<p>The boat Mr. de Ayala got into capsized and he was -thrown into the water, but later he was picked up.</p> - -<p>“Captain Turner,” said Mr. de Ayala, “thought -he could bring the crippled vessel into Queenstown, -but she rapidly began to sink by the head.</p> - -<p>“Her stern went up so high,” Mr. de Ayala added, -“that we could see all of her propellers, and she went -down with a headlong plunge, volumes of steam -hissing from her funnels.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef3_10">RESCUED UNCONSCIOUS FROM THE WATER</h3> - -<p>The experience of two New York girls, Miss Mary -Barrett and Miss Kate MacDonald, rescued at the -last minute, may be taken as typical of the experience -of many others. Miss Barrett gives the following -account of her experiences:</p> - -<p>“We had gone into the second saloon and were -just finishing lunch. I heard a sound something -like the smashing of big dishes and then there came a -second and louder crash. Miss MacDonald and -I started to go upstairs, but we were thrown back by -the crowd when the ship stopped. But we managed -to get to the second deck, where we found sailors -trying to lower boats.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page47">[47]</a></span></p> - -<p>“There was no panic and the ship’s officers and crew -went about their work quietly and steadily. I went -to get two life-belts, but a man standing by told us -to remain where we were and he would fetch them for -us. He brought us two belts and we put them on. By -this time the ship was leaning right over to starboard -and we were both thrown down. We managed to -scramble to the side of the liner.</p> - -<p>“Near us I saw a rope attached to one of the life-boats. -I thought I could catch it, so we murmured -a few words of prayer and then jumped into the water. -I missed the rope, but floated about in the water for -some time. I did not lose consciousness at first, but -the water got into my eyes and mouth and I began to -lose hope of ever seeing my friends again. I could -not see anybody near me. Then I must have lost -consciousness, for I remember nothing more until one -of the Lusitania’s life-boats came along. The crew -was pulling on board another woman, who was unconscious, -and they shouted to me, ‘You hold on a -little longer!’</p> - -<p>“After a time they lifted me out of the water. Then -I remembered nothing more for a time. In the meantime -our boat had picked up twenty others. It was -getting late in the evening when we were transferred -to a trawler and taken to Queenstown.</p> - -<p>“Miss MacDonald floated about nearly four hours -in a dazed state. She had little remembrance of what -had passed until a boat saved her. She remembered -somebody saying, ‘Oh, the poor girl is dead!’ She had -just strength to raise her hand and they returned and -pulled her on board.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page48">[48]</a></span></p> - -<p>Miss Conner, a cousin of Henry L. Stimson, formerly -Secretary of War of the United States, was standing -beside Lady Mackworth when they were flung -into the water as the ship keeled over. Both women -were provided with life-belts and were picked up when -at the point of exhaustion.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef3_11">LIFE-BOAT SMASHED</h3> - -<p>Doctor Howard Fisher of New York, who is a -brother of Walter L. Fisher, formerly Secretary -of the Interior of the United States, was on his -way to Belgium for Red Cross duty. His story -follows:</p> - -<p>“It is not true that those on board were unconcerned -over the possibility of being torpedoed. I -took the big liner to save time and also because in -case of a floating mine I felt she would have more -chance of staying up. But like everybody else aboard, -I felt sure in case of being torpedoed that we would -have ample time to take to the boats.</p> - -<p>“When I heard the crash I rushed to the port side. -No officer was in sight. An effort was being made -to lower the boat swinging just opposite the grand -entrance. Women, children and men made a mad -scramble about this boat, which was smashed against -the side, throwing all the occupants into the sea.</p> - -<p>“Then two big men, one a sailor and the other a -passenger, succeeded in launching a second boat. -Much to my surprise this amateur effort was successful. -This boat got away and carried chiefly women -and children. This boat was successfully launched -on the port side.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page49">[49]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef3_12">REASSURED BY SHIP’S OFFICER</h3> - -<p>“We then saw our first glimpse of an officer, who -came along the deck and spoke to Lady Mackworth, -Miss Conner and myself, who were standing in a -group. He said:</p> - -<p>“‘Don’t worry, the ship will right itself.’ He had -hardly moved on before the ship turned sideways -and then seemed to plunge head foremost into the -sea.</p> - -<p>“I came up after what seemed to be an interminable -time under water and found myself surrounded -by swimmers, dead bodies and wreckage. I got on -an upturned yawl, where I found thirty other people, -among them Lady Allan, whose collar-bone was broken -while she was in the water.</p> - -<p>“Another passenger on the yawl, a man whose name -I did not learn, had his arm hanging by the skin. -His injury probably was due to the explosion which -followed. His arm was amputated successfully with -a butcher knife by a little Italian surgeon aboard the -tramp steamer which picked me up.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page50">[50]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER IV</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">A CANADIAN’S ACCOUNT OF THE -LUSITANIA HORROR</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef4_0">PERCY ROGERS, OF CANADIAN NATIONAL EXHIBITION, -TELLS GRAPHIC STORY</a> — <a href="#SecRef4_1">PASSENGERS WERE -AGHAST</a> — <a href="#SecRef4_2">OCCUPANTS OF LIFE-BOATS THROWN INTO -SEA</a> — <a href="#SecRef4_3">A HEART-BREAKING SCENE</a>.</p> - -<p id="SecRef4_0">Percy Rogers, assistant manager and secretary -of the Canadian National Exhibition, who went to -England in connection with the Toronto Fair, told -a graphic story of his experiences after the Lusitania -was struck. He undoubtedly owed his life to the fact -that he was a good swimmer.</p> - -<p>“It had been a splendid crossing,” he said, “with -a calm sea and fine weather contributing to a delightful -trip. The Lusitania made nothing like her maximum -pace. Her speed probably was about five hundred -miles daily, which, as travelers know, is below her -average.</p> - -<p>“Early Friday morning we sighted the Irish coast. -Then we entered a slight fog, and speed was reduced, -but we soon came into a clear atmosphere again, and -the pace of the boat increased. The morning passed -and we went as usual down to lunch, although some -were a little later than others in taking the meal. I -should think it would be about ten minutes past two -when I came from lunch. I immediately proceeded to<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page51">[51]</a></span> -my stateroom, close to the dining-room, to get a letter -which I had written. While in there I heard a tremendous -thud, and I came out immediately.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef4_1">PASSENGERS WERE AGHAST</h3> - -<p>“There was no panic where I was, but the people were -aghast. It was realized that the boat had been struck, -apparently on the side nearest the land. The passengers -hastened to the boat deck above. The life-boats -were hanging out, having been put into that position -on the previous day. The Lusitania soon began to list -badly with the result that the side on which I and -several others were standing went up as the other -side dropped. This seemed to cause difficulty in launching -the boats, which seemed to get bound against the -side of the liner.</p> - -<p>“It was impossible, of course, for me to see what was -happening in other places, but among the group where -I was stationed there was no panic. The order was -given, ‘Women and children first,’ and was followed -implicitly. The first life-boat lowered with people at -the spot where I stood smacked upon the water, and -as it did so the stern of this life-boat seemed to part and -the people were thrown into the sea. The other boats -were lowered more successfully.</p> - -<p>“We heard somebody say, ‘Get out of the boats; -there is no danger,’ and some people actually did get -out, but the direction was not generally acted upon. -I entered a boat in which there were men, women and -children, I should say between twenty and twenty-five. -There were no other women or children standing on -the liner where we were, our position, I should think,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page52">[52]</a></span> -being about the last boat but one from the stern of the -ship.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef4_2">OCCUPANTS OF LIFE-BOATS THROWN INTO SEA</h3> - -<p>“Our boat dropped into the water, and for a few -minutes we were all right. Then the liner went over. -We were not far from her. Whatever the cause may -have been—perhaps the effect of suction—I don’t know, -but we were thrown into the sea. Some of the occupants -were wearing life-belts, but I was not. The -only life-belts I knew about were in the cabins, and it -had not appeared to me that there was time to risk -going there. It must have been about 2.30 when I was -thrown into the water. The watch I was wearing -stopped at that time.</p> - -<p>“What a terrible scene there was around me! It -is harrowing to think about the men, women and children -struggling in the water. I had the presence of -mind to swim away from the boat and made towards -a collapsible boat, upon which was the captain and a -number of others. For this purpose I had to swim -quite a distance.</p> - -<p>“I noticed three children among the group. Our -collapsible boat began rocking. Every moment it -seemed we should be thrown again into the sea. The -captain appealed to the people in it to be careful, but -the boat continued to rock, and I came to the conclusion -that it would be dangerous to remain in it if all were -to have a chance. I said, ‘Good-by, Captain; I’m -going to swim,’ and jumped into the water. I believe -the captain did the same thing after me, although I did -not see him, but I understand he was picked up.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page53">[53]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo060.jpg" alt="" title="“GOD IS WITH US”" width="397" height="500" /> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page54">[54]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef4_3">A HEART-BREAKING SCENE</h3> - -<p>“The scene was now terrible. Particularly do I -remember a young child with a life-belt around her -calling, ‘Mamma!’ She was not saved. I had seen -her on the liner, and her sister was on the collapsible -boat, but I could not reach her. I saw a cold-storage -box or cupboard. I swam towards it and clung to it. -This supported me for a long time. At last I saw -a boat coming towards me and shouted. I was heard -and taken in. From this I was transferred to what I -think was a trawler, which also picked up three or four -others. Eventually I was placed upon a ferry boat -known as the Flying Fish, in which, with others, I was -taken to Queenstown.</p> - -<p>“It was quite possible that some people went down -while in their cabins, because after lunch it was the -custom with some to go for a rest. A friend of mine -on the liner has told me he saw Alfred G. Vanderbilt -on deck with a life-belt and observed him give it to a -lady. It seemed to me the seriousness of the situation -scarcely was realized when the boat was torpedoed. -It was all so sudden and so unexpected, and the recollection -of it all is terrible.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page55">[55]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER V</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">THE PLOT AGAINST THE RESCUE SHIPS</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef5_1">GERMAN SUBMARINES PREVENTED RESCUE OF LUSITANIA -PASSENGERS</a> — <a href="#SecRef5_2">STORY OF ETONIAN’S CAPTAIN</a> — <a href="#SecRef5_3">DODGED -TWO SUBMARINES</a> — <a href="#SecRef5_4">NARRAGANSETT -DRIVEN OFF</a> — <a href="#SecRef5_5">TORPEDO FIRED AT NARRAGANSETT</a>.</p> - -<p id="SecRef5_1">From the lips of Captain Turner, of the Lusitania, -and from several of the survivors the world has heard -the story of the sudden appearance among the débris -and the dead of the sunken liner, of the German -submarine that had fired the torpedo which sent almost -1,200 non-combatants, hundreds of them helpless women -and children, and among them more than a hundred -American citizens, to their deaths. But it remained for -the captain of the steamship Etonian, arriving at -Boston on May 18, to add the crowning touch to the -tragedy.</p> - -<p>Captain William F. Wood, of the Etonian, specifically -charged that two German submarines deliberately -prevented him from going to the rescue of the Lusitania’s -passengers after he had received the liner’s -wireless S. O. S. call, and when he was but forty miles -or so away, and might have rendered great assistance -to the hundreds of victims.</p> - -<p>Captain Wood charged further that two other ships, -both within the same distance of the Lusitania when -she sank, were warned off by submarines, and that<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page56">[56]</a></span> -when the nearest one, the Narragansett, bound for New -York, persisted in the attempt to proceed to the rescue -of the Lusitania’s passengers, a submarine fired a -torpedo at her, which missed the Narragansett by only -a few feet.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef5_2">STORY OF ETONIAN’S CAPTAIN</h3> - -<p>The Etonian is a freight-carrying steamship, owned -by the Wilson-Furness-Leyland lines, and under charter -to the Cunard Line. She sailed from Liverpool on May -6. Captain Wood’s story, as he told it without embellishment -and in the most positive terms, was as follows:</p> - -<p>“We had left Liverpool without unusual incident, and -it was two o’clock on the afternoon of Friday, May 7, -that we received the S. O. S. call from the Lusitania. -Her wireless operator sent this message: ‘We are ten -miles south of Kinsale. Come at once.’</p> - -<p>“I was then about forty-two miles from the position -he gave me. Two other steamships were ahead of me, -going in the same direction. They were the Narragansett -and the City of Exeter. The Narragansett -was closer to the Lusitania, and she answered the -S. O. S. call.</p> - -<p>“At 5 <span class="smcapall">P.M.</span> I observed the City of Exeter across our -bow and she signaled, ‘Have you heard anything of -the disaster?’</p> - -<p>“At that very moment I saw the periscope of a -submarine between the Etonian and the City of -Exeter. The submarine was about a quarter of a -mile directly ahead of us. She immediately dived as -soon as she saw us coming for her. I distinctly saw -the splash in the water caused by her submerging.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo064.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="384" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Charging Through Barbed-Wire Entanglements.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">The King’s Regiment of the British Army suffered heavily -while trying to penetrate the enemy’s wire entanglement -at Givenchy. Three lines of a perfect thicket of barbed-wire lay between them and the enemy. Only one brave -officer even managed to penetrate the wire. <span class="copyright">(<i>Il. L. News copr.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo065.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="387" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">A Land Mine Exploded Underneath a Section of the Enemy’s Trenches.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">A method which has been known to blow forty men to pieces at once. By sapping and mining the gallery was -dug almost to the enemy’s trenches underground and explosives placed, which were then fired by electric wire. The -explosion hurled a piece of railroad iron weighing twenty-five pounds a distance of over a mile. <span class="copyright">(<i>Il. L. News -copr.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page57">[57]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef5_3">DODGED TWO SUBMARINES</h3> - -<p>“I signaled to the engine room for every available -inch of speed, and there was a prompt response. Then -we saw the submarine come up astern of us with the -periscope in line afterward. I now ordered full speed -ahead, and we left the submarine slowly behind. The -periscope remained in sight about twenty minutes. -Our speed was perhaps two miles an hour better than -the submarine could do.</p> - -<p>“No sooner had we lost sight of the submarine -astern than I made out another on the starboard bow. -This one was directly ahead and on the surface, not -submerged. I starboarded hard away from him, he -swinging as we did. About eight minutes later he -submerged. I continued at top speed for four hours, -and saw no more of the submarines. It was the ship’s -speed that saved her. That’s all.</p> - -<p>“Both these submarines were long craft, and the -second one had wireless masts. There is no question -in my mind that these two submarines were acting -in concert and were so placed as to torpedo any ship -that might attempt to go to the rescue of the passengers -of the Lusitania.</p> - -<p>“As a matter of fact, the Narragansett, as soon as -she heard the S. O. S. call, went to the assistance of the -Lusitania. One of the submarines discharged a -torpedo at her and missed her by a few feet. The -Narragansett then warned us not to attempt to go to -the rescue of the Lusitania, and I got her wireless call -while I was dodging the two submarines. You can -see that three ships would have gone to the assistance of -the Lusitania had it not been for the two submarines.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page58">[58]</a></span></p> - -<p>“These German craft were, it seems to me, deliberately -stationed off Old Head of Kinsale, at a point -where all ships have got to pass, for the express purpose -of preventing any assistance being given to the -passengers of the Lusitania.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef5_4">NARRAGANSETT DRIVEN OFF</h3> - -<p>That the British tank steamer Narragansett, one of the -vessels that caught the distress signal of the Lusitania, -was also driven off her rescue course by a torpedo from -a submarine when she arrived within seven miles of -the spot where the Lusitania went down, an hour and -three-quarters after she caught the wireless call for -help, was alleged by the officers of the tanker, which -arrived at Bayonne, N. J., on the same day that the -Etonian reached Boston.</p> - -<p>The story told by the officers of the Narragansett -corroborated the statements made by officers of the -Etonian. They said that submarines were apparently -scouting the sea to drive back rescue vessels when the -Lusitania fell a victim to another undersea craft.</p> - -<p>The Lusitania’s call for help was received by the -Narragansett at two o’clock on the afternoon of May 7, -according to wireless operator Talbot Smith, who -said the message read: “Strong list. Come quick.”</p> - -<p>When the Narragansett received the message she -was thirty-five miles southeast of the Lusitania, having -sailed from Liverpool the preceding afternoon at five -o’clock for Bayonne. The message was delivered -quickly to Captain Charles Harwood, and he ordered -the vessel to put on full steam and increase her speed -from eleven to fourteen knots. The Narragansett<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page59">[59]</a></span> -changed her course and started in the direction of the -sinking ship.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef5_5">TORPEDO FIRED AT NARRAGANSETT</h3> - -<p>Second Officer John Letts, who was on the bridge, -said he sighted the periscope of a submarine at 3.35 -o’clock, and almost at the same instant he saw a -torpedo shooting through the water. The torpedo, -according to the second officer, was traveling at great -speed.</p> - -<p>It shot past the Narragansett, missing the stem by -hardly thirty feet, and disappeared. The periscope -of the submarine went out of sight at the same time, -but the captain of the Narragansett decided not to -take any chance, changed the course of his vessel so -that the stern pointed directly toward the spot where -the periscope was last sighted, and, after steering -straight ahead for some distance, followed a somewhat -zigzag course until he was out of the immediate submarine -territories.</p> - -<p>Captain Harwood abandoned all thought of the -Lusitania’s call for help, because he thought it was a -decoy message sent out to trap the Narragansett into -the submarine’s path.</p> - -<p>“My opinion,” said Second Officer Letts, “is that -submarines were scattered around that territory to -prevent any vessel that received the S. O. S. call of the -Lusitania from going to her assistance.”</p> - -<p>When attacked by the submarine the Narragansett -had out her log, according to Second Officer Letts, and -the torpedo passed under the line to which it was -attached. The torpedo was fired from the submarine<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page60">[60]</a></span> -when the undersea boat was within two hundred yards -of the tanker.</p> - -<p>The Narragansett when turned back had not sighted -the wreck of the Lusitania, and her officers, who were -led to believe the S. O. S. was a decoy, did not learn -of the sinking of the Cunarder until the following -morning at two o’clock.</p> - -<p>The Narragansett, under charter to the Standard -Oil Company, is one of the largest tank steamships -afloat. She is 540 feet long, has a sixty-foot beam, and -12,500 tons displacement.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page61">[61]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER VI</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">BRITISH JURY FINDS KAISER A -MURDERER</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef6_1">“THE CRIME OF WHOLESALE MURDER”</a>—<a href="#SecRef6_2">CAPTAIN -TURNER’S TESTIMONY</a> — <a href="#SecRef6_3">SAW THE TORPEDO</a> — <a href="#SecRef6_4">DOUBLE -LOOKOUTS ON LINER</a> — <a href="#SecRef6_5">NO WARNING GIVEN</a> — <a href="#SecRef6_6">OTHER -TESTIMONY</a> — <a href="#SecRef6_7">CORONER HORGAN’S STATEMENT</a>.</p> - -<p>One of the first official acts with reference to the loss -of the Lusitania was the impaneling, on May 10, of a -coroner’s jury at Queenstown to fix the responsibility -for the death of the passengers whose bodies were -recovered and taken to that place. The inquest was -conducted by Coroner John Horgan. The coroner’s -proceedings were comparatively brief, and were concluded -with the return of the following verdict of the -jury:</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef6_1">“THE CRIME OF WHOLESALE MURDER”</h3> - -<p>“We find that the deceased met death from prolonged -immersion and exhaustion in the sea eight -miles south-southwest of Old Head of Kinsale, Friday, -May 7, 1915, owing to the sinking of the Lusitania -by torpedoes fired by a German submarine.</p> - -<p>“We find that this appalling crime was committed -contrary to international law and the conventions of all -civilized nations.</p> - -<p>“We also charge the officers of said submarine and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page62">[62]</a></span> -the Emperor and Government of Germany, under -whose orders they acted, with the crime of wholesale -murder before the tribunal of the civilized world.</p> - -<p>“We desire to express sincere condolences and -sympathy with the relatives of the deceased, the -Cunard Company and the United States, many of -whose citizens perished in this murderous attack on -an unarmed liner.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef6_2">CAPTAIN TURNER’S TESTIMONY</h3> - -<p>Captain W. T. Turner, the Lusitania’s commander, -was the chief witness at the inquest.</p> - -<p>The Coroner asked the captain whether he had -received a message concerning the sinking of a ship off -Kinsale by a submarine. Captain Turner replied that -he had not.</p> - -<p>“Did you receive any special instructions as to the -voyage?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, sir.”</p> - -<p>“Are you at liberty to tell us what they were?”</p> - -<p>“No, sir.”</p> - -<p>“Did you carry them out?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, to the best of my ability.”</p> - -<p>“You were aware threats had been made that the -ship would be torpedoed?”</p> - -<p>“We were,” the captain replied.</p> - -<p>“Was she armed?”</p> - -<p>“No, sir.”</p> - -<p>“What precautions did you take?”</p> - -<p>“We had all the boats swung when we came within -the danger zone, between the passing of Fastnet and -the time of the accident.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page63">[63]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo072.jpg" alt="Cartoon" width="400" height="569" title='CIVILIZATION -"UNCLEAN!"' /> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page64">[64]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Tell us in your own words what happened after -passing Fastnet.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef6_3">SAW THE TORPEDO</h3> - -<p>“The weather was clear,” Captain Turner answered. -“We were going at a speed of eighteen knots. I was -on the port side and heard Second Officer Hefford -call out, ‘Here’s a torpedo.’</p> - -<p>“I ran to the other side and saw clearly the wake of -a torpedo. Smoke and steam came up between the last -two funnels. There was a slight shock. Immediately -after the first explosion there was another report, but -that may possibly have been internal.</p> - -<p>“I at once gave the order to lower the boats down to -the rails, and I directed that women and children should -get into them. I also had all the bulkheads closed.</p> - -<p>“I also gave orders to stop the ship,” Captain Turner -continued, “but we could not stop. We found that the -engines were out of commission. It was not safe to -lower boats until the speed was off the vessel. As a -matter of fact, there was a perceptible headway on her -up to the time she went down.</p> - -<p>“When she was struck she listed to starboard. I -stood on the bridge when she sank, and the Lusitania -went down under me. She floated about eighteen -minutes after the torpedo struck her. My watch -stopped at 2.36. I was picked up from among the -wreckage and afterward was brought aboard a trawler.</p> - -<p>“No warship was convoying us. I saw no warship, -and none was reported to me as having been seen. At -the time I was picked up I noticed bodies floating on -the surface, but saw no living persons.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page65">[65]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Eighteen knots was not the normal speed of the -Lusitania, was it?” he was asked.</p> - -<p>“At ordinary times,” answered Captain Turner, -“she could make twenty-five knots, but in war times -her speed was reduced to twenty-one knots. My reason -for going eighteen knots was that I wanted to arrive -at Liverpool without stopping and within two or three -hours of high water.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef6_4">DOUBLE LOOKOUTS ON LINER</h3> - -<p>“Was there a lookout kept for submarines, having -regard to previous warnings?”</p> - -<p>“Yes; we had double lookouts.”</p> - -<p>“Were you going a zigzag course at the moment -the torpedoing took place?”</p> - -<p>“No; it was bright weather, and land was clearly -visible.”</p> - -<p>“Was it possible for a submarine to approach without -being seen?”</p> - -<p>“Oh, yes, quite possible.”</p> - -<p>“Something has been said regarding the impossibility -of launching the boats on the port side?”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” said Captain Turner, “owing to the listing -of the ship.”</p> - -<p>“How many boats were launched safely?”</p> - -<p>“I cannot say.”</p> - -<p>“Were your orders promptly carried out?”</p> - -<p>“Yes.”</p> - -<p>“Was there any panic on board?”</p> - -<p>“No, there was no panic at all; it was all most calm.”</p> - -<p>By the foreman of the jury:</p> - -<p>“In the face of the warnings at New York that the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page66">[66]</a></span> -Lusitania would be torpedoed, did you make any -application to the Admiralty for an escort?”</p> - -<p>“No, I left that to them. It is their business, not -mine. I simply had to carry out my orders to go, and -I would do it again.”</p> - -<p>Captain Turner uttered the last words of this reply -with great emphasis.</p> - -<p>By the coroner:</p> - -<p>“I am very glad to hear you say so, Captain.”</p> - -<p>By a juryman:</p> - -<p>“Did you get a wireless to steer your vessel in a -northerly direction?”</p> - -<p>“No,” replied Captain Turner.</p> - -<p>“Was the course of the vessel altered after the -torpedoes struck her?”</p> - -<p>“I headed straight for land, but it was useless. -Previous to this the water-tight bulkheads were closed. -I suppose the explosion forced them open. I don’t -know the exact extent to which the Lusitania was -damaged.”</p> - -<p>“There must have been serious damage done to the -water-tight bulkheads.”</p> - -<p>“There certainly was, without doubt.”</p> - -<p>“Were the passengers supplied with life-belts?”</p> - -<p>“Yes.”</p> - -<p>“Were any special orders given that morning that -life-belts be put on?”</p> - -<p>“No.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef6_5">NO WARNING GIVEN</h3> - -<p>“Was any warning given you before you were -torpedoed?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page67">[67]</a></span></p> - -<p>“None whatever. It was suddenly done and -finished.”</p> - -<p>“If there had been a patrol boat aboard; might it -have been of assistance?”</p> - -<p>“It might, but it is one of those things one never -knows.”</p> - -<p>With regard to the threats against his ship, Captain -Turner said he saw nothing except what appeared in -the New York papers the day before the Lusitania -sailed. He never had heard the passengers talking -about the threats, he said.</p> - -<p>“Was a warning given to the lower decks after the -ship had been struck?” Captain Turner was asked.</p> - -<p>“All the passengers must have heard the explosion,” -Captain Turner replied.</p> - -<p>Captain Turner in answer to another question said -he received no report from the lookout before the -torpedo struck the Lusitania.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef6_6">OTHER TESTIMONY</h3> - -<p>Cornelius Horrigan, a waiter aboard the Lusitania, -testified that it was impossible to launch boats on the -starboard side because of the steamer’s list. He went -down with the ship, but came up and was rescued. -Horrigan gave a partial identification of one of the -bodies, which he thought to be that of Steward -Cranston.</p> - -<p>The ship’s bugler, Vernon Livermore, gave evidence -that the water-tight compartments were closed, but -thought that the explosion must have opened them. -No one was able to identify a man in whose pocket was -found a card bearing the name of John Wanamaker of<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page68">[68]</a></span> -New York, and in the left-hand corner “Notary Public -MacQuerrie, Bureau of Information.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef6_7">CORONER HORGAN’S STATEMENT</h3> - -<p>Coroner Horgan said that the first torpedo fired by -the German submarine did serious damage to the -Lusitania, but that, not satisfied with this, the Germans -had discharged another torpedo. The second torpedo, -he said, must have been more deadly, because it went -right through the ship, hastening the work of destruction.</p> - -<p>He charged that the responsibility “lay on the -German government and the whole people of Germany -who collaborated in the terrible crime.</p> - -<p>“This is a case,” he said, “in which a powerful war-like -engine attacked an unarmed vessel without warning. -It was simple barbarism and cold-blooded murder.</p> - -<p>“I purpose to ask the jury to return the only verdict -possible for a self-respecting jury—that the men in -charge of the German submarine were guilty of willful -murder.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page69">[69]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER VII</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">THE WORLD-WIDE INDICTMENT OF -GERMANY FOR THE LUSITANIA -ATROCITY</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef7_1">VIEWS OF COLONEL ROOSEVELT, UNITED STATES -SENATORS AND OTHER PROMINENT MEN</a>—OPINIONS -OF THE NEWSPAPERS OF THE <a href="#SecRef7_2">UNITED STATES</a> AND -<a href="#SecRef7_3">CANADA</a> — <a href="#SecRef7_4">VIEWS OF PROMINENT CANADIANS</a>.</p> - -<p id="SecRef7_1">Not even the invasion of peaceful Belgium, nor -any of the other atrocities charged to the belligerent -nations in the great war, stirred such universal and -emphatic condemnation as the destruction of the -Lusitania and over half its <i>human</i> freight of <i>human</i> -lives. From all quarters of the globe the cry of amazement, -indignation and outrage arose.</p> - -<p>One of the first to express his feelings was Colonel -Theodore Roosevelt, who said: “This represents not -merely piracy, but piracy on a vaster scale of murder -than any old-time pirate ever practiced.</p> - -<p>“This is the warfare which destroyed Louvain and -Dinant and hundreds of men, women and children in -Belgium carried out to innocent men, women and -children on the ocean and to our own fellow countrymen -and countrywomen who are among the sufferers.</p> - -<p>“It seems inconceivable that we should refrain from -taking action in this matter, for we owe it not only to -humanity, but to our own national self-respect.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page70">[70]</a></span></p> - -<p>Atlee Pomerene, U. S. Senator from Ohio, member of -the Foreign Relations Committee, said: “To Americans -the sinking of the Lusitania is the most deplorable -incident of the European war. Every man with the -milk of human kindness in his breast condemns any -policy by any nation that leads to the slaughter without -warning of babes, women and non-combatants.”</p> - -<p>Morris Sheppard, U. S. Senator from Texas, said: -“The sinking of the Lusitania is an illustration of the -unspeakable horror of modern warfare, and will be a -tremendous argument for general disarmament when -the war closes. Let us handle the present situation -with patience and calmness, trusting the President -to take the proper course.”</p> - -<p>John W. Griggs, former Governor of New Jersey and -at one time Attorney-General of the United States, -expressed himself emphatically on the Lusitania -tragedy. He said: “The time for watchful waiting -has passed. No investigating committee is needed. -The facts are known. Action is demanded. A -demand should be made at once without waiting by -the government to get the finding of any investigations -or inquests. Would you hesitate to act if a man slapped -you in the face? I do not say what should be demanded. -That is for the government to decide. -But an explanation should be demanded of Germany -at once. The German submarine violated a law that -even savages would recognize. I would hold Germany -to account by proclaiming her an outlaw among the -nations of the world. If the German government -pleads that it was justified in this crime—which it -will—it is then the duty of the United States to join<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page71">[71]</a></span> -with other neutral nations and cut her off from the -rest of the world.”</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo080.jpg" alt="Cartoon" width="450" height="322" /> -<p class="caption main">“<span class="smcap">I’m Not Arguing With You, William; I’m Just Telling You!</span>”</p> -</div> - -<p>Jacob M. Dickinson, Secretary of War under President -Taft, issued a statement in which he said: “It is not -likely that Germany will disavow the purpose to destroy -the Lusitania with full knowledge of the fact that this -involved many American lives. In view of the result -and the warning given by our government to Germany, -some proper action must be taken, or the American -government will incur the contempt of the world and -the contempt of a vast number of its own people.”</p> - -<p>“An act of barbarity without justification,” was the -expression of Frederick R. Coudert, of New York, an -authority on international law, in referring to the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page72">[72]</a></span> -torpedoing of the Lusitania. Mr. Coudert said: “I -make that statement on the supposition that lives -of citizens of the United States, a neutral nation, -were destroyed by the sinking of the vessel. There -is no justification, however, for ruthlessly sinking a -merchant ship in the open seas when that vessel is not -engaged in any manner as a belligerent vessel, and -when the lives of non-combatants depend upon its -safety. It would seem to be time for the government -of this country to determine whether it will sit idly -by and accept explanations that Americans were warned -to keep off the steamer, or take a definite stand upon -the rights of our citizens on the seas.”</p> - -<p>The opinion of the nation on the sinking of the -Lusitania is fairly represented by the following extracts -from the editorial columns of leading newspapers -throughout the United States:</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef7_2">THE EAST</h3> - -<p>New York Evening Post: “Germany ought not to -be left in a moment’s doubt how the civilized world -regards her latest display of ‘frightfulness.’ It is a -deed for which a Hun would blush, a Turk be ashamed -and a Barbary pirate apologize. To speak of technicalities -and the rules of war, in the face of such wholesale -murder on the high seas, is a waste of time. The law -of nations and the law of God have been alike trampled -upon. The German government must be given to understand -that no plea of military necessity will now avail -it before the tribunal on which sits as judge the humane -conscience of the world. As was declared by Germany’s -own representative at The Hague Congress, the late -Marschall von Bieberstein, there are some atrocities -which international law does not need to legislate -against, since they fall under the instant and universal -condemnation of mankind.”</p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> - -<img src="images/illo082.jpg" alt="" width="391" height="600" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Non-Combatants Honored With Their Flags.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">The upper picture shows the body of an American victim of the -Lusitania disaster carried through the streets of Queenstown covered with -the Stars and Stripes. Below, British soldiers laying the Union Jack over -the coffins of victims recovered after the sinking of the Lusitania. <span class="copyright">(<i>C. Int. -News Service.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> - -<img src="images/illo083.jpg" alt="" width="394" height="600" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">One American Family Lost on the Lusitania.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">Wife and children of Paul Crompton. Not only hundreds of non-combatant -men, but many women and children were intentionally sunk -with the Lusitania.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page73">[73]</a></span></p> - -<p>New York Tribune: “Failing these things, no -American should misunderstand the meaning of the -present crisis; no American should shrink from the -facts that cannot be evaded or avoided. If Germany -has once and for all embarked upon a deliberate -campaign of murder directed against American citizens, -there can be but one consequence—the end is inescapable.”</p> - -<p>New York World: “The main thing that concerns -the American government today is not the subordinate -question of reparation for the assassination of American -citizens who were traveling on the Lusitania. It -is the broader question of whether Germany can be -brought to her senses and induced to abandon methods -of warfare that are a crime against civilization and an -affront to humanity.”</p> - -<p>New York Times: “Neither in law nor in custom is -there any extenuation for this act of monstrous inhumanity, -no exception, no condition, can be made to -shield it from the full force and condemnation it -deserves and has received. And the warning advertisement -published by the German Embassy here, -being notice of an intent to commit a crime, is of no -more avail for exculpation than a Black Hand letter -of threat.”</p> - -<p>New York Globe: “The duty of this government -is sufficiently clear. In a formal and emphatic manner, -not shrinking from explicit characterization, it should<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page74">[74]</a></span> -denounce the greatest international outrage that has -occurred since the Boxer savages of China, with the -countenance of a treacherous government, attacked -the women and children in the legations at Pekin.”</p> - -<p>Philadelphia Public Ledger: “As it stands the horror -is almost inconceivable. There has been nothing like -it before. One of the consequences of this war ought -to be that nothing like it can ever happen again. -Unless civilization is to relapse into barbarism, helpless -non-combatants must not be exposed in such a fashion -to the worst calamities of war.”</p> - -<p>Boston Transcript: “The torpedoing of the Lusitania -was not battle—it was massacre. To destroy an -enemy ship, an unarmed merchant vessel of great -value and power, is an act of war; to sink her in such -a manner as to send hundreds of her passengers, among -them many neutrals, to their death, is morally murder, -and no technical military plea will avail to procure -any other verdict at the bar of civilized public opinion.”</p> - -<p>Boston Post: “The sinking of the British liner -Lusitania by the torpedo of a German submarine -with terrible loss of life, is the worst crime against -civilization and humanity that the modern world has -ever known. It is a reversion to barbarism that will -set the whole world, save perhaps the little world of -its perpetrators, aflame with horror and indignation.”</p> - -<p>Boston Traveler: “With the destruction of this -queen of the ocean liners and the hundreds of lives -of non-combatant men, women and children, also came -the ruin of the last vestige of the structure of international -law and humane consideration that through -the centuries mankind has been striving to erect.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page75">[75]</a></span> -The very life and honor of the nation depend upon the -manner in which this attack upon its integrity is -adjudicated, even if any adjudication of a civil nature -will be deemed sufficient to permit of a peaceful, to say -nothing of a friendly, adjustment.”</p> - -<p>Hartford Courant: “It is hard to find in the dictionary -the words strong enough to fit such conduct, and -the effect of the destruction of the ship and the loss -of lives will be to turn public sentiment more than ever -against the Germans.”</p> - -<p>Providence Journal: “Scores of Americans were -murdered yesterday on the high seas, by order of the -German government. Men and women, citizens of -the United States, traveling peaceably on a merchant -steamer, have been sent to their death by the deliberately -planned act of Emperor William and his -advisers.”</p> - -<p>Providence Evening Tribune: “The torpedoing of -the Lusitania, in that it destroyed innocent American -lives, was a capital crime committed by Germany -against the United States. A capital crime is a crime -punishable by death. And in the case of a nation -punitive death is usually administered by the process -of war.”</p> - -<h3>THE WEST</h3> - -<p>Chicago Herald: “International law contemplates -the capture of merchant vessels. It contemplates -their destruction under certain conditions. But it -does not contemplate, provide for or justify destruction -of the crews and passengers of such ships without -giving them a chance for safety.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page76">[76]</a></span></p> - -<p>Minneapolis Journal: “Germany intends to become -the outlaw of nations. Perhaps we are yet to witness -savagery carried to its ultimate perfection.”</p> - -<p>Minneapolis Tribune: “The sinking of the Lusitania -is outside the rules of civilized warfare. The President -will have the loyal support of the people of this country -in whatever course wise counsel may find it necessary -to pursue.”</p> - -<p>Denver Rocky Mountain News: “Mankind will -hang its head in shame. It was not war. It is not -England that suffers; it is not the relatives and friends -of the dead that suffer only; the people of Germany -will suffer for the deed of yesterday.”</p> - -<h3>THE SOUTH</h3> - -<p>Washington Post: “No warrant whatever, in law or -morals, can be found for the willful destruction of an -unarmed vessel, neutral or enemy, carrying passengers, -without giving them an opportunity to leave the -vessel. Germany stands indicted on this charge, and -if it is proved the world will not exonerate that nation -for the awful destruction of innocent life.”</p> - -<p>Baltimore American: “Americans must and will -resent the invasion of their rights, and in this there -can be no division of American sentiment.”</p> - -<p>Charleston News and Courier: “The destruction of -the Lusitania has been accomplished, it now appears, -with the most diabolically cruel deliberation. If this -shall be established as a fact, there can be no question -that the wrath of the American people will flame—and -should flame.”</p> - -<p>New Orleans Times-Picayune: “What is Washington<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page77">[77]</a></span> -going to do about it? Slaughter of American citizens -in contravention of all laws of warfare has placed the -United States in a position that is intolerable. Our -people were wantonly done to death.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef7_3">SENTIMENT OF THE CANADIAN PRESS</h3> - -<p>Even sterner was the tone of the editorial opinion -of the Canadian press. In many cases the actual intervention -of the United States in the war was advocated. -The following excerpts are characteristic of the opinion -of the newspapers of Canada:</p> - -<p>Toronto Daily News: “This fresh display of Teutonic -Kultur raises anew the question as to how long -the Washington government is going to be scorned -and trampled upon by the most unscrupulous and -barbarous race of modern times. What effect will -this deliberate destruction of hundreds of American -citizens in cold blood have upon public sentiment -throughout the United States? Can President Wilson -forever stand aside while international law and international -moral standards are cast to the winds by a -brutal and infuriated people?”</p> - -<p>Toronto Mail and Empire: “The Washington -government knows why the American citizens whose -names are on the passenger list of the Lusitania trusted -themselves to the ship despite the warnings of the -Kaiser’s agents and accomplices in New York. Those -American men and women disregarded the warnings, not -because they believed the Germans incapable of torpedoing -a passenger vessel, but because they felt that -the neutrality and puissance of their nation would be -respected. The Washington government cannot let<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page78">[78]</a></span> -these American citizens who relied on its protection -go unavenged.”</p> - -<p>Toronto Globe: “But what of the United States. -Does President Wilson propose to let German submarines -destroy the lives of American citizens because -they choose to cross the Atlantic in a passenger ship -flying the British flag? Does he still think the mad -dog of Europe can be trusted at large? Is it not -almost time to join in hunting down the brute?”</p> - -<p>Toronto Daily Star: “The sinking of the Lusitania -was not necessary to prove what was already abundantly -demonstrated—that there is no length of -vindictiveness to which Germany will not go. There -is no lesson to be drawn from it except that Germany -must be fought to a finish, and that all the resources -of the allied countries must be marshalled for that -purpose. We are engaged in no ordinary war. The -very existence of civilization is at stake. The civilized -world is threatened by a nation that has deliberately -gone back to barbarism and given a free rein to criminal -instincts. Denunciation and rebuke are of no avail in -such a case. The conflict is between a powerful -criminal and those who desire to live under the reign of -law; and the time has come for every man who believes -in law, in every nation, to fight for the life of civilization.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef7_4">VIEWS OF PROMINENT CANADIANS</h3> - -<p>That the torpedoing of the Lusitania was not an act -of war in the technical sense committed by Germany -as against the United States, was the view expressed -by Mr. McGregor Young, professor of international<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page79">[79]</a></span> -law in Toronto University, who said in an -interview:</p> - -<p>“Certain acts are acts of war in the technical -sense—acts, that is to say, which touch the state -qua state. But the torpedoing of the Lusitania does -not come within that category, so far as the United -States is concerned. It is not an act such as is -not compatible with friendly relations between that -country and Germany. The Lusitania was a British -ship, and the American passengers on board her were -really an incident, as it were. Whether it would be -consistent with the United States’ self-respect to put -up with Germany’s action is another matter. That is -a question as to which a nation must judge for itself.”</p> - -<p>Mr. E. F. B. Johnston, K.C., gave his opinion as -follows:</p> - -<p>“The Lusitania was a vessel owned by a British -company, carrying on business in England. It -was not under the control of the United States. -Individual citizens choosing to travel by this boat -would do so at their own risk, and so far as loss is -concerned, the United States as a nation would not -perhaps be legally affected. But if citizens of the -United States are not to be protected by their own -Government, a wholesale slaughter might be justified -on the ground that the ship was English. It seems to -me to be a question of policy. And, as such, one -would say that it was the duty of the United States -to protect, as far as possible, their own citizens.”</p> - -<p>On the Sunday following the destruction of the -Lusitania reference to the disaster was made by countless -clergymen throughout Canada. Varying sentiments<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page80">[80]</a></span> -were expressed in their sermons, but perhaps -the keynote was sounded by the Rev. W. H. Hincks, -D.D., pastor of Trinity Methodist Church, Toronto, -who alluded to the subject as follows:</p> - -<p>“Neutral nations headed by the President of the -United States seven months ago entered a united -diplomatic protest against the violation of the branch -of The Hague Convention which has to do with the -killing of civilians. The greatest thinkers in Great -Britain have taken the view that the United States -can do more good as a neutral by exerting her influence -in the interest of humanity and in accordance with -The Hague Convention than in entering unprepared -into the war. Our duty is to pray for the President -of the United States, that, surrounded by the wisest -of his advisers, he may take action with other neutral -nations to prevent the repetition of such a crime.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page81">[81]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER VIII</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">AMERICA’S PROTEST AGAINST -UNCIVILIZED WARFARE</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef8_1">PRESIDENT WILSON’S GREAT RESPONSIBILITY</a> — <a href="#SecRef8_2">THE -NOTE TO GERMANY</a> — <a href="#SecRef8_3">ATTACKS CALLED CONTRARY -TO RULES OF WARFARE</a> — <a href="#SecRef8_4">WARNING TO GERMANY -RECALLED</a> — <a href="#SecRef8_5">SUBMARINE WARFARE ON COMMERCE -CONDEMNED</a> — <a href="#SecRef8_6">PUBLISHED WARNING DECLARED NO -EXCUSE FOR ATTACK</a> — <a href="#SecRef8_7">PROMPT, JUST ACTION BY -GERMANY EXPECTED</a> — <a href="#SecRef8_8">THE WHOLE NATION BEHIND -THE PRESIDENT</a> — <a href="#SecRef8_9">SOUTH AND WEST RESOUNDED -WITH APPROVAL</a>.</p> - -<p id="SecRef8_1">Rarely has a man in any office of life had laid upon -his shoulders so great a responsibility as was thrust -upon President Wilson by the destruction of more than -a hundred American lives in the Lusitania disaster. -No heart was more sorely stricken than his by the -dastardly calamity, and yet it is characteristic of the -man, and to his everlasting credit, that when impetuous -minds were urging him to hasty action, his reply was,</p> - -<p>“We must think first of humanity.”</p> - -<p>A man of lesser stature, mentally and spiritually, -would have required a host of counselors. In the great -crisis which he faced President Wilson assumed for -himself full responsibility. There was the rare spectacle -of a man great enough and sure enough to determine -wholly within his own mind upon the action he should<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page82">[82]</a></span> -take. He sought no advice; he eschewed advisers. -In solitude he evolved his supreme duty.</p> - -<p>When, in the seclusion of his own soul, he had fixed -upon his policy, he proceeded in the same way to put -it into words. It is a thing perhaps without precedent -before the administration of President Wilson that the -note to the German government, which has become a -historic document, was written originally by the -President in shorthand. After he had set down the -communication in this way he transcribed it on his -own typewriter. No official or clerk of the White -House had any part in the preparation of the document -until after it had been presented to the members -of the Cabinet. Not even Secretary Bryan saw it -in advance of that time.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef8_2">THE NOTE TO GERMANY</h3> - -<p>The full text of President Wilson’s note, dated May -13, and communicated over the name of Secretary of -State Bryan, is as follows:</p> - -<div class="germanynote"> - -<p><i>“The Secretary of State to the American Ambassador at -Berlin</i>:</p> - -<p>“Please call on the Minister of Foreign Affairs, and -after reading to him this communication, leave with -him a copy:</p> - -<p>“In view of the recent acts of the German authorities -in violation of American rights on the high seas, which -culminated in the torpedoing and sinking of the -British steamship Lusitania on May 7, 1915, by which -over one hundred American citizens lost their lives, it is -clearly wise and desirable that the government of the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page83">[83]</a></span> -United States and the imperial German government -should come to a clear and full understanding as to the -grave situation which has resulted.</p> - -<p>“The sinking of the British passenger steamship -Falaba by a German submarine on March 28, through -which Leon C. Thresher, an American citizen, was -drowned; the attack on April 28 on the American -vessel Cushing by a German aeroplane; the torpedoing -on May 1 of the American vessel Gulflight by a German -submarine, as a result of which two or more American -citizens met their death; and, finally, the torpedoing -and sinking of the steamship Lusitania, constitute a -series of events which the government of the United -States has observed with growing concern, distress and -amazement.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef8_3">ATTACKS CALLED CONTRARY TO RULES OF WARFARE</h3> - -<p>“Recalling the humane and enlightened attitude -hitherto assumed by the imperial German government -in matters of international right, and particularly with -regard to the freedom of the seas; having learned to -recognize the German views and the German influence -in the field of international obligation as always -engaged upon the side of justice and humanity; and -having understood the instructions of the imperial -German government to its naval commanders to be -upon the same plane of humane action prescribed by -the naval codes of other nations, the government of -the United States was loath to believe—it cannot -now bring itself to believe—that these acts, so absolutely -contrary to the rules, the practices and the spirit of -modern warfare, could have the countenance or sanction<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page84">[84]</a></span> -of that great government. It feels it to be its -duty, therefore, to address the imperial German government -concerning them with the utmost frankness -and in the earnest hope that it is not mistaken in -expecting action on the part of the imperial German -government which will correct the unfortunate impressions -which have been created and vindicate once more -the position of that government with regard to the -sacred freedom of the seas.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef8_4">WARNING TO GERMANY RECALLED</h3> - -<p>“The government of the United States has been -apprised that the imperial German government considered -themselves to be obliged by the extraordinary -circumstances of the present war and the measures -adopted by their adversaries in seeking to cut Germany -off from all commerce, to adopt methods of retaliation -which go much beyond the ordinary methods of warfare -at sea, in the proclamation of a war zone from which -they have warned neutral ships to keep away. This -government has already taken occasion to inform the -imperial German government that it cannot admit -the adoption of such measures or such a warning of -danger to operate as in any degree an abbreviation of -the rights of American shipmasters or of American -citizens bound on lawful errands as passengers on -merchant ships of belligerent nationality; and that it -must hold the imperial German government to a -strict accountability for any infringement of those -rights, intentional or incidental. It does not understand -the imperial German government to question -those rights. It assumes, on the contrary, that the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page85">[85]</a></span> -imperial German government accept, as of course, the -rule that the lives of non-combatants, whether they -be of neutral citizenship or citizens of one of the nations -at war, cannot lawfully or rightfully be put in jeopardy -by the capture or destruction of an unarmed merchantman, -and recognize, also, as all other nations do, the -obligation to take the usual precaution of visit and -search to ascertain whether a suspected merchantman -is in fact of belligerent nationality or is in fact carrying -contraband of war under a neutral flag.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef8_5">SUBMARINE WARFARE ON COMMERCE CONDEMNED</h3> - -<p>“The government of the United States, therefore, -desires to call the attention of the imperial German -government with the utmost earnestness to the fact -that the objection to their present method of attack -against the trade of their enemies lies in the practical -impossibility of employing submarines in the destruction -of commerce without disregarding those rules of -fairness, reason, justice and humanity, which all -modern opinion regards as imperative. It is practically -impossible for the officers of a submarine to visit a -merchantman at sea and examine her papers and cargo. -It is practically impossible for them to make a prize -of her; and, if they cannot put a prize crew on board of -her, they cannot sink her without leaving her crew and -all on board of her to the mercy of the sea in her small -boats. These facts, it is understood, the imperial -German government frankly admit.</p> - -<p>“We are informed that in the instances of which we -have spoken time enough for even that poor measure of -safety was not given, and in at least two of the cases<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page86">[86]</a></span> -cited not so much as a warning was received. Manifestly, -submarines cannot be used against merchantmen, -as the last few weeks have shown, without an -inevitable violation of many sacred principles of -justice and humanity.</p> - -<p>“American citizens act within their indisputable -rights in taking their ships and in traveling wherever -their legitimate business calls them upon the high seas, -and exercise those rights in what should be the well-justified -confidence that their lives will not be endangered -by acts done in clear violation of universally -acknowledged international obligations, and certainly -in the confidence that their own government will -sustain them in the exercise of their rights.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef8_6">PUBLISHED WARNING DECLARED NO EXCUSE FOR -ATTACK</h3> - -<p>“There was recently published in the newspapers of -the United States, I regret to inform the imperial -German government, a formal warning, purporting -to come from the imperial German embassy at Washington, -addressed to the people of the United States, -and stating in effect that any citizen of the United -States who exercised his right of free travel upon the -seas would do so at his peril if his journey should take -him within the zone of waters within which the imperial -German navy was using submarines against the -commerce of Great Britain and France, notwithstanding -the respectful but very earnest protest of this -government, the government of the United States. -I do not refer to this for the purpose of calling the -attention of the imperial German government at this<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page87">[87]</a></span> -time to the surprising irregularity of a communication -from the imperial German embassy at Washington -addressed to the people of the United States through -the newspapers, but only for the purpose of pointing -out that no warning that an unlawful and inhumane -act will be committed can possibly be accepted as an -excuse or palliation for that act, or as an abatement -of the responsibility for its commission.</p> - -<p>“Long acquainted as this government has been with -the character of the imperial German government and -with the high principles of equity by which they have in -the past been actuated and guided, the government of -the United States cannot believe that the commanders -of the vessels which committed these acts of lawlessness -did so except under a misapprehension of the orders -issued by the imperial German naval authorities. -It takes it for granted that, at least within the practical -possibilities of every such case, the commanders even -of submarines were expected to do nothing that would -involve the lives of non-combatants or the safety -of neutral ships, even at the cost of failing of their -object of capture or destruction.</p> - -<p>“It confidently expects, therefore, that the imperial -German government will disavow the acts of which -the government of the United States complains; that -they will make reparation so far as reparation is -possible for injuries which are without measure, and -that they will take immediate steps to prevent the -recurrence of anything so obviously subversive of the -principles of warfare for which the imperial German -government have in the past so wisely and so firmly -contended.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page88">[88]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef8_7">PROMPT, JUST ACTION BY GERMANY EXPECTED</h3> - -<p>“The government and people of the United States -look to the imperial German government for just, -prompt and enlightened action in this vital matter -with the greater confidence because the United States -and Germany are bound together not only by special -ties of friendship, but also by the explicit stipulations -of the treaty of 1828 between the United States and -the Kingdom of Prussia.</p> - -<p>“Expressions of regret and offers of reparation in case -of the destruction of neutral ships sunk by mistake, -while they may satisfy international obligations, if -no loss of life results, cannot justify or excuse a practice, -the natural and necessary effect of which is to -subject neutral nations and neutral persons to new and -immeasurable risks.</p> - -<p>“The imperial German government will not expect -the government of the United States to omit any -word or any act necessary to the performance of its -sacred duty of maintaining the rights of the United -States and its citizens and of safeguarding their free -exercise and enjoyment.</p> - -<p class="sigright">“<span class="smcap">Bryan.</span>”</p> - -</div><!--germanynote--> - -<h3 id="SecRef8_8">THE WHOLE NATION BEHIND THE PRESIDENT</h3> - -<p>With anxiety, even if with confidence, the American -people waited the publication of this note. Then they -read, and the whole country resounded with enthusiastic -support. More than at almost any previous period -in the history of the United States, more certainly -than at the outbreak of any previous foreign war, the -nation stood solidly behind the President. According -to the New York Tribune he “acted with calm statesmanlike -directness, deserved well of his own nation -and earned the respect of the world.” The New -York Sun, commenting on the note, said: “The -President has spoken firmly. The country, supporting -him as firmly, awaits without passion the German -reply,” and the New York Herald in an editorial -declared that President Wilson had “expressed the -unanimous voice of the great American republic.” -“Everyone trusts the President because he has shown -himself worthy of trust,” was the comment of the -Philadelphia Public Ledger. “The Government’s -position in this case is the country’s position. It is -not extreme, yet it covers the ground,” spoke the -Springfield Republican, and the Christian Science -Monitor went so far as to state that there was “probably -no body of opinion in the United States which will be -dissatisfied either with the tone or temper of the -message.”</p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> - -<img src="images/illo100.jpg" alt="" width="389" height="600" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Zeppelin Device for Dropping Bombs.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">An armored car is suspended by three cables from the Zeppelin airship -to a distance of several thousand feet below the monster air-craft, which -is concealed in the clouds above. <span class="copyright">(<i>Sphere copr.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> - -<img src="images/illo101.jpg" alt="" width="392" height="600" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Falling to Earth Like a Blazing Meteor.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">This stirring picture represents a German aeroplane of the type called -Aviatik, beaten in a fight high up in the air by the famous French Aviator -Garros, plunging to earth in flames, turning and turning like a falling star.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page89">[89]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef8_9">SOUTH AND WEST RESOUNDED WITH APPROVAL</h3> - -<p>No less enthusiastic was the approval of the press -in the South and West. “The citizenry of this country -is with Wilson,” stoutly declared the Baltimore Sun, -and the Louisville Post maintained: “There are no -neutrals in America now. We are all earnest supporters -of the President, who by patience and fortitude has -established his right to lead a free people.” The note, -according to the Atlanta Journal, was “the voice -of the American people proclaiming in terms unmistakable -their conscience and their will.”</p> - -<p>“Whatever the fate of our relations with Germany,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page90">[90]</a></span> -the President undoubtedly has voiced the sentiment of -the nation upon the use of the submarine and as to the -rights of neutrals on the high seas,” was the comment -of the Chicago Tribune. The note was described by -the Cleveland News as “all that Americans could -wish,” and according to the San Francisco Chronicle, -it commended itself “to the common sense of people -unafflicted with inflammable hatreds.” “It is probable -that no document of state ever came nearer reflecting -the sentiment of the American people,” commented the -Denver Times, and the Indianapolis News proclaimed: -“It is not simply the government, but the nation that -speaks through the document. There is no one who -does not hope for a peaceful adjustment of the difficulty.” -The Minneapolis Journal, after analyzing the -note and especially the last strong paragraph of protest, -declared: “The American people will stand by these -words.”</p> - -<p>If no president of the United States ever faced so -grave a crisis, certainly none ever received more unanimous -support. If there were any murmurs of dissatisfaction -they were too faint to be heard above the -chorus of approval.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page91">[91]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER IX</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">THE GERMAN DEFENSE FOR THE DESTRUCTION -OF THE LUSITANIA</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef9_1">BLAMES BRITAIN FOR MISUSE OF FLAG</a> — <a href="#SecRef9_2">INVESTIGATING -CASES OF CUSHING AND GULFLIGHT</a> — <a href="#SecRef9_3">DECLARES -SHIP CARRIED MOUNTED CANNON</a> — <a href="#SecRef9_4">SAYS -IT ACTED IN JUSTIFIED SELF-DEFENSE</a> — <a href="#SecRef9_5">FINAL -DECISION ON DEMANDS DEFERRED</a> — <a href="#SecRef9_6">AMERICAN -OPINION OF GERMAN EXCUSES</a> — <a href="#SecRef9_7">EVASIVE AND -INSINCERE</a> — <a href="#SecRef9_8">ATTACKS ON AMERICAN VESSELS MUST -CEASE</a> — <a href="#SecRef9_9">SUPPORT THE PRESIDENT</a>.</p> - -<p>The German defense for the destruction of the -Lusitania and for other marine atrocities committed -against non-combatant vessels in the famous, or infamous, -war zone was contained in a note to the American -government, transmitted May 31, in reply to President -Wilson’s note of protest. The full text of the German -note is as follows:</p> - -<p>“The undersigned has the honor to submit to Ambassador -Gerard the following answer to the communication -of May 13 regarding the injury to American -interests through German submarine warfare.</p> - -<p>“The Imperial government has subjected the communication -of the American government to a thorough -investigation. It entertains also a keen wish to -co-operate in a frank and friendly way in clearing up -a possible misunderstanding which may have arisen<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page92">[92]</a></span> -in the relations between the two governments through -the events mentioned by the American government.</p> - -<p>“Regarding, firstly, the cases of the American -steamers Cushing and Gulflight. The American -embassy has already been informed that the German -government has no intention of submitting neutral -ships in the war zone, which are guilty of no hostile -acts, to attacks by a submarine or submarines or -aviators. On the contrary, the German forces have -repeatedly been instructed most specifically to avoid -attacks on such ships.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef9_1">BLAMES BRITAIN FOR MISUSE OF FLAGS</h3> - -<p>“If neutral ships in recent months have suffered -through the German submarine warfare, owing to -mistakes in identification, it is a question only of -quite isolated and exceptional cases, which can be -attributed to the British government’s abuse of flags, -together with the suspicious or culpable behavior of -the masters of the ships.</p> - -<p>“The German government, in all cases in which it -has been shown by its investigations that a neutral -ship, not itself at fault, was damaged by German submarines -or aviators, has expressed regret over the -unfortunate accident and, if justified by conditions, has -offered indemnification.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef9_2">INVESTIGATING CASES OF CUSHING AND GULFLIGHT</h3> - -<p>“The cases of the Cushing and the Gulflight will -be treated on the same principles. An investigation -of both cases is in progress, the result of which will -presently be communicated to the embassy. The<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page93">[93]</a></span> -investigation can, if necessary, be supplemented by an -international call on the international commission of -inquiry as provided by Article III of The Hague -agreement of October 18, 1907.</p> - -<p>“When sinking the British steamer Falaba, the -commander of the German submarine had the intention -of allowing the passengers and crew a full opportunity -for a safe escape. Only when the master did -not obey the order to heave-to, but fled and summoned -help by rocket signals, did the German commander -order the crew and passengers by signals and megaphone -to leave the ship within ten minutes. He actually -allowed them twenty-three minutes time and fired -the torpedo only when suspicious craft were hastening -to the assistance of the Falaba.</p> - -<p>“Regarding the loss of life by the sinking of the -British passenger steamer Lusitania, the German -government has already expressed to the neutral -governments concerned its keen regret that citizens of -their states lost their lives.</p> - -<p>“On this occasion, the Imperial government, however, -cannot escape the impression that certain important -facts having a direct bearing on the sinking of -the Lusitania may have escaped the attention of the -American government.</p> - -<p>“In the interest of a clear and complete understanding, -which is the aim of both governments, the -Imperial government considers it first necessary to -convince itself that the information accessible to both -governments about the facts of the case is complete -and in accord.</p> - -<p>“The government of the United States proceeds on<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page94">[94]</a></span> -the assumption that the Lusitania could be regarded -as an ordinary unarmed merchantman. The Imperial -government allows itself in this connection to point -out that the Lusitania was one of the largest and -fastest British merchant ships, built with government -funds as an auxiliary cruiser and carried expressly as -such in the ‘navy list’ issued by the British admiralty.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef9_3">DECLARES SHIP CARRIED MOUNTED CANNON</h3> - -<p>“It is further known to the Imperial government -from trustworthy reports from its agents and neutral -passengers, that for a considerable time practically all -the more valuable British merchantmen have been -equipped with cannon and ammunition and other -weapons and manned with persons who have been -specially trained in serving guns. The Lusitania, too, -according to information received here, had cannon -aboard, which were mounted and concealed below decks.</p> - -<p>“The Imperial government, further, has the honor -to direct the particular attention of the American -government to the fact that the British admiralty in -a confidential instruction issued in February, 1915, -recommended its mercantile shipping not only to seek -protection under neutral flags and disguising marks, -but also, while thus disguised, to attack German submarines -by ramming. As a special incitation to -merchantmen to destroy submarines, the British government -also offered high prizes and has already paid such -rewards.</p> - -<p>“The Imperial government in view of these facts -indubitably known to it, is unable to regard British -merchantmen in the zone of naval operations specified<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page95">[95]</a></span> -by the admiralty staff of the German navy as ‘undefended.’ -German commanders consequently are no -longer able to observe the customary regulations of the -prize law, which they always followed.</p> - -<p>“Finally the Imperial government must point out -particularly that the Lusitania on its last trip, as on -earlier occasions, carried Canadian troops and war -material, including no less than 5,400 cases of ammunition -intended for the destruction of the brave German -soldiers who are fulfilling their duty with self-sacrifice -and devotion in the Fatherland’s service.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef9_4">SAYS IT ACTED IN JUSTIFIED SELF-DEFENSE</h3> - -<p>“The German government believes that it was acting -in justified self-defense in seeking with all the -means of warfare at its disposition to protect the lives -of its soldiers by destroying ammunition intended for -the enemy.</p> - -<p>“The British shipping company must have been -aware of the danger to which the passengers aboard the -Lusitania were exposed under these conditions. The -company, in embarking them notwithstanding this, -attempted deliberately to use the lives of American -citizens as protection for the ammunition aboard, and -acted against the clear provisions of the American -law, which expressly prohibits the forwarding of passengers -on ships carrying ammunition, and provides a -penalty therefor. The company therefore is wantonly -guilty of the death of so many passengers.</p> - -<p>“There can be no doubt according to definite report -of the submarine’s commander, which is further confirmed -by all other information, that the quick sinking<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page96">[96]</a></span> -of the Lusitania is primarily attributed to the explosion -of the ammunition shipment caused by a torpedo. -The Lusitania’s passengers would otherwise, in all -human probability, have been saved.</p> - -<p>“The Imperial government considers the above-mentioned -facts important enough to recommend them -to the attentive examination of the American government.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef9_5">FINAL DECISION ON DEMANDS DEFERRED</h3> - -<p>“The Imperial government, while withholding its -final decision on the demands -advanced in connection -with the sinking of the Lusitania until receipt of an -answer from the American government, feels impelled -in conclusion to recall here and now that it took cognizance -with satisfaction of the mediatory proposals -submitted by the United States government to Berlin -and London as a basis for a modus vivendi for conducting -the maritime warfare between Germany and -Great Britain.</p> - -<p>“The Imperial government by its readiness to enter -upon a discussion of these proposals, then demonstrated -its good intentions in ample fashion. The realization -of these proposals was defeated, as is well known, by -the declinatory attitude of the British government.</p> - -<p>“The undersigned takes occasion, etc.</p> - -<p class="blankbefore1 right padr1">“<span class="smcap">Jagow.</span>”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef9_6">AMERICAN OPINION OF GERMAN EXCUSES</h3> - -<p>The effect of the German note on American opinion -was to create a sense of angry disappointment. The -newspapers were a unit in calling it evasive. It “does -not meet the issue,” declared the New York World, -while the New York Times viewed it as being “not -responsive to our demand. It tends rather to becloud -understanding.” The Albany Knickerbocker Press -denounced it as “an answer which purposely does not -answer. Germany evidently is playing for time.” -This thought was reiterated by the Pittsburgh Gazette-Times, -which pointed out that “it is palpable that -Germany proposes to consume time by raising points -which call for further correspondence, in the meanwhile -continuing in the course to which the United States -has objected.”</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo110.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="389" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Survivors of the Lusitania Disaster.</span></p> - -<div class="split5050"> - -<div class="leftsplit5050"> - -<p class="caption secondjust padr1">Mr. Cowper, a Canadian journalist, holding little -Helen Smith, a six-year-old American girl, who lost both -father and mother. (<i>C. Int. News Service.</i>)</p> - -</div><!--leftsplit5050--> - -<div class="rightsplit5050"> - -<p class="caption secondjust padl1">“The Man Who Cannot Be Drowned.” This stoker -was saved from the Titanic, the Empress of Ireland and, -lastly, from the Lusitania.</p> - -</div><!--rightsplit5050--> - -</div><!--split5050--> - -<p class="clearboth"> </p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo111.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="364" /> - -<div class="split5050"> - -<div class="leftsplit5050"> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Sapping and Mining the Enemy’s Trenches.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust padr1">When the hostile trenches are near together an open zig-zag trench -is dug to a point very close to the enemy’s line, then a covered gallery is -excavated to a point almost under the hostile trench.</p> - -</div><!--leftsplit5050--> - -<div class="rightsplit5050"> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Gaining a Foot of Ground Per Hour.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust padl1">Here a charge of explosive is placed and fired from a distance by an -electric wire. At the same instant the men charge over the ground and -occupy the ruined trench of the enemy. (<i>Il. L. News copr.</i>)</p> - -</div><!--rightsplit--> - -</div><!--split5050--> - -<p class="clearboth"> </p> - -<p class="largeillo"><a href="images/illo111_lg.jpg">Larger illustration</a> (317 kB)</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo112.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="391" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Belgian Refugees Find Safety in Holland.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">This photograph, made at Putte, a Holland frontier town, -shows some of the three hundred thousand refugees who -sought safety in Holland. <span class="copyright">(<i>Copyright by Underwood and Underwood.</i>)</span></p> - -<p class="clearboth"> </p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page97">[97]</a></span></p> - -<div class="protestnote"> - -<div class="insidebox"> - -<p class="center fsize175">United States’ Note of Protest and<br /> -Germany’s Reply Compared</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="american allclear"> - -<p class="noindent"><i>President Wilson Demanded</i>:</p> - -<p class="fsize90 blankbefore025">Practical cessation of submarine -attacks on non-combatant vessels.</p> - -<p class="fsize90">Observance of the rule of visit -and search in the case of all -suspected merchantmen before -any such ship shall be subjected -to capture or destruction.</p> - -<p class="fsize90">Protection of non-combatants -who may be on suspected merchantmen.</p> - -<p class="fsize90">Disavowal of official German -responsibility for injury to Americans -in the Cushing, Gulflight and -Lusitania cases.</p> - -<p class="fsize90">Reparation, so far as reparation -is possible, for irreparable damage.</p> - -<p class="fsize90">Immediate steps by Germany -to prevent the recurrence of -incidents “so obviously subversive -of the principles of warfare.”</p> - -<p class="fsize90">The first three items, as noted -above, were stated not as actual -demands, but as assumptions of -what Germany would agree to in -view of previous communications -from this country in the matter of -what is allowable in maritime warfare -according to previously acknowledged -international law and -the dictates of humanity.</p> - -</div><!--american--> - -<div class="german"> - -<p class="noindent"><i>Germany Conceded</i>:</p> - -<p class="fsize90 blankbefore025">No intention of attacking neutral -ships not guilty of hostile -acts in “war zone.”</p> - -<p class="fsize90">Regrets and indemnity where -neutral ship, not itself at fault, is -damaged.</p> - -<p class="fsize90">Attacks on the American ships -Gulflight and Cushing unintentional, -the circumstances being -rigidly investigated.</p> - -<p class="fsize90">Keen regret at loss of lives of -neutral citizens on Lusitania.</p> - -<p class="noindent blankbefore025"><i>Germany Evaded</i>:</p> - -<p class="fsize90 blankbefore025">Issue as to humanitarian aspect -and facts in Lusitania case.</p> - -<p class="fsize90">Giving of any direct promise to -abandon submarine warfare.</p> - -<p class="fsize90">Any attempt to justify such -warfare, except as “self-defense.”</p> - -<p class="noindent blankbefore025"><i>Germany Countered</i>:</p> - -<p class="fsize90 blankbefore025">By raising question as to Lusitania -being an “auxiliary armed -cruiser,” and not of the “undefended -merchantmen” class.</p> - -<p class="fsize90">By accusing Cunard company -of using American citizens to protect -the “ammunition” carried -by Lusitania, and of being guilty -of their death.</p> - -</div><!--german--> - -</div><!--insidebox--> - -<p class="clearboth"> </p> - -</div><!--protestnote--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page98">[98]</a></span></p> - -<p>The Chicago Herald more specifically pointed out the -evasiveness of the German reply, claiming that it -“fails wholly to meet the main points at issue, both -the specific point of the slaughter of American citizens -on the Lusitania and the general point of the impossibility -of employing submarines in the destruction of -commerce without disregarding rules of fairness, reason, -justice and humanity—established principles of international -law.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef9_7">EVASIVE AND INSINCERE</h3> - -<p>The Philadelphia Public Ledger also criticized it for -ignoring altogether “the protest in the name of humanity -against submarine warfare upon non-combatants,” -and the Cincinnati Commercial Tribune laid bare the -“absolute ignoring of the vital principles set forth in -the Wilson letter,” adding that “there is a half contemptuous, -albeit entirely courteous, suggestion of -‘Well, they are still dead; now, what do you propose -to do about it?<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page99">[99]</a></span>’”</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo115.jpg" alt="Cartoon" width="450" height="427" /> -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">No Use.</span></p> -</div> - -<p>The German claim that the Lusitania was in effect -a warship, with mounted guns, and carried ammunition -and Canadian soldiers, was emphatically denied in a -public statement by Dudley Field Malone, collector of -the port of New York, and the New York World -vehemently answered -the German -claim by declaring -that “the -Lusitania was a -warship in the -same way that -Belgium was an -aggressor against -Germany; in the -same way that -the University of -Louvain and -Rheims Cathedral -were ‘fortifications’; -in the same way that various seaside resorts -in England, raided by Germans, were ‘defended.’”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef9_8">ATTACKS ON AMERICAN VESSELS MUST CEASE</h3> - -<p>Many newspapers joined in calling for more drastic -action on the part of the United States government. -“We have but one thing in mind,” announced the New -York Tribune, “that these crimes shall cease. Any -answer, therefore, which fails to guarantee their stoppage -as a condition precedent to diplomatic rectification -cannot be expected to satisfy the just expectation -of the United States.” The Washington Herald followed<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page100">[100]</a></span> -this by saying: “The patience of the American -people in the face of contemptuous disregard of their -rights and a series of outrages against their countrymen -has been sublime, but surely it has a limit. Surely a -way will be found, without much longer delay, to -compel Germany to cease her attacks on American -vessels engaged in neutral commerce and to guarantee -the safety of American lives and property.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef9_9">SUPPORT THE PRESIDENT</h3> - -<p>On the other hand there was a strong element that -counseled coolness and restraint. “This is not a time,” -declared the Albany Knickerbocker Press, “to suggest -to President Wilson what ought to be done. It is not -a time to become impatient. It is a time for restraint. -Nothing can be gained now by playing upon the strings -of excitable public opinion in America. The President -must find his way out and every true American must -support him loyally.” Echoing this sentiment, the -Springfield Republican added, “but the German -government may fairly be required to give definite -assurances that during the period of the negotiations -no more torpedo attacks on passenger ships which -may be carrying American citizens will be permitted.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page101">[101]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER X</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">SWIFT REVERSAL TO BARBARISM</span><br /> -<span class="chapauthor"><span class="smcap">By Vance Thompson</span></span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef10_1">CULTURE SWEPT AWAY</a> — <a href="#SecRef10_2">BREAKING POINT OF -CIVILIZATION</a> — <a href="#SecRef10_3">BARBARISM -AND WOMEN</a> — <a href="#SecRef10_4">AFTER BARBARISM, WHAT?</a></p> - -<p class="courtesy">[The following article is reproduced by the courtesy of the -New York Times.]</p> - -<p id="SecRef10_1">There is in Brussels—if the Uhlans have spared it—a -mad and monstrous picture. It is called “A Scene -in Hell,” and hangs in the Musée Wiertz. And what -you see on the canvas are the fierce and blinding -flames of hell; and amid them looms the dark figure -of Napoleon, and around him the wives and mothers -and maids of Belgium scream and surge and clutch -and curse—taking their posthumous vengeance.</p> - -<p>And since Napoleon was a notable emperor in his -time, the picture is not without significance today. -Paint in another face, and let it go at that.</p> - -<p>War is a bad thing. Even hell is the worse for it.</p> - -<p>War is a bad thing; it is a reversal, sudden and -complete, to barbarism. That is what I would get -at in this article. One day there is civilization, authentic, -complex, triumphant; comes war, and in a -moment the entire fabric sinks down into a slime<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page102">[102]</a></span> -of mud and blood. In a day, in an hour, a cycle of -civilization is canceled. What you saw in the morning -was suave and ordered life; and the sun sets on -howling savagery. In the morning black-coated men -lifted their hats to women. Ere nightfall they are slashing -them with sabres and burning the houses over -their heads. And the grave old professors who were -droning platitudes of peace and progress and humanitarianism -are screaming, ere today is done, shrill -senile clamors for blood and ravage and rapine.</p> - -<p>A reversal to barbarism.</p> - -<p>Here; it is in the tea-room of the smartest hotel in -Munich; war has come; high-voiced women of title -chatter over their teacups; comes swaggering in the -Crown Prince Ruprecht of Bavaria; he has just -had his sabre sharpened and has girt his abdomen for -war. His wife runs to him. And she kisses the sabre -and shouts: “Bring it back to me covered with blood—that -I may kiss it again!” And the other high-voiced -women flock to kiss the sword.</p> - -<p>A reversal to barbarism.</p> - -<p>It has taken place in an hour; but yesterday these -were sweet patrician ladies, who prattled of humanity -and love and the fair graces of life; and now they -would fain wet their mouths with blood—laughingly, -as harlots wet their mouths with wine.</p> - -<p>The unclean and vampirish spirit of war has swept -them back to the habits of the cave-dwelling ages of -the race. In an hour the culture so painfully acquired -in slow generations has been swept away. Royalty, -in the tea-room of the “Four Seasons,” is one with -the blonde nude female who romped and fought in<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page103">[103]</a></span> -the dark Teutonic forests ere Caesar came through -Gaul.</p> - -<p>Reversal to barbarism.</p> - -<p>War is declared; and in Berlin the Emperor of Germany -rides in an open motor car down Unter den -Linden; he is in full uniform, sworded, erect, hieratic; -and at his side sits the Empress—she the good -mother, the housewife, the fond grandmother—garmented -from head to foot in cloth the color of blood.</p> - -<p>Theatricalism? No. The symbolism is more significant. -The symbol bears a savage significance. -It marks, as a red sunset, the going down of civilization -and the coming of the dark barbarism of war.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef10_2">BREAKING POINT OF CIVILIZATION</h3> - -<p>There was war; and the whole machinery of civilization -stopped.</p> - -<p>Modern civilization is the most complex machine -imaginable; its infinite cogged wheels turn endlessly -upon each other; and perfectly it accomplishes its -multifarious purposes; but smash one wheel and it -all falls apart into muddle and ruin. The declaration -of war was like thrusting a mailed fist into the intricate -works of a clock. There was an end of the perfected -machine of civilization. Everything stopped.</p> - -<p>That was a queer world we woke in. A world that -seemed new, so old it was.</p> - -<p>Money had ceased to exist. It seemed at that -moment an appalling thing. I was on the edge and -frontier of a neutral state. I had money in a bank. -It ceased to be money. A thousand-franc note was -paper. A hundred-mark note was rubbish. British<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page104">[104]</a></span> -sovereigns were refused at the railway station. The -Swiss shopkeeper would not change a Swiss note. -What had seemed money was not money.</p> - -<p>Values were told in terms of bread.</p> - -<p>It was a swift and immediate return to the economic -conditions of barbarism. Metals were hoarded; and -where there had been trade there was barter. And it -all happened in an hour, in that first fierce panic of -war.</p> - -<p>Traffic stopped with a clang as of rusty iron. The -mailed fist had dislocated the complex machinery of -European traffic. Frontiers which had been mere -landmarks of travel became suddenly formidable and -impassable barriers, guarded by harsh, hysterical men -with bayonets.</p> - -<p>War makes men brave and courageous? Rubbish! -It fills them with the cruelty of hysteria and the panic -of the unknown. I am not talking of battle, which -is a different thing. But I say the men who guarded -the German frontier—and I dare say every other -frontier—in the first stress of war, were wrenched and -shaken with veritable hysteria. At St. Ludwig and -Constance those husky soldiers in iron-mongery, with -shaved heads and beards and outstanding ears, fell -into sheer savagery, not because they were bad and -savage men, but simply because they were hysterical. -The fact is worth noting.</p> - -<p>It explains many a bloody and infamous deed in -the tragic history of sad Alsace and of little Belgium. -The war-begotten reversal to savagery brought with -it all the hysteria of the savage man. The sentries -at St. Ludwig struck with muskets and sabres because<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page105">[105]</a></span> -they were hysterical with terror of the new, unknown -state into which they had been plunged, not because -they were not men like you and me. Surely the savage -Uhlan who ravaged the cottages of Alsace was your -brother and mine, as were the Magyar beyond the Danube -and the Cossack at Kovna. Only they had gone -back to the terrors of the man who dwelt in a cave.</p> - -<p>Traffic stopped; and when it stopped civilization -fell away from the travelers. That was strange. -Take the afternoon of the day war was declared, the -date being Aug. 1, in the year of our Lord 1914, and -the hour 7.30 <span class="smcapall">P.M.</span>, Berlin time. It was the last -train that reached the frontier from Paris. Between -Delle and Bicourt lies a neutral zone about three -kilometers—say, nearly two and a half miles—in extent. -On one side France and invasion and terror -and war; on the other side of the zone the relative -safety of Switzerland. Six hundred passengers poured -out of the French train at noon into that neutral -zone and started to walk to Swiss safety. A blazing -August sun; a road of pebbles and stinging, upblown -dust.</p> - -<p>The passengers had been permitted to bring on the -train only what luggage they could carry; so they were -laden with bags and coats, dressing bags and jewel -cases—all they had deemed most valuable. Mostly -women. German ladies fleeing for refuge; Russian -ladies; English, American; and a crowd of men, -urgent to reach their armies, German, Swiss, Russian, -Austrian, Servian, Italian; withal many of the kind -of American men who go to Switzerland in August.</p> - -<p>And the caravan started in the dust and heat of a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page106">[106]</a></span> -desert. A woman let fall her heavy bag and plodded -on. Another threw away her coats. Men shook off -their bundles. The heat was stifling. And through -the clouds of dust a panic terror crept. It was the -antique terror of the God Pan—the God All; it was a -fear as immense as the sky.</p> - -<p>A woman screamed and began to run, throwing -away everything she had safeguarded so she might -run with empty hands. A score followed her. Men -began to run. They thrust the women aside, cursing; -and ran. And for over two miles the road was covered -thick with coats and bags, with packages and -jewel cases. The greed of possession died out in the -causeless fear.</p> - -<p>These hoarse, pushing men, these sweating, shameless -women had gone back 10,000 years into prehistoric -savagery. Lightly they threw away all the -baubles and gewgaws civilization had fashioned for -adorning and disguising their raw humanity, and the -habits of civilization as well.</p> - -<p>They had touched but the outermost edge of war, -and their very clothes fell off them.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef10_3">BARBARISM AND WOMEN</h3> - -<p>War; and it takes eighty-four hours to make a -twelve-hour journey from the Alps to Paris; the -cable is dead; the telegraph is dumb; letters go only -when smuggled over the frontiers by couriers; you -look about you and find you are in a mediæval and -mysterious world. You stand amid the melancholy -ruins of canceled cycles. The mailed fist of war has -smashed your world to pieces. You do not know it.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page107">[107]</a></span></p> - -<p>The man you thought of as a brother looks at you -with eyes of passionate hatred; you have eaten bread -and salt together; you have drunk together; you -have been uplifted by the same books; you have been -sublimed by the same music; but he is a German, -and your blood was made in another land, and he -looks at you with suspicion and hate—perhaps you -are a spy. (The spy mania! Dear Lord, what absurd, -bloody, and abominable stories I could write of this -madness which has Europe by the throat, this madness -which is only another form of war hysteria!) -A reversal to barbarism; you and the man who was -your friend have gone back to the fear and hatred -of primitive savages, meeting at the corner of a dark -wood. All of humanity we have acquired in the slow -way of evolution sloughs off us.</p> - -<p>We are savages once more. For science is dead. -All the laboratories are shut, save those where poison -is brewed and destruction is put up in packages. -Education has ceased, save that fierce Nietzschean -education which declares: “The weak and helpless -must go to the wall; and we shall help them go.” All -that made life humanly fair is hidden in the fetid -clouds of war where savages (in terror and hysteria) -grope for each other’s throats.</p> - -<p>The glory of war—rot! The heroism of war—rot! -The scarlet and beneficent energies of war—rot! -When you look at it close what you see are hulking -masses of brutes with fear behind them prodding -them on, or wild and splendid savages, hysterical with -hate, battling to save their hearth fires and women -from the oncoming horde. Reversal to barbarism.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page108">[108]</a></span></p> - -<p>Think it over. Upon whom falls the stress of war? -Not upon the soldier. He is killed and fattens the -soil where he falls; or he is maimed and hobbles off -toward a pension or beggary—both tolerable things; -anyway he has drunk deep of cruelty and terror and -may go his way. By rare good grace he may have -been a hero. In other words, he may have been a -Belgian—which is a word like a decoration, a name -to make one strut like a Greek of Thermopylae—and -become thus a permanent part of the world’s finest -history.</p> - -<p class="starline">******</p> - -<p>I would like to write here the name of a friend, -Charles Flamache of Brussels. He was twenty-one -years old. He was an artist who had already tasted -fame. He had known the love of woman. That his -destiny might be fulfilled he died, the blithe, brave -boy, in front of Liège. It was the right death at the -right time—ere yet the massed Prussians had rolled -in fire and blood over his fair small land. Wherefore, -hail and farewell, young hero!</p> - -<p class="starline">******</p> - -<p>But upon whom falls the stress of war?</p> - -<p>In a time of barbarism those who suffer are always -the weak. War is in its essence (as said Nietzsche, -the German philosopher of “world power”) an attack -upon weakness. The weakest suffer most.</p> - -<p>I saw children born on cinder heaps, and I saw them -die; and the mothers die gasping like she dogs in a -smother of flies.</p> - -<p>Some day the story of what was done in Alsace will -be written and the stories of Visé and Aerschot and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page109">[109]</a></span> -Orsmael and Louvain will seem pale and negligible; -but not now—five generations to come will whisper -them in the Vosges.</p> - -<p>What I would emphasize is that in the natural -state of barbarism induced by the war the woman falls -back to her antique state of she animal. In thousands -of years she has been made into a thing of exquisite -and mysterious femininity; in a day she is thrown -back to kinship with the she dog. Slashed with -sabres, pricked with lances, she is a mere thing of -prey.</p> - -<p>Surely not the dear Countess and Baroness? Of -course not. War is made in the palaces, but it does -not attack the palaces. The worth of every nation -dwells in the cottage; and it is upon the cottage -that war works its worst infamy. Go to Alsace -and see.</p> - -<p>Pillage, loot, incendiarism, “indemnity”—you can -read that in the records of the invasion of Belgium; -that is war; it is all right if war is to be, for all this -talk of chivalrous consideration for foes and regard -for international law is all nonsense; necessity, as -Bethmann-Hollweg said, knows no law, and necessity -has always been the tyrant’s plea; it is the business -of a soldier to kill and terrify; if he restricts his -killing and terrifying he is a bad soldier and bad at -his work of barbarism; but—</p> - -<p>There is a more sinister side to Europe’s lapse into -barbarism. The women are paying too dear. And -to make them pay dear is not really the business of -a soldier, not even a bad soldier. Yet the woman is -paying, God knows. A tragic payment.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page110">[110]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef10_4">AFTER BARBARISM WHAT?</h3> - -<p>One morning at dawn—it was at Ambérieu—I saw -the long trains go by carrying the German wounded -and the German prisoners, who had been taken in the -battles of the Vosges. There were 2,400 taken on -toward the south. There were French nurses with -the wounded. I saw water and fruit and chocolate -given to the prisoners.</p> - -<p>This was early in the war. The sheer lapse into -barbarism had not yet come. Soon the German newspapers -announced:</p> - -<p>“Great concern is expressed in press and public -utterances lest prisoners of war receive anything in -the line of favored treatment. Newspapers have -conducted an angry campaign against women who -have ventured at the railway station to give coffee or -food to prisoners of war passing through; commanding -officers have ordered that persons ‘demeaning themselves -by such unworthy conduct’ are to be immediately -ejected from the stations, and in response to -public clamor official announcements have been issued -that such prisoners in transport receive only bread -and water.”</p> - -<p>And the French followed suit; no “coddling” of -prisoners; back to barbarism, the lessons of humanity -forgot and savagery come again.</p> - -<p>Civilization in the old world is smashed. I have -traversed the ruins; and my feet are still dirty with -mud and blood. But I can tell you what is going to -come out of that welter of ruin. There will come a -sane and righteous hatred of militarism. What will -be surely destroyed is Cæsarism. Prophecy? This<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page111">[111]</a></span> -is not prophecy; I am stating an assured fact. Even -at this hour of hysterical and relentless warfare there -lies deep in the heart of the democracy of Europe a -consuming hatred of militarism.</p> - -<p>Drops of water (or blood) do not more naturally -flow into each than did the English hatred of Cæsarism -blend with the high French hatred of the evil -thing; and when the palaces have done fighting, the -cottages of Europe, from the Baltic to the Mediterranean -and from the Black Sea to the Hebrides, will -proclaim its destruction.</p> - -<p>And you will see it; you will see Cæsarism drowned -in the very blood it has shed. And the German, mark -you, will not be the least bitter of the foes of militarism. -He will be indeed a relentless foe.</p> - -<p>Reversal to barbarism, say you? A shuddering -lapse into savagery?</p> - -<p>Quite true; that is the state of Europe over the -fairest and most highly civilized provinces. The -picture of Sir John French strolling up and down -the battle line smoking a cigarette does not give a -fair idea of it; nor do you get it from the Kaiser on a -hilltop surveying his massed war bullocks surging -forth patiently to battle; all that belongs to the picture -books of war.</p> - -<p>The real thing is dirtier.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page112">[112]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XI</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">BELGIUM’S BITTER NEED</span><br /> -<span class="chapauthor"><span class="smcap">By Sir Gilbert Parker</span></span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef11_1">THE MARTYRDOM OF BELGIUM</a> — <a href="#SecRef11_2">ABYSS OF WANT -AND WOE</a> — <a href="#SecRef11_3">NO WORK AND HEAVY WAR TAXES</a> — <a href="#SecRef11_4">PATIENCE -OF BELGIANS</a> — <a href="#SecRef11_5">CRYING NEED OF FOOD</a> — <a href="#SecRef11_6">BELGIAN -PEOPLE WARDS OF THE WORLD</a>.</p> - -<p class="courtesy">[Sir Gilbert Parker went abroad at the request of the American -Committee for the Relief of Belgium, and the following -graphic statement and appeal to the American people, dated -December 5, 1914, appeared in the New York Times.]</p> - -<p id="SecRef11_1">Since the beginning of the war the hearts of all -humane people have been tortured by the sufferings -of Belgium. For myself the martyrdom of Belgium -had been a nightmare since the fall of Liège. Whoever -or whatever country is to blame for this war, Belgium -is innocent. Her hands are free from stain. She has -kept the faith. She saw it with the eyes of duty and -honor. Her government is carried on in another land. -Her king is in the trenches. Her army is decimated, -but the last decimals fight on.</p> - -<p>Her people wander in foreign lands, the highest and -lowest looking for work and bread; they cannot look -for homes. Those left behind huddle near the ruins -of their shattered villages or take refuge in towns -which cannot feed their own citizens.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page113">[113]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef11_2">ABYSS OF WANT AND WOE</h3> - -<p>Many cities and towns have been completely destroyed; -others, reduced or shattered, struggle in vain -to feed their poor and broken populations. Stones -and ashes mark the places where small communities -lived their peaceful lives before the invasion. The -Belgian people live now in the abyss of want and woe.</p> - -<p>All this I knew in England, but knew it from the -reports of others. I did not, could not, know what the -destitution, the desolation of Belgium was, what were -the imperative needs of this people, until I got to -Holland and to the borders of Belgian territory. -Inside that territory I could not pass because I was -a Britisher, but there I could see German soldiers, the -Landwehr, keeping guard over what they call their -new German province. Belgium a German province!</p> - -<p>There at Maastricht I saw fugitives crossing the -frontier into Holland with all their worldly goods on -their shoulders or in their hands, or with nothing at all, -seeking hospitality of a little land which itself feels, -though it is neutral, the painful stress and cost of the -war. There, on the frontier, I was standing between -Dutch soldiers and German soldiers, so near the -Germans that I could almost have touched them, so -near three German officers that their conversation as -they saluted me reached my ears.</p> - -<p>I begin to understand what the sufferings and needs -of Belgium are. They are such that the horror of it -almost paralyzes expression. I met at Maastricht -Belgians, representatives of municipalities, who said -that they had food for only a fortnight longer. And -what was the food they had? No meat, no vegetables,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page114">[114]</a></span> -but only one-third of a soldier’s rations of bread for -each person per day. At Liège, as I write, there is -food for only three days.</p> - -<p>What is it the people of Belgium ask for? They -ask for bread and salt, no more, and it is not forthcoming. -They do not ask for meat; they cannot get -it. They have no fires for cooking, and they do not -beg for petrol. Money is of little use to them, because -there is no food to be bought with money.</p> - -<p>Belgium under ordinary circumstances imports five-sixths -of the food she eats. The ordinary channels -of sale and purchase are closed. They cannot buy -and sell if they would. Representatives of Belgian -communities told me at Maastricht that the crops were -taken from their fields—the wheat and potatoes—and -were sent into Germany.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef11_3">NO WORK, AND HEAVY WAR TAXES</h3> - -<p>There is no work. The factories are closed because -they have not raw material, coal, or petrol, because -they have no markets.</p> - -<p>And yet war taxes are falling with hideous pressure -upon a people whose hands are empty, whose workshops -are closed, whose fields are idle, whose cattle -have been taken, or compulsorily purchased without -value received.</p> - -<p>In Belgium itself the misery of the populace is -greater than the misery of the Belgian fugitives in -other countries, such as Holland, where there have -come since the fall of Liège one and a half million of -fugitives. To gauge what that misery in Belgium is, -think of what even the fugitives suffer. I have seen<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page115">[115]</a></span> -in a room without fire, the walls damp, the floor -without covering, not even straw, a family of nine -women and eight children, one on an improvised bunk -seriously ill. Their home in Belgium was leveled with -the ground, the father killed in battle.</p> - -<p>Their food is coffee and bread for breakfast, potatoes -for dinner, with salt—and in having the salt they were -lucky—bread and coffee for supper. Insufficiently -clothed, there by the North Sea, they watched the -bleak hours pass, with nothing to do except cling -together in a vain attempt to keep warm.</p> - -<p>Multiply this case by hundreds of thousands and -you will have some hint of the people’s sufferings.</p> - -<p>In a lighter on the River Maas at Rotterdam, without -windows, without doors, with only an open hatchway -from which a ladder descends, several hundred -fugitives spend their nights and the best parts of their -days in the iron hold, forever covered with moisture, -leaky when rain comes, with the floor never dry, and -pervasive with a perpetual smell like the smell of a -cave which never gets the light of day. Here men, -women, and children were huddled together in a promiscuous -communion of misery, made infinitely more -pathetic and heartrending because none complained.</p> - -<p>At Rosendaal, at Scheveningen, Eysden, and Flushing, -at a dozen other places, these ghastly things are -repeated in one form or another. Holland has sheltered -hundreds of thousands, but she could not in a -moment organize even adequate shelter, much less -comforts.</p> - -<p>In Bergen-op-Zoom, where I write these words, -there have come since the fall of Antwerp 300,000<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page116">[116]</a></span> -hungry marchers, with no resources except what they -carry with them. This little town of 15,000 people -did its best to meet the terrible pressure, and its -citizens went without bread themselves to feed the -refugees. How can a small municipality suddenly -deal with so vast a catastrophe? Yet slowly some -sort of order was organized out of chaos, and when -the Government was able to establish refugee camps -through the military the worst conditions were moderated, -and now, in tents and in vans on a fortunately -situated piece of land, over 3,000 people live, so far as -comforts are concerned, like Kaffirs in Karoo or -aborigines in a camp in the back blocks of Australia. -The tents are crammed with people, and life is reduced -to its barest elements. Straw, boards, and a few -blankets and dishes for rations—that constitutes the -ménage.</p> - -<p>Children are born in the hugger-mugger of such -conditions, but the good Holland citizens see that the -children are cared for and that the babies have milk. -Devoted priests teach the children, and the value of -military organization illuminates the whole panoply of -misery. Yet the best of the refugee camps would -seem to American citizens like the dark and dreadful -life of an underworld, in which is neither work, purpose, -nor opportunity. It is a sight repugnant to -civilization.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef11_4">PATIENCE OF BELGIANS</h3> - -<p>The saddest, most heartrending thing I have ever -seen has been the patience of every Belgian, whatever -his state, I have met. Among the thousands of<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page117">[117]</a></span> -refugees I have seen in Holland, in the long stream -that crossed the frontier at Maastricht and besieged -the doors of the Belgian Consul while I was there, -no man, no woman railed or declaimed against the -horror of their situation. The pathos of lonely, -staring, apathetic endurance is tragic beyond words. -So grateful, so simply grateful, are they, every one, -for whatever is done for them.</p> - -<p>None begs, none asks for money, and yet on the -faces of these frontier refugees I saw stark hunger, -the weakness come of long weeks of famine. One man, -one fortunate man from Verviers, told me he could -purchase as much as 2s. 8d. worth of food for himself, -his wife and child for a week.</p> - -<p>Think of it, American citizens! Sixty-six cents’ -worth of food for a man, his wife, and child for a whole -week, if he were permitted to purchase that much! -Sixty-six cents! That is what an average American -citizen pays for his dinner in his own home. He -cannot get breakfast, he can only get half a breakfast, -for that at the Waldorf or the Plaza in New York.</p> - -<p>This man was only allowed to purchase that much -food if he could, because if he purchased more he -would be taking from some one else, and they were -living on rations for the week which would represent -the food of an ordinary man for a day. A rich man -can have no more than a poor man. It is a democracy -of famine.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef11_5">CRYING NEED OF FOOD</h3> - -<p>There is enough food wasted in the average American -household in one day to keep a Belgian for a fortnight<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page118">[118]</a></span> -in health and strength. They want in Belgium -30,000 tons of food a month. That is their normal -requirement. The American Relief Committee is -asking for 8,000 tons a month, one-quarter of the -normal requirements, one-half of a soldier’s rations -for each Belgian. The American Committee needs -$5,000,000 a month until next harvest. It is a huge -sum, but it must be forthcoming.</p> - -<p>Of all the great powers of the world the United -States is the only one not at war or in peril of war. -Of all the foremost nations of the world the United -States is the only one that can save Belgium from -starvation if she will. She was the only nation that -Germany would allow a foothold for humanity’s and for -Christ’s sake in Belgium. Such an opportunity, such -responsibility, no nation ever had before in the history -of the world. Spain and Italy join with her, but the -initiative and resources and organization are hers.</p> - -<p>Around Belgium is a ring of steel. Within that -ring of steel is a disappearing and forever disappearing -population. Towns like Dendermonde, that were -of 10,000 people, have now 4,000, and in Dendermonde -1,200 houses have fallen under the iron and fire of war. -Into that vast graveyard and camp of the desolate -only the United States enters with an adequate and -responsible organization upon the mission of humanity.</p> - -<p>No such opportunity was ever given to a people, -no such test ever came to a Christian people in all the -records of time. Will the American nation rise to -the chance given to it to prove that its civilization is a -real thing and that its acts measure up with its -inherent and professed Christianity?</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page119">[119]</a></span></p> - -<p>I am a profound believer in the great-heartedness -of the United States, and there is not an American -of German origin who ought not gladly and freely -give to the relief of people who, unless the world -feeds them, must -be the remnant of -a nation; and the -world in this case is -the United States. -She can give most.</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo135.jpg" alt="Cartoon" width="350" height="483" /> -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Bringing Up Reinforcements.</span></p> -</div> - -<p>The price of one -good meal a week -for a family in an -American home -will keep a Belgian -alive for a -fortnight.</p> - -<p>Probably the -United States has -18,000,000 homes. -How many of -them will deny -themselves a meal -for martyred Belgium? -The mass of the American people do not -need to deny themselves anything to give to Belgium. -The whole standard of living on the American continent, -in the United States and Canada, is so much -higher than the European standard that if they lowered -the scale by one-tenth just for one six months -the Belgian problem would be solved.</p> - -<p>I say to the American people that they cannot<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page120">[120]</a></span> -conceive what this strain upon the populations of -Europe is at this moment, and, in the cruel grip of -winter, hundreds of thousands will agonize till death -or relief comes. In Australia in drought times vast -flocks of sheep go traveling with shepherds looking -for food and water, and no flock ever comes back as -it went forth. Not in flocks guided by shepherds, -but lonely, hopeless units, the Belgian people take -flight, looking for food and shelter, or remain paralyzed -by the tragedy fallen upon them in their own land.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef11_6">BELGIAN PEOPLE WARDS OF THE WORLD</h3> - -<p>Their sufferings are majestic in simple heroism and -uncomplaining endurance. So majestic in proportion -ought the relief to be. The Belgian people are wards -of the world. In the circumstances the Belgian people -are special wards of the one great country that is -secure in its peace and that by its natural instincts -of human sympathy and love of freedom is best suited -to do the work that should be done for Belgium. -If every millionaire would give a thousand, if every -man with $100 a month would give $10, the American -Committee for the Relief of Belgium, with its splendid -organization, its unrivaled efficiency, through which -flows a tide of human sympathy, would be able to -report at the end of the war that a small nation in -misfortune had been saved from famine and despair -by a great people far away, who had responded to the -call, “Come over and help us!”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page121">[121]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XII</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">JAMES BRYCE’S REPORT ON SYSTEMATIC -MASSACRE IN BELGIUM</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef12_1">REPORT OF COMMISSION TO INVESTIGATE GERMAN -OUTRAGES</a> — <a href="#SecRef12_2">A HARROWING RECITAL</a> — <a href="#SecRef12_3">TELLS OF -MASSACRES</a> — <a href="#SecRef12_4">“KILLED IN MASSES”</a>—<a href="#SecRef12_5">THE TALE OF -LOUVAIN</a> — <a href="#SecRef12_6">TREATMENT OF WOMEN AND CHILDREN</a> — <a href="#SecRef12_7">CALLS -KILLING DELIBERATE</a> — <a href="#SecRef12_8">“SPIRIT OF WAR DEIFIED”</a>—<a href="#SecRef12_9">THE -COMMISSION’S CONCLUSIONS</a>.</p> - -<p id="SecRef12_1">Viscount Bryce, former British Ambassador -at Washington, was appointed chairman of a special -government commission to investigate and report on -“outrages alleged to have been committed by German -troops.” Associated with Lord Bryce on the commission -were Sir Frederick Pollock, Sir Edward Clarke, -Sir Alfred Hopkinson, H. A. L. Fisher, Vice-Chancellor -of the University of Sheffield; Harold Cox, and Kenelm -E. Digby. The commission was appointed by Premier -Asquith on January 22, 1915. The document is -considered as probably the most severe arraignment -made of the German military sweep across Belgium, -mainly because of the position of Viscount Bryce as a -historian, and also because of the care with which -the investigation was made, the great number of -witnesses whose testimony was examined, and the mass -of evidence submitted with the report of the commission.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page122">[122]</a></span></p> - -<p>The report makes an official document of sixty-one -printed pages, or upward of 30,000 words, accompanied -by maps showing the various routes of the army and -the chief scenes of desolation. It states at the outset -that 1,200 witnesses have been examined, the depositions -being taken by examiners of legal knowledge and -experience, though without authority to administer -an oath. The examiners were instructed not to “lead” -the witnesses, and to seek to bring out the truth by -cross-examination and otherwise. The commission -also submitted extracts from a number of diaries taken -from the German dead, chiefly German soldiers and in -some cases officers.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef12_2">A HARROWING RECITAL</h3> - -<p>Taking up conditions at Liège at the outset of the -war, the report gives a harrowing recital of occurrences -at various points in the devastated territory. At -Herve on August 4, 1914, the report says, “the murder -of an innocent fugitive civilian was a prelude to the -burning and pillage of the town and of other villages -in the neighborhood; to the indiscriminate shooting -of civilians of both sexes and to the organized military -execution of batches of selected males. Thus some -fifty men escaping from burning houses were seized, -taken outside the town and shot. At Melen, in one -household alone the father and mother (names given) -were shot, the daughter died after being repeatedly -attacked and the son was wounded.</p> - -<p>“In Soumagne and Micheroux very many civilians -were summarily shot. In a field belonging to a man -named E——, fifty-six or fifty-seven were put to death.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page123">[123]</a></span> -A German officer said, ‘You have shot at us.’ One of -the villagers asked to be allowed to speak, and said, -‘If you think these people fired, kill me, but let them -go.’ The answer was three volleys. The survivors -were bayoneted. Their corpses were seen in the field -that night by another witness. One at least had been -mutilated. These were not the only victims in Soumagne. -The eye-witness of the massacre saw, on his -way home, twenty bodies, one that of a girl of thirteen. -Another witness saw nineteen corpses in a meadow.</p> - -<p>“At Heure le Romain all the male inhabitants, -including some bed-ridden old men, were imprisoned -in the church. The burgomaster’s brother and the -priest were bayoneted. The village of Visé was completely -destroyed. Officers directed the incendiaries. -Antiques and china were removed from the houses -before their destruction, by officers, who guarded the -plunder, revolver in hand.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef12_3">TELLS OF MASSACRES</h3> - -<p>“Entries in a German diary show that on August -10 the German soldiers gave themselves up to debauchery -in the streets of Liège, and on the night of the -20th a massacre took place in the streets. . . . Though -the cause of the massacre is in dispute, the results are -known with certainty. The Rue des Pitteurs and -houses in the Place de l’Université and the Quai des -Pêcheurs were systematically fired with benzine; and -many inhabitants were burned alive in their houses, -their efforts to escape being prevented by rifle fire. -Twenty people were shot while trying to escape, -before the eyes of one of the witnesses. The Liège<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page124">[124]</a></span> -Fire Brigade turned out, but was not allowed to extinguish -the fire. Its carts, however, were usefully -employed in removing heaps of civilian corpses to the -Town Hall.”</p> - -<p>Taking up the Valleys of the Meuse and Sambre, the -report gives lengthy details of terrible conditions -described by witnesses at Andenne, and says:</p> - -<p>“About four hundred people lost their lives in this -massacre, some on the banks of the Meuse, where they -were shot according to orders given, and some in the -cellars of the houses where they had taken refuge. -Eight men belonging to one family were murdered. -Another man was placed close to a machine gun which -was fired through him. His wife brought his body home -on a wheelbarrow. The Germans broke into her house -and ransacked it.</p> - -<p>“A hair-dresser was murdered in his kitchen where -he was sitting with a child on each knee. A paralytic -was murdered in his garden. After this came the -general sack of the town. Many of the inhabitants -who escaped the massacre were kept as prisoners and -compelled to clear the houses of corpses and bury them -in trenches. These prisoners were subsequently used -as a shelter and protection for a pontoon bridge which -the Germans had built across the river and were -so used to prevent the Belgian forts from firing -upon it.</p> - -<p>“A few days later the Germans celebrated a ‘fête -nocturne’ in the square. Hot wine, located in the -town, was drunk, and the women were compelled to -give three cheers for the Kaiser and to sing ‘Deutschland -über Alles.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page125">[125]</a></span>’”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef12_4">“KILLED IN MASSES”</h3> - -<p>Similar details are recited at much length in reference -to the districts of Namur, Charleroi and the town of -Dinant. At the latter point, the report says, “Unarmed -civilians were killed in masses. We have no reason -to believe that the civilian population of Dinant -gave any provocation or that any other defense can -be put forward to justify the treatment inflicted -upon its citizens.”</p> - -<p>The commission stated that it had received a great -mass of evidence on “scenes of chronic outrage” in the -territory bounded by the towns Aerschot, Malines, -Vilvorde and Louvain. It stated that the total number -of outrages was so great that the commission could -not refer to them all.</p> - -<p>“The commission is specially impressed by the -character of the outrages committed in the smaller -villages. Many of these are exceptionally shocking -and cannot be regarded as contemplated or prescribed -by responsible commanders of the troops by whom they -were commanded. Evidence goes to show that deaths -in these villages were due not to accident but to deliberate -purpose. The wounds were generally stabs or -cuts, and for the most part appear to have been inflicted -with a bayonet.</p> - -<p>“In Sempst the corpse of a man with his legs cut -off, who was partly bound, was seen by a witness, who -also saw a girl of seventeen in great distress dressed -only in a chemise. She alleged that she herself and -other girls had been dragged into a field, stripped -naked and attacked, and that some of them had been -killed with a bayonet.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page126">[126]</a></span></p> - -<p>Taking up conditions at Aerschot and the surrounding -district during September, the report says:</p> - -<p>“At Haecht several children had been murdered; -one of two or three years old was found nailed to the -door of a farmhouse by its hands and feet, a crime which -seems almost incredible, but the evidence for which we -feel bound to accept. At Eppeghem the body of a -child of two was seen pinned to the ground with a -German lance. The same witness saw a mutilated -woman alive near Weerde on the same day.”</p> - -<p>A chapter is given to the terrible conditions at -Louvain, where the report states, “massacre, fire and -destruction went on. . . . Citizens were shot and -others taken prisoners and compelled to go with the -troops. Soldiers went through the streets saying, ‘Man -hat geschossen’ (some one has fired on us).</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef12_5">THE TALE OF LOUVAIN</h3> - -<p>“The massacre of civilians at Louvain was not -confined to its citizens. Large crowds of people were -brought into Louvain from the surrounding districts, -not only from Aerschot and Gelrod, but also from other -places. For example, a witness describes how many -women and children were taken in carts to Louvain, -and there placed in a stable. Of the hundreds of -people thus taken from the various villages and brought -to Louvain as prisoners, some were massacred there, -others were forced to march along with citizens of -Louvain through various places, some being ultimately -sent to the Belgian lines at Malines, others were taken -in trucks to Cologne, others were released.</p> - -<p>“Ropes were put around the necks of some and they<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page127">[127]</a></span> -were told they would be hanged. An order then came -that they were to be shot instead of hanged. A firing -squad was prepared, and five or six prisoners were put -up, but were not shot. . . . This taking of the inhabitants -in groups and marching them to various places -must evidently have been done under the direction of a -higher military authority. The ill-treatment of the -prisoners was under the eyes and often under the direction -or sanction of officers, and officers themselves took -part in it. . . .</p> - -<p>“It is to be noticed that cases occur in the depositions -in which humane acts by individual officers and soldiers -are mentioned, or in which officers are said to have -expressed regret at being obliged to carry out orders -for cruel action against the civilians. Similarly, we -find entries in diaries which reveal a genuine pity for -the population and disgust at the conduct of the -enemy. It appears that a German non-commissioned -officer stated definitely that he ‘was acting under orders -and executing them with great unwillingness.’ A -commissioned officer on being asked at Louvain by a -witness, a highly educated man, about the horrible -acts committed by the soldiers, said he ‘was merely -executing orders,’ and that he himself would be shot -if he did not execute them.”</p> - -<p>Another division of the report is on the “killing of -non-combatants in France.” This is not as detailed -as the case of Belgium, as the commission states that -the French official report gives the most complete -account as to the invaded districts in France. It -adds:</p> - -<p>“The evidence before us proves that, in the parts<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page128">[128]</a></span> -of France referred to, murder of unoffending civilians -and other acts of cruelty, including aggravated cases -of felonious attack, carried out under threat of death, -and sometimes actually followed by murder of the victim, -were committed by some of the German troops.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef12_6">TREATMENT OF WOMEN AND CHILDREN</h3> - -<p>A special chapter is given to the treatment of women -and children. The latter, it is said, frequently received -milder treatment than the men. But many instances -are given of “calculated cruelty, often going the length -of murder, towards the women and children.” A witness -gives a story, very circumstantial in its details, -of how women were publicly attacked in the market -place of the city, five young German officers assisting. -The report goes on: “In the evidence before us there -are cases tending to show that aggravated crimes -against women were sometimes severely punished. -These instances are sufficient to show that the maltreatment -of women was not part of the military scheme of -the invaders, however much it may appear to have -been the inevitable result of the system of terror -deliberately adopted in certain regions.</p> - -<p>“It is clearly shown that many offences were committed -against infants and quite young children. On -one occasion children were even roped together and -used as a military screen against the enemy, on another -three soldiers went into action carrying small children -to protect themselves from flank fire. It is difficult -to imagine the motives which may have prompted such -acts. Whether or not Belgian civilians fired on German -soldiers, young children at any rate did not fire.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page129">[129]</a></span></p> - -<p>Many instances are given of the use of civilians as -screens during the military operation. Cases of the -Red Cross being misused for offensive military purposes, -and of abuse of the white flag are also given. As to the -latter the report says: “There is in our opinion sufficient -evidence that these offences have been frequent, -deliberate and in many cases committed by whole -units under orders. All the facts mentioned are in -contravention of The Hague Convention, signed by the -Great Powers, including France, Germany, Great -Britain and the United States, in 1907.”</p> - -<p>A division of the report is given to diaries of German -soldiers. The entry of a sergeant of the First Guards -Regiment, who received the Iron Cross, says, under -date of August 10: “A transport of 300 Belgians came -through Duisburg in the morning. Of these, eighty, -including the Oberburgomaster, were shot according -to martial law.” The diary of a member of the Fourth -Company of Jägers says, under date of August 23: -“About 220 inhabitants and the village were burned.” -Another diary, by a member of the Second Mounted -Battery, First Kurhessian Field Artillery Regiment, -No. 11, records an incident which happened in French -territory near Lille on October 11: “We had no fight, -but we caught about twenty men and shot them.” -The commission says of this last diary: “By this -time killing not in a fight would seem to have passed -into a habit.”</p> - -<p>The report adds that the most important entry was -contained in diary No. 19. This contained no name and -address, but names referred to in the diary indicate -that the entries were made by an officer of the First<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page130">[130]</a></span> -Regiment of Foot Guards. The entry made at Bermeton -on August 24 says: “We took about 1,000 prisoners; -at least 500 were shot. The village was burned because -inhabitants had also shot. Two civilians were shot at -once.”</p> - -<p>“If a line is drawn on a map from the Belgian -frontier to Liège and continued to Charleroi, and a -second line drawn from Liège to Malines, a sort of -figure resembling an irregular Y will be formed. It -is along this ‘Y’ that most of the systematic (as opposed -to isolated) outrages were committed. If the period -from August 4 to August 30 is taken it will be found to -cover most of these organized outrages. Termonde and -Alost extend, it is true, beyond the ‘Y’ lines, and they -belong to the month of September. Murder, assault, -arson and pillage began from the moment when the -German army crossed the frontier. For the first -fortnight of the war the towns and villages near Liège -were the chief sufferers. From August 19 to the end -of the month outrages spread in the direction of -Charleroi and Malines and reached their period of -greatest intensity.</p> - -<p>“There is a certain significance in the fact that the -outrages around Liège coincide with the unexpected -resistance of the Belgian army in that district, and -that the slaughter which reigned from August 19 to -the end of the month is contemporaneous with the -period when the German army’s need for a quick -passage through Belgium at all costs was deemed -imperative.</p> - -<p>“In all wars occur many shocking and outrageous acts -of men of criminal instincts whose worst passions are<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page131">[131]</a></span> -unloosed by the immunity which the conditions of -warfare afford. Drunkenness, moreover, may turn -even a soldier who has no criminal habits into a brute, -and there is evidence that intoxication was extremely -prevalent among the German army, both in Belgium -and in France. Unfortunately little seems to have -been done to repress this source of danger.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef12_7">CALLS KILLING DELIBERATE</h3> - -<p>“In the present war, however—and this is the gravest -charge against the German army—the evidence shows -that the killing of non-combatants was carried out to -an extent for which no previous war between nations -claiming to be civilized (for such cases as the atrocities -perpetrated by the Turks on the Bulgarian Christians in -1876, and on the Armenian Christians in 1895 and 1896, -do not belong to that category) furnishes any precedent. -That this killing was done as part of a deliberate plan -is clear from the facts hereinbefore set forth regarding -Louvain, Aerschot, Dinant and other towns. The -killing was done under orders in each place. It began -at a certain fixed date. Some of the officers who carried -out the work did it reluctantly, and said they were -obeying directions from their chiefs. The same remarks -apply to the destruction of property. House burning -was part of the program; and villages, even large parts -of a city, were given to the flames as part of the terrorizing -policy.</p> - -<p>“Citizens of neutral states who visited Belgium in -December and January report that the German -authorities do not deny that non-combatants were -systematically killed in large numbers during the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page132">[132]</a></span> -first weeks of the invasion, and this, so far as we know, -has never been officially denied.</p> - -<p>“The German government has, however, sought -to justify these severities on the grounds of military -necessity and has excused them as retaliation for -cases in which civilians fired on German troops. There -may have been cases in which such firing occurred, but -no proof has ever been given, or, to our knowledge, -attempted to be given, of such cases, nor of the stories -of shocking outrages perpetrated by Belgian men and -women on German soldiers. . . .</p> - -<p>“We gladly record the instances where the evidence -shows that humanity has not wholly disappeared from -some members of the German army and that they -realized that the responsible heads of that organization -were employing them not in war but in butchery: ‘I am -merely executing orders, and I should be shot if I did -not execute them,’ said an officer to a witness at Louvain. -At Brussels another officer said, ‘I have not done -one hundredth part of what we have been ordered to -do by the high German military authorities.’</p> - -<p>“That these acts should have been perpetrated on -the peaceful population of an unoffending country -which was not at war with its invaders, but merely -defending its own neutrality, guaranteed by the -invading power, may excite amazement and even -incredulity. It was with amazement and almost with -incredulity that the commission first read the depositions -relating to such acts. But when the evidence -regarding Liège was followed by that regarding Aerschot, -Louvain, Andenne, Dinant, and the other towns -and villages, the cumulative effect of such a mass<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page133">[133]</a></span> -of concurrent testimony became irresistible, and we -were driven to the conclusion that the things described -had really happened. The question then arose -how they could have happened.</p> - -<p>“The explanation seems to be that these excesses -were committed—in some cases ordered, in others -allowed—on a system and in pursuance of a set purpose. -That purpose was to strike terror into the civil population -and dishearten the Belgian troops, so as to crush -down resistance and extinguish the very spirit of self-defense. -The pretext that civilians had fired upon the -invading troops was used to justify not merely the -shooting of individual franc-tireurs, but the murder -of large numbers of innocent civilians, an act absolutely -forbidden by the rules of civilized warfare.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef12_8">“SPIRIT OF WAR DEIFIED”</h3> - -<p>“In the minds of Prussian officers war seems to have -become a sort of sacred mission, one of the highest -functions of the omnipotent state, which is itself as -much an army as a state. Ordinary morality and the -ordinary sentiment of pity vanish in its presence, -superseded by a new standard which justifies to the -soldier every means that can conduce to success, -however shocking to a natural sense of justice and -humanity, however revolting to his own feelings. The -spirit of war is deified. Obedience to the state and -its war lord leaves no room for any other duty or -feeling. Cruelty becomes legitimate when it promises -victory. Proclaimed by the heads of the army, this -doctrine would seem to have permeated the officers -and affected even the private soldiers, leading them to<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page134">[134]</a></span> -justify the killing of non-combatants as an act of war, -and so accustoming them to slaughter that even women -and children become at last the victims.</p> - -<p>“It cannot be supposed to be a national doctrine, -for it neither springs from nor reflects the mind and -feelings of the German people as they have heretofore -been known to other nations. It is specifically military -doctrine, the outcome of a theory held by a ruling -caste who have brooded and thought, written and -talked and dreamed about war until they have fallen -under its obsession and been hypnotized by its spirit.</p> - -<p>“The doctrine is plainly set forth in the German -official monograph on the usages of war on land, issued -under the direction of the German staff. This book -is pervaded throughout by the view that whatever -military needs suggest becomes thereby lawful, and -upon this principle, as the diaries show, the German -officers acted.</p> - -<p>“If this explanation be the true one, the mystery -is solved, and that which seemed scarcely credible -becomes more intelligible though not less pernicious. -This is not the only case that history records in which -a false theory, disguising itself as loyalty to a state or -to a church, has perverted the conception of duty and -become a source of danger to the world.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef12_9">THE COMMISSION’S CONCLUSIONS</h3> - -<p>The conclusions of the commission, as to the various -detailed recitals, are as follows:</p> - -<p>“We may now sum up and endeavor to explain the -character and significance of the wrongful acts done -by the German army in Belgium.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page135">[135]</a></span></p> - -<p>“It is proved, first, that there were in many parts -of Belgium deliberate and systematically organized -massacres of the civil population accompanied by many -isolated murders and other outrages.</p> - -<p>“Second—That in the conduct of the war generally -innocent civilians, both men and women, were murdered -in large numbers, women attacked and children -murdered.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> - -<img src="images/illo151.jpg" alt="Cartoon" width="450" height="279" /> - -<p class="caption main">“<span class="smcap">Their First Success.</span>”</p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">“At Morfontaine, near Longwy, the Germans -shot two fifteen-year-old children who had -warned the French gendarmes of the enemy’s -arrival.”—The Newspapers.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p>“Third—That looting, house burning and the wanton -destruction of -property were ordered -and countenanced -by the -officers of the -German army, -that elaborate -provision had -been made for -systematic incendiarism -at the -very outbreak of -the war, and that -the burning and -destruction were frequently where no military necessity -could be alleged, being, indeed, part of a system of -general terrorization.</p> - -<p>“Fourth—That the rules and usages of war were -frequently broken, particularly by the using of civilians, -including women and children, as a shield for advancing -forces exposed to fire, to a less degree by killing the -wounded and prisoners, and in the frequent abuse of -the Red Cross and the white flag.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page136">[136]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Sensible as they are of the gravity of these conclusions, -the commission conceive that they would be -doing less than their duty if they failed to record them -as fully established by the evidence. Murder, lust and -pillage prevailed over many parts of Belgium on a -scale unparalleled in any war between civilized nations -during the last three centuries.</p> - -<p>“Our function is ended when we have stated what -the evidence establishes, but we may be permitted to -express our belief that these disclosures will not have -been made in vain if they touch and rouse the conscience -of mankind, and we venture to hope that as soon as the -present war is over, the nations of the world in council -will consider what means can be provided and sanctions -devised to prevent the recurrence of such horrors as -our generation is now witnessing.”</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo153.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="392" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Most Beautiful City in Europe Destroyed by the Germans.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">Scene of desolation in Louvain. On the right is the magnificent Town Hall, -considered one of the most marvelous -pieces of architecture in Europe’s which escaped almost untouched. In the center, however, the famous St. Peter’s -Cathedral has only the walls standing. <span class="copyright">(<i>Copyright by the International News Service.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo154.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="388" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Ruins of Ypres After the Bombardment.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">The old Flemish town was the center of hot fighting between the -Allies and the German troops in the battles for -the possession of Belgium. At the right of the picture are seen the ruins of the famous Cloth Hall, one of the most -famous medieval buildings in Europe. <span class="copyright">(<i>Copyright by the International News Service.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page137">[137]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XIII</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">A BELGIAN BOY’S STORY OF THE RUIN OF -AERSCHOT</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef13_1">PITIABLE PLIGHT OF BOY OF SIXTEEN STRANDED -IN ANTWERP</a> — <a href="#SecRef13_2">HIS ARREST</a> — <a href="#SecRef13_3">A TOWN IN -RUINS</a> — <a href="#SecRef13_4">BURYING -THE DEAD</a> — <a href="#SecRef13_5">THE LEVELED GUNS</a> — <a href="#SecRef13_6">MARCHING -AMONG GERMAN CAMPS</a> — <a href="#SecRef13_7">NO MONEY AND NO -WORK</a>.</p> - -<p id="SecRef13_1">To the thousands of unhappy Belgian refugees -driven from their homes by the advancing Germans -and transported to England the pity of the whole world -has gone out; yet even more deplorable than the -condition of these was the fate of those who were left -behind to suffer at the hands of a relentless enemy. -The story of a delicate boy of sixteen, as told in the -following letter which he himself wrote from Antwerp -to his former employer, an American living at the -time in England, is typical.</p> - -<p>When this boy, fleeing from Aerschot, arrived in -Antwerp, without friends, money or papers, there was -no agency to help him. If he had been a smaller -child somebody doubtless would have taken pity on -him and carried him with them as they fled; if he -had been able to preserve his legitimatization papers -the Belgian authorities would have given him some -support; and, of course, if he had been older, he would -have been immediately enlisted in the service of his<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page138">[138]</a></span> -country. As it was he could only drift before the foe, -and suffer.</p> - -<p class="right padr2">“<span class="smcap">Antwerp</span>, Sept. 23, 1914.</p> - -<p>“<span class="smcap">Dear Sir</span>: As you correctly said in my testimonial -when you were closing the office, the war has isolated -Belgium. Really I can well say that I have been -painfully struck by this scourge, and I permit myself, -dear sir, to give you a little description of my Calvary.</p> - -<p>“Your offices were closed in the beginning of August. -As I did not know what to do and as the fatherland -had not enough men to defend its territory I tried to -get myself accepted as a volunteer.</p> - -<p>“On Aug. 10 I went to Aerschot, my native town, -to get my certificate of good conduct. Then I went to -Louvain to have same signed by the commander of -the place. This gentleman sent me to St. Nicholas -and thence to Hemixem, where I was rejected as too -young. I then decided to return to Brussels, passing -through Aerschot. Here my aunt asked me to stay -with her, saying that she was afraid of the Germans.</p> - -<p>“I remained at Aerschot. This was Aug. 15. Suddenly, -on the 19th, at nine o’clock in the morning, after -a terrible bombardment, the Germans made their -entry into Aerschot. In the first street which they -passed through they broke into the houses. They -brought out six men whom I knew very well and -immediately shot them. Learning of this, I fled to -Louvain, where I arrived on Aug. 19 at one o’clock.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef13_2">HIS ARREST</h3> - -<p>“At 1.30 <span class="smcapall">P.M.</span> the Germans entered Louvain. They -did not do anything to the people in the beginning.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page139">[139]</a></span> -On the following Saturday, Aug. 22, I started to -return to Aerschot, as I had no money. (All my -money was still in Brussels.) The whole distance -from Louvain to Aerschot I saw nothing but German -armies, always Germans. They did not say a word -to me until I suddenly found myself alone with three -of the “Todeshusaren” (Death’s-head Hussars), -the vanguard of their regiment. They arrested me -at the point of the revolver, demanded where I was -going and why I had run away from Aerschot. They -said that the whole of Aerschot was now on fire, -because the son of the burgomaster had killed a -general. Finally they searched me from head to -foot, and I heard them discuss the question of my -fate.</p> - -<p>“Finally the non-commissioned officer told me that -I could continue on my way; that they would certainly -take care of me in Aerschot, as I had been -firing at Germans, and they would shoot me when -I arrived. I would have liked better to return to -Louvain, but with an imperious gesture he pointed -out my road to Aerschot, and I continued. On -arriving within a few hundred meters of the town -I was arrested once more.</p> - -<p>“I forgot to tell you that of all the houses which -I passed between Louvain and Aerschot, there were -only a few left intact. Upon these the Germans -had written in chalk in the German language: ‘Please -spare. Good people. Do not burn.’ Lying along -the road I saw many dead horses putrefying. There -were also to be seen pigs, goats, and cows which had -nothing to eat, and which were howling like wild<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page140">[140]</a></span> -beasts. Not a soul was to be seen in the houses or in -the streets. Everything was empty.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> - -<img src="images/illo158.jpg" alt="Cartoon" width="450" height="429" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">In Belgium.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondcenter"><i>Jean</i>—“Do you think St. Nicholas will find -us, now that we haven’t a chimney?”</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p>“I was then arrested when a short distance from -Aerschot. There were with me two or three families -from Sichem, a -village between -Diest and Aerschot. -We remained -in the -fields alongside the -road, while the -Prussian regiments -with their -artillery continued -to pass by. When -the artillery had -passed we were -marched at the -point of the bayonet -to the church -in Aerschot. On arrival at the church the families of -Sichem (there were at least twenty small children) -were permitted to continue on their way, and the non-commissioned -officer, delighted that I could speak -German, permitted me to go to my aunt’s house.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef13_3">A TOWN IN RUINS</h3> - -<p>“The aspect of the town was terrible. Not more -than half the houses were standing. In the first -three streets which the Germans traversed there was -not a single house left. There was not a house in the -town but had been pillaged. All doors had been burst<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page141">[141]</a></span> -open. There was nothing, nothing left. The stench -in the streets was insupportable.</p> - -<p>“I then went home, or, rather, I should say, I went -to the house where my father had always been boarding. -You know, perhaps, that my mother died twelve -years ago. I did not find my father, but according to -what the people told me he had been arrested, and, -with five other Aerschot men, taken to Germany—I do -not know for what purpose.</p> - -<p>“I got into this house without any difficulty, because -the door was smashed in. I stayed there from Saturday, -Aug. 22, up to Wednesday, the 26th, a little more -comfortable. There was nothing to eat left in the -house. I lived on what a few women who remained -in Aerschot could give me. I was forced to go with -the soldiers into the cellars of M. X., director of a -large factory, to hunt for wine. As recompense I got -a loaf. It was not much, but at this moment it meant -very much for me.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef13_4">BURYING THE DEAD</h3> - -<p>“On Wednesday, Aug. 26, we were all once more -locked up in the church. It was then half-past four in -the afternoon. We could not get out, even for our -necessities. On Thursday, about nine o’clock, each of -us was given a piece of bread and a glass of water. -This was to last the whole day. At ten o’clock a -lieutenant came in, accompanied by fifteen soldiers. -He placed all the men who were left in a square, -selected seventy of us and ordered us out to bury the -corpses of Germans and Belgians around the town, -which had been lying there since the battle of the 19th.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page142">[142]</a></span> -That was a week that these bodies had remained there, -and it is no use to ask if there was a stench. Afterward -we had to clean the streets, and then it was -evening.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef13_5">THE LEVELED GUNS</h3> - -<p>“They just got ready to shoot us. There were -then ten of us. The guns had already been leveled at -us, when suddenly a German soldier ran out shouting -that we had not fired on them. A few minutes before -we had heard rifle-firing and the Germans said it was -the Aerschot people who were shooting, though all -these had been locked up in the church and we were -the only inhabitants then in the streets, cleaning them, -under surveillance of Germans. It was this German -who saved our lives.</p> - -<p>“Picture to yourself what we have suffered! It is -impossible to describe. On Aug. 28 we were brought -to Louvain, always guarded by German soldiers. -There were with us about twenty old men, over -eighty years of age. These were placed in two -carts, tied to one another in pairs. I and -about twenty of my unfortunate compatriots -had then to pull the carts all the way to Louvain. -It was hard, but that could be supported all the -same.</p> - -<p>“On arriving at Louvain I saw with my own eyes a -German who shot at us. The Germans who were at -the station shouted ‘The civilians have been shooting,’ -and commenced a fusillade against us. Many of us -fell dead, others wounded, but I had the chance to -run away.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page143">[143]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef13_6">MARCHING AMONG GERMAN CAMPS</h3> - -<p>“I now took the road to Tirlemont, marching all -the time among German camps. Once I was arrested. -Again they wanted to shoot me, insisting that I was -a student of the University of Louvain. The Germans -pretend it was the students who caused the population -in Louvain to shoot at them. However, my youth -saved me, and I was set at liberty.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef13_7">NO MONEY AND NO WORK</h3> - -<p>“All my money, the twenty francs which you presented -me and my salary for five weeks, as well as my -little savings, are lying in Brussels, and I cannot get -at them. . . I cannot work, because there is no work -to be got. I cannot cross over to England, as, to do -this, it is necessary that there should be a whole -family. In these horrible circumstances, I respectfully -take the liberty of addressing you, and I hope -you will aid me as best you can. I swear to you that -I shall pay you back all that you give me. I have -here in Antwerp no place, no family. The town will -not give me any aid, because I have no papers to -prove my identity. I threw all my papers away for -fear of the Germans. I count then on you with a -firm hope to pay you back later.</p> - -<p>“Please accept, dear sir, my respectful greetings.”</p> - -<p class="right blankbefore1 padr2">—— ——.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page144">[144]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XIV</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">THE UNSPEAKABLE ATROCITIES OF -“CIVILIZED” WARFARE</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef14_1">DISCLOSURES MADE IN FRENCH OFFICIAL REPORTS -AND NOTEBOOKS OF GERMAN SOLDIERS</a> — <a href="#SecRef14_2">NOTHING -SACRED</a> — <a href="#SecRef14_3">HIDEOUS FACES OF THE DEAD</a> — <a href="#SecRef14_4">WOMEN -FORCED TO DIG GRAVES</a> — <a href="#SecRef14_5">GETTING HARDENED</a> — <a href="#SecRef14_6">WHOLESALE -PILLAGE</a> — <a href="#SecRef14_7">MUTILATIONS OF THE DEAD -AND WOUNDED</a> — <a href="#SecRef14_8">THE FRENCH REPORT</a>.</p> - -<p id="SecRef14_1">The French official report on German atrocities -contained records of such horror that the whole civilized -world stood aghast. Here at last was war with all its -multitudinous attendant crimes, more horrible than -the actual warfare itself because so causeless and so -bestial. Many stories of atrocities had been told by -travelers and war correspondents abroad; the official -report from France verified these earlier accounts, -though there was still a vestige of doubt because it was -a French report of German atrocities; and then to back -up this record and remove the last shadow of disbelief, -came the testimony of the Germans against themselves, -through the “War Diaries” of German soldiers, many -of which naturally fell into the hands of the enemy. -Paragraphs selected from these notebooks follow:</p> - -<p>“In this way we destroyed eight dwellings and their -inhabitants. In one of the houses we bayoneted two -men, with their wives and a young girl eighteen years<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page145">[145]</a></span> -old. The young one almost unmanned me, her look -was so innocent! But we could not master the excited -troop, for at such times they are no longer men—they -are beasts.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef14_2">NOTHING SACRED</h3> - -<p>“Unfortunately, I am forced to make note of a fact -which should not have occurred, but there are to be -found, even in our own army, creatures who are no -longer men, but hogs, to whom nothing is sacred. -One of these broke into a sacristy; it was locked, and -there the Blessed Sacrament was kept. A Protestant, -out of respect, had refused to sleep there. This man -used it as a deposit for his excrements. How is it -possible there should be such creatures? Last night -one of the men of the landwehr, more than thirty-five -years of age, married, tried to rape the daughter of -the inhabitant where he had taken up his quarters—a -mere girl—and when the father intervened he pressed -his bayonet against his breast.”</p> - -<p>“Langeviller, Aug. 22.—Village destroyed by the -eleventh battalion of Pioneers. Three women hanged -to trees; the first dead I have seen.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef14_3">HIDEOUS FACES OF THE DEAD</h3> - -<p>“The inhabitants fled through the village. It was -horrible. The walls of houses are bespattered with -blood and the faces of the dead are hideous to look -upon. They were buried at once, some sixty of them. -Among them many old women, old men, and one woman -pregnant—the whole a dreadful sight. Three children -huddled together—all dead. Altar and arches of the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page146">[146]</a></span> -church shattered. Telephone communication with -the enemy was found there. This morning, Sept. 2, -all the survivors were driven out; I saw four little -boys carrying on two poles a cradle with a child some -five or six months old. The whole makes a fearful -sight. Blow upon blow! Thunderbolt on thunderbolt! -Everything given over to plunder. I saw a mother -with her two little ones—one of them had a great wound -in the head and an eye put out.”</p> - -<p>“At the entrance to the village lay the bodies of some -fifty citizens, shot for having fired upon our troops from -ambush. In the course of the night many others were -shot down in like manner, so that we counted more -than two hundred. Women and children, holding -their lamps, were compelled to assist at this horrible -spectacle. We then sat down midst the corpses to eat -our rice, as we had eaten nothing since morning.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef14_4">WOMEN FORCED TO DIG GRAVES</h3> - -<p>“Aug. 25 (in Belgium).—We shot 300 of the inhabitants -of the town. Those that survived the salvo were -requisitioned as grave-diggers. You should have seen -the women at that time! But it was impossible to do -otherwise. In our march upon Wilot things went -better; the inhabitants who wished to leave were -allowed to do so. But whoever fired was shot. Upon -our leaving Owele the rifles rang out, and with that, -flames, women and all the rest.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef14_5">GETTING HARDENED</h3> - -<p>“We arrested three civilians, and a bright idea struck -me. We furnished them with chairs and made them<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page147">[147]</a></span> -seat themselves in the middle of the street. There were -supplications on one part, and some blows with the -stocks of our guns on the other. One, little by little, -gets terribly hardened. Finally, there they were sitting -in the street. How many anguished prayers they may -have muttered, I cannot say, but during the whole time -their hands were joined in nervous contraction. I am -sorry for them, but the stratagem was of immediate -effect. The enfilading -directed -from the houses -diminished at -once; we were -able then to take -possession of the -house opposite, -and thus became -masters of the -principal street. -From that moment -every one -that showed his -face in the street was shot. And the artillery meanwhile -kept up vigorous work, so that at about seven o’clock in -the evening, when the brigade advanced to rescue us, I -could report ‘Saint-Dié has been emptied of all enemies.’</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo165.jpg" alt="Cartoon" width="450" height="395" /> -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Road to Yesterday.</span></p> -</div> - -<p>“As I learned later, the —— regiment of reserves, -which came into Saint-Dié further north, had experiences -entirely similar to our own. The four civilians -whom they had placed on chairs in the middle of the -street were killed by French bullets. I saw them myself -stretched out in the street near the hospital.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page148">[148]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef14_6">WHOLESALE PILLAGE</h3> - -<p>“Aug. 8, 1914. Gouvy (Belgium).—There, the -Belgians having fired on some German soldiers, we -started at once pillaging the merchandise warehouse. -Several cases—eggs, shirts, and everything that could -be eaten was carried off. The safe was forced and the -gold distributed among the men. As to the securities, -they were torn up.”</p> - -<p>“The enemy occupied the village of Bièvre and the -edge of the wood behind it. The third company -advanced in first line. We carried the village, and then -pillaged and burned almost all the houses.”</p> - -<p>“The first village we burned was Parux (Meurthe-et-Moselle). -After this the dance began, throughout -the villages, one after the other; over the fields and -pastures we went on our bicycles up to the ditches at -the edge of the road, and there sat down to eat our -cherries.”</p> - -<p>“Our first fight was at Haybes (Belgium) on the -24th of August. The second battalion entered the -village, ransacked the houses, pillaged them, and -burned those from which shots had been fired.”</p> - -<p>“They do not behave as soldiers, but rather as -highwaymen, bandits and brigands, and are a dishonor -to our regiment and to our army.”</p> - -<p>“No discipline, . . . the Pioneers are well nigh -worthless; as to the artillery, it is a band of robbers.”</p> - -<p>“Aug. 12, 1914, in Belgium.—One can get an idea -of the fury of our soldiers in seeing the destroyed -villages. Not one house left untouched. Everything -eatable is requisitioned by the unofficered soldiers. -Several heaps of men and women put to execution.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page149">[149]</a></span> -Young pigs are running about looking for their -mothers.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef14_7">MUTILATIONS OF THE DEAD</h3> - -<p>“On the 22d, in the evening, I learned that in the -woods, about one hundred and fifty meters north of -the square formed by the intersection of the great -Calonne trench with the road from Vaux-les-Palameis -to Saint-Rémy, there were corpses of French soldiers -shot by the Germans. I went to the spot and found -the bodies of about thirty soldiers within a small space, -most of them prone, but several still kneeling, and -<i>all having a precisely similar wound</i>—a bullet through -the ear. One only, seriously wounded in his lower -parts, could still speak, and told me that the Germans -before leaving had ordered them to lie down and that -they had them shot through the head; that he, already -wounded, had secured indulgence by stating that he -was the father of three small children. The skulls -of these unfortunates were scattered; the guns, broken -at the stock, were scattered here and there; and the -blood had besprinkled the bushes to such an extent -that in coming out of the woods my cape was spattered -with it; it was a veritable shambles.”</p> - -<p>“Dogs chained, without food or drink. And the -houses about them on fire. But the just anger of our -soldiers is accompanied also by pure vandalism. In the -villages, already emptied of their inhabitants, the -houses are set on fire. I feel sorry for this population. -If they have made use of disloyal weapons, after all, -they are only defending their own country. The -atrocities which these non-combatants are still committing<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page150">[150]</a></span> -are revenged after a savage fashion. Mutilations -of the wounded are the order of the day.”</p> - -<p>This order was addressed by General Stenger, in -command of the fifty-eighth German brigade, on the -26th of August, to the troops under his orders:</p> - -<p>“From this day forward no further prisoners will be -taken. All prisoners will be massacred. The wounded, -whether in arms or not in arms, shall be massacred. -Even the prisoners already gathered in convoys will be -massacred. No living enemy must remain behind us.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef14_8">THE FRENCH REPORT</h3> - -<p>Having been instructed to investigate atrocities -said to have been committed by the Germans in -portions of French territory which had been occupied -by them, a commission composed of four representatives -of the French Government repaired to these districts -in order to make a thorough investigation. The commission -was composed of M. Georges Payelle, First -President of the Cour des Comptes; Armand Mollard, -Minister Plenipotentiary; Georges Maringer, Counselor -of State, and Edmond Paillot, Counselor of the -Cour de Cassation.</p> - -<p>They started on their mission late in September, -1914, and visited the Departments of Seine-et-Marne, -Marne, Meuse, Meurthe-et-Moselle, Oise, and Aisne. -According to the report, they made note only of those -accusations against the invaders which were backed -up by reliable testimony and discarded everything that -might have been occasioned by the exigencies of war.</p> - -<p>The statement, which extends over many pages and -contains over 25,000 words, is a record of the most<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page151">[151]</a></span> -fiendish crimes imaginable. “On every side our eyes -rested on ruin. Whole villages have been destroyed -by bombardment or fire; towns formerly full of life -are now nothing but deserts full of ruins; and, in visiting -the scenes of desolation where the invader’s torch has -done its work, one feels continually as though one -were walking among the remains of one of those cities -of antiquity which have been annihilated by the great -cataclysms of nature.</p> - -<p>“In truth it can be stated that never has a war -carried on between civilized nations assumed the -savage and ferocious character of the one which at this -moment is being waged on our soil by an implacable -adversary. Pillage, rape, arson, and murder are the -common practice of our enemies; and the facts which -have been revealed to us day by day at once constitute -definite crimes against common rights, punished by -the codes of every country with the most severe and the -most dishonoring penalties, and which prove an astonishing -degeneration in German habits of thought -since 1870.</p> - -<p>“Crimes against women and young girls have been -of appalling frequency. We have proved a great -number of them, but they only represent an infinitesimal -proportion of those which we could have taken up. -Owing to a sense of decency, which is deserving of every -respect, the victims of these hateful acts usually refuse -to disclose them. Doubtless fewer would have been -committed if the leaders of an army whose discipline -is most rigorous had taken any trouble to prevent -them; yet, strictly speaking, they can only be considered -as the individual and spontaneous acts of uncaged<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page152">[152]</a></span> -beasts. But with regard to arson, theft, and murder -the case is very different; the officers, even those of the -highest station, will bear before humanity the overwhelming -responsibility for these crimes.</p> - -<p>“In the greater part of the places where we carried -on our inquiry we came to the conclusion that the -German Army constantly professes the most complete -contempt for human life, that its soldiers, and even its -officers, do not hesitate to finish off the wounded, that -they kill without pity the inoffensive inhabitants of the -territories which they have invaded, and they do not -spare in their murderous rage women, old men, or -children. The wholesale shootings at Lunéville, Gerbéviller, -Nomeny, and Senlis are terrible examples of -this; and in the course of this report you will read the -story of scenes of carnage in which officers themselves -have not been ashamed to take part.”</p> - -<h4 id="SecRef14_9">HORRIBLE CASES OF RAPE</h4> - -<p>Of the criminal attempts on women cited in the -report two of the most horrible occurred in the Department -of Seine-et-Marne.</p> - -<p>“Frightful scenes occurred at the Château de —— in -the neighborhood of La Ferté-Gaucher. There lived -there an old gentleman, M. X., with his servant, Mlle. -Y., 54 years old. On Sept. 5 several Germans, among -whom was a non-commissioned officer, were in occupation -of this property. After they had been supplied -with food, the non-commissioned officer proposed to -a refugee, a Mme. Z., that she should sleep with him; -she refused. M. X., to save her from the designs of -which she was the object, sent her to his farm, which -was in the neighborhood. The German ran there to -fetch her, dragged her back to the château and led her -to the attic; then, having completely undressed her, -he tried to violate her. At this moment M. X., wishing -to protect her, fired revolver shots on the staircase and -was immediately shot.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> - -<img src="images/illo171.jpg" alt="" width="445" height="600" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Bombardment of the East Coast of England.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">This scene, painted in Hartlepool, shows the effect of a bursting German -shell in the unfortified British town. Several women and many other -civilians were killed by the German raiders.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> - -<img src="images/illo172.jpg" alt="" width="390" height="600" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Prussian Soldier Kidnapping a Red Cross Nurse.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">In spite of her prayer he seized her roughly, tied her hands together -and throwing her across his saddle rode away. Fortunately, a Cossack -appeared, pierced the scoundrel with his lance and rescued the woman. -<span class="copyright">(<i>Graphic copr.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page153">[153]</a></span></p> - -<p>“The non-commissioned officer then made Mme. X. -come out of the -attic, obliged her -to step over the -corpse of the old -man, and led her -to a closet, where -he again made two -unsuccessful attempts -upon her. -Leaving her at -last, he threw himself -upon Mlle. Y., -having first handed -Mme. Z. over to -two soldiers, who, -after having violated -her, one once -and the other -twice, in the dead man’s room, made her pass the night -in a barn near them, where one of them twice again -had sexual connection with her.</p> - -<p>“As for Mlle. Y., she was obliged by threats of being -shot, to strip herself completely naked and lie on a -mattress with the non-commissioned officer, who kept -her there until morning.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page154">[154]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w450"> -<img src="images/illo173.jpg" alt="Cartoon" width="450" height="502" /> -<p class="caption main">“<span class="smcap">At Least They Only <i>Drown</i> Your -Women.</span>”</p> -</div> - -<p>“It is generally believed at Coulommiers that -criminal attempts have been made on many women -of that town, but only one crime of this nature has -been proved for certain. A charwoman, Mme. X., -was the victim. A soldier came to her house on the 6th -of September, toward 9.30 in the evening, and sent -away her husband to go and search for one of his -comrades in the street. Then, in spite of the fact that -two small children were present, he tried to rape the -young woman. X., when he heard his wife’s cries, -rushed back, but was driven off with blows of the -butt of the man’s rifle into a neighboring room, of which -the door was left open, and his wife was forced to suffer -the consummation of the outrage. The rape took place -almost under the eyes of the husband, who, being -terrorized, did not dare to intervene, and used his -efforts only to calm the terror of his children.</p> - -<h4 id="SecRef14_10">ARSON AND MURDER RAMPANT</h4> - -<p>“Personal liberty, like human life, is the object of -complete scorn on the part of the German military -authorities. Almost everywhere citizens of every age -have been dragged from their homes and led into -captivity, many have died or been killed on the way.</p> - -<p>“Arson, still more than murder, forms the usual -procedure of our adversaries. It is employed by them -either as a means of systematic devastation or as a -means of terrorism. The German Army, in order to -provide for it, possesses a complete outfit, which -comprises torches, grenades, rockets, petrol pumps, -fuse sticks, and little bags of pastilles made of compressed -powder which are very inflammable. The lust<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page155">[155]</a></span> -for arson is manifested chiefly against churches and -against monuments which have some special interest, -either artistic or historical.</p> - -<p>“Thousands of houses in the ground covered by the -investigators had been completely destroyed by fire. -In the Department of Marne a great many villages, as -well as important country towns, were burned without -any reason whatever. Without doubt these crimes -were committed by order, as German detachments -arrived in the neighborhood with their torches, their -grenades, and their usual outfit for arson.</p> - -<p>“At Lépine, a laborer named Caqué, in whose house -two German cyclists were billeted, asked the latter if -the grenades which he saw in their possession were -destined for his house. They answered: ‘No. Lépine -is finished with.’ At that moment nine houses in the -village were burned out.</p> - -<p>“At Marfaux nineteen private houses were burned.</p> - -<p>“Of the commune of Glannes practically nothing -remains. At Somme-Tourbe the entire village has -been destroyed, with the exception of the mayoralty -house, the church, and two private buildings.</p> - -<p>“At Auve nearly the whole town has been destroyed. -At Etrepy sixty-three families out of seventy are -homeless. At Huiron all the houses, with the exception -of five, have been burned. At Sermaize-les-Bains only -about forty houses out of nine hundred remain. At -Bignicourt-sur-Saultz thirty houses out of thirty-three -are in ruins.</p> - -<p>“At Suippes, the big market town which has been -practically burned out, German soldiers carrying straw -and cans of petrol have been seen in the streets. While<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page156">[156]</a></span> -the mayor’s house was burning, six sentinels with -fixed bayonets were under orders to forbid any one to -approach and to prevent any help being given.</p> - -<p>“All this destruction by arson, which only represents -a small proportion of the acts of the same kind in the -Department of Seine-et-Marne, was accomplished -without the least tendency to rebellion or the smallest -act of resistance being recorded against the inhabitants -of the localities which are today more or less completely -destroyed. In some villages the Germans, before -setting fire to them, made one of their soldiers fire a -shot from his rifle so as to be able to pretend afterward -that the civilian population had attacked them, an -allegation which is all the more absurd since at the -time when the enemy arrived the only inhabitants left -were old men, sick persons, or people absolutely without -any means of aggression.</p> - -<h4 id="SecRef14_11">UNCONTROLLED SAVAGERY</h4> - -<p>“On the 6th of September at Champguyon, Mme. -Louvet was present at the martyrdom of her husband. -She saw him in the hands of ten or fifteen soldiers, -who were beating him to death before his own house, -and ran up and kissed him through the bars of the -gate. She was brutally pushed back and fell, while -the murderers dragged along the unhappy man covered -with blood, begging them to spare his life and protesting -that he had done nothing to be treated thus. He was -finished off at the end of the village. When his wife -found his body it was horribly disfigured. His head -was beaten in, one of his eyes hung from the socket, and -one of his wrists was broken.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page157">[157]</a></span></p> - -<p>“At Montmirail a scene of real savagery was enacted. -On the 5th of September a non-commissioned officer -flung himself almost naked on the widow Naudé, on -whom he was billeted, and carried her into his room. -This woman’s father, François Fontaine, rushed up on -hearing his daughter’s cry. At once fifteen or twenty -Germans broke through the door of the house, pushed -the old man into the street, and shot him without -mercy. Little Juliette Naudé opened the window at -this moment and was struck in the stomach by a -bullet, which went through her body. The poor child -died after twenty-four hours of most dreadful suffering.</p> - -<h4 id="SecRef14_12">CONSTANT EVIDENCE OF THEFT</h4> - -<p>“We have constantly found definite evidence of -theft,” states the report further, “and we do not hesitate -to state that where a body of the enemy has passed -it has given itself up to a systematically organized -pillage, in the presence of its leaders, who have even -themselves often taken part in it. Cellars have been -emptied to the last bottle, safes have been gutted, -considerable sums of money have been stolen or -extorted; a great quantity of plate and jewelry, as well -as pictures, furniture, ‘objets d’art,’ linen, bicycles, -women’s dresses, sewing machines, even down to -children’s toys, after having been taken away, have -been loaded on vehicles to be taken toward the frontier.”</p> - -<p>Space forbids further quotation from the harrowing -document, in which one frightful tale succeeds another, -until with a wave of sickening horror the reader cries -out, “Can such things really be?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page158">[158]</a></span></p> - -<h4 id="SecRef14_13">GERMANY DENIES ATROCITIES</h4> - -<p>“A chain of baseless fabrications” is the phrase used -by Germany to characterize the charges brought against -the German armies by the French government, claiming -that “German army officers have, by every means -and with full success, effected the maintenance of -discipline and the strict observance of all the rules of -war in each and all the spheres of operation.”</p> - -<p>The demolished villages and pitiful victims must -tell their own tale of terror. Doubtless many of the -crimes committed have been without the sanction of -the German government or even without the authority -of a superior officer, but, even allowing for the partisanship -that is natural on the part of afflicted inhabitants, -the testimony of the French commission together -with that of former Ambassador Bryce must deeply -affect the attitude of all thinking people toward -warfare.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page159">[159]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XV</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">DESTROYING THE PRICELESS MONUMENTS -OF CIVILIZATION</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef15_1">THE INEXPIABLE GERMAN CRIME, LOUVAIN</a> — <a href="#SecRef15_2">ART -TREASURES OF HISTORIC CITY</a> — <a href="#SecRef15_3">REDUCED TO A -HEAP OF ASHES</a> — <a href="#SecRef15_4">PITILESS DESTRUCTION AS TOLD -BY TOWN TREASURER</a> — <a href="#SecRef15_5">A MODERN POMPEII</a> — <a href="#SecRef15_6">BURNING -OF CITY SYSTEMATIC</a> — <a href="#SecRef15_7">INDIGNANT -PROTEST AGAINST MODERN HUNS</a>.</p> - -<p id="SecRef15_1">All through Belgium and all through the country -of the Franco-German border line are towns and cities -filled with treasures of art and history—some of the -richest, indeed, that centuries of civilization have -amassed. Under the guns of both sides of the mighty -conflict these paintings and shrines and storied buildings -have been exposed to destruction, and many of them -have been wantonly sacrificed, shattered beyond hope -of restoration.</p> - -<p>Under the latest Hague proposals, Article XXVIII, -historic monuments are supposed to be respected even -by warring nations, yet both Germany and France -have accused each other of violating this convention. -The whole of civilized humanity rises in protest -against such sacrilege.</p> - -<p>Among all the black crimes of the German invasion -of Belgium none is blacker than the sack and burning of -Louvain, the fairest city of Belgium and the intellectual -metropolis of the Low Countries. According to a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page160">[160]</a></span> -bitter statement of Frank Jewett Mather, the well-known -American art critic, “Louvain contained more -beautiful works of art than the Prussian nation has -produced in its entire history.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef15_2">ART TREASURES OF HISTORIC CITY</h3> - -<p>There was hardly a building within the ramparts -but breathed the air of some romance of the Middle -Ages or marked a stepping-stone in its stirring history. -Once before war robbed it of its commercial prestige, -only to permit it to rise, phœnix-like, as the center of -learning during the sixteenth century. At the opening -of the present war it still boasted of the largest university -in Belgium, in which thousands of antique volumes -and prints were stored. Its museums and its churches -housed scores of paintings of the old Flemish -masters.</p> - -<p>Louvain has passed through successive periods of -culture and barbarity ever since Julius Caesar established -a permanent camp there during his campaigns -against the Belgians and the Germans. In the eleventh -century it became the residence of the long line of -Dukes of Brabant, and was the capital until Brussels -wrested this distinction from it during an uprising of -weavers against their feudal masters. In the fourteenth -century it had gained a population of between -100,000 and 150,000, and there were no fewer than -2,400 woolen manufactories. The weavers were a -turbulent lot, however, and when they rose against the -Duke Wencelaus he conquered them and forced -thousands of them to flee to Holland and England. -It was then that Brussels became the capital and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page161">[161]</a></span> -Louvain lost its prestige as a center of the cloth-making -industry.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w300"> - -<img src="images/illo181.jpg" alt="Cartoon" width="250" height="425" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Voice of the Cologne Church Speaks</span>:</p> - -<p class="caption secondcenter">“Louvain, thou wast built on my foundations, -spirit of my spirit, heart of my heart.”</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p>Scholars began to pour into the town, however, to -glean what learning -they could -from the old -parchments and -books which its -castles contained. -In 1423 Duke John -IV of Brabant -founded Louvain -University. Students -flocked there -from all over the -world. In the -sixteenth century -it had 4,000 students -and forty-three -colleges.</p> - -<p>The library occupied -a large -room with fine -wood panels, -carved in intricate -designs. It held -150,000 volumes -and thousands of -manuscripts, valuable -beyond -price. It contained a colossal group representing a -scene from the Flood, sculptured by Geerts in 1839.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page162">[162]</a></span></p> - -<p>One block to the north of the university is the Grande -Place, on which faced the Hôtel de Ville, one of the -finest examples of the late Gothic style of architecture -in Europe. It surpassed the town halls of Bruges, -Brussels, and Ghent in elegance of detail and harmony -of design. It was erected in 1448 by Mathieu de -Layens, and it was from the upper windows of this -building that thirteen magistrates of noble birth were -hurled to their death on the spears of the populace in -the streets below during the weavers’ uprising.</p> - -<p>Across the Grande Place stood the church of St. -Pierre, a magnificent type of the Gothic style built on -a cruciform plan and flanked by chapels holding reliquaries -of the saints, life-sized wooden figures, and -priceless carvings and paintings. There might have -been seen the works of Van Papenhoven, Roger van -der Weyden, Dierick Bouts, and De Layens.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef15_3">REDUCED TO A HEAP OF ASHES</h3> - -<p>The notification of the sacking of Louvain was contained -in the notice issued by the British Press Bureau -on Friday, August 28, 1914, which read as follows: “On -Tuesday evening a German corps, after receiving a -check, withdrew in disorder into the town of Louvain. -A German guard at the entrance to the town mistook -the nature of this incursion and fired on their routed -fellow-countrymen, mistaking them for Belgians. In -spite of all denials from the authorities the Germans, -in order to cover their mistake, pretended that it was -the inhabitants who had fired on them, whereas the -inhabitants, including the police, had been disarmed -more than a week before. Without inquiry and without<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page163">[163]</a></span> -listening to any protests the German commander-in-chief -announced that the town would be immediately -destroyed. The inhabitants were ordered to leave -their dwellings; a party of the men were made prisoners -and the women and children put into trains, the destination -of which is unknown. Soldiers furnished with -bombs set fire to all parts of the town. The splendid -church of St. Pierre, the University buildings, the -library, and the scientific establishment were delivered -to the flames. Several notable citizens were shot. A -town of 45,000 inhabitants, the intellectual metropolis -of the Low Countries since the fifteenth century, is -now no more than a heap of ashes.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef15_4">PITILESS DESTRUCTION AS TOLD BY TOWN TREASURER</h3> - -<p>The town treasurer of Louvain, who managed to -escape from the sacked city, gave in the London Times -the following account of the destruction:</p> - -<p>“At last, on Tuesday night, there took place -the unspeakable crime, the shame of which can be -understood only by those who followed and watched -the different phases of the German occupation of -Louvain.</p> - -<p>“It is a significant fact that the German wounded -and sick, including their Red Cross nurses, were all -removed from the hospitals. The Germans meanwhile -proceeded methodically to make a last and supreme -requisition, although they knew the town could not -satisfy it. Toward six o’clock the bugle sounded, and -officers lodging in private houses left at once with arms -and luggage. At the same time thousands of additional -soldiers, with numerous field pieces and cannon,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page164">[164]</a></span> -marched into the town to their allotted positions. The -gas factory, which had been idle, had been worked -through the previous night and day by Germans, so -that during this premeditated outrage the people could -not take advantage of darkness to escape from the -town. A further fact that proves their premeditation -is that the attack took place at eight o’clock, the exact -time at which the population entered their homes in -conformity with the German orders—consequently -escape became well-nigh impossible. At 8.20 the full -fusillade with the roar of the cannons came from all -sides of the town at once.</p> - -<p>“The cavalry charged through the streets sabring -fugitives, while the infantry, posted on the foot-paths, -had their fingers on the triggers of their guns waiting -for the unfortunate people to rush from the houses or -appear at the windows, the soldiers praising and -complimenting each other on their marksmanship as -they fired at the unhappy fugitives. Those whose -houses were not yet destroyed were ordered to quit and -follow the soldiers to the railway station. There the -men were separated from mothers, wives, and children, -and thrown, some bound, into trains leaving in the -direction of Germany. They saw their carefully-collected -art and other treasures being shared out by -the soldiers, the officers looking on. Those who -attempted to appeal to their tormentors’ better feelings -were immediately shot. A few were let loose, but -most of them were sent to Germany.</p> - -<p>“On Wednesday at daybreak the remaining women -and children were driven out of the town—a lamentable -spectacle—with uplifted arms and under the menace of<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page165">[165]</a></span> -bayonets and revolvers. The day was practically -calm. The destruction of the most beautiful part of -the town seemed momentarily to have soothed the -barbarian rage of the invaders. On Thursday the -remnant of the Civil Guard was called up on the pretext -of extinguishing the conflagration; those who demurred -were chained and sent with some wounded Germans to -the Fatherland, whilst the population had to quit.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef15_5">A MODERN POMPEII</h3> - -<p>Fair Louvain is now a place of desolation and ashes. -Its treasures have been madly sacrificed to the god of -war. A graphic description of the ruin has been -written by Professor E. Gilson, of the University of -Louvain, in the form of a letter to the Belgian Minister -of Justice. It says in part:</p> - -<p>“At the ‘Seven Corners’ Louvain reveals itself to my -eyes like a luminous panorama in the glade of a forest. -The center of the city is a smoking heap of ruins. -Houses are caved in, nothing remains but smoking -ruins, and a mass of brick. It is a veritable Pompeii. -But how much more tragic and vivid is the sight of this -new Pompeii! An oppressive silence everywhere. -Everybody has fled; at the windows of cellars I see -frightened faces, and at the street corners Prussian -sentinels, sordid, immovable and silent.</p> - -<p>“In the center stand the walls of St. Pierre, now a -grinning silhouette, roof and belfry gone, the walls -blackened and caved in. In front stands the Hôtel de -Ville, dominating everything and almost intact. -Further on, the remains of Les Hales, entirely destroyed, -except for the arcade of big pillars of the Salle<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page166">[166]</a></span> -des Pas Perdus. The library and its treasures are -entirely gone.</p> - -<p>“In the Petite Rue Louis Nelsens everything is -destroyed. At the foot of the statue, in a flower bed all -tramped underfoot, there is an irregular hillock covered -with a few dead leaves. An old woman, recognizing -me, comes out of her cellar and tells me: ‘Monsieur, -this is the grave of Monsieur David and his son, the -best people that ever lived.’ She cries. They were -killed by shrapnel fired upon them as they were leaving -their house. The Capuchin brothers made temporary -graves for the dead.</p> - -<p>“Graves were found nearly everywhere. In front -of the statue, near a house, I find traces of fire. ‘In -this place,’ the old woman tells me, ‘the Prussians -burned a body after soaking it in petroleum. Some -men buried the charred remains.’ I pick up a key -which must have belonged to the dead man—a memento -of this monstrous incident.</p> - -<p>“In the center of the city the sight is extraordinarily -picturesque—gloomy, abominable, and more so in the -evening when the full moon is shining over the mass of -ruins, it is really fantastic, diabolical.</p> - -<p>“The center of old Louvain, the old city of the Dukes -of Brabant, exists no longer; a new city will have to be -built in the center of the quarters spared by the torch.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef15_6">BURNING OF CITY SYSTEMATIC</h3> - -<p>“A villager told me that the soldiers had two ways -of setting fire to the houses: One was to break the -windows of the first floor, to throw petroleum on the -floor, and throw in torches of burning straw, while<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page167">[167]</a></span> -others were engaged in shooting at the upper-story -windows to prevent the inhabitants from throwing -missiles on those setting fire to their homes.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef15_7">INDIGNANT PROTEST AGAINST MODERN HUNS</h3> - -<p>Indignant protest against the outrageous sacrifice -of Louvain arose from every quarter of the civilized -world. The London Tablet, commenting on the desolation -of Belgium and the sacrifice of her temples, said:</p> - -<p>“The irreparable crime of Louvain and the ruthless -damage done to the Cathedral of Malines while Cardinal -Mercier was absent in Rome have left Belgium’s cup -of bitterness still unfilled. We do not understand -the reason of these remorseless attacks upon venerable -places of worship, and particularly upon Roman -Catholic churches. We do not fully discern why even -the modern Huns should be so eager to violate these -peaceful sanctuaries, destroying one, bombarding -another with zest, stabling their horses in a third, as -they have undoubtedly done. One would almost fancy -that the late Professor Cramb was right after all, -that Germany regards the Christian creed as outworn, -and that she dreams, when she has imposed her will -upon the world (if she can), of founding a new religion, -with the Kaiser as its inspired expositor. We wonder -what the pious people of Bavaria and Austria-Hungary -think of this persistent desecration of Catholic shrines. -The meaning of the sack of Dinant is, however, sufficiently -clear. Thousands of travelers know that -pleasant little town, which clustered beneath the old -citadel on the banks of the Meuse. They will learn -with horror and distress that it has shared the fate of<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page168">[168]</a></span> -Louvain, that it has been shelled and burned, that -many of its defenseless men have been shot, and that its -women are hunted and homeless. We have not yet -been told, but doubtless shall hear in due course, that -the splendid thirteenth-century church of Notre Dame, -the most complete example of pointed Gothic architecture -in Belgium, has perished amid the general -destruction. The reason of this sack and pillage of -town after town in Belgium, with every accompaniment -of murderous barbarity—Termonde is another melancholy -case in point—is becoming obvious. It is due -to the resolute resistance of Antwerp. The Germans -want to capture Antwerp, but can not spare enough -men to invest the fortress, and in any case hope to -obtain it without paying the price. They seek to -terrorize Antwerp into submission by laying Belgium -waste, by razing her undefended cities to the ground, -and by shedding the blood of innocent Belgian citizens -of both sexes. . . . The wilful devastation of Belgium -will have only one definite result. It will increase the -chorus of indignant denunciation of German methods -of warfare which now rises from every civilized country -in the world.”</p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> - -<img src="images/illo189.jpg" alt="" width="389" height="600" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Burning of the Cathedral of Rheims.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">This noble building, one of the finest pieces of Gothic architecture in -the world, was bombarded by German shells and set on fire. Much of the -priceless statuary and the entire roof were destroyed.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo190.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="389" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Sacking of Louvain.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">According to the official report of the Commission of Inquiry into the German atrocities at Louvain and other -places, men were brutally separated from their wives and children, and after having been subjected to abominable -treatment by the Germans were herded out of the town. The corpses of many a civilian encumbered the streets and -squares.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page169">[169]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XVI</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">WANTON DESTRUCTION OF THE BEAUTIFUL -CATHEDRAL OF RHEIMS</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef16_1">DESECRATION OF THE SHRINES OF HUMANITY</a> — <a href="#SecRef16_2">THE -“ROYAL CITY”</a>—<a href="#SecRef16_3">CATHEDRAL OF NOTRE DAME</a> — <a href="#SecRef16_4">ART -TREASURES</a> — <a href="#SecRef16_5">CATHEDRAL A TARGET</a> — <a href="#SecRef16_6">ANGER -OF CROWD STILLED BY PRIESTS</a> — <a href="#SecRef16_7">“SUPREME SACRIFICE -AGAINST THE SPIRIT OF MAN”</a>—<a href="#SecRef16_8">BEAUTY -IRREPARABLY GONE</a>.</p> - -<p id="SecRef16_1">If the destruction of famous buildings, shrines of -humanity as well as of art and religion, were but put -down to the unavoidable accidents of war, after the -first poignant sense of the irreparable loss, one would -rather sorrowfully accept the smoking ruins as further -evidence of the horrible, if unavoidable, waste of war. -But to have Louvain’s atrocities justified, to have -the destruction of towns systematically brought about -in a spirit of fiendish reprisal or as part of a propaganda -of military terrorism, this is what revolts the -world. It is this demoniacal barbarism, raised to the -ultimate power for evil by modern mechanism, that -staggers civilization.</p> - -<p>The sacking of Louvain had hardly ceased to be a -matter of world-wide outcry against such inexcusable -barbarity when there came the official report that the -Cathedral of Rheims, one of the most glorious -examples of Gothic art in the world and an historic<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page170">[170]</a></span> -monument of first rank, had fallen before the German -guns in the bombardment of that historic city.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef16_2">THE “ROYAL CITY”</h3> - -<p>Rheims has been a city of importance since the time -of the Romans. The cathedral, wherein for nearly -1,000 years the kings of France were crowned, has -been fittingly described as “the most perfect -example in grandeur and grace of Gothic style in -existence.”</p> - -<p>Hincmar, a mighty archbishop of the ninth century, -once declared that Rheims was “by the appointment -of Heaven a royal city.”</p> - -<p>The words are at once historical and prophetic. -Here Clovis was baptized by St. Remigius, and -here in the cathedral in 1429, Charles VII of -France was crowned through the efforts of Joan of -Arc.</p> - -<p>According to the historians of art, Rheims is royal -in another sense. In no city in Europe have the life -and thought of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance -found such perfect expression in architecture. From -early Gothic to Romanesque, and from Romanesque -to Renaissance, the buildings of Rheims reveal better -than any records the city’s historical development. -Of all the buildings illustrative of their various periods -there were said to be no better examples than the -cathedral and the church of St. Jacques, fine monuments -of early Gothic; the later Gothic edifice of the -archbishop’s palace, and, finally, the city hall, a handsome -work of the best period of French Renaissance.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page171">[171]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef16_3">CATHEDRAL OF NOTRE DAME</h3> - -<p>No one really knows who designed and built the -cathedral. The first stones were laid in 1211, and -the building, with the exception of the superb west -façade, was completed in the thirteenth century. The -façade, which -dates from the -fourteenth century, -was adorned -with three exquisite -recessed -portals containing, -in a more or -less good state of -preservation, over -five hundred statues. -Of the entire -structure, we -read in “Cathedrals -of the Isle -de France”: -“Nothing can exceed -the majesty of its deeply recessed portals, the -beauty of the rose window that surmounts them, or -the elegance of the gallery that completes the façade.”</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo193.jpg" alt="Cartoon" width="400" height="420" /> -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Christian World!</span></p> -</div> - -<h3 id="SecRef16_4">ART TREASURES</h3> - -<p>The interior, which was cruciform, was 455 feet long -and 99 feet wide; the distance from the middle isle to the -highest point in the roof was 125 feet. Here in niches -in the walls was another multitude of statues, and in -the nave and transepts were preserved valuable<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page172">[172]</a></span> -tapestry, representing biblical scenes and scenes from -the history of medieval France. Here also hung a -treasure of paintings, including canvases by Tintoretto, -Nicolas Poussin, and others, and some fine old tapestries.</p> - -<p>In the treasury were reliquaries, one said to contain -a thorn from the Holy Crown, the skull of St. -Remi and a collection of valuable vessels in gold, the -most remarkable in France. The treasures included -not only the coronation ornaments of various kings, -but the vase of St. Ursula, the massive chalice of -St. Remigius, and countless crucifixes in gold, silver -and precious woods.</p> - -<p>In the treasury was also preserved the Sainte -Ampoule—the vessel in which the oil used to anoint -the kings of France was preserved—a successor to the -famous ampulla, which a dove was said to have brought -from heaven filled with inexhaustible holy oil at the -time of the baptism of Clovis, in 496. During the -Revolution the sacred vessel was shattered, but a fragment -was piously preserved, in which some of the oil -was said still to remain.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef16_5">CATHEDRAL A TARGET</h3> - -<p>The Cathedral of Notre Dame is now no more than -an empty shell of charred and blackened walls. The -fire started between four and five o’clock Sunday afternoon, -September 20, 1914, after shells had been -crashing into the town all day. Over five hundred -fell between early morning and sunset.</p> - -<p>The cathedral had been turned into a hospital for -the German wounded, to secure for the building the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page173">[173]</a></span> -protection of the Red Cross flag. When the first -shell struck the roof everyone believed it was a stray -shot, but later in the day a German battery four -miles away, began making the great Gothic pile its -target. Shell after shell crashed its way into the old -masonry and stonework that had stood the storms of -centuries.</p> - -<p>At 4.30 some scaffolding around the east end of -the cathedral, where repairs were going on, caught -fire and soon the whole network of poles and planks -was ablaze. Then the roof of old oak timbers caught -fire and soon the ceilings of the nave and transepts -were a roaring furnace.</p> - -<p>The blazing piers of carved woodwork crashed to -the floor, where piles of straw had been gathered in -connection with the work of the field hospital. As -soon as this caught fire the paneling of the altars, the -chairs and other furniture were devoured.</p> - -<p>Twenty wounded Germans would have perished by -the efforts of their own countrymen if several French -army doctors, with their bearers, had not carried them -one by one at their own risk out of the church by one -of the side doors.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef16_6">ANGER OF CROWD STILLED BY PRIESTS</h3> - -<p>There a grim scene was only prevented by the -courage of the priests of the cathedral. A crowd of -about two hundred citizens had come out to watch -the terrible spectacle. As these Germans, in their -uniforms, appeared at the transept door howls of -uncontrollable passion went up from the crowd. “Kill -them!” they shouted. Soldiers in the crowd leveled<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page174">[174]</a></span> -their rifles, when Abbé Andrieux sprang forward -between the wounded men and the muzzles that -threatened them.</p> - -<p>“Don’t fire,” he shouted, “you would make yourselves -as guilty as they.”</p> - -<p>The reproach was enough, and amid fierce hooting -and angry cries the Germans were carried to shelter -in the museum near by.</p> - -<p>From the hills the flaming cathedral was an even -more impressive sight than in the streets of the town. -From the yawning roof the red glare poured up into -the dark sky and its windows flickered with dancing -flames. So night closed down. Not for long was its -stillness undisturbed. At two o’clock German batteries -opened fire again. Then from windows that looked -toward Rheims across the plain one could watch the -lurid sight of night bombardment.</p> - -<p>At last daybreak came, a sad gray dawn, with cold, -dispiriting rain falling. When the shadows had lifted -and enough light had filtered through the low, lead-colored -clouds for one to see across the plain, the -ravished city, with its ruined cathedral standing stark -against the background and a vast wall of smoke -rising slowly from the still flaming ruins, was as -desolate a thing as the sun could well have found -in its journey round the world that morning.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef16_7">“SUPREME SACRIFICE AGAINST THE SPIRIT OF MAN”</h3> - -<p>“Will not every artist, every writer, every lover of -the beautiful, unite with us in a protestation of horror -against the infamous destruction of Rheims Cathedral?” -wrote Emile Hovelaque, French Inspector General<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page175">[175]</a></span> -of Public Instruction, in a letter to the London -Times. “It was the cradle of our kings, the high altar -of our race, a sanctuary and shrine dear from every -memory, sacred in every thought, loved as our -remotest past, an ever-speaking witness to the permanence -through change of the ideals, aspirations and -dreams of our country.</p> - -<p>“Can such deeds go unavenged? Will not the conscience -of the whole world rise against those nameless -barbarians who shelled Red Cross flags floating over -that twice-sacred pile, who have committed this -supreme sacrifice against the spirit of man in seven -hundred years? Those gray cliffs of chiseled stone had -risen above the furious tides of innumerable invasions -unhurt, spared by the most savage onsets. Battered, -by every storm of heaven and earth, the noblest sculpture -of the West remained until German culture came.</p> - -<p>“And then, deliberately, methodically, slowly, the -princes and captains of an accursed race mangled the -sacred pile until all had fallen. Fairest and most -human images in all the world, a forest of gigantic -columns, a vast vaulted canopy of stone, majestic -walls and heaven-stained glass—it was murder in cold -blood, the murder not of a life but of immortality. -Forty-eight long hours the inexplicable crime dragged -out. Louvain first, now Rheims. What next?”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef16_8">BEAUTY IRREPARABLY GONE</h3> - -<p>The artistic beauty of the cathedral of Rheims can -never be restored, in the opinion of Whitney Warren, -the New York architect, who made a thorough inspection -of the structure.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page176">[176]</a></span></p> - -<p>Mr. Warren, who is a corresponding member of the -Institut de France, was given the privilege of visiting -the cathedral. His investigation had no official character, -but the result of his observations was communicated -to Myron T. Herrick, American Ambassador -to Belgium.</p> - -<p>“That anything remains of the edifice,” said Mr. -Warren, “is due to the strong construction of the walls -and vaults which are of a robustness that can resist -even modern implements of war.”</p> - -<p>The building was not battered by the heavier guns, -as had been feared, but it suffered most from shrapnel -fire. The famous rose windows, the sculpture and -other details of the façade that were ruined are, however, -just the examples of art that can not be replaced.</p> - -<p>Statues, gargoyles, and other ornaments on the -exterior of the cathedral have been tumbled to the -pavement and shattered, though at first glance the -outer walls of the cathedral do not show the ruin that -has taken place. These blackened walls yet stand -as a monument to the glory of France, but still more -as a grim reminder of the barbarity of German -warfare.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page177">[177]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XVII</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">THE CANADIANS’ GLORIOUS FEAT AT -LANGEMARCK</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef17_1">THE CRUCIAL TEST OF CANADA’S MEN</a> — <a href="#SecRef17_2">WONDERFUL -STORY OF HEROISM AS TOLD BY SIR MAX AITKEN</a> — <a href="#SecRef17_3">A -REMARKABLE PERFORMANCE</a> — <a href="#SecRef17_4">QUIET PRECEDING -STORM</a> — <a href="#SecRef17_5">SECOND BATTLE OF YPRES</a> — <a href="#SecRef17_6">LINE NEVER -WAVERED</a> — <a href="#SecRef17_7">OFFICER FELL AT HEAD OF TROOPS</a> — <a href="#SecRef17_8">FORTUNES -OF THIRD BRIGADE</a> — <a href="#SecRef17_9">IN DIRE PERIL</a> — <a href="#SecRef17_10">OVERWHELMING -NUMBERS</a> — <a href="#SecRef17_11">PUT TO TEST</a> — <a href="#SecRef17_12">CAPTURE -OF ST. JULIEN</a> — <a href="#SecRef17_13">A HERO LEADING HEROES</a>.</p> - -<p id="SecRef17_1">The fight of the Canadians at Langemarck and -St. Julien in April, 1915, makes such a battle story as -has sufficed, in other nations, to inspire song and -tradition for centuries. In the words of Sir John -French, the Canadians, by holding their ground when -it did not seem humanly possible to hold it, “saved the -situation,” kept the enemy out of Ypres, kept closed -the road to Calais, and made a failure of German -plans that otherwise were about to be successful.</p> - -<p>The Canadian soldiers have indeed shown that they -are second to none. They were put to as supreme a -test as it would be possible for any army to meet with, -for they fought overwhelming numbers under conditions -that seemed to ensure annihilation. They fought -on, and failed neither in courage, discipline, nor -tenacity, although thousands of them fell.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page178">[178]</a></span></p> - -<p id="SecRef17_2">The story of their unflinching heroism was told by Sir -Max Aitken, the record officer serving with the -Canadian division in France:</p> - -<p>“The recent fighting in Flanders, in which the -Canadians played so glorious a part, cannot of course -be described with precision of military detail until -time has made possible the co-ordination of relevant -facts, and the piecing together in a narrative both -lucid and exact of much which, so near the event, is -confused and blurred. But it is considered right that -the mourning in Canada for husbands, sons or brothers -who have given their lives for the Empire should have -with as little reserve as military considerations allow -the rare and precious consolation which, in the agony -of bereavement, the record of the valor of their dead -must bring, and indeed the mourning in Canada will -be very widely spread, for the battle which raged for -so many days in the neighborhood of Ypres was bloody, -even as men appraise battles in this callous and life-engulfing -war. But as long as brave deeds retain the -power to fire the blood of Anglo-Saxons, the stand made -by the Canadians in those desperate days will be told -by fathers to their sons.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef17_3">A REMARKABLE PERFORMANCE</h3> - -<p>“The Canadians have wrested the trenches over the -bodies of the dead and earned the right to stand side -by side with the superb troops who, in the first battle -of Ypres, broke and drove before them the flower of -the Prussian Guards. Looked at from any point the -performance would be remarkable. It is amazing to -soldiers when the genesis and composition of the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page179">[179]</a></span> -Canadian division are considered. It contained no -doubt a sprinkling of South African veterans, but it -consisted in the main of men who were admirable raw -material, but who, at the outbreak of war, were neither -disciplined nor trained as men count discipline and -training in these days of scientific warfare. It was, it -is true, commanded by a distinguished English general. -Its staff was supplemented, without being replaced, by -some brilliant British staff officers. But in its higher -and regimental commands were to be found lawyers, -college professors, business men and real estate agents, -ready with cool self-confidence to do battle against an -organization in which the study of military science is -the exclusive pursuit of laborious lives.</p> - -<p>“With what devotion, with a valor how desperate, -with resourcefulness how cool and how frightful, the -amateur soldier of Canada confronted overwhelming -odds, may perhaps be made clear, even by a narrative -so incomplete as the present.</p> - -<p>“The salient of Ypres has become familiar to all -students of the campaign in Flanders. Like all salients -it was, and was known to be, a source of weakness to -the forces holding it, but the reasons which have led to -its retention are apparent, and need not be explained.</p> - -<p>“On Thursday, April 22, 1915, the Canadian division -held a line of roughly five thousand yards, extending -in a northwesterly direction from the Ypres-Roulers -railway, to the Ypres-Poekapelle road, and connecting -at its terminus with the French troops. The division -consisted of three infantry brigades in addition to the -artillery brigades. Of the infantry brigades the first -was in reserve, the second was on the right, and the third<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page180">[180]</a></span> -established contact with the allies at the point indicated -above.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef17_4">QUIET PRECEDING STORM</h3> - -<p>“The day was a peaceful one, warm and sunny, and -except that the previous day had witnessed a further -bombardment of the stricken town of Ypres, everything -seemed quiet in front of the Canadian line. At -five o’clock in the afternoon a plan carefully prepared -was put into execution against our French allies on the -left. Asphyxiating gas of great intensity was projected -into their trenches, probably by means of force -pumps and pipes laid out under the parapets. The -fumes, aided by a favorable wind, floated backwards, -poisoning and disabling over an extended area those -who fell under their effect. The result was that the -French were compelled to give ground for a considerable -distance. The glory which the French army has won -in this war would make it impertinent to labor on the -compelling nature of the poisonous discharges under -which the trenches were lost. The French did, as everyone -knew they would do, all that stout soldiers could -do, and the Canadian division, officers and men, look -forward to many occasions in the future in which they -will stand side by side with the brave armies of France.</p> - -<p>“The immediate consequence of this enforced withdrawal -was, of course, extremely grave. The third -brigade of the Canadian division was without any left, -or, in other words, its left was in the air. It became -imperatively necessary greatly to extend the Canadian -lines to the left rear. It was not, of course, practicable -to move the first brigade from reserve at a momen<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page181">[181]</a></span>t’s -notice, and the line, extended from five to nine thousand -yards, was not naturally the line that had been held by -the allies at five o’clock, and a gap still existed on its left.</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> - -<img src="images/illo203.png" alt="" width="483" height="600" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Map Illustrating the Battle of Langemarck.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondcenter">Shaded Portion Indicates German Gain.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page182">[182]</a></span></p> - -<p>“The new line, of which our recent point of contact -with the French formed the apex, ran quite roughly -to the south and west. As shown above, it became -necessary for Brigadier-General Turner, commanding -the third brigade, to throw back his left flank southward -to protect his rear. In the course of the confusion -which followed upon the readjustment of position, the -enemy, who had advanced rapidly after his initial -successes, took four British 4.7 guns in a small wood -to the west of the village of St. Julien, two miles in the -rear of the original French trenches.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef17_5">SECOND BATTLE OF YPRES</h3> - -<p>“The story of the second battle of Ypres is the story -of how the Canadian division, enormously outnumbered, -for they had in front of them at least four -divisions, supported by immensely heavy artillery, -with a gap still existing, though reduced, in their lines, -and with dispositions made hurriedly under the stimulus -of critical danger, fought through the day and -through the night, and then through another day and -night; fought under their officers until, as happened -to so many, these perished gloriously, and then fought -from the impulsion of sheer valor because they came -from fighting stock.</p> - -<p>“The enemy, of course, was aware, whether fully -or not may perhaps be doubted, of the advantage his -breach in the line had given him, and immediately -began to push a formidable series of attacks upon the -whole of the newly-formed Canadian salient.</p> - -<p>“If it is possible to distinguish when the attack was -everywhere so fierce, it developed with particular<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page183">[183]</a></span> -intensity at this moment upon the apex of the newly-formed -line running in the direction of St. Julien. It -has already been stated that four British guns were -taken in a wood comparatively early in the evening -of the 22d. In the course of that night, and under -the heaviest machine-gun fire, this wood was assaulted -by the Canadian Scottish, sixteenth battalion, of the -third brigade, and the tenth battalion of the second -brigade, which was intercepted for this purpose on its -way to a reserve trench. The battalions were respectively -commanded by Lieutenant-Colonel Leckie, and -Lieutenant-Colonel Boyle, and after a most fierce -struggle in the light of a misty moon they took the -position at the point of the bayonet. At midnight -the second battalion, under Lieutenant-Colonel Watson -and the Toronto regiment, Queen’s Own (third battalion), -under Lieutenant-Colonel Rennie, both of the -first brigade, brought up much-needed reinforcements, -and though not actually engaged in the assault, were -in reserve.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef17_6">LINE NEVER WAVERED</h3> - -<p>“All through the following days and nights these -battalions shared the fortunes and misfortunes of the -third brigade. An officer, who took part in the attack, -describes how the men about him fell under the fire -of the machine guns, which, in his phrase, played upon -them ‘like a watering pot.’ He added quite simply, -‘I wrote my own life off,’ but the line never wavered. -When one man fell another took his place, and with a -final shout the survivors of the two battalions flung -themselves into the wood.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page184">[184]</a></span></p> - -<p>“The German garrison was completely demoralized, -and the impetuous advance of the Canadians did not -cease until they reached the far side of the wood and -entrenched themselves there in the position so dearly -gained. They had, however, the disappointment of -finding that the guns had been blown up by the enemy, -and later on the same night, a most formidable concentration -of artillery fire, sweeping the wood as a -tropical storm sweeps the leaves from a forest, made -it impossible for them to hold the position for which -they had sacrified so much.</p> - -<p>“The fighting continued without intermission all -through the night and to those who observed the -indications that the attack was being pushed with -ever-growing strength, it hardly seemed possible that -the Canadians, fighting in positions so difficult to -defend, and so little the subject of deliberate choice, -could maintain their resistance for any long period. -At 6 <span class="smcapall">A.M.</span> on Friday it became apparent that the left -was becoming more and more involved and a powerful -German attempt to outflank it developed rapidly. -The consequences if it had been broken or outflanked -need not be insisted upon. They were not merely -local.</p> - -<p>“It was therefore decided, formidable as the attempt -undoubtedly was, to try and give relief by a counter-attack -upon the first line of German trenches, now far, -far advanced from those originally occupied by the -French. This was carried out by the Ontario first -and fourth battalions of the first brigade, under Brigadier-General -Mercer, acting in combination with a -British brigade. It is safe to say that the youngest -private in the rank, as he set his teeth for the advance, -knew the task in front of him, and the youngest subaltern -knew all that rested upon its success.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo207.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="387" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">German Abuse of the White Flag.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">An incident showing how a company of British soldiers were cut down by an ambushed enemy. The front rank of -Germans had been firing from behind a small ridge. In apparent surrender they stood up in a long row and held up -the white flag. The British advanced to receive their guns and take them prisoners, when suddenly the entire line -fell down and a second line arose from behind the ridge and immediately killed all the British company. <span class="copyright">(<i>Sphere -copr.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo208.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="388" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Terrible Effect of a German Shell on Wounded British Soldiers.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">A party of wounded Highlanders were resting in a house on the bank of the Aisne River, where a doctor was -attending them. A German shell came through the window and the soldiers resting on the sofas and on the floor -were nearly all killed by flying fragments of shell. <span class="copyright">(<i>Sphere copr.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page185">[185]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef17_7">OFFICER FELL AT HEAD OF TROOPS</h3> - -<p>“It did not seem that any human being could live -in the shower of shot and shell which began to play -upon the advancing troops. They suffered terrible -casualties. For a short time every man seemed to -fall, but the attack was pressed even closer and closer. -The fourth Canadian battalion at one moment came -under a particularly withering fire. For a moment, -not more, it wavered. Its most gallant commanding -officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Birchall, carrying, after an -old fashion, a light cane, coolly and cheerfully rallied -his men, and at the very moment when his example -had infected them fell dead at the head of his battalion.</p> - -<p>“With a hoarse cry of anger they sprang forward -(for, indeed, they loved him) as if to avenge his death. -The astonishing attack which followed, pushed home in -the face of direct frontal fire, made in broad daylight -by battalions whose names should live forever in the -memories of soldiers, was carried to the first line of -German trenches. After a hand-to-hand struggle -the last German who resisted was bayoneted, and the -trench was won.</p> - -<p>“The measure of this success may be taken when it -is pointed out that this trench represented in the -German advance the apex in the breach which the -enemy had made in the original line of the allies, and -that it was two and a half miles south of that line.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page186">[186]</a></span> -This charge, made by men who looked death indifferently -in the face, for no man who took part in it could -think that he was likely to live, saved the Canadian -left. But it did more; up to the point where the assailants -conquered or died, it secured and maintained -during the most critical moment of all the integrity of -the allied line. For the trench was not only taken, -it was thereafter held against all comers, and in the -teeth of every conceivable projectile, until the night -of Sunday, the 25th, when all that remained of the war-broken -but victorious battalions was relieved by fresh -troops.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef17_8">FORTUNES OF THIRD BRIGADE</h3> - -<p>“It is necessary now to return to the fortunes of the -third brigade, commanded by Brigadier-General Turner, -which, as we have seen, at five o’clock on Thursday -was holding the Canadian left and after the first -attack assumed the defense of the new Canadian salient, -at the same time sparing all the men it could to form -an extemporized line between the wood and St. Julien. -This brigade also was, at the first moment of the German -offensive, made the object of an attack by the discharge -of poisonous gas. The discharge was followed by two -enemy assaults. Although the fumes were extremely -poisonous, they were not, perhaps, having regard to -the wind, so disabling as on the French lines (which -ran almost east to west), and the brigade, though -affected by the fumes, stoutly beat back the two -German assaults.</p> - -<p>“Encouraged by this success, it rose to the supreme -effort required by the assault of the wood, which has<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page187">[187]</a></span> -already been described. At 4 <span class="smcapall">A.M.</span> on the morning of -Friday, the 23d, a fresh emission of gas was made both -upon the second brigade, which held the line running -northeast, and upon the third brigade, which, as has -been fully explained, had continued the line up to the -pivotal point, as defined above, and had then spread -down in a southeasterly direction. It is perhaps worth -mentioning, that two privates of the forty-eighth -Highlanders, who found their way into the trenches -commanded by Colonel Lipsett, ninetieth Winnipeg -Rifles, eighth battalion, perished of the fumes, and it -was noticed that their faces became blue immediately -after dissolution.</p> - -<p>“The Royal Highlanders of Montreal, thirteenth -battalion, and the forty-eighth Highlanders, fifteenth -battalion, were more especially affected by the discharge. -The Royal Highlanders, though considerably -shaken, remained immovable upon their ground. -The forty-eighth Highlanders, who no doubt received -a more poisonous discharge, were for the moment dismayed -and indeed their trench, according to the -testimony of very hardened soldiers, became intolerable. -The battalion retired from the trench, but for -a very short distance, and for an equally short time. -In a few moments they were again their own. They -advanced upon and occupied the trenches which they -had momentarily abandoned.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef17_9">IN DIRE PERIL</h3> - -<p>“In the course of the same night the third brigade, -which had already displayed a resource, a gallantry, -and a tenacity, for which no eulogy could be excessive,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page188">[188]</a></span> -was exposed (and with it the whole allied cause) to a -peril still more formidable.</p> - -<p>“It has been explained, and indeed the fundamental -situation made the peril clear, that several German -divisions were attempting to crush, or drive back this -devoted brigade, and in any event to use their enormous -numerical superiority to sweep around and overwhelm -our left wing at a point in the line which cannot -be precisely determined. The last attempt partially -succeeded, and in the course of this critical struggle, -German troops in considerable, though not in overwhelming, -numbers swung past the unsupported left -to the brigade and, slipping in between the wood and -St. Julien, added to the torturing anxieties of the long-drawn-out -struggle by the appearance, and indeed for -the moment the reality, of isolation from the brigade -base.</p> - -<p>“In the exertions made by the third brigade during -this supreme crisis, it is almost impossible to single -out one battalion without injustice to others, but -though the efforts of the Royal Highlanders of Montreal, -thirteenth battalion, were only equal to those -of the other battalions who did such heroic service, it -so happened by chance that the fate of some of its -officers attracted special attention.</p> - -<p>“Major Norsworthy, already almost disabled by a -bullet wound, was bayoneted and killed while he was -rallying his men with easy cheerfulness. The case of -Captain McCuaig, of the same battalion, was not less -glorious, although his death can claim no witness. -This most gallant officer was seriously wounded in a -hurriedly constructed trench. At a moment when it<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page189">[189]</a></span> -would have been possible to remove him to safety, he -absolutely refused to move, and continued in the -discharge of his duty. But the situation grew instantly -worse, and peremptory orders were received -for an immediate withdrawal. Those who were compelled -to obey them were most insistent to carry -with them, at whatever risk to their own mobility and -safety, an officer to whom they were devotedly attached. -But he, knowing, it may be, better than they, the -exertions which still lay in front of them, and unwilling -to inflict upon them the disabilities of a maimed man, -very resolutely refused, and asked of them one thing -only, that there should be given to him as he lay alone -in the trench, two loaded Colt revolvers to add to his -own, which lay in his right hand as he made his last -request. And so, with three revolvers ready to his -hand for use, a very brave officer waited to sell his life, -wounded and racked with pain, in an abandoned -trench.</p> - -<p>“On Friday afternoon the left of the Canadian line -was strengthened by important reinforcements of -British troops, amounting to seven battalions. From -this time forward the Canadians also continued to -receive further assistance on the left from a series of -French counter-attacks pushed in a northeasterly -direction from the canal bank.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef17_10">OVERWHELMING NUMBERS</h3> - -<p>“But the artillery fire of the enemy continually -grew in intensity, and it became more and more evident -that the Canadian salient could no longer be maintained -against the overwhelming superiority of<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page190">[190]</a></span> -numbers by which it was assailed. Slowly, stubbornly, -and contesting every yard, the defenders -gave ground until the salient gradually receded -from the apex near the point where it had originally -aligned with the French, and fell back upon -St. John.</p> - -<p>“Soon it became evident that even St. Julien, -exposed from right and left, was no longer tenable in -the face of overwhelming numerical superiority. The -third brigade was therefore ordered to retreat further -south, selling every yard of ground as dearly as it had -done since five o’clock on Thursday. But it was -found impossible, without hazarding far larger forces, -to disentangle the detachment of the Royal Highlanders -of Montreal, thirteenth battalion, and of the -Royal Montreal Regiment, fourteenth battalion. The -brigade was ordered, and not a moment too soon, to -move back. It left these units with hearts as heavy as -those of his comrades who had said farewell to Captain -McCuaig.</p> - -<p>“The German line rolled, indeed, over the deserted -village, but for several hours after the enemy had -become master of the village the sullen and persistent -rifle fire which survived showed that they were not yet -master of the Canadian rear guard. If they died, they -died worthy of Canada. The enforced retirement of -the third brigade (and to have stayed longer would -have been madness) reproduced for the second brigade, -commanded by Brigadier-General Curry, in a singularly -exact fashion the position of the third brigade -itself at the moment of the withdrawal of the -French.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page191">[191]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef17_11">SECOND BRIGADE PUT TO TEST</h3> - -<p>“The second brigade, it must be remembered, had -retained the whole line of trenches, roughly five hundred -yards, which it was holding at five o’clock on Thursday -afternoon, supported by the incomparable exertions -of the third brigade, and by the highly hazardous -deployment in which necessity had involved that -brigade. The second brigade had maintained its lines. -It now devolved upon General Curry, commanding -this brigade, to reproduce the tactical maneuvers by -which earlier in the fight the third brigade had adapted -itself to the flank movement of overwhelming numerical -superiority. He flung his left flank round and his -record is that in the very crisis of this immense struggle -he held his line of trenches from Thursday at five -o’clock until Sunday afternoon, and on Sunday afternoon -he had not abandoned his trenches. There were -none left. They had been obliterated by artillery. -He withdrew his undefeated troops from the fragments -of his field fortifications, and the hearts of his men -were as completely unbroken as the parapets of his -trenches were completely broken. Such a brigade!</p> - -<p>“It is invidious to single out any battalion for -special praise, but it is perhaps necessary to the story -to point out that Lieutenant-Colonel Lipsett, commanding -the ninetieth Winnipeg Rifles, eighth battalion, -of the second brigade, held the extreme left -of the brigade position at the most critical moment.</p> - -<p>“The battalion was expelled from the trenches -early on Friday morning by an emission of poisonous -gas, but recovering in three-quarters of an hour, it -counter-attacked, retook the trenches it had abandoned<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page192">[192]</a></span> -and bayoneted the enemy, and after the third brigade -had been forced to retire, Lieutenant-Colonel Lipsett -held his position, though his left was in the air, until -two British regiments filled up the gap on Saturday -night.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef17_12">CAPTURE OF ST. JULIEN</h3> - -<p>“The individual fortunes of those two brigades -have brought us to the events of Sunday afternoon, -but it is necessary, to make the story complete, -to recur for a moment to the events of the -morning.</p> - -<p>“After a very formidable attack the enemy succeeded -in capturing the village of St. Julien, which has -so often been referred to in describing the fortunes of -the Canadian left. This success opened up a new and -formidable line of advance, but by this time further -reinforcements had arrived. Here again it became -evident that the tactical necessities of the situation -dictated an offensive movement, as the surest method -of arresting further progress.</p> - -<p>“General Alderson, who was in command of the -reinforcements, accordingly directed that an advance -should be made by a British brigade which had been -brought up in support. The attack was thrust through -the Canadian left and center, and as the troops making -it swept on, many of them going to certain death, they -paused an instant, and with deep-throated cheers for -Canada gave the first indication to the division of the -warm admiration which their exertions had excited in -the British army.</p> - -<p>“The advance was indeed costly, but it could not<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page193">[193]</a></span> -be gainsaid. The story is one of which the brigade -may be proud, but it does not belong to the special -account of the fortunes of the Canadian contingent. -It is sufficient for our purpose to notice that the attack -succeeded in its object, and the German advance -along the line, which was momentarily threatened, -was arrested.</p> - -<p>“We had reached, in describing the events of the -afternoon, the points at which the trenches of the -second brigade had been completely destroyed. This -brigade and the third brigade, and the considerable -reinforcements which by this time filled the gap between -the two brigades, were gradually driven, fighting every -yard, upon a line running, roughly, from Fortuin, south -of St. Julien, in a northeasterly direction towards -Passchendale. Here the two brigades were relieved -by two British brigades, after exertions as glorious, -as fruitful, and, alas! as costly, as soldiers have ever -been called upon to make.</p> - -<p>“Monday morning broke bright and clear, and found -the Canadians behind the firing line. This day, too, -was to bring its anxieties. The attack was still pressed, -and it became necessary to ask Brigadier-General -Curry whether he could once more call upon his -shrunken brigade.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef17_13">A HERO LEADING HEROES</h3> - -<p>“‘The men are tired,’ this indomitable soldier -replied, ‘but they are ready and glad to go again to -the trenches.’ And so once more, a hero leading -heroes, the general marched back the men of the -second brigade, reduced to a quarter of its original<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page194">[194]</a></span> -strength, to the apex of the line as it existed at that -moment.</p> - -<p>“This position he held all day Monday. On Tuesday -he was still occupying reserve trenches, and on Wednesday -was relieved and retired to billets in the rear.</p> - -<p>“Such, in the most general outline, is the story of a -great and glorious feat of arms. A story told so soon -after the event, while tendering bare justice to units -whose doings fell under the eyes of particular observers, -must do less than justice to others who played their -part—and all did—as gloriously as those whose special -activities it is possible, even at this stage, to describe. -But the friends of men who fought in other battalions -may be content in the knowledge that they, too, shall -learn, when time allows, the exact part which each -unit played in these unforgettable days.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page195">[195]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XVIII</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">PITIFUL FLIGHT OF A MILLION WOMEN</span><br /> -<span class="chapauthor"><span class="smcap">By Philip Gibbs</span><br /> -Of the London Daily Chronicle</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef18_1">THE GERMAN ADVANCE UPON PARIS</a> — <a href="#SecRef18_2">THE PRIZE -OF PARIS</a> — <a href="#SecRef18_3">HEROIC EFFORTS OF FRENCH SOLDIERS</a> — <a href="#SecRef18_4">GERMANS -BALKED OF THEIR PRIZE</a> — <a href="#SecRef18_5">SIXTY MILES -OF FUGITIVES</a> — <a href="#SecRef18_6">TERROR IN EYES</a> — <a href="#SecRef18_7">PARIS THE -BEAUTIFUL</a>.</p> - -<p class="courtesy">[The following article is reproduced by the courtesy of the -New York Times.]</p> - -<p id="SecRef18_1">At least a million German soldiers—that is no -exaggeration of a light pen, but the sober and actual -truth—were advancing steadily upon the capital of -France. They were close to Beauvais when I escaped -from what was then a death-trap. They were fighting -our British troops at Creil when I came to that town. -Upon the following days they were holding our men in -the Forest of Compiègne. They had been as near to -Paris as Senlis, almost within gunshot of the outer forts.</p> - -<p>“Nothing seems to stop them,” said many soldiers -with whom I spoke. “We kill them and kill them, but -they come on.”</p> - -<p>The situation seemed to me almost ready for the -supreme tragedy—the capture or destruction of Paris. -The northwest of France lay very open to the enemy,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page196">[196]</a></span> -abandoned as far south as Abbéville and Amiens, too -lightly held by a mixed army corps of French and -Algerian troops with their headquarters at Aumale.</p> - -<p>Here was an easy way to Paris.</p> - -<p>Always obsessed with the idea that the Germans -must come from the east, the almost fatal error of this -war, the French had girdled Paris with almost impenetrable -forts on the east side, from those of Ecouen and -Montmorency, by the far-flung forts of Chelles and -Champigny, to those of Susy and Villeneuve, on the -outer lines of the triple cordon; but on the west side, -between Pontoise and Versailles, the defenses of Paris -were weak. I say, “were,” because during the last -days thousands of men were digging trenches and -throwing up ramparts. Only the snakelike Seine, -twining into a Pégoud loop, forms a natural defense to -the western approach to the city, none too secure -against men who have crossed many rivers in their -desperate assaults.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef18_2">THE PRIZE OF PARIS</h3> - -<p>This, then, was the Germans’ chance; it was for -this that they had fought their way westward and -southward through incessant battlefields from Mons -and Charleroi to St. Quentin and Amiens and down -to Creil and Compiègne, flinging away human life as -though it were but rubbish for death-pits. The prize -of Paris, Paris the great and beautiful, seemed to be -within their grasp.</p> - -<p>It was their intention to smash their way into it by -this western entry and then to skin it alive. Holding -this city at ransom, it was their idea to force France to<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page197">[197]</a></span> -her knees under threat of making a vast and desolate -ruin of all those palaces and churches and noble buildings -in which the soul of French history is enshrined.</p> - -<p>I am not saying these things from rumor and hearsay, -I am writing from the evidence of my own eyes after -traveling several hundreds of miles in France along -the main strategical -lines, grim -sentinels guarding -the last barriers -to that approaching -death -which was sweeping -on its way -through France -to the rich harvest -of Paris.</p> - -<p>There was only -one thing to do -to escape from -the menace of -this death. By -all the ways open, -by any way, the -population of -Paris emptied itself like rushing rivers of humanity -along all the lines which promised anything like safety.</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo221.jpg" alt="European Civilisation on its death bed" width="400" height="496" title="European Civilization" /> -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Anxious Hour.</span></p> -</div> - -<p>Only those stayed behind to whom life means very -little away from Paris and who if death came desired -to die in the city of their life.</p> - -<p>Again I write from what I saw and to tell the honest -truth from what I suffered, for the fatigue of this<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page198">[198]</a></span> -hunting for facts behind the screen of war is exhausting -to all but one’s moral strength, and even to that.</p> - -<p>I found myself in the midst of a new and extraordinary -activity of the French and English armies. -Regiments were being rushed up to the center of the -allied forces toward Creil, Montdidier, and Noyon.</p> - -<p>This great movement continued for several days, -putting to a severe test the French railway system, -which is so wonderfully organized that it achieved -this mighty transportation of troops with clockwork -regularity. Working to a time-table dictated by some -great brain in the headquarters of the French army, -there were calculated with perfect precision the conditions -of a network of lines on which troop trains -might be run to a given point. It was an immense -victory of organization, and a movement which -heartened one observer at least to believe that the German -death-blow would again be averted.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef18_3">HEROIC EFFORTS OF FRENCH SOLDIERS</h3> - -<p>I saw regiment after regiment entraining. Men -from the Southern Provinces, speaking the patois of -the South; men from the Eastern Departments whom -I had seen a month before, at the beginning of the war, -at Châlons and Epernay and Nancy, and men from -the southwest and center of France, in garrisons -along the Loire. They were all in splendid spirits -and utterly undaunted by the rapidity of the German -advance.</p> - -<p>“It is nothing, my little one,” said a dirty, unshaved -gentleman with the laughing eyes of a D’Artagnan; -“we shall bite their heads off. These brutal ‘bosches<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page199">[199]</a></span>’ -are going to put themselves in a ‘guet-apens,’ a veritable -death-trap. We shall have them at last.”</p> - -<p>Many of them had fought at Longwy and along the -heights of the Vosges. The youngest of them had -bristling beards, their blue coats with turned-back flaps -were war-worn and flanked with the dust of long -marches; their red trousers were sloppy and stained, -but they had not forgotten how to laugh, and the -gallantry of their spirits was a joy to see.</p> - -<p>They are very proud, these French soldiers, of -fighting side by side with their old foes. The English -now, after long centuries of strife, from Edward, the -Black Prince, to Wellington, are their brothers-in-arms -upon the battle-fields, and because I am English they -offered me their cigarettes and made me one of them. -But I realized even then that the individual is of no -account in this inhuman business of war.</p> - -<p>It is only masses of men that matter, moved by -common obedience at the dictation of mysterious far-off -powers, and I thanked Heaven that masses of men -were on the move rapidly in vast numbers and in the -right direction to support the French lines which had -fallen back from Amiens a few hours before I left that -town, and whom I had followed in their retirement, -back and back, with the English always strengthening -their left, but retiring with them almost to the outskirts -of Paris itself.</p> - -<p>Only this could save Paris—the rapid strengthening -of the allied front by enormous reserves strong enough -to hold back the arrow-shaped battering ram of the -enemy’s main army.</p> - -<p>Undoubtedly the French headquarters staff was<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page200">[200]</a></span> -working heroically and with fine intelligence to save -the situation at the very gates of Paris. The country -was being swept absolutely clean of troops in all parts -of France, where they had been waiting as reserves.</p> - -<p>It was astounding to me to see, after those three -days of rushing troop trains and of crowded stations -not large enough to contain the regiments, how an -air of profound solitude and peace had taken possession -of all these routes.</p> - -<p>In my long journey through and about France and -circling round Paris I found myself wondering sometimes -whether all this war had not been a dreadful -illusion without reality, and a transformation had -taken place, startling in its change, from military turmoil -to rural peace.</p> - -<p>Dijon was emptied of its troops. The road to -Châlons was deserted by all but fugitives. The great -armed camp at Châlons itself had been cleared out -except for a small garrison. The troops at Tours had -gone northward to the French center. All our English -reserves had been rushed up to the front from Havre -and Rouen.</p> - -<p>There was only one deduction to be drawn from this -great, swift movement—the French and English lines -had been supported by every available battalion to save -Paris from its menace of destruction, to meet the -weight of the enemy’s metal by a force strong enough -to resist its mighty mass.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef18_4">GERMANS BALKED OF THEIR PRIZE</h3> - -<p>It was still possible that the Germans might be -smashed on their left wing, hurled back to the west -between Paris and the sea, and cut off from their line -of communications. It was undoubtedly this impending -peril which scared the enemy’s headquarters staff -and upset all its calculations. They had not anticipated -the rapidity of the supporting movement -of the allied armies, and at the very gates of -Paris they saw themselves balked of their prize, the -greatest prize of the war, by the necessity of changing -front.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> - -<img src="images/illo225.jpg" alt="" width="393" height="600" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Great German Howitzers.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">Hauling a German twenty-one centimeter Howitzer on its firing mat -with a purchase on the wheels, which are fitted with caterpillar pads to -prevent sinking into soft mud.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo226.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="389" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Frightful Destruction Caused by German Siege Guns.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">Ruins of the Fort Loncin at Liège, Belgium, -after the German army had bombarded it with their huge guns and -reduced to fragments the strong concrete fortifications. <span -class="copyright">(<i>Copyright by International News Service.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page201">[201]</a></span></p> - -<p>To do them justice, they realized instantly the new -order of things, and with quick and marvelous decision -did not hesitate to alter the direction of their main -force. Instead of proceeding to the west of Paris they -swung round steadily to the southeast in order to -keep their armies away from the enveloping movement -of the French and English and drive their -famous wedge-like formation southward for the -purpose of dividing the allied forces of the west from -the French army of the east. The miraculous had -happened, and Paris, for a little time at least, was -unmolested.</p> - -<p>After wandering along the westerly and southerly -roads I started for Paris when thousands and scores of -thousands were flying from it. At that time I believed, -as all France believed, that in a few hours German -shells would be crashing across the fortifications of the -city and that Paris the beautiful would be Paris the -infernal. It needed a good deal of resolution on my -part to go deliberately to a city from which the population -was fleeing, and I confess quite honestly that I -had a nasty sensation in the neighborhood of my waistcoat -buttons at the thought.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page202">[202]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef18_5">SIXTY MILES OF FUGITIVES</h3> - -<p>Along the road from Tours to Paris there were -sixty unbroken miles of people—on my honor, I do -not exaggerate, but write the absolute truth. They -were all people who had despaired of breaking through -the dense masses of their fellow-citizens camped around -the railway stations, and had decided to take the roads -as the only way of escape.</p> - -<p>The vehicles were taxicabs, for which the rich paid -fabulous prices; motor cars which had escaped military -requisition, farmers’ carts laden with several families -and piles of household goods, shop carts drawn by -horses already tired to the point of death because of the -weight of the people who crowded behind, pony traps -and governess carts.</p> - -<p>Many persons, well dressed and belonging obviously -to well-to-do bourgeoisie, were wheeling barrows like -costers, but instead of trundling cabbages were pushing -forward sleeping babies and little children, who seemed -on the first stage to find new amusement and excitement -in the journey from home; but for the most part they -trudged along bravely, carrying their babies and holding -the hands of their little ones.</p> - -<p>They were of all classes, rank and fortune being -annihilated by the common tragedy. Elegant women -whose beauty is known in Paris salons, whose frivolity, -perhaps, in the past was the main purpose of their life, -were now on a level with the peasant mothers of -the French suburbs and with the “midinettes” of Montmartre, -and their courage did not fail them so quickly.</p> - -<p>I looked into many proud, brave faces of these -delicate women, walking in high-heeled shoes, all too<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page203">[203]</a></span> -frail for the hard, dusty roadways. They belonged to -the same race and breed as those ladies who defied -death with fine disdain upon the scaffold of the guillotine -in the great Revolution.</p> - -<p>They were leaving Paris now, not because of any -fears for themselves—I believe they were fearless—but -because they had decided to save the little sons and -daughters of soldier fathers.</p> - -<p>This great army in retreat was made up of every type -familiar in Paris.</p> - -<p>Here were women of the gay world, poor creatures -whose painted faces had been washed with tears, and -whose tight skirts and white stockings were never made -for a long march down the highways of France.</p> - -<p>Here also were thousands of those poor old ladies -who live on a few francs a week in the top attics of the -Paris streets which Balzac knew; they had fled from their -poor sanctuaries and some of them were still carrying -cats and canaries, as dear to them as their own lives.</p> - -<p>There was one young woman who walked with a pet -monkey on her shoulder while she carried a bird in a -golden cage. Old men, who remembered 1870, gave -their arms to old ladies to whom they had made love -when the Prussians were at the gates of Paris then.</p> - -<p>It was pitiful to see these old people now hobbling -along together—pitiful, but beautiful also, because -of their lasting love.</p> - -<p>Young boy students, with ties as black as their hats -and rat-tail hair, marched in small companies of -comrades, singing brave songs, as though they had no -fear in their hearts, and very little food, I think, in -their stomachs.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page204">[204]</a></span></p> - -<p>Shopgirls and concierges, city clerks, old aristocrats, -young boys and girls, who supported grandfathers and -grandmothers and carried new-born babies and gave -pick-a-back rides to little brothers and sisters, came -along the way of retreat.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef18_6">TERROR IN EYES</h3> - -<p>Each human being in the vast torrent of life will -have an unforgettable story of adventure to tell if life -remains. As a novelist I should have been glad to -get their narratives along this road for a great story -of suffering and strange adventure, but there was no -time for that and no excuse.</p> - -<p>When I met many of them they were almost beyond -the power of words. The hot sun of this September -had beaten down upon them—scorching them as in -the glow of molten metal. Their tongues clave to their -mouths with thirst.</p> - -<p>Some of them had that wild look in their eyes which -is the first sign of the delirium of thirst and fatigue.</p> - -<p>Nothing to eat or drink could be found on the way -from Paris. The little roadside cafés had been cleared -out by the preceding hordes.</p> - -<p>Unless these people carried their own food and drink -they could have none except of the charity of their -comrades in misfortune, and that charity has exceeded -all other acts of heroism in this war. Women gave -their last biscuit, their last little drop of wine, to poor -mothers whose children were famishing with thirst and -hunger; peasant women fed other women’s babies -when their own were satisfied.</p> - -<p>It was a tragic road. At every mile of it there were<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page205">[205]</a></span> -people who had fainted on the roadside and poor old -men and women who could go no farther, but sat on -the banks below the hedges, weeping silently or bidding -younger ones go forward and leave them to their fate. -Young women who had stepped out jauntily at first -were so footsore and lame that they limped along with -lines of pain about their lips and eyes.</p> - -<p>Many of the taxicabs, bought at great prices, and -many of the motor cars had broken down as I passed, -and had been abandoned by their owners, who had -decided to walk. Farmers’ carts had bolted into -ditches and lost their wheels. Wheelbarrows, too -heavy to be trundled, had been tilted up, with all their -household goods spilled into the roadway, and the -children had been carried farther, until at last darkness -came, and their only shelter was a haystack in a field -under the harvest moon.</p> - -<p>For days also I have been wedged up with fugitives -in railway trains more dreadful than the open roads, -stifling in their heat and heart-racking in their cargoes -of misery. Poor women have wept hysterically clasping -my hand, a stranger’s hand, for comfort in their -wretchedness and weakness. Yet on the whole they -have shown amazing courage, and, after their tears, -have laughed at their own breakdown, and, always -the children of France have been superb, so that again -and again I have wondered at the gallantry with which -they endured this horror. Young boys have revealed -the heroic strain in them and have played the part of -men in helping their mothers. And yet, when I came at -last into Paris against all this tide of retreat, it seemed -a needless fear that had driven these people away.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page206">[206]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef18_7">PARIS THE BEAUTIFUL</h3> - -<p>Then I passed long lines of beautiful little villas on -the Seine side, utterly abandoned among their trees -and flowers. A solitary fisherman held his line above -the water as though all the world were at peace, and in -a field close to the fortifications which I expected to see -bursting with shells, an old peasant bent above the -furrows and planted cabbages. Then, at last, I walked -through the streets of Paris and found them strangely -quiet and tranquil.</p> - -<p>The people I met looked perfectly calm. There were -a few children playing in the gardens of Champs -Elysées and under the Arc de Triomphe symbolical of -the glory of France.</p> - -<p>I looked back upon the beauty of Paris all golden -in the light of the setting sun, with its glinting spires -and white gleaming palaces and rays of light flashing -in front of the golden trophies of its monuments. Paris -was still unbroken. No shell had come shattering into -this city of splendor, and I thanked Heaven that for a -little while the peril had passed.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page207">[207]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XIX</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">FACING DEATH IN THE TRENCHES</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef19_1">CAVE-DWELLING THE LOT OF MODERN SOLDIERS</a> — <a href="#SecRef19_2">GERMANS -HAVE LEARNED MUCH</a> — <a href="#SecRef19_3">STANDARDIZED -MODEL</a> — <a href="#SecRef19_4">FRENCH STUDY OF GERMAN METHODS</a> — <a href="#SecRef19_5">“COMFORTS -OF HOME”</a>—<a href="#SecRef19_6">BRITISH REFUGES IN -NORTHERN FRANCE</a> — <a href="#SecRef19_7">“PICNICKING” IN THE OPEN -AIR</a> — <a href="#SecRef19_8">RAVAGES OF ARTILLERY FIRE</a> — <a href="#SecRef19_9">THE COMMON -ENEMY, THE WEATHER</a> — <a href="#SecRef19_10">WHY COOKS WEAR IRON -CROSSES</a> — <a href="#SecRef19_11">“PUTTING ONE OVER” ON THE RUSSIANS</a>.</p> - -<p id="SecRef19_1">“Other times, other manners” applies as accurately -to the battle-field as it does elsewhere. The cavalry -charge is nearly extinct, mass formation is going, -hand-to-hand conflict is rarely found, and now, it -appears, the old-fashioned and romantic bivouac is no -more. Trench-fighting has been carried on to such an -extent in France and Belgium, and Poland, that the -open camp, with its rows of little tents, outposts, and -sentry guard, becomes almost a forgotten picture of -warfare. Doubtless the military schools of the future -will make provision for special instruction in the -construction of commodious caverns on the battle-field, -safe, warm, and containing all the comforts of a -barrack.</p> - -<p>The modern warrior, like a mole, lives under ground -and displays his greatest activity at night. With the -coming of subterranean warfare, as trench-fighting<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page208">[208]</a></span> -can be appropriately called, great armies have had to -adopt unique methods. They have been compelled -to build peculiar little forts—for a trench is a fort, in -fact—wherever their soldiers meet the enemy. In -consequence these rectangular excavations have been -improved far beyond their original outline.</p> - -<p>The first trench was nothing more nor less than a -hole in the ground, deep enough to protect a man -kneeling, standing, or sitting, as the case might be. -Before the advent of the modern rifle and modern -cannon, these defenses, with several feet of loose earth -thrown up in front of them, served admirably. In -those days the question of head-cover was of minor -importance; today a protective roofing is the sine qua -non of any well-constructed trench. Early in the -European war it was discovered that the trench -offered the safest haven from the bursting shells of the -enemy’s field artillery. To all intents and purposes, -shrapnel, or, as its inventor termed it, the man-killing -projectile—is practically harmless in its effect upon -entrenched troops. Unless a shell can be placed -absolutely within the two-feet wide excavation it -wastes its destructive powers on the inoffensive earth -and air. This has led to a modification of artillery -methods, which, in turn, compels the elaboration of -the trench and emphasizes the importance of head-cover.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef19_2">GERMANS HAVE LEARNED MUCH</h3> - -<p>“The history of the great war,” to quote from a -French paper, “will show, among other things, how -the Germans profited by the lessons of recent conflicts.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page209">[209]</a></span> -The South African, the Russo-Japanese, and the -Balkan wars were studied minutely by them, and their -particular preparations, their tactics, and their artifices -result from the knowledge thus acquired. They learned -much, especially, as regards the formation of trenches.</p> - -<p>“After 1870 we confined ourselves to three regulation -types of trenches: for men prone, kneeling, and -standing. While in training, our soldiers were taught -how to take shelter momentarily between advances, -by digging up the soil a little and lying flat behind the -smallest of mounds. They were instructed, moreover, -how to protect themselves from the enemy’s fire by -propping up their knapsacks in front of them. This -meant insufficient protection, and an extremely dangerous -visibility, since the foe, by simply counting the -number of knapsacks, could know the strength opposed -to him. To insure the making of such shelter, a French -company was equipped with eighty picks and eighty -spades; that is, 160 tools for 250 men. These tools -were fixed on to the knapsacks; and it took some time -to bring them into use.”</p> - -<p>The German methods for defensive and offensive -trench-making are quite different. Each man has a -tool of his own, which is fixed on to the scabbard of -his sword-bayonet. When occasion for fighting arises, -the line conceals itself, and, as soon as it is engaged, -it prepares for possible retreat, making strong positions -assuring an unrelenting defensive and counter-attacks.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef19_3">STANDARDIZED MODEL</h3> - -<p>It is on these sound principles that all the German -fighting-lines are organized, on a more or less standardized<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page210">[210]</a></span> -model. The fighting-lines consist generally -of one, two, or three lines of shelter-trenches lying -parallel, measuring twenty or twenty-five inches in -width, and varying in length according to the number -they hold; the trenches are joined together by zigzag -approaches and by a line of reinforced trenches (armed -with machine guns), which are almost completely -proof against rifle, machine gun, or gun fire. The -ordinary German trenches are almost invisible from -350 yards away, a distance which permits a very deadly -fire. It is easy to realize that if the enemy occupies -three successive lines and a line of reinforced entrenchments, -the attacking line is likely, at the lowest estimate, -to be decimated during an advance of 650 yards—by -rifle-fire at a range of 350 yards’ distance, and by the -extremely quick fire of the machine guns, which can -each deliver from 300 to 600 bullets a minute with -absolute precision. In the field-trench, it is obvious, -a soldier enjoys far greater security than he would if -merely prone behind his knapsack in an excavation -barely fifteen inches deep. He has merely to stoop -down a little to disappear below the level of the ground -and be immune from infantry fire; moreover, his -machine guns can fire without endangering him. In -addition, this stooping position brings the man’s -knapsack on a level with his helmet, thus forming -some protection against shrapnel and shell-splinters.</p> - -<p>At the back of the German trenches, shelters are -dug for non-commissioned officers and for the commander -of the unit. The latter’s shelter is connected -with the communication trench; the others are not. -If one adds that the bank, or, rather, the earth that is -dug from the trenches and spread out in front, extends -for five or six yards, and is covered with grass, or -appropriate vegetation, it will be recognized that the -works concealing the German lines can be seen only -when a near approach is made to them.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page211">[211]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w600" id="FigRef1"> - -<img src="images/illo237a.png" alt="" width="600" height="372" /> - -<img src="images/illo237b.png" alt="" width="600" height="325" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Reinforced Trenches.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">Upper view: Details of roofs, loop-holes, and the form of the excavations. -Lower left-hand view: Vertical section of trenches and shelters. Lower -right-hand view: A plan and section of trenches and rest-room.</p> - -<p class="largeillo"><a href="images/illo237_lg.png">Larger illustration</a> (254 kB)</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page212">[212]</a></span></p> - -<p>As to reinforced trenches, the <a href="#FigRef1">drawings</a> show -clearly their conception and arrangement. They are -proof against ordinary bullets and shrapnel. Only -percussion-shells are able to destroy them and to -decimate their defenders. The interior details of the -trenches vary according to the ingenuity and spare -time of the occupants and the nature of the ground.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef19_4">FRENCH STUDY OF GERMAN METHODS</h3> - -<p>The whole system, that of the rest-rooms more -especially, is designed to give the men the maximum of -comfort and security. Doors and wooden shutters -wrenched from deserted houses are used for covers, or -else turf-covered branches.</p> - -<p>Ever since the outbreak of the war, the French troops -in Lorraine, after severe experiences, realized rapidly -the advantages of the German trenches, and began to -study those they had taken gloriously. Officers, non-commissioned -officers, and men of the Engineers were -straightway detached in every unit to teach the -infantry how to construct similar shelters. The -education was quick, and very soon they had completed -the work necessary for the protection of all. The -tools of the enemy “casualties,” the spades and picks -left behind in deserted villages, were all gladly piled -on to the French soldiers’ knapsacks, to be carried willingly -by the very men who used to grumble at being -loaded with even the smallest regulation tool. As soon as -night had set in on the occasion of a lull in the fighting, -the digging of the trenches was begun. Sometimes, in<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page213">[213]</a></span> -the darkness, the men of each fighting nation—less -than 500 yards away from their enemy—would hear -the noise of the workers of the foe: the sounds of picks -and axes; the officers’ words of encouragement; and -tacitly they would agree to an armistice during which -to dig shelters from which, in the morning, they would -dash out, to fight once more.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef19_5">“COMFORTS OF HOME”</h3> - -<p>Commodious, indeed, are some of the present trench -barracks, if we may believe the letters from the front. -One French soldier writes:</p> - -<p>“In really up-to-date entrenchments you may find -kitchens, dining-rooms, bedrooms, and even stables. -One regiment has first class cow-sheds. One day a -whimsical ‘piou-piou,’ finding a cow wandering about -in the danger zone, had the bright idea of finding -shelter for it in the trenches. The example was quickly -followed, and at this moment the —th Infantry possess -an underground farm, in which fat kine, well cared -for, give such quantities of milk that regular distributions -of butter are being made—and very good butter, -too.”</p> - -<p>But this is not all. An officer writes home a tale of -yet another one of the comforts of home added to the -equipment of the trenches:</p> - -<p>“We are clean people here. Thanks to the ingenuity -of ——, we are able to take a warm bath every day -from ten to twelve. We call this teasing the -‘bosches,’ for this bathing-establishment of the -latest type is fitted up—would you believe it?—in -the trenches!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page214">[214]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef19_6">BRITISH REFUGES IN NORTHERN FRANCE</h3> - -<p>Describing trenches occupied by the British in their -protracted “siege-warfare” in Northern France along -and to the north of the Aisne Valley, a British officer -wrote: “In the firing-line the men sleep and obtain -shelter in the dugouts they have hollowed or ‘undercut’ -in the side of the trenches. These refuges are -slightly raised above the bottom of the trench, so as -to remain dry in wet weather. The floor of the trench -is also sloped for purposes of draining. Some trenches -are provided with head-cover, and others with overhead -cover, the latter, of course, giving protection from the -weather as well as from shrapnel balls and splinters of -shells. . . . At all points subject to shell-fire access -to the firing-line from behind is provided by communication-trenches. -These are now so good that it -is possible to cross in safety the fire-swept zone to the -advanced trenches from the billets in villages, the -bivouacs in quarries, or the other places where the -headquarters of units happen to be.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef19_7">“PICNICKING” IN THE OPEN AIR</h3> - -<p>A cavalry subaltern gave the following account of -life in the trenches: “Picnicking in the open air, day -and night (you never see a roof now), is the only real -method of existence. There are loads of straw to -bed down on, and everyone sleeps like a log, in turn, -even with shrapnel bursting within fifty yards.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef19_8">RAVAGES OF ARTILLERY FIRE</h3> - -<p>One English officer described the ravages of modern -artillery fire, not only upon all men, animals and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page215">[215]</a></span> -buildings within its zone, but upon the very face of -nature itself: “In the trenches crouch lines of men, -in brown or gray or blue, coated with mud, unshaven, -hollow-eyed with the continual strain.”</p> - -<p>“The fighting is now taking place over ground where -both sides have for weeks past been excavating in all -directions,” said another letter from the front, “until -it has become a perfect labyrinth. A trench runs -straight for a considerable distance, then it suddenly -forks in three or four directions. One branch merely -leads into a ditch full of water, used in drier weather -as a means of communication; another ends abruptly -in a cul-de-sac, probably an abandoned sap-head; the -third winds on, leading into galleries and passages -further forward.</p> - -<p>“Sometimes where new ground is broken the spade -turns up the long-buried dead, ghastly relics of former -fights, and on all sides the surface of the earth is -ploughed and furrowed by fragments of shell and bombs -and distorted by mines. Seen from a distance, this -apparently confused mass of passages, crossing and -recrossing one another, resembles an irregular gridiron.</p> - -<p>“The life led by the infantry on both sides at close -quarters is a strange, cramped existence, with death -always near, either by means of some missile from above -or some mine explosion from beneath—a life which has -one dull, monotonous background of mud and water. -Even when there is but little fighting the troops are -kept hard at work strengthening the existing defenses, -constructing others, and improvising the shelter imperative -in such weather.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page216">[216]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef19_9">THE COMMON ENEMY, THE WEATHER</h3> - -<p>But it is not the guns or cannon of the enemy that -affect the spirits of the soldiers. It is the weather. A -week of alternate rain and snow, when the ill-drained -dugouts are half-filled with a freezing viscid mud; -when, day after day, the feet are numbed by the frost -until all sensation in them is deadened; when the -coarse, scanty ration is refused by the tortured stomach—then -it is that the spirits of the stoutest falter. Let -the enemy attack as he will, and he must fail. It is -only in fighting that the men find an outlet for their -rancor.</p> - -<p>More than thirty years ago a well-known German -general declared that a book on “Seasonal Tactics” -might as properly be written as those on the tactics of -weapons, and of geographical conditions; and in a -recent issue of the Deutsche Revue an unsigned -article by a veteran of the Franco-Prussian war recounts -the difficulties that arise when the Frost King -holds sway. “To begin with, the precious hours of -daylight are much fewer, and even these may be -shortened by overcast skies and heavy fogs. Soft -snow and mud seriously impede marching and at times -it is impossible to take cross-country cuts, even single -horsemen having great difficulty in crossing the frozen -ridges of plowed fields or stubble. Moreover, even -regular highways may become so slippery that they -endanger both man and horse, and in hilly country -such conditions make it necessary to haul heavy artillery -up steep ascents by man-power. Cold head-winds -also greatly impede progress.</p> - -<p>“The necessity of bringing the troops under cover -enforces long marches at the end of the day’s work, and -again at its beginning, and therefore makes extra -demands on energy. . . . The early dark hinders the -offense from carrying out its plans completely and from -utilizing any advantage won by following it up energetically. -Night battles become frequent. The defense -seeks to regain what it has lost by day, the offense -to make use of the long nights to win what it could not -achieve in the daytime. Then, too, the need of getting -warmed-up makes the troops more enterprising.”</p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> - -<img src="images/illo243.jpg" alt="" width="389" height="600" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Sinking of a Torpedoed Battleship.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">As the British vessel “Aboukir” was sinking after being torpedoed by -a German submarine, one of the sailors described the last moment as -follows: “The captain sings out an order just like on any ordinary occasion, -‘If any man wishes to leave the side of the ship he can do so, every -man for himself,’ then we gave a cheer and in we went.”</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo244.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="387" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Rescuing Sailors After Sinking of German Battleship.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">The conduct of the British fleet is well -illustrated by this picture, which shows life-boats and torpedo destroyers -rescuing the drowning sailors of a German battleship after the latter had been sunk. The heads and shoulders of -numerous unfortunate men are seen dotted about in the water. <span class="copyright">(<i>Photo by Underwood and Underwood.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page217">[217]</a></span></p> - -<p>All sorts of constructive work—fortification building, -the erection of stations for telegraphs, telephones and -wireless, etc.—is naturally much more difficult in -frozen ground. General von der Goltz of the German -Army is said to have recommended many years ago -that in view of possible winter campaigns provision -should be made in quantity of warm winter clothing, -materials for the building of barracks, making double -tents, etc. Another important preventive of suffering -and the consequent diminished efficiency is to provide -plenty of good hot food for the men.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef19_10">WHY COOKS WEAR IRON CROSSES</h3> - -<p>“There isn’t anything heroic about cooks,” wrote -Herbert Corey in the New York Globe, “and when -things go wrong one either apprehends a cook as -chasing a waiter with a bread-knife or giving way to -tears.” Yet the German army contains many a cook -whose expansive apron is decorated with the Iron -Cross. “And the Iron Cross,” Mr. Corey reminds -us, “is conferred for one thing only—for 100 per cent -courage.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page218">[218]</a></span></p> - -<p>“‘They’ve earned it,’ said the man who had seen -them. ‘They are the bravest men in the Kaiser’s -four millions. I’ve seen generals salute greasy, -paunchy, sour-looking army cooks.’</p> - -<p>“The cook’s job is to feed the men of his company. -Each German company is followed, or preceded, by a -field-kitchen on wheels. Sometimes the fires are kept -going while the device trundles along. The cook stands -on the foot-board and thumps his bread. He is always -the first man up in the morning and the last to sleep -at night.</p> - -<p>“When that company goes into the trenches the -cook stays behind. There is no place for a field-kitchen -in a four-foot trench. But these men in the -trench must be fed. The Teuton insists that all -soldiers must be fed—but especially the men in the -trench. The others may go hungry, but these must -have tight belts. Upon their staying power may depend -the safety of an army.</p> - -<p>“So, as the company can not go to the cook, the -cook goes to the company. When meal-hour comes -he puts a yoke on his shoulders and a cook’s cap on -his head and, warning the second cook as to what will -happen if he lets the fires go out, puts a bucketful of -hot veal stew on either end of the yoke and goes to his -men. Maybe the trench is under fire. No matter. -His men are in that trench and must be fed.</p> - -<p>“Sometimes the second cook gets his step right here. -Sometimes the apprentice cook—the dish-washer—is -summoned to pick up the cook’s yoke and refill the -spilled buckets and tramp steadily forward to the line. -Sometimes the supply of assistant cooks, even, runs<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page219">[219]</a></span> -short. But the men in the trenches always get their -food.</p> - -<p>“‘That’s why so many cooks in the German Army -have Iron Crosses dangling from their breasts,’ said -the man who knows. ‘No braver men ever lived. The -man in the trench can duck his head and light his -pipe and be relatively safe. No fat cook yoked to two -buckets of veal stew ever can be safe as he marches -down the trench.’”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef19_11">“PUTTING ONE OVER” ON THE RUSSIANS</h3> - -<p>Granville Fortescue, who visited the Russian trenches -in Poland, related in the Illustrated London News a -story of how the Germans, to use a slang phrase, “put -one over” on the too-confiding Russians. “This -happened,” he wrote, “at a portion of the line where -the positions ran so close that the men could communicate -by shouting. It was around Christmas, and -the Germans invited the Russians to come over for a -hot cup of new coffee just received from home. The -Russians replied to this invitation, shouting: ‘Come -over and try our tea. It’s a special gift from the -Czar.’</p> - -<p>“The Germans then put up the white flag, and said -that they would send over fifteen men to try the tea -if the Russians would send over the same number to -sample their coffee. The plan was carried out. When -the fifteen Germans appeared in the Russian trench, -the hosts remarked to one another that if these were a -sample the enemy would not hold out long. They were -a sick-looking lot. Suddenly the Germans pulled down -their white flag and commenced firing. Then the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page220">[220]</a></span> -Russians found that they had exchanged fifteen good -soldiers for fifteen typhus patients.</p> - -<p>“It is easy to believe that the Russian soldier could -be imposed upon in this way. Although extremely -courageous, he is very simple-minded with it all, and -certainly trusting. He is a splendid physical specimen. -In the trail of trench warfare this is the great desideratum. -Then, the Russians of the type that are drafted -into the army have all their life been accustomed to -privation and exposure. For this reason they are the -only troops that I have seen who can stick six days and -nights on end in a trench, under constant small arms -and shell fire, with the temperature below zero, and -after a day’s rest be as good as ever. The Russians -never grumble.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page221">[221]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XX</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">A VIVID PICTURE OF WAR</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef20_1">THE BATTLE OF NEUVE CHAPELLE</a> — <a href="#SecRef20_2">A SURPRISE -PREPARED</a> — <a href="#SecRef20_3">“HELL BROKE LOOSE”</a>—<a href="#SecRef20_4">A HORRIBLE -THIRTY-FIVE MINUTES</a> — <a href="#SecRef20_5">TRENCHES FILLED WITH -DEAD</a> — <a href="#SecRef20_6">HOARSE SHOUTS AND THE GROANS OF THE -WOUNDED</a> — <a href="#SecRef20_7">INDESCRIBABLE MASS OF RUINS RUINS</a> — <a href="#SecRef20_8">“SMEARED -WITH DUST AND BLOOD.”</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef20_1">One of the most vivid word-pictures of what war -means in all its horror was told by an eye-witness of -the battle of Neuve Chapelle in which the British -soldiers dislodged the Germans from an important -position. He said:</p> - -<p>“The dawn, which broke reluctantly through a -veil of clouds on the morning of Wednesday, March 10, -1915, seemed as any other to the Germans behind the -white and blue sandbags in their long line of trenches -curving in a hemicycle about the battered village of -Neuve Chapelle. For five months they had remained -undisputed masters of the positions they had here -wrested from the British in October. Ensconced in -their comfortably-arranged trenches with but a thin -outpost in their fire trenches, they had watched day -succeed day and night succeed night without the least -variation from the monotony of trench warfare, the -intermittent bark of the machine guns—rat-tat-tat-tat-tat—and -the perpetual rattle of rifle fire, with here -and there a bomb, and now and then an exploded mine.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page222">[222]</a></span></p> - - -<h3 id="SecRef20_2">A SURPRISE PREPARED</h3> - -<p>“For weeks past the German airmen had grown -strangely shy. On this Wednesday morning none were -aloft to spy out the strange doings which as dawn broke -might have been descried on the desolate roads -behind the British lines.</p> - -<p>“From ten o’clock of the preceding evening endless -files of men marched silently down the roads leading -towards the German positions through Laventie and -Richebourg St. Vaast, poor shattered villages of the -dead where months of incessant bombardment have -driven away the last inhabitants and left roofless -houses and rent roadways. . . .</p> - -<p>“Two days before, a quiet room, where Nelson’s -Prayer stands on the mantel-shelf, saw the ripening of -the plans that sent these sturdy sons of Britain’s four -kingdoms marching all through the night. Sir John -French met the army corps commanders and unfolded -to them his plans for the offensive of the British Army -against the German line at Neuve Chapelle.</p> - -<p>“The onslaught was to be a surprise. That was its -essence. The Germans were to be battered with -artillery, then rushed before they recovered their wits. -We had thirty-six clear hours before us. Thus long, it -was reckoned (with complete accuracy as afterwards -appeared), must elapse before the Germans, whose line -before us had been weakened, could rush up reinforcements. -To ensure the enemy’s being pinned down right -and left of the ‘great push,’ an attack was to be delivered -north and south of the main thrust simultaneously -with the assault on Neuve Chapelle.”</p> - -<p>After describing the impatience of the British<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page223">[223]</a></span> -soldiers as they awaited the signal to open the attack, -and the actual beginning of the engagement, the narrator -continues:</p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> -<img src="images/illo251.jpg" alt="" width="395" height="450" /> -<p class="caption main">“<span class="smcap">There Is Nothing to Report.</span>”</p> -</div> - -<h3 id="SecRef20_3">“HELL BROKE LOOSE”</h3> - -<p>“Then hell broke loose. With a mighty, hideous, -screeching burst of noise, hundreds of guns spoke. The -men in the front -trenches were deafened -by the sharp -reports of the -field-guns spitting -out their shells at -close range to cut -through the Germans’ -barbed wire -entanglements. In -some cases the -trajectory of these -vicious missiles -was so flat that -they passed only a -few feet above the -British trenches.</p> - -<p>“The din was -continuous. An officer who had the curious idea -of putting his ear to the ground said it was as -though the earth were being smitten great blows -with a Titan’s hammer. After the first few shells -had plunged screaming amid clouds of earth and -dust into the German trenches, a dense pall of smoke -hung over the German lines. The sickening fumes of<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page224">[224]</a></span> -lyddite blew back into the British trenches. In some -places the troops were smothered in earth and dust -or even spattered with blood from the hideous fragments -of human bodies that went hurtling through the -air. At one point the upper half of a German officer, -his cap crammed on his head, was blown into one of -our trenches.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef20_4">A HORRIBLE THIRTY-FIVE MINUTES</h3> - -<p>“Words will never convey any adequate idea of -the horror of those five and thirty minutes. When -the hands of officers’ watches pointed to five minutes -past eight, whistles resounded along the British lines. -At the same moment the shells began to burst farther -ahead, for, by previous arrangement, the gunners, -lengthening their fuses, were ‘lifting’ on to the village -of Neuve Chapelle so as to leave the road open for our -infantry to rush in and finish what the guns had begun.</p> - -<p>“The shells were now falling thick among the houses -of Neuve Chapelle, a confused mass of buildings seen -reddish through the pillars of smoke and flying earth -and dust. At the sound of the whistle—alas for the -bugle, once the herald of victory, now banished from -the fray!—our men scrambled out of the trenches and -hurried higgledy-piggledy into the open. Their officers -were in front. Many, wearing overcoats and carrying -rifles with fixed bayonets, closely resembled their men.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef20_5">TRENCHES FILLED WITH DEAD</h3> - -<p>“It was from the center of our attacking line that -the assault was pressed home soonest. The guns had -done their work well. The trenches were blown to<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page225">[225]</a></span> -irrecognizable pits dotted with dead. The barbed -wire had been cut like so much twine. Starting from -the Rue Tilleloy the Lincolns and the Berkshires -were off the mark first, with orders to swerve to right -and left respectively as soon as they had captured the -first line of trenches, in order to let the Royal Irish -Rifles and the Rifle Brigade through to the village. -The Germans left alive in the trenches, half demented -with fright, surrounded by a welter of dead and dying -men, mostly surrendered. The Berkshires were opposed -with the utmost gallantry by two German officers -who had remained alone in a trench serving a machine -gun. But the lads from Berkshire made their way into -that trench and bayoneted the Germans where they -stood, fighting to the last. The Lincolns, against -desperate resistance, eventually occupied their section -of the trench and then waited for the Irishmen and the -Rifle Brigade to come and take the village ahead of -them. Meanwhile the second thirty-ninth Garhwalis -on the right had taken their trenches with a rush and -were away towards the village and the Biez Wood.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef20_6">HOARSE SHOUTS AND THE GROANS OF THE WOUNDED</h3> - -<p>“Things had moved so fast that by the time the -troops were ready to advance against the village the -artillery had not finished its work. So, while the -Lincolns and the Berks assembled the prisoners who -were trooping out of the trenches in all directions, the -infantry on whom devolved the honor of capturing the -village, waited. One saw them standing out in the -open, laughing and cracking jokes amid the terrific -din made by the huge howitzer shells screeching overhead<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page226">[226]</a></span> -and bursting in the village, the rattle of machine -guns all along the line, and the popping of rifles. Over -to the right where the Garhwalis had been working -with the bayonet, men were shouting hoarsely and -wounded were groaning as the stretcher-bearers, all -heedless of bullets, moved swiftly to and fro over the -shell-torn ground.</p> - -<p>“There was bloody work in the village of Neuve -Chapelle. The capture of a place at the bayonet -point is generally a grim business, in which instant, -unconditional surrender is the only means by which -bloodshed, a deal of bloodshed, can be prevented. -If there is individual resistance here and there the -attacking troops cannot discriminate. They must -go through, slaying as they go such as oppose them -(the Germans have a monopoly of the finishing-off -of wounded men), otherwise the enemy’s resistance -would not be broken, and the assailants would be sniped -and enfiladed from hastily prepared strongholds at -half a dozen different points.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef20_7">INDESCRIBABLE MASS OF RUINS</h3> - -<p>“The village was a sight that the men say they will -never forget. It looked as if an earthquake had struck -it. The published photographs do not give any idea -of the indescribable mass of ruins to which our guns -reduced it. The chaos is so utter that the very line -of the streets is all but obliterated.</p> - -<p>“It was indeed a scene of desolation into which the -Rifle Brigade—the first regiment to enter the village, -I believe—raced headlong. Of the church only the -bare shell remained, the interior lost to view beneath<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page227">[227]</a></span> -a gigantic mound of debris. The little churchyard -was devastated, the very dead plucked from their -graves, broken coffins and ancient bones scattered -about amid the fresher dead, the slain of that morning—grey -green forms asprawl athwart the tombs. Of all -that once fair village but two things remained intact—two -great crucifixes reared aloft, one in the churchyard, -the other over against the château. From the cross -that is the emblem of our faith the figure of Christ, -yet intact though all pitted with bullet marks, looked -down in mute agony on the slain in the village.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef20_8">“SMEARED WITH DUST AND BLOOD”</h3> - -<p>“The din and confusion were indescribable. Through -the thick pall of shell smoke Germans were seen on all -sides, some emerging hall dazed from cellars and dugouts, -their hands above their heads, others dodging -round the shattered houses, others firing from the -windows, from behind carts, even from behind the -overturned tombstones. Machine guns were firing -from the houses on the outskirts, rapping out their -nerve-racking note above the noise of the rifles.</p> - -<p>“Just outside the village there was a scene of tremendous -enthusiasm. The Rifle Brigade, smeared -with dust and blood, fell in with the Third Gurkhas -with whom they had been brigaded in India. The -little brown men were dirty but radiant. Kukri in -hand they had very thoroughly gone through some -houses at the cross-roads on the Rue du Bois and -silenced a party of Germans who were making themselves -a nuisance there with some machine guns. -Riflemen and Gurkhas cheered themselves hoarse.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page228">[228]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXI</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">HARROWING SCENES ALONG THE BATTLE -LINES</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef21_1">DRIVING BACK THE GERMANS UNDER FIRE</a> — <a href="#SecRef21_2">ON -THE FIRING LINE</a> — <a href="#SecRef21_3">AMONG MANGLED HORSES AND -MEN</a> — <a href="#SecRef21_4">GERMAN LOSSES FRIGHTFUL</a> — <a href="#SecRef21_5">DIXMUDE A -PLACE OF DEATH AND HORROR</a>.</p> - -<p id="SecRef21_1">Some idea of the ruin wrought day after day as -the battle raged in Flanders may be gained from the -occasional reports of war correspondents who shared -the fortunes of battle.</p> - -<p>“The battle rages along the Yser with frightful -destruction of life,” wrote a correspondent of the -London Daily News in October. “Air engines, sea -engines, and land engines death-sweep this desolate -country, vertically, horizontally, and transversely. -Through it the frail little human engines crawl and -dig, walk and run, skirmishing, charging, and blundering -in little individual fights and tussles, tired and -puzzled, ordered here and there, sleeping where they -can, never washing, and dying unnoticed. A friend -may find himself firing on a friendly force, and few -are to blame.</p> - -<p>“Thursday the Germans were driven back over the -Yser; Friday they secured a footing again, and Saturday -they were again hurled back. Now a bridge blown -up by one side is repaired by the other; it is again<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page229">[229]</a></span> -blown up by the first, or left as a death trap till the -enemy is actually crossing.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w400"> -<img src="images/illo257.jpg" alt="" width="400" height="410" /> -<p class="imagetext left">POVERTY—HATRED—REVENGE—STARVATION</p> -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">These Always Survive.</span></p> -</div> - -<p>“Actions by armored trains, some of them the -most reckless adventures, are attempted daily. Each -day accumulates an unwritten record of individual -daring feats, accepted as part of the daily work. Day -by day our men -push out on -these dangerous -explorations, attacked -by shell -fire, in danger of -cross-fire, dynamite, -and ambuscades, -bringing -a priceless -support to the -threatened lines. -As the armored -train approaches -the river under -shell fire the car -cracks with the -constant thunder of guns aboard. It is amazing to -see the angle at which the guns can be swung.</p> - -<p>“And overhead the airmen are busy venturing -through fog and puffs of exploding shells to get one -small fact of information. We used to regard the -looping of the loop of the Germans overhead as a hare-brained -piece of impudent defiance to our infantry fire. -Now we know it means early trouble for the infantry.</p> - -<p>“Besides us, as we crawl up snuffing the lines like<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page230">[230]</a></span> -dogs on a scent, grim train-loads of wounded wait -soundlessly in the sidings. Further up the line ambulances -are coming slowly back. The bullets of machine -guns begin to rattle on our armored coats. Shells -we learned to disregard, but the machine gun is the -master in this war.</p> - -<p>“Now we near the river at a flat country farm. -The territory is scarred with trenches, and it is impossible -to say at first who is in them, so incidental and -separate are the fortunes of this riverside battle. The -Germans are on our bank enfilading the lines of the -Allies’ trenches. We creep up and the Germans come -into sight out of the trenches, rush to the bank, and -are scattered and mashed. The Allies follow with a -fierce bayonet charge.</p> - -<p>“The Germans do not wait. They rush to the -bridges and are swept away by the deadliest destroyer -of all, the machine gun. The bridge is blown up, but -who can say by whom? Quickly the train runs back.</p> - -<p>“‘A brisk day,’ remarks the correspondent. ‘Not -so bad,’ replies the officer. So the days pass.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef21_2">ON THE FIRING LINE</h3> - -<p>Another correspondent who, accompanied by a son -of the Belgian War Minister, M. de Broqueville, -made a tour of the battleground in the Dixmude -district wrote:</p> - -<p>“No pen could do justice to the grandeur and horror -of the scene. As far as the eye could reach nothing -could be seen but burning villages and bursting shells.</p> - -<p>“Arriving at the firing line, a terrible scene presented -itself. The shell fire from the German batteries was<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page231">[231]</a></span> -so terrific that Belgian soldiers and French marines -were continually being blown out of their dugouts and -sent scattering to cover. Elsewhere, also, little groups -of peasants were forced to flee because their cellars -began to fall in. These unfortunates had to make their -way as best they could on foot to the rear. They were -frightened to death by the bursting shells, and the -sight of crying children among them was most pathetic.</p> - -<p>“Dixmude was the objective of the German attack, -and shells were bursting all over it, crashing among the -roofs and blowing whole streets to pieces. From a -distance of three miles we could hear them crashing -down, but the town itself was invisible, except for the -flames and the smoke and clouds rising above it. The -Belgians had only a few field batteries, so that the -enemy’s howitzers simply dominated the field, and the -infantry trenches around the town had to rely upon -their own unaided efforts.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef21_3">AMONG MANGLED HORSES AND MEN</h3> - -<p>“Our progress along the road was suddenly stopped -by one of the most horrible sights I have ever seen. -A heavy howitzer shell had fallen and burst right in -the midst of a Belgian battery which was making its -way to the front, causing terrible destruction. The -mangled horses and men among the debris presented a -shocking spectacle.</p> - -<p>“Eventually, we got into Dixmude itself, and -every time a shell came crashing among the roofs we -thought our end had come. The Hôtel de Ville (town -hall) was a sad sight. The roof was completely riddled<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page232">[232]</a></span> -by shell, while inside was a scene of chaos. It was piled -with loaves of bread, bicycles, and dead soldiers.</p> - -<p>“The battle redoubled in fury, and by seven o’clock -in the evening Dixmude was a furnace, presenting a -scene of terrible grandeur. The horizon was red -with burning homes.</p> - -<p>“Our return journey was a melancholy one, owing -to the constant trains of wounded that were passing.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef21_4">GERMAN LOSSES FRIGHTFUL</h3> - -<p>“The German losses are frightful” wrote another -correspondent. “Three meadows near Ostend are -heaped with dead. The wounded are now installed -in private houses in Bruges, where large wooden sheds -are being rushed up to receive additional injured. -Thirty-seven farm wagons containing wounded, dying, -and dead passed in one hour near Middelkerke.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef21_5">DIXMUDE A PLACE OF DEATH AND HORROR</h3> - -<p>From Fumes, Belgium, members of the staff of the -English hospital traveled to Dixmude to search for -wounded men on the firing line. Philip Gibbs, of the -London Daily Chronicle, who traveled with them in -reporting his experiences, said:</p> - -<p>“I was in one of the ambulances, and Mr. Gleeson -sat behind me in the narrow space between the -stretchers. Over his shoulder he talked in a quiet -voice of the job that lay before us. I was glad of that -quiet voice, so placid in its courage. We went forward -at what seemed to me a crawl, though I think it was a -fair pace, shells bursting around us now on all sides, -while shrapnel bullets sprayed the earth about us. -It appeared to me an odd thing that we were still alive. -Then we came into Dixmude.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo261.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="386" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Destruction of the Sea-Raider “Emden.”</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">The Australian cruiser “Sydney” came up with the -German cruiser “Emden” off the Cocos Keeling Island on -November 9. After the “Sydney” had fired six hundred rounds of ammunition and covered fifty-six miles in -maneuvering, she forced the “Emden” to run ashore owing to the breaking of her steering gear. The German vessel -ran at a speed of nineteen knots upon the beach, the shock killing the man at the wheel. <span class="copyright">(<i>From a direct camera -picture taken on board the “Sydney.”</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo262.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="368" /> -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Sinking of the German Cruiser “Bluecher.”</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">This most dramatic photograph of the Great North Sea Battle, -in which the British fleet was victor, January 24, -1915, shows the death agony of the German cruiser “Bluecher” just as she turned turtle and sank. The ship is shown -lying on her side, with her machinery and armament shot into masses of twisted iron and steel, great fires raging -forward, amidship and aft. The officers and men can be seen ranged along the side of the vessel: many of them have -slipped into the water and may be seen swimming about. -<span class="copyright">(<i>Copyright by the International News Service.</i>)</span></p> - -<p class="allclear"><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page233">[233]</a></span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p>“When I saw it for the first and last time it was a -place of death and horror. The streets through which -we passed were utterly deserted and wrecked from -end to end, as though by an earthquake. Incessant -explosions of shell fire crashed down upon the walls -which still stood. Great gashes opened in the walls, -which then toppled and fell. A roof came tumbling -down with an appalling clatter. Like a house of cards -blown by a puff of wind, a little shop suddenly collapsed -into a mass of ruins. Here and there, further into the -town, we saw living figures. They ran swiftly for a -moment and then disappeared into dark caverns under -toppling porticoes. They were Belgian soldiers. . . .</p> - -<p>“We stood on some steps, looking down into that -cellar. It was a dark hole, illumined dimly by a -lantern, I think. I caught sight of a little heap of -huddled bodies. Two soldiers, still unwounded, dragged -three of them out and handed them up to us. The -work of getting those three men into the first ambulance -seemed to us interminable; it was really no more than -fifteen or twenty minutes.</p> - -<p>“I had lost consciousness of myself. Something -outside myself, as it seemed, was saying that there was -no way of escape; that it was monstrous to suppose -that all these bursting shells would not smash the -ambulance to bits and finish the agony of the wounded, -and that death was very hideous. I remember thinking -also how ridiculous it was for men to kill one another -like this and to make such hells on earth.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page234">[234]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXII</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">WHAT THE MEN IN THE TRENCHES WRITE -HOME</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef22_1">SOBERING REALITIES OF BATTLE</a> — <a href="#SecRef22_2">“WAR -IS TERRIBLE”</a>—<a href="#SecRef22_3">THE -COMMON ENEMY, DEATH</a>—“A WASTEFUL -WAR”—<a href="#SecRef22_4">“SAME PAIR OF BLUE EYES”</a>—<a href="#SecRef22_5">FIGHTING -WITHOUT HATE.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef22_1">Life at the front is not all marching and fighting by -any means: there are long days and nights of waiting -in which though it be</p> - -<div class="poemcenter"> - -<div class="poem"> -<div class="stanza"> -<span class="i0">“Theirs not to reason why”<br /></span> -</div> -</div> - -</div><!--poemcenter--> - -<p class="noindent">the soldiers have abundant time to reflect upon the -grim fatality of war and the hideousness of the carnage. -They are continually facing death, and though many of -them, perhaps most of them, become inured to the -sights of human slaughter, others cannot fail to be -impressed by the stark, white faces of the fallen—friends -and foes alike. Sights more horrible than perhaps -they could have imagined are burned into their minds, -never to be effaced.</p> - -<p>Naturally some of their reflections find expression -in the letters home, when the soldier is more or less -off guard. There we get an “inside view” of the war -which does much to offset the ruthlessness of rulers -and restore one’s faith in the essential humanity of -men.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page235">[235]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef22_2">“WAR IS TERRIBLE”</h3> - -<p>The following letter, which Refers to the fighting along -the Aisne, was found on a German officer of the Seventh -Reserve Corp:</p> - -<p class="right padr2 blankbefore1">“Cerny, South of Laon, Sept. 14, 1914.</p> - -<p>“My dear Parents: Our corps has the task of -holding the heights -south of Cerny in -all circumstances -until the fourteenth -corps on -our left flank can -grip the enemy’s -flank. On our -right are other -corps. We are -fighting with the -English Guards, -Highlanders, and -Zouaves. The -losses on both -sides have been enormous. For the most part this is -due to the too brilliant French artillery.</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo265.jpg" alt="" width="400" height="360" /> -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Mother.</span></p> -</div> - -<p>“The English are marvelously trained in making -use of ground. One never sees them, and one is -constantly under fire. The French airmen perform -wonderful feats. We cannot get rid of them. As -soon as an airman has flown over us, ten minutes -later we get their shrapnel fire in our positions. We -have little artillery in our corps; without it we cannot -get forward.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page236">[236]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Three days ago our division took possession of these -heights and dug itself in. Two days ago, early in the -morning, we were attacked by an immensely superior -English force, one brigade and two battalions, and -were turned out of our positions. The fellows took -five guns from us. It was a tremendous hand-to-hand -fight.</p> - -<p>“How I escaped myself I am not clear. I then had -to bring up supports on foot. My horse was wounded, -and the others were too far in the rear. Then came up -the guards jäger battalion, fourth jäger, sixth regiment, -reserve regiment thirteen, and landwehr regiments -thirteen and sixteen, and with the help of the artillery -we drove the fellows out of the position again. Our -machine guns did excellent work; the English fell in -heaps.</p> - -<p>“In our battalion three Iron Crosses have been -given, one to C. O., one to Captain ——, and one to -Surgeon ——. [Names probably deleted.] Let us -hope that we shall be the lucky ones next time.</p> - -<p>“During the first two days of the battle I had only -one piece of bread and no water. I spent the night in -the rain without my overcoat. The rest of my kit was -on the horses which had been left behind with the -baggage and which cannot come up into the battle -because as soon as you put your nose up from behind -cover the bullets whistle.</p> - -<p>“War is terrible. We are all hoping that a decisive -battle will end the war, as our troops already have got -round Paris. If we beat the English the French resistance -will soon be broken. Russia will be very quickly -dealt with; of this there is no doubt.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page237">[237]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Yesterday evening, about six, in the valley in which -our reserves stood there was such a terrible cannonade -that we saw nothing of the sky but a cloud of smoke. -We had few casualties.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef22_3">THE COMMON ENEMY, DEATH</h3> - -<p>How foe helps foe when the last grim hour comes is -revealed in the letter which a French cavalry officer -sent to his fiancée in Paris:</p> - -<p>“There are two other men lying near me, and I do -not think there is much hope for them either. One is -an officer of a Scottish regiment and the other a private -in the Uhlans. They were struck down after me, and -when I came to myself, I found them bending over me, -rendering first aid.</p> - -<p>“The Britisher was pouring water down my throat -from his flask, while the German was endeavoring to -stanch my wound with an antiseptic preparation -served out to them by their medical corps. The Highlander -had one of his legs shattered, and the German -had several pieces of shrapnel buried in his side.</p> - -<p>“In spite of their own sufferings they were trying -to help me, and when I was fully conscious again the -German gave us a morphia injection and took one -himself. His medical corps had also provided him with -the injection and the needle, together with printed -instructions for its use.</p> - -<p>“After the injection, feeling wonderfully at ease, -we spoke of the lives we had lived before the war. We -all spoke English, and we talked of the women we had -left at home. Both the German and the Britisher -had only been married a year. . . .</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page238">[238]</a></span></p> - -<p>“I wonder, and I supposed the others did, why we -had fought each other at all. I looked at the Highlander, -who was falling to sleep, exhausted, and in spite -of his drawn face and mud-stained uniform, he looked -the embodiment of freedom. Then I thought of the -Tri-color of France, and all that France had done for -liberty. Then I watched the German, who had ceased -to speak. He had taken a prayer book from his -knapsack and was trying to read a service for soldiers -wounded in battle.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef22_4">“SAME PAIR OF BLUE EYES”</h3> - -<p>Sergeant Gabriel David, of the French infantry, who -saw seven months of continuous service in the trenches -of the Argonne Forest, described the odd effect of -peeping over the top of a trench for weeks into the -same pair of German blue eyes.</p> - -<p>“I don’t know who this man was or what he might -have been,” he said, “but wherever I go I can yet see -those sad-looking eyes. He and I gazed at each other -for three weeks in one stretch; his watch seemed to -always be the same as mine. We came to respect each -other. I am sure that I would always know those blue -eyes, and I would like to meet that man when the war -has ended.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef22_5">FIGHTING WITHOUT HATE</h3> - -<p>There is yet to appear an authentic letter from a -private or officer on either side that contains a tithe of -the virulence and bitterness shown in the statements -and writings of many non-combatants.</p> - -<p>“One wonders,” runs a letter of a British officer,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page239">[239]</a></span> -“when one sees a German face to face, is this really one -of those devils who wrought such devastation—for -devastation they have surely wrought. You can -hardly believe it, for he seems much the same as other -soldiers. I can assure you that out here there is none -of that insensate hatred that one hears about.</p> - -<p>“Just to give you some idea of what I mean, the -other night four German snipers were shot on our wire. -The next night our men went out and brought one in -who was near and get-at-able and buried him. They -did it with just the same reverence and sadness as -they do to our own dear fellows. I went to look at the -grave the next morning, and one of the most uncouth-looking -men in my company had placed a cross at the -head of the grave, and had written on it:</p> - -<div class="poemcenter"> - -<div class="poem"> -<div class="stanza"> -<span class="i00">“‘Here lies a German.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">We don’t know his name.<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For he died bravely fighting<br /></span> -<span class="i0">For his Fatherland.’<br /></span> -</div> -</div> - -</div><!--poemcenter--> - -<p>“And under that, ‘got mitt uns’ (sic), that being -the highest effort of all the men at German. Not bad -for a bloodthirsty Briton, eh? Really that shows the -spirit.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page240">[240]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXIII</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">BOMBARDING UNDEFENDED CITIES</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef23_1">THE GERMAN RAID ON THE ENGLISH COAST</a> — <a href="#SecRef23_2">MRS. -KAUFFMAN’S DESCRIPTION</a> — <a href="#SecRef23_3">CANNONADING AT -WHITBY</a> — <a href="#SecRef23_4">FREAKISH EFFECT OF SHELLS</a> — <a href="#SecRef23_5">FLIGHT OF -SCHOOL CHILDREN.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef23_1">The Ninth Hague Convention of 1907, to which -both Germany and Great Britain gave their assent -upon identical conditions, expressly forbids “the bombardment -by naval forces of undefended ports, towns, -villages, dwellings or buildings,” and by inference -requires notice to be given previous to any such operations. -Neither of these stipulations was observed by -the German naval raiders who on December 16, 1914, -bombarded the historic English towns of Hartlepool, -Whitby and Scarborough. Appearing in the early -morning, the Germans rained deadly shells upon these -coast towns, none of which was of strategic importance, -and only one protected by fortifications. The immediate -result was the useless slaughter of many non-combatants—men -and women and children, and the -ruin of buildings, churches and historic monuments, -including the ancient abbey of St. Hilda at Whitby.</p> - -<p>The raid on Scarborough was described by Ruth -Kauffman, the wife of the novelist, Reginald Wright -Kauffman, in an interesting communication. The<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page241">[241]</a></span> -Kauffmans had been living for several years just outside -of Cloughton, a village near Scarborough.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef23_2">MRS. KAUFFMAN’S DESCRIPTION</h3> - -<p>“It’s a very curious thing to watch a bombardment -from your house.</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo271.png" alt="" width="600" height="329" /> -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Where the War Was Brought Home to England.</span></p> -</div> - -<p>“Everybody knew the Kaiser would do it. But -there was a little doubt about the date, and then somehow -the spy-hunting sport took up general attention. -When the Kaiser did send his card it was quite as -much of a surprise as most Christmas cards—from a -friend forgotten.</p> - -<p>“Eighteen people were killed in the morning -between eight and eight-thirty o’clock in the streets -and houses of Scarborough by German shrapnel, two -hundred were wounded and more than two hundred -houses were damaged or demolished.</p> - -<p>“From our windows we could not quite make out the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page242">[242]</a></span> -contours of the ruined castle, which is generally plainly -visible. Our attention was called to the fact that -there was “practicing” going on and we could at 8.07 -see quick flashes. That these flashes pointed directly -at Scarborough we did not for a few moments comprehend, -then the fog slowly lifting, we saw a fog that -was partly smoke. The castle grew into its place in -the six miles distance.</p> - -<p>“It seemed for a moment that the eight-foot thick -Norman walls tottered, but no, whatever tottered was -behind the keep. Curiously enough, we could barely -hear the cannonading, for the wind was keen in the -opposite direction, yet we could, as the minutes crept -by and the air cleared, see distinctly the flashes from -the boats and the flashes in the city.</p> - -<p>“After about fifteen minutes there was a cessation, -or perhaps a hesitation, that lasted two minutes; then -the flashes continued. Ten minutes more and the -boats began to move again. One cruiser disappeared -from sight, sailing south by east.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef23_3">CANNONADING AT WHITBY</h3> - -<p>“The other two rushed like fast trains north again, -close to our cliffs, and in another half hour we heard -all too plainly the cannonading which had almost -escaped our ears from Scarborough. We thought it -was Robin Hood’s Bay, as far north of us as Scarborough -is south, but afterward we learned that the boats -omitted this pretty red-roofed town and concentrated -their remaining energy on Whitby, fifteen miles north; -the wind blowing toward us brought us the vibrating -boom.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page243">[243]</a></span></p> - -<p>“We drove to Scarborough. We had not gone one -mile of the distance when we began to meet people -coming in the opposite direction. A small white-faced -boy in a milk cart that early every morning makes its -Scarborough rounds showed us a piece of shell he had -picked up, and said it had first struck a man a few -yards from him and killed the man. A woman carrying -a basket told us, with trembling lips, that men and -women were lying about the streets dead.</p> - -<p>“We did not meet a deserted city when we entered. -The streets were thronging. There was a Sunday hush -over everything, without the accompanying Sunday -clothes, but people moved about or stood at their doorways. -Many of the shop fronts were boarded up and -shop windows were empty of display. The main street, -a narrow passage-way that clambers up from the sea and -points due west, was filled with a procession that slowly -marched down one side and up the other. People -hardly spoke. They made room automatically for a -group of silent Boy Scouts, who carried an unconscious -woman past us to the hospital. There was the insistent -honk of a motor-car. As it pushed its way through, all -that struck me about the car was the set face of the -old man rising above improvised bandages about -his neck, part of the price of the Kaiser’s Christmas -card.</p> - -<p>“The damage to property did not first reach our -attention. But as we walked down the main street -and then up it with the procession we saw that shops -and houses all along had windows smashed next to -windows unhurt. At first we thought the broken -windows were from concussion; but apparently very<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page244">[244]</a></span> -few were so broken; there was not much concussion, -but the shells, splintering as they exploded, had flown -red hot in every direction, The smoke, we had seen, -had come from fires quickly extinguished.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef23_4">FREAKISH EFFECTS OF SHELLS</h3> - -<p>“We left the main business street and picked our way -toward the foreshore and the South Cliff, the more -fashionable part of the town as well as the school -section. Here there was a great deal of havoc, and -we had to climb over some of the debris. Roofs were -half torn off and balancing in mid-air; shells had shot -through chimneys and some chimneys tottered, while -several had merely round holes through the brick -work; mortar, brick and glass lay about the streets; -here a third-story room was bare to the view, the wall -lifted as for a child’s doll house and disclosing a single -bedroom with shaving materials on the bureau still -secure; there a drug-store front lay fallen into the -street, and the iron railing about it was torn and twisted -out of shape.</p> - -<p>“A man and a boy had just been carried away dead. -All around small pieces of iron rail and ripped asphalt -lay scattered. Iron bars were driven into the woodwork -of houses. There were great gaps in walls and -roofs. The attack had not spent itself on any one -section of the city, but had scattered itself in different -wards. The freaks of the shells were as inexplicable -as those of a great fire that destroys everything in a -house except a piano and a mantelpiece with its bric-a-brac, -or a flood that carries away a log cabin and leaves -a rosebush unharmed and blooming.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page245">[245]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Silent pedestrians walked along and searched the -ground for souvenirs, of which there were plenty. -Sentries guarded houses and streets where it was -dangerous to explore and park benches were used as -barriers to the public. All the cabs were requisitioned -to take away luggage and frightened inhabitants. -During the shelling hundreds of women and children, -breakfastless, their hair hanging, hatless and even -penniless, except for their mere railway fares, had rushed -to the station and taken tickets to the first safe town -they could think of. There was no panic, these hatless, -penniless women all asserted, when they arrived in -York and Leeds.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef23_5">FLIGHT OF SCHOOL CHILDREN</h3> - -<p>“A friend of mine hurried into Scarborough by -motor to rescue her sister, who was a pupil at one of -the boarding schools. But it appeared that when the -windows of the school began to crash the teachers -hurried from prayers, ordered the pupils to gather -hats and coats and sweet chocolate that happened to -be on hand as a substitute for breakfast and made them -run for a mile and a half, with shells exploding about -them, through the streets to the nearest out-of-Scarborough -railway station. My friend, after unbelievable -difficulties, finally found her sister in a private house -of a village near by, the girl in tears and pleading not -to be sent to London; she had been told that her -family’s house was probably destroyed, as it was -actually on the sea-coast.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page246">[246]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXIV</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">GERMANY’S FATAL WAR ZONE</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef24_1">THE WARNING TO NEUTRAL NATIONS</a> — <a href="#SecRef24_2">UNITED -STATES REFUSED TO RECOGNIZE WAR ZONE</a> — <a href="#SecRef24_3">A -VIOLATION OF INTERNATIONAL RIGHTS</a> — <a href="#SecRef24_4">AIMED AT -NEUTRAL SHIPPING</a> — <a href="#SecRef24_5">AN INHUMAN POLICY.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef24_1">The German imperial decree making all of the -waters surrounding the British Isles a war zone and -threatening to destroy ships and crews found therein -after February 18, 1915, whether they were English -or neutral, raised a storm of protest in the United -States. The decree read:</p> - -<p>“The waters around Great Britain and Ireland, -including the whole English Channel, are declared a -war zone from and after February 18, 1915.</p> - -<p>“Every enemy ship found in this war zone will be -destroyed, even if it is impossible to avert dangers -which threaten the crew and passengers.</p> - -<p>“Also, neutral ships in the war zone are in danger, -as in consequence of the misuse of neutral flags ordered -by the British government on January 31 and in view -of the hazards of naval warfare it cannot always be -avoided that attacks meant for enemy ships shall -endanger neutral ships.</p> - -<p>“Shipping northward, around the Shetland Islands, -in the eastern basin of the North Sea, and in a strip<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page247">[247]</a></span> -of at least thirty nautical miles in breadth along the -Dutch coast, is endangered in the same way.”</p> - -<p>As plainly as words could state it, this was a warning -that American and other neutral vessels might be -sunk by German submarines and that Germany would -repudiate responsibility for such action. The American -press denounced the declaration and its intent, and -the United States government made public a note to -Germany, containing the following paragraph:</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef24_2">UNITED STATES REFUSED TO RECOGNIZE WAR ZONE</h3> - -<p>“If the commanders of German vessels of war -should act upon the presumption that the flag of the -United States was not being used in good faith and -should destroy on the high seas an American vessel, -or the lives of American citizens, it would be difficult -for the government of the United States to view the -act in any other light than as an indefensible violation -of neutral rights which it would be very hard indeed -to reconcile with the friendly relations now happily -subsisting between the two governments.”</p> - -<p>Frederick R. Coudert, of New York, an authority -on international law, said in discussing the war zone:</p> - -<p>“From the beginning the United States government -always maintained the right to treat the open sea as -a public highway, and refused to acquiesce in one -attempt after another to establish a closed sea. It -refused to submit to an imposition of the Sound dues -by Denmark, or to recognize the Baltic as a closed -sea. It refused to pay tribute to the Barbary -powers for the privilege of navigating the Mediterranean, -and gave notice to Russia that it would<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page248">[248]</a></span> -disregard the claim to make the North Pacific a closed -sea.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef24_3">A VIOLATION OF INTERNATIONAL RIGHTS</h3> - -<p>“No one has ever pretended to assert a claim to -control the navigation of the North Sea, and Germany -has no more right to plant mines in the open sea -between Great Britain and Belgium and France than -she would have to do so in Delaware Bay, or than a -property owner, who was annoyed by automobiles, -would have to plant torpedoes in a turnpike.</p> - -<p>“The right to plant mines as a defense to a harbor, -from which all vessels might lawfully be excluded, is -one thing, but to destroy the use of the open sea as a -highway, by sowing mines which might indeed destroy -British ships, but might also destroy American ships, -is an act of hostility which, if persisted in, would -constitute a casus belli, and if we had Mr. Webster, -or Mr. Marcey, or Mr. Evarts in Washington as Secretary -of State, prompt notice would be given that for -any damage done Germany would be held responsible.”</p> - -<p>A representative quotation from the newspapers -of the United States is the following:</p> - -<p>“The imperial decree making all of the waters surrounding -the British isles a ‘war zone,’ and threatening -to destroy ships and crews found therein after February -18, whether they be English or neutral, is surely the -maddest proposal ever put forth by a civilized nation.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef24_4">AIMED AT NEUTRAL SHIPPING</h3> - -<p>“This excessively efficient method of warfare, however, -is one that most concerns England and France. -The interest of the United States lies in the fact that -the threat is aimed emphatically at neutral shipping.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo279.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="387" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Three British Cruisers Sunk by Submarines.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">The “Aboukir,” “Hogue” and “Cressy” sunk by -torpedoes on September 22. The horrors of modern warfare are -illustrated by the notice issued after this disaster by the British Admiralty, which reads in part, “No act of -humanity, whether to friend or foe, should lead to neglect of the proper precautions and dispositions of war, and no -measure can be taken to save life which prejudice the military situation.” -<span class="copyright">(<i>Copyright by the Sun News Service.</i>)</span></p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo280.jpg" alt="" width="600" height="389" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Loss of the “Irresistible” in the Dardanelles.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">On March 18 the “Irresistible” quit the line of the French -and English fleet, which was bombarding the Turkish -forts in the narrows of the Dardanelles, and sank in deep water. The whole ship was lifted up in the explosion, and -to increase the horror of the situation the Turks commenced bombarding the vessel with their big guns.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page249">[249]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Neutral nations were loath to accept the sinister -meaning of the order when it was first published; but -its intent was emphasized by Bismarck’s old organ, -the Hamburger Nachrichten:</p> - -<p>“‘Beginning on February 18 everybody must take -the consequences. The hate and envy of the whole -world concern us not at all. If neutrals do not protect -their flags against England, they do not deserve -Germany’s respect.’</p> - -<p>“The misuse of the American flag is annoying to this -country as well as exasperating to Germany, but no -government in its senses would seriously threaten to -make that an excuse for piratical operations. A -merchant ship has a right to fly any flag the skipper -has in his locker, particularly if thereby he can deceive -an enemy and evade capture. The custom is as old -as maritime warfare, and has been resorted to numberless -times by every nation.</p> - -<p>“But this issue is trifling compared to the German -effort to exclude neutral shipping from an arbitrarily -decreed ‘war zone.’ It is officially admitted that this -does not comprise a formal blockade, but it is clear -that Germany is attempting to achieve the benefits -of a blockade without its heavy responsibilities.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef24_5">AN INHUMAN POLICY</h3> - -<p>“It is understood that she has a perfect right to hold -up and search neutral ships in her declared ‘war zone,’ -and to make prizes of such as carry contraband. But -it is the possession of this very right which forbids<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page250">[250]</a></span> -the inhuman policy she proclaims. She cannot plead -ignorance of a vessel’s identity, or attack it unless it -refuses to stop when signaled. The burden of proof -is upon the submarine, and to torpedo a vessel on -suspicion merely would be unredeemed piracy and -murder.</p> - -<p>“This is distinctly a case in which the convenient -doctrine of ‘military necessity’ is not to be invoked. -Nor would an occasional misuse of a neutral flag by -belligerent vessels, as a ruse of war, justify a mistaken -act of destruction. If every British merchantman -approaching England flew the American colors, that -would not excuse the torpedoing of one American ship.</p> - -<p>“These facts are stated with convincing clearness -in the official protest sent from Washington to Berlin. -We do not know who framed this document, although -it bears distinct literary marks of revision by President -Wilson. But whoever the men actually responsible -for it, they produced a state paper which is a model -of terseness, lucidity, dignified courtesy and force, -an irrefutable presentation of the relevant principles -of international law and justice. No loyal American -wants trouble, but the blood of the most pacific citizen -must move a little faster on reading the German decree -and the restrained but perfectly straightforward reply -sent by our government.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page251">[251]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXV</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">MULTITUDINOUS TRAGEDIES AT SEA</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef25_1">TWENTY-NINE VESSELS SUNK IN ONE WEEK</a> — <a href="#SecRef25_2">EIGHTY-TWO -NON-COMBATANT VESSELS DESTROYED -IN GERMAN WAR ZONE</a> — <a href="#SecRef25_2">THE ATTACK ON THE -GULFLIGHT.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef25_1">The fact that the Lusitania was the twenty-ninth -vessel to be sunk or damaged in one week in May in the -war zone established by Germany around the British -Isles throws into grim relief the ruthlessness of modern -war. The naval battles of the past were engagements -of dignity in which, when a vessel was lost, it went down -with a certain tragic magnificence after a fair fight; -but most of the vessels lost in the European war have -been the victims of torpedoes, struck by stealthy blows -in the dark. In less than three months, from February -18 to May 7, 1915, no less than eighty-two merchant -vessels belonging either to the Allies or to neutral -nations were torpedoed or mined in the war zone, with -a loss of life estimated at 1,704 non-combatants—a -terrible sacrifice to modern warfare.</p> - -<p id="SecRef25_2">Naturally the greater number of these merchant ships -were British, but the fact that the war zone was proclaimed -by Germany with a view to stopping neutral -shipping as well is established by the figures which show -that among the eighty-two non-combatant vessels<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page252">[252]</a></span> -destroyed there were French, Russian, Norwegian, -Swedish, Dutch, Danish, Greek and three American -vessels, the latter being the Evelyn, sunk by a mine -explosion February 20; the Carib, sunk by a mine -explosion February 22, and the Gulflight, torpedoed -May 1.</p> - -<p>In addition to these eighty-two cases of non-combatant -vessels destroyed, there have been innumerable -instances of unsuccessful attacks, of which a notable -example was the double attempt to sink the American -tank steamship Cushing, once by a Zeppelin which -aimed three bombs at the vessel, and once by a submarine -which placed a contact mine directly in the path -of the ship; her bow narrowly missed the mine, and -her stern struck it a glancing blow, but not with sufficient -force to explode it.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef25_3">THE ATTACK ON THE GULFLIGHT</h3> - -<p>It would require many hundreds of pages to recount -the details of all of these crimes against non-combatant -merchant ships, and to show the relentless severity with -which neutral commerce has been attacked, but the -organized military measures even against neutral ships -are well illustrated by the case of the American ship -Gulflight, as described by the second officer, Paul -Bower:</p> - -<p>“When the Gulflight left Port Arthur, Texas, on -April 10, bound for Rouen, France,” said Bower, “we -were followed by a warship of some description, which -kept out of sight, but in touch by wireless and warned -us not to disclose our position to any one.</p> - -<p>“At noon Saturday, May 1, we were twenty-five<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page253">[253]</a></span> -miles west of the Scilly Islands, a small group about -thirty miles southwest of England. The weather was -hazy, but not thick. About two and one-half miles -ahead I saw a submarine.</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> - -<img src="images/illo285.png" alt="" width="550" height="496" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Where Lusitania Was Torpedoed.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondcenter">Kinsale, on South Coast of Ireland, close to Cork Harbor.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p>“Twenty-five minutes later we were struck by a -torpedo on the starboard side, and there was a tremendous -shock. The submarine had not reappeared on -the surface before discharging the torpedo.</p> - -<p>“Previous to this, we had been met by two patrol -boats, which accompanied us on either side. The boat<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page254">[254]</a></span> -on our starboard side was so badly shaken by the -explosion that her crew imagined that she also had been -torpedoed. We immediately lowered the boats and -left our ship and were quickly taken on board the patrol -boats. But the fog increased and we drifted about all -night and did not land at Scilly until 10.30 o’clock -Sunday morning.</p> - -<p>“At midnight of Saturday, while still on board the -patrol boat, Captain Gunter summoned me. I found -him in bed and he said he wanted some one to roll a -cigarette for him. He then tossed up his arms and -fainted. From then until the time of his death, which -occurred about 3.30 o’clock Sunday morning, he -remained unconscious.</p> - -<p>“Captain Gunter’s speech was thick and indistinct, -but we could distinguish that he wished some one to -take care of his wife. The crew had always regarded -Captain Gunter as a healthy man and had never -heard him complain.”</p> - -<p>Second Assistant Engineer Crist, of the Gulflight, -said:</p> - -<p>“I was on watch in the engine room when we were -torpedoed, and so terrible was the blow that the Gulflight -seemed to be tumbling to pieces. She appeared -to be lifted high in the air and then to descend rapidly. -I told the boys to beat it as quickly as possible and -shut the engines down.</p> - -<p>“Reaching the deck, I found them launching both -life-boats. We got safely into them, with the exception -of wireless operator Short and a Spanish seaman, -who had dived overboard when they felt the shock, and -were drowned.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page255">[255]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXVI</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">HOW “NEUTRAL” WATERS ARE VIOLATED</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef26_1">THE THREE-MILE LIMIT</a> — <a href="#SecRef26_2">BELLIGERENTS’ -RIGHTS</a> — <a href="#SecRef26_3">NOTICE -IN LEAVING NEUTRAL WATERS</a> — <a href="#SecRef26_4">EVASIONS -OF NEUTRALITY.</a></p> - -<p>“A neutral has a perilous part to sustain.” So -says Louis XI to his treacherous minister, Cardinal -Balue, in Scott’s famous novel. The dictum is true -enough even when a strong state is in question. For -Great Britain the question of neutrality is of great -importance in so far as it affects her on the sea. Historically, -of course, neutrality is rather a modern -development. Small and weak states in the earlier -ages of the world had little hope of keeping themselves -free from the havoc of a great world conflict. Great -naval powers, such as the Hanseatic League, Genoa, -and Venice, did, during the Middle Ages, succeed at -times in inspiring respect for their neutrality, but it -was at best precarious, and strong states rarely paid -much respect to neutral waters. Early in the reign -of Charles I the Dutch destroyed a Spanish fleet in -the very Downs; and though Charles was master of a -strong naval power he made no attempt to resent the -insult. In this case, of course, there were special -reasons for England’s apathy, but the incident is significant. -Roughly speaking, it may be laid down as<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page256">[256]</a></span> -an axiom that in all the ages of history the neutrality -of a state, on sea as on land, has been respected -only in so far as it has possessed the power to make -it so.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef26_1">THE THREE-MILE LIMIT</h3> - -<p>During the Napoleonic wars, Great Britain was in -constant trouble with the United States owing to the -fashion in which British naval commanders exercised, -and sometimes abused, the right of searching American -ships for contraband of war. The British-American -quarrels had the good effect that attempts were made to -standardize and establish on a firm basis the laws of -neutrality at sea. The naval portion of the Neutrality -Conference of 1907 contains twenty-eight clauses, of -which the first provides that belligerents must respect -neutral waters. Where the coast borders the open sea -the neutral zone extends to three miles from the shore. -As this is well within the range of even small naval -guns it is clear that an opportunity is afforded to an -unscrupulous captain of sinking vessels which have -crossed the neutral line. In the case of a power controlling -the entrance to inland seas the provision becomes -of enormous importance.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef26_2">BELLIGERENTS’ RIGHTS</h3> - -<p>Within neutral waters belligerents may not take -prizes, hold prize courts, nor establish warlike bases, -nor may they obtain supplies therein. At the same -time neutrality is not held to be compromised by the -simple passage through neutral waters of belligerent -ships and prizes. Belligerent vessels may also obtain<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page257">[257]</a></span> -the help of pilots. The neutral state must use all its -endeavor to be impartial and must expel or warn off -vessels guilty of breaches of neutrality.</p> - -<p>Except in special cases a belligerent warship may -make a stay of only twenty-four hours in neutral -waters. The special cases would usually be those of -vessels disabled or otherwise in distress or storm-bound. -When damaged a warship may remain long enough in a -neutral port to effect necessary repairs, but it must -not take on board extra armament, ammunition, or -reinforcements of men. If out of coal it must only -take on board sufficient to carry it to its nearest home -port. Nor is it supposed to fill up with food stores -beyond its ordinary supply in time of peace. In -all these cases the neutral authorities are the judges. -It must be obvious that a weak neutral state will be -in a terrible quandary if the vessel be a powerful -one and the country to which it belongs a powerful one.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef26_3">NOTICE IN LEAVING NEUTRAL WATERS</h3> - -<p>The belligerent ship must give twenty-four hours’ -notice before leaving, and must not visit the same port -again until three months have elapsed. Should it -break the neutrality laws the neutral state authorities -may incapacitate it for immediate service and detain it, -leaving on board just as many of the crew as are necessary -to keep it clean and in order. The steps taken -would generally be to remove the vitally necessary -engine and gun fittings. Should two hostile ships -enter a neutral port they must, while there, observe -its neutrality, and must leave at an interval of twenty-four -hours.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page258">[258]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef26_4">EVASIONS OF NEUTRALITY</h3> - -<p>It must be obvious from all this that the inviolability -of neutrality will always depend very much upon the -ability of the state concerned to keep it so.</p> - -<p>It is not difficult, either, to imagine various methods -by which the neutrality, which is supposed to govern -within the three-mile limit, may be evaded. It is only -necessary to cite the case of a war vessel unable to overtake -a fast merchant-man until the latter reaches -neutral waters, but successful in sinking it by long-range -gun-fire from a point outside the three-mile -limit.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page259">[259]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXVII</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">THE TERRIBLE DISTRESS OF POLAND</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef27_1">A LONG-TORTURED NATION AGAIN BLIGHTED BY -WAR</a> — <a href="#SecRef27_2">DESOLATION AND FAMINE THROUGHOUT -LAND</a> — <a href="#SecRef27_3">RICH AND POOR ALIKE DESTITUTE</a> — <a href="#SecRef27_4">PLIGHT -OF RUSSIAN POLAND</a> — <a href="#SecRef27_5">NO BREAD FOR WEEKS IN -LODZ</a> — <a href="#SecRef27_6">THREE TIMES A BATTLE-FIELD</a> — <a href="#SecRef27_7">UNABLE TO -HELP HERSELF</a> — <a href="#SecRef27_8">NO SEED AND NO DRAFT ANIMALS.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef27_1">“If you imagined all the people of New York State -deprived of everything they owned, left a prey to -starvation and disease, and hopelessly crushed under -the iron heels of contending armies, you might form a -slight idea of what the Poles are enduring at present,” -declared the great pianist, Paderewski, while visiting -America in 1915 in the interests of the afflicted nation. -“One of the worst phases of the situation lies in the -inability of the inhabitants of one-half of the country -to communicate with those in the other. Compared -with their lot, even that of the Belgians loses some of -its horror, for my unhappy countrymen have no France, -Holland, or England in which they can seek refuge.”</p> - -<p>Girt by a ring of war, Poland in the winter and spring -of 1915 was in the most terrible straits. Her cities -and villages had been captured and recaptured by -both Germans and Russians, her fields had been laid -waste, and her inhabitants were slowly dying of -starvation.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page260">[260]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef27_2">DESOLATION AND FAMINE THROUGHOUT LAND</h3> - -<p>“If figures can give any idea of the immensity of -this disaster,” pleaded the great musician, “then these -may convey a slight impression of what has gone on -in Poland: An area equal in size to the states of -Pennsylvania and New York has been laid waste. -The mere money losses, due to the destruction of -property and the means of agriculture and industry, -are $2,500,000,000. A whole nation of 18,000,000 -people, including 2,000,000 Jews, are carrying the -burden of the war in the east on their backs, and their -backs are breaking under the load. The great majority -of the whole Polish people, about 11,000,000 men, -women and children, peasants and workmen, have -been driven into the open, their homes taken from -them or burned, and they flee, terror-stricken, hungry -and in confusion, whither they know not. In ruins, -in woods or in hollows they are hiding, feeding on roots -and the bark of trees. It is Christian humanity that -calls for help for succumbing Poland.”</p> - -<p>“From the banks of the Niemen to the summits of -the Carpathians,” wrote the novelist, Henryk Sienkiewicz, -in his plea to the American people, “fire has -destroyed the towns and villages, and over the whole -of this huge, desolated country the specter of famine -has spread its wings; all labor and industry have been -swept away; the ploughshare is rusted; the peasant -has neither grain nor cattle; the artisan is idle; all -works and factories have been destroyed; the tradesman -cannot sell his wares; the hearth fire is extinguished, -and disease and misery prevail. To such starving -people, crying out for aid, listen, Christian nations.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page261">[261]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef27_3">RICH AND POOR ALIKE DESTITUTE</h3> - -<p>The Polish Relief Committee, headed by Madame -Sembrich, published this word from the great tenor, -Jean de Reszké, whose home is in Paris:</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo293.jpg" alt="" width="400" height="355" /> -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">The Harvest-moon in Europe.</span></p> -</div> - -<p>“My poor brother was unable to get away from the -war zone in time. He wrote this letter several weeks -ago, and now I fear he may never survive the terrible -hardships. He -had plenty of -money and a -splendid estate, -but all were swept -away.”</p> - -<p>The letter referred -to shows -that there is no -leveler like war. -It runs:</p> - -<p>“My dear brother, -whether this -will ever get -through the lines -and reach you I do not know. I am sure no man -could get through alive, with all this fighting and -the continual bombardment going on on every hand.</p> - -<p>“The war broke with such suddenness that it was -impossible to escape. I was forced to remain here on -my estate in Garnesk. This part of Poland has been -reduced to worse than a desert. All is desolate and -every one is suffering. My beautiful estate has met -the common fate and been reduced to ashes. I am -now living in a cellar with scanty covering. If a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page262">[262]</a></span> -shell should drop in it would afford no protection. So -fierce has been the fighting here that there have been -days when I could not venture forth. We have been -between two fires. All Poland needs relief.</p> - -<p>“I have no coal, oil, coffee, and only a handful of -grain left. Through the cold and the rain I have had -but poor shelter, but my lot is the same as that of my -fellow countrymen here. Every one is in want; every -one is suffering. Many are dead, and many more will -die unless aid reaches them soon. Prince Lukouirski -and his wife recently reached here and are sharing my -cellar with me. Their own beautiful estate has been -destroyed, and even the cellar blown to atoms by the -shells.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef27_4">PLIGHT OF RUSSIAN POLAND</h3> - -<p>Mr. Herbert Corey, writing from Berlin to the New -York Globe, in the spring of 1915, declared that unless -something was done the world would be horrified—if -the world had not lost its capacity for horror—by the -sufferings of the Poles. “Soon cholera will come to -Poland. Famine is there now. Scarlet fever and -typhoid and smallpox and enteric and typhus are old -settlers.” The million now in utter want only live -at all because “humanity has a wonderful capacity -for adjustment to wretchedness.</p> - -<p>“There are 6,000,000 Poles in the portion of Russian -Poland that is being fought over. Of these, according -to the Red Cross men, 1,000,000 are absolutely destitute. -They are without food or the means to buy -food. They are living on the charity of others who -are but slightly better off. That charity must come<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page263">[263]</a></span> -to an end soon—because food is coming to an end. It -is not merely that money is lacking. Flour is lacking. -It must be imported or starvation follows.</p> - -<p>“Russian Poland is a conspicuous example of Russian -rule. No measure of self-government is permitted the -people. All governing officials are appointed from -Petrograd. Lodz, for example, a city which contains -from 500,000 to 750,000 people—all statistics in Poland -are mere guesses—is ruled by a mayor and four assistants, -all sent out from Russia. No city may expend -more than $150, American money, for its own purposes, -except permission is secured from Petrograd. That -permission is rarely given. Petrograd needs the taxes -that Lodz pays. When permission is given it is long -delayed. Therefore, Lodz, a town as large as St. Louis, -has unpaved streets that are ankle-deep in mud in -winter and ankle-deep in dust in summer. It has a -privately owned and paid fire department that responds -only to calls from its own clients. Ninety per cent of its -residents live in sties on streets that are mere stenches.</p> - -<p>“And yet Lodz is the second cotton-manufacturing -town in Europe. It is excelled only by Manchester -in its manufacturing totals. Isolated on the bleak -plains of Poland, at a distance from a seaport, served -by two railroads only, it is an anomaly in the commercial -world.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef27_5">NO BREAD FOR WEEKS IN LODZ</h3> - -<p>“For two weeks Lodz had no bread at all. For -months it has had no meat at all—so far as the poorer -classes are concerned. During those two weeks the -mass of the population lived on potatoes.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page264">[264]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Conditions were slightly worse in Czenstochow, the -second city in Russian Poland. Here 90,000 people -live. It has no street-lights. It has no attempt -at street-paving. It has no sewers. It has no city -water. It has no publicly maintained fire department, -though a few of the merchants have a department of -their own. It is pre-middle-ages in everything—morals, -discomfort, filth, darkness, disease, death-rate. -Cholera is there all the time. Most of its people exist -in reeking hovels, smoke-filled when they can afford -fires, wet and cold at other times.</p> - -<p>“As the towns grow smaller, conditions grow worse.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef27_6">THREE TIMES A BATTLE-FIELD</h3> - -<p>If the war had not come, these people would have -prospered after a fashion. Potatoes were plentiful, -and they had few other wants. A woman earned -thirty cents a day in the mills and a man three cents -more. Children worked as soon as they were old -enough. Sixty-five per cent are wholly illiterate. -Then—</p> - -<p>“Russia struck at Germany. The German armies -invaded Poland in retaliation. They swept almost to -Warsaw—and an invading army sweeps fairly clean. -There were some things left when they passed over. -They were driven back, and the Russian armies covered -this territory—and they gleaned what was left. Then -the Russians were driven back—sacking as they went—and -the Germans covered the ground once more. Three -times unhappy Poland has been fought over. It had -little at the beginning. It has nothing now. For -months Poland has been starving, not merely going<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page265">[265]</a></span> -hungry. That is a commonplace of war. Poles have -been dying because they cannot get food.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef27_7">UNABLE TO HELP HERSELF</h3> - -<p>“Poland is quite unable to help herself. Most of -the mills—probably all of the mills—are owned by -Russian and German and French capitalists. The -banks are all branches of foreign institutions. These -concerns are all conducted by resident managers. -Some of the managers have—on their own responsibility—given -their work people two and a half and three -cents a day each for food. Some have added a trifle -for the children also. But this has practically come to -an end. The managers have exhausted their supply -of cash. They cannot get more. There are no mails. -The towns of Poland are each printing their own paper -money—not by consent of the Russian bureaucrats, but -in defiance of them—but this money circulates only -within the town’s borders. It is highly improbable -it will ever be redeemed in real money. Meanwhile -the price of food commodities has risen fifty per cent -in two months. By the time this reaches America -the prices may have doubled.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef27_8">NO SEED AND NO DRAFT ANIMALS</h3> - -<p>“Conditions are slightly better in the agricultural -sections. The farmers have no seed and no draft -animals, it is true. But they have fairly good supplies -of potatoes. Last year’s potato-crop was an enormous -one.</p> - -<p>“There is a Jewish question in every city of Poland. -Where there is a Jewish question in Russia there are<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page266">[266]</a></span> -riots. There will be more rioting in Poland unless -Providence intervenes. Russia has always confined -her Jews to the pale. Being forced to make their -living by trading, their naturally sharp wits have been -whetted. Today they are—broadly speaking—owners -of every shop in Poland. There may be Christian -shopkeepers here and there. People who know Poland -doubt it.</p> - -<p>“Beggars follow the stranger in the Polish cities. -Some of them are mute. They only look at the stranger -through hollow eyes and hold out skinny hands. Others -are vociferous. They cling to the garments of the -passer-by. They cry for aid in an uncouth dialect. -They run out from darkened doorways. The man who -gives is pursued by a cue of them.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page267">[267]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXVIII</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">THE GHASTLY HAVOC WROUGHT BY -THE AIR-DEMONS</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef28_1">THE HORROR OF BOMB-DROPPING—ANTI-AIRCRAFT -GUNS</a> — <a href="#SecRef28_2">KINDS OF BOMBS</a> — <a href="#SecRef28_3">STEEL -DARTS</a> — <a href="#SecRef28_4">“ARROW -BULLETS” AND AERIAL TORPEDOES</a> — <a href="#SecRef28_5">MACHINE GUNS -IN AIRCRAFT</a> — <a href="#SecRef28_6">ACCURACY IN DROPPING BOMBS.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef28_1">Ten years ago the dropping of bombs from balloons -was still considered an illegitimate form of warfare, -involving danger to non-combatants, and was -under the ban of the Geneva Convention. At the -Hague Peace Conference the Germans refused to -abstain from bomb-dropping, and other nations followed -suit. According to the German conception -of war, civilians in the theater of operations must -take their chance of being killed, but must not shoot -back under pain of summary execution. The horrors -which this theory has added to war have proved only -too real, but, so far as bomb-dropping is concerned, -the reality has so far fallen short of anticipations. -The great Zeppelins, capable of carrying a ton of -explosives, have practically been frightened out of -the air by the new anti-aircraft guns; and, except -for one instance at Antwerp, bomb-dropping has been -confined to aeroplanes. Now, in the first place, an -aeroplane can carry only a limited weight of bombs—say, two hundred pounds; and in the second place, it -is extraordinarily difficult to hit anything with them. -If the airman could hover over his target and take -deliberate aim, he might be more dangerous; as it -is, the German airman finds a cathedral hardly a big -enough mark. The British airmen, at Düsseldorf -and Lake Constance, adopted a different plan from -the Germans; instead of dropping bombs from a -great height, they made a steep “vol piqué” down -on to the target, turned sharply up again, and dropped -the bomb at the moment when the plane was checked -by the elevator. This plan is more dangerous, but -affords a better chance of hitting.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page268">[268]</a></span></p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo300a.png" alt="" width="287" height="450" id="Fig1" /> - -<img src="images/illo300b.png" alt="" width="370" height="450" id="Fig2" /> - -<img src="images/illo300c.png" alt="" width="354" height="450" id="Fig3" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Types of Air-Craft Weapons.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust"><a href="#Fig1">Fig. 1</a>.—An aeroplane bomb containing 12 -lbs. of tetranitranilin, with a screw stem up which the vanes travel in -flight and thus “arm” the fuse. <a href="#Fig2">Fig. 2</a>.—Steel dart -and boxes of darts used by Taube aeroplanes over Paris, showing -how they are inverted and released. <a href="#Fig3">Fig. 3</a>.—A French “arrow -bullet”; very light, but able to kill a man from a -height of 1,800 feet. <a href="#Fig3">Fig. 4</a>.—A French aerial torpedo -used by aeroplanes against Zeppelins, exploding when it has -pierced an air-ship’s envelope and is suddenly arrested by the wooden cross.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page269">[269]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef28_2">KINDS OF BOMBS</h3> - -<p>Various kinds of bombs are used for dropping from -aeroplanes. A simple pattern shown in <a href="#Fig1">Fig. 1</a> -consists of a thin spherical shell of steel, containing -twelve pounds of tetranitranilin, which is an explosive -more powerful than melinite. The stem of the bomb, -by which it is handled, has an external screw-thread, -and carries a pair of vanes. While in the position -shown, the bomb is harmless, but as it drops, the vanes -screw themselves up to the top of the stem till they -press against the stop. This, by means of a rod -passing down the center of the stem, “arms” or -prepares the fuse seen at the bottom of the bomb, -so that it acts at the slightest touch, even on the -wing of another aeroplane. The fuse effects the -explosion of the burster by means of a primer of azide -of lead, which causes the tetranitranilin to detonate -with great violence. The whole bomb weighs twenty-two<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page270">[270]</a></span> -pounds, and an aeroplane usually carries six -of them.</p> - -<p>The Italians, in their campaign in Tripoli, used -similar bombs, but without the special device for -rendering the fuse sensitive. These were not a success, -as many of them failed to explode in the desert -sand, and the Arabs used to collect them and throw -them into the Italian trenches at night.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef28_3">STEEL DARTS</h3> - -<p>The Taube aeroplanes, when they flew over Paris, -used sometimes to drop steel darts pointed at one -end and flattened and feathered at the other, as shown -in <a href="#Fig2">Fig. 2</a>. These were put up in boxes of a hundred, -so that when the box was released from its hook, it -turned over and released the darts.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef28_4">“ARROW BULLETS” AND AERIAL TORPEDOES</h3> - -<p>The “arrow bullet” shown in <a href="#Fig3">Fig. 3</a> is a French -device; though weighing only three-quarters of an -ounce, its peculiar shape enables it to acquire a high -velocity, so that it will kill a man when dropped from -a height of six hundred yards. An aerial torpedo -carried by French aeroplanes for the destruction of -Zeppelins is shown in <a href="#Fig3">Fig. 4</a>; it contains a powerful -charge of explosive and a fuse, to which the suspending-wire -is connected. When dropped on a Zeppelin, -the needle-pointed torpedo pierces the envelope and -gas-chamber, but the wooden cross is arrested and -the sudden jerk on the suspending-wire sets the fuse -in action, causing the certain destruction of the airship. -The torpedo would be too dangerous to handle,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page271">[271]</a></span> -but the French have an ingenious device which renders -it perfectly safe until it is dropped.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef28_5">MACHINE GUNS IN AIRCRAFT</h3> - -<p>Various attempts have been made to mount machine -guns on aeroplanes, but the operator, in his -narrow seat, has hardly space to point a machine -gun in any direction except straight to his front. -The American Curtis machine gun exhibited at Olympia -is the most efficient form yet produced, but at -present the airman seems to prefer an automatic -rifle. Even in the early days of the war, Sir John -French was able to report that British airmen had -disposed of no less than five of the enemy’s aircraft -with this weapon.</p> - -<p>The Zeppelins are well armed with machine guns, -carrying one in each of the two cars, and one on top -of the structure. Access is had to the latter by means -of a shaft and ladder which passes up through the -gas-chambers.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef28_6">ACCURACY IN DROPPING BOMBS</h3> - -<p>The Zeppelins have elaborate bomb-dropping apparatus -with which it should be theoretically possible -to drop a bomb with great accuracy, but on the occasion -when it was tried at Antwerp, the Germans met -with no great success. The principle of the bomb-dropping -device is as follows: A sort of camera, -pointed vertically downwards, is used, and an observer -notes the speed with which an object on the -ground passes across the field, and the direction in -which it appears to move. He then reads the height<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page272">[272]</a></span> -of the airship from the barometer, which gives the -time taken by the bomb to fall, say fifteen seconds for -3,500 feet. He has now to calculate, from the data -given by the camera-observation, the allowance to -be made for speed and leeway for fifteen seconds of -fall, and to point his sighting-tube accordingly. The -air-ship is steered to windward of the target, and at -the moment when the target (say, the second funnel -of a dreadnaught) appears on the cross wires, the -nine hundred-pound bomb is dropped, and the ship -goes to the bottom.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo304.png" alt="" width="600" height="461" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Scene of Air Raid on England.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">Leigh, shown on the map, is only twenty-five miles from the British -capital, and South End just five miles further on. The fleet of Zeppelins, -or aeroplanes, or both, it will be seen, got uncomfortably close to the British -metropolis.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page273">[273]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXIX</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">THE DEADLY SUBMARINE AND ITS -STEALTHY DESTRUCTION</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef29_1">NEW COMPLICATIONS IN NAVAL ATTACK</a> — <a href="#SecRef29_2">ATTACK -ON LINER DESCRIBED</a> — <a href="#SecRef29_3">OPERATION OF TORPEDOES</a> — <a href="#SecRef29_4">NETS -TO TRAP SUBMARINES</a> — <a href="#SecRef29_5">HOW CRAFT SUBMERGE.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef29_1">What is the value of the submarine in war? Is it -so great that all our theories of naval attack and -defense will have to be revised? Are the great battles -of the future to be fought under water? Is a little -vessel of a few hundred tons to make the dreadnaught -useless? German naval tactics in the present war -have made these questions interesting alike to the -expert, who has his answers to them, and to the layman, -who is profoundly ignorant on the whole subject.</p> - -<p>Simon Lake, an inventor who has done much to -bring the submarine to its present degree of efficiency, -says that “it is the first weapon which has a potential -power to destroy an invading force, and also to prevent -an invading force from leaving its own harbors or -roadsteads, but which is itself useless for invading -purposes.” This is at once an exaltation and a limitation -of its effectiveness. Yet Captain Lake believes -that it will be “the most potent influence that has -been conceived to bring about a permanent peace -between maritime nations.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page274">[274]</a></span></p> - -<p>Heavy armament would have availed the Lusitania -nothing, even if the vessel had been so equipped, -declared Captain Lake. Even if the Cunarder had -been bristling with guns from bow to stern, she could -have done no damage to the under-water craft that -attacked her. She was doomed when the submarine -approached her.</p> - -<p>The submarine with its periscope three feet under -water could not have been seen fifty feet distant from -the liner’s side, and the chances were she was 1,000 -yards distant. No shot from the vessel could have -located her, though aimed by trained officers.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef29_2">ATTACK ON LINER DESCRIBED</h3> - -<p>The scenes on both the vessel and the little submarine -may be pictured from a theoretical description -given by Captain Lake as follows: “The great ship, -knowing the lurking danger, is traveling at her best -speed limit, changing the course from time to time -in a zigzag manner. Waiting beneath the surface -of the calm sea a big submarine, now said to be capable -of discharging a torpedo at a distance of five miles, -rolls idly in the underground swell. Her crew is -sleeping or talking in the semi-fetid atmosphere that -the compressed air tanks relieve from time to time. -An officer sits with his eye glued to a periscope, which -constantly revolves that he may discern the rising -smoke of an approaching vessel.</p> - -<p>“On the deck of the Lusitania passengers are lolling -in steamer chairs or leaning over the rails. They -covertly fear attack, yet the horizon shows no sign -of the impending calamity.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page275">[275]</a></span></p> - -<p>“Suddenly the submarine commander focuses his -periscope upon a faint and hazy line on the horizon. -Closely he watches it move. An electric signal is -given and the submarine crew is in place. Another -and the boat swings silently and slowly on its course -diagonal to that of the approaching vessel. The -electric engines turn without noise.</p> - -<p>“The vessels near each other. An order is transmitted -from the conning tower to the forward compartment -of the submarine. The outside ports of -two bow torpedo tubes are closed; compressed air -drives out all water. Two inside ports are carefully -opened and two one-ton torpedoes are lifted by means -of chain tackle and swung carefully into the tubes. -The inside ports are closed and the outside ports again -opened. The air chamber between the torpedo and -the breaches is filled with air compressed to nearly -1,200 pounds to the square inch—nearly the force -of exploding dynamite.</p> - -<p>“Both vessels are closing together at right angles. -On the bigger one all is gayety and hope of early and -safe arrival at port. On the submarine all are alert. -The bow is carefully trained toward a direct line over -which the ship must travel. The speed and distance -are carefully gauged by trained officers.</p> - -<p>“The submarine sinks beneath the surface and men -are stationed at the firing levers on each of the forward -tubes. An officer stands with a watch in his -hand, counting the seconds. A little bell tinkles -over the lever man on the port or starboard side of -the submarine. He pulls the lever which releases -the trigger, and with a rush the enormous torpedo<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page276">[276]</a></span> -forces itself in a direct line toward the vessel. Another -second elapses and the bell rings again. Similar -action is observed on the submarine, which a moment -later rises with its periscope above the slight ripple -of the water.</p> - -<p>“There is a deadening crash, as the shock is transmitted -through the water and the resounding shell -of the air-filled submarine. The officer at the submarine -periscope, or conning tower, is the only living -person on the submarine that sees a great vessel rise -out of the water and slowly settle back. He knows -that the shots have taken effect and he can offer no -aid to the thousands who a moment later will be -attempting to save their lives. He turns his bow -homeward, or cruises for other victims of his mechanical -ingenuity, as his sealed sailing orders may direct.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef29_3">OPERATION OF TORPEDOES</h3> - -<p>“The course of the torpedo from the time it is -released in the tube by the lever trip is interesting,” -said Captain Lake. “These torpedoes are made at -a cost of $5,000 each, much of which is spent in testing. -With their high charge of explosive placed well -forward and a little plunger on the nose, connecting -with a percussion cap, their interior presents the same -view as that of a large steamship. The officer is a -little gyroscope, impelled by compressed air. This in -turn may be set from the outside to travel straight -forward or on a curve, and by a timing device to change -its course after a certain distance. Usually it is set -to travel straight beneath the water at a depth of -about fifteen feet.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page277">[277]</a></span></p> - -<p>“To insure accuracy the torpedo without explosive -charge must be fired many times from a fixed torpedo -tube. It is finally inspected and passed. As it leaves -the torpedo tube on its last journey the trip releases -the compressed air which turns its turbine engine. -That in turn revolves the propeller. The rudder, -speed and depth of passage are actuated by the gyroscope.</p> - -<p>“A torpedo has been fired accurately at a distance -of five miles. The distance for accuracy is between -fifty yards and one thousand. Owing to the concussion -on the ear-drums of those in a submarine the greatest -distance compatible with accuracy is sought. As the -plunger on the torpedo strikes the vessel it explodes -the charge almost directly against the side of the -vessel.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef29_4">NETS TO TRAP SUBMARINES</h3> - -<p>The British naval authorities took measures to -guard British shipping in the English Channel by -stretching nets over as much of the water, particularly -in the narrows, as possible. The nets are made of -links of steel. These links are about six or eight -inches in diameter and made of one-half inch steel. -The nets are similar to those formerly used to guard -battleships and large cruisers, but which have now -been discarded because a torpedo will puncture the -net and the second torpedo, which is fired only a -second or two after the first, will go through the hole -made by the first and reach the hull of the vessel.</p> - -<p>These chain nets are moored very securely and have -buoys at the upper edges to hold them in position.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page278">[278]</a></span> -Often they are set just as a fisherman sets his nets. -When the submarine, like a fish, gets in the pound it -cannot get out, and those in the vessel must either die -there or take chances on reaching the surface and -swimming to shore.</p> - -<p>It takes very little to disable a submarine. The -hull is of comparatively thin steel which is easily -punctured and the propeller when caught is absolutely -useless. Even an ordinary fisherman’s net will disable -a submarine, and should one get foul of such a net -the chances of getting clear are very slim.</p> - -<p>According to the German naval press, the latest -submarines are fitted with double acting Diesel oil -engines of 1,000 horse power or more. These engines -are as simple and run as smoothly as marine steam -engines and are as easily controlled. So strongly built -are these craft that they can plunge to a depth of 150 -feet, at which the water pressure is enormous.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef29_5">HOW CRAFT SUBMERGE</h3> - -<p>A security weight, as it is called, of about five tons -is carried. This can be released from the inside of the -vessel at a moment’s notice, and the effect is like that -of dropping a mass of ballast from an airship. When -in diving trim, that is to say, when the boat is awash, -an up-to-date submarine can disappear under water in -fifteen seconds and re-emerge in twenty seconds. It -can remain under water for a whole day and night, -or even longer.</p> - -<p>A submarine when submerged is handled mechanically. -Those in charge cannot see where the vessel -is going. The officer in charge steers according to<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page279">[279]</a></span> -the ranges he has taken when on the surface, and it -is absolutely impossible to see obstructions that may -be ahead. It is impossible to see another submarine -unless the two are floating near the surface and in -bright daylight. For this reason it is impossible for -one submarine to fight another when submerged.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page280">[280]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXX</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">THE TERRIBLE WORK OF ARTILLERY IN -WAR</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef30_1">SEVENTY PER CENT OF CASUALTIES DUE TO -ARTILLERY FIRE</a> — <a href="#SecRef30_2">INCREASED RANGE</a> — <a href="#SecRef30_3">MODERN -GUNS</a> — <a href="#SecRef30_4">RAPID FIRING</a> — <a href="#SecRef30_5">HOW -A BIG GUN IS AIMED</a> — <a href="#SecRef30_6">AWFUL DESTRUCTIVENESS -OF MODERN GUNS.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef30_1">A full century ago, Napoleon the Great, himself an -artillery officer, had developed the fighting power of -artillery of his day so as to make its fire a dominant -factor on the battle-field. In the present war its action -is even more important, since we learn from the front -that seventy per cent of the casualties are due to -artillery fire. It was the gun that took Liège and -Antwerp, and it is the gun which held the contending -armies pent up within a semicircle of fire. -Once massed formations were abandoned, the gun -lost its terrors to a great extent, and did not regain -its place in military estimation till the introduction -of the shrapnel shell.</p> - -<p>This is a hollow steel projectile, packed with bullets, -and containing a charge of powder in the base. (See <a href="#Fig5">Fig. -1</a>.) It is exploded by a time-fuse, containing a ring -of slowly burning composition which can be set so as -to fire the powder during the flight of the shell, when -it has traveled to within fifty yards of the enemy. -The head is blown off, and the bullets are projected<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page281">[281]</a></span> -forward in a sheaf, spreading outwards as they go. -The British eighteen-pounder shell covers a space of -ground some three hundred yards long by thirty-five -yards wide with its 365 heavy bullets.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600" id="Fig5"> - -<img src="images/illo313.png" alt="" width="600" height="399" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Types of Shells</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">Fig. 1.—Shrapnel shell, packed with bullets that spread. Fig. 2.—A French -quick-firer shell, like an enlarged rifle cartridge. Fig. 3.—The “Universal” -shell, combining the action of shrapnel and high explosives. Fig. 4.—A fuse-setting -machine.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<h3 id="SecRef30_2">INCREASED RANGE</h3> - -<p>In 1885 the British brought out the twelve-pounder -high-velocity field-gun, which remained for some years -the best gun in Europe. Its power was afterwards -increased by giving it a fifteen-pounder shell, and, as -a fifteen-pounder, it did good work in South Africa. -Then came another development, the quick-firing gun<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page282">[282]</a></span> -now being used in the war, with a steel shield to protect -the detachment. The quick-firing gun is badly named; -its high rate of fire is only incidental, and is rarely of -use in the combat. The essential feature of the “Q.F.” -gun, as it is generally styled, is that the carriage -does not move on firing, so that the gunners can -remain safely crouched behind the shield.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef30_3">MODERN GUNS</h3> - -<p>The French gun as it was originally brought out has -now been improved by the addition of a steel plate -which closes the gap between the shields; and a steel -shield is also provided to protect the officer standing on -the upturned ammunition-wagon.</p> - -<p>The carriage does not move, and the men remain in -their positions behind the shield while the gun recoils -between them. The carriage is prevented from sharing -the movement of recoil by the spade at the end of the -trail, which digs into the ground so as to “anchor” it.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef30_4">RAPID FIRING</h3> - -<p>The gun-recoil carriage, as the new invention was -called, increases the rate of fire, since there is no delay -in running up. The French were quick to develop -this new feature, and set to work to make the rate of -fire as high as possible. Up till then the ammunition -fired from a field-gun had consisted of a shell, a bag of -powder, and a friction-tube introduced through the -vent to fire the charge. This was called a round of -ammunition, and its complexity was increased by the -fuse, which was carried separately and screwed into the -shell when the round was prepared for loading, and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page283">[283]</a></span> -afterwards set with a key to burst the shell at the -required distance. The French combined the whole -of these separate parts into one, so that a round of -“fixed” ammunition, as now used, looks exactly like -an enlarged rifle cartridge. (See <a href="#Fig5">Fig. 2</a>.)</p> - -<p>Further, they did away with the cumbrous process -of setting the fuse by hand, and introduced a machine -which sets fuses as fast as the shell can be put into it. -One of these machines is shown in <a href="#Fig5">Fig. 4</a>. It is of a -later pattern than that of the French service gun, being -the one used by the Servians with their new gun made -by the famous firm of Schneider of Creusot. The -machine is set to the range ordered by the battery -commander, the shell is dropped into it, and a turn -of the handle sets the fuse.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef30_5">HOW A BIG GUN IS AIMED</h3> - -<p>The independent line of sight is another modern -device for facilitating the service of a gun. With this -the gear for giving the gun the elevation necessary to -carry a shell to the required distance is kept entirely -separate from that used for pointing the gun at the -target. The gun-layer has merely to keep his sighting -telescope on the target, while another man puts on the -range-elevation ordered by the battery commander.</p> - -<p>The result of all these improvements is that the best -quick-firing guns (among which the French gun is still -reckoned) are capable of firing twenty-five rounds a -minute. The German field-gun is hardly capable of -twenty rounds a minute, being an inferior weapon -converted from the old breech-loader.</p> - -<p>But these high rates of fire are used only on emergency,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page284">[284]</a></span> -as a gun firing twenty-five rounds a minute -would exhaust the whole of the ammunition carried -with it in the battery in three minutes.</p> - -<p>One of the first consequences of the introduction of -the shielded gun was the reappearance of the old common -shell in an improved form. The common shell is -almost as old as Agincourt, and consisted simply of a -hollow shell filled with powder, which exploded on -striking the object. When shrapnel came into use most -nations abandoned the common shell. But shrapnel -proved almost ineffective against the shielded gun, and -the gunners were indifferent to the bullets pattering on -the steel shield in front of them. The answer to this -was the high-explosive shell, a steel case filled with -high explosive, such as melinite, which is the same as -lyddite, shimose, or picric acid. This, when detonated -upon striking a gun, can be relied upon to disable it and -to kill the gunners behind it.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef30_6">AWFUL DESTRUCTIVENESS OF MODERN GUNS</h3> - -<p>Of late years a shell which combines the action of -the shrapnel and the high-explosive shell has been -introduced. This is the “Universal” shell (see <a href="#Fig5">Fig. 3</a>) -invented by Major van Essen, of the Dutch Artillery. -It is a shrapnel with a detachable head filled with high -explosive. When burst during flight it acts like an -ordinary shrapnel, and the bullets fly forward and -sweep the ground in front of it; at the same time the -head, with its explosive burster, flies forward and acts -as a small but efficient high-explosive shell. These -projectiles have been introduced for howitzers and for -anti-aircraft guns, and some of the nations with new<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page285">[285]</a></span> -equipments, such as the Balkan States, have them for -their field-guns. Their introduction has, however, -been delayed in Western Europe, as they are less -efficient as such than the ordinary shrapnel, which is -considered the principal field artillery projectile.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page286">[286]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXXI</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">WHOLESALE SLAUGHTER BY POISONOUS -GASES</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef31_1">CANADIAN VICTIMS</a> — <a href="#SecRef31_2">TRENCH -GAS AT YPRES</a> — <a href="#SecRef31_3">AWFUL -FORM OF SCIENTIFIC TORTURE</a> — <a href="#SecRef31_4">REPORT OF -MEDICAL EXPERT</a> — <a href="#SecRef31_5">KIND OF GAS EMPLOYED</a> — <a href="#SecRef31_6">ALLIES -FORCED TO USE SIMILAR METHODS.</a></p> - -<p>Killing by noxious gases may be, as the Germans -claim, no more barbarous than slaughter by shrapnel, -but it has been denounced in America as a violation -of all written and unwritten codes and as a backward -step toward savagery. Certainly the descriptions of -responsible persons who have witnessed the pernicious -work of the gas only deepens the horror with which -all peace-loving citizens look upon “civilized” warfare.</p> - -<p>The following description of the effect is told by a -responsible British officer who visited some Canadians -who were disabled by gas:</p> - -<p>“The whole of England and the civilized world -ought to have the truth fully brought before them -in vivid detail, and not wrapped up as at present. -When we got to the hospital we had no difficulty in -finding out in which ward the men were, as the noise -of the poor devils trying to get breath was sufficient -to direct us.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page287">[287]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef31_1">CANADIAN VICTIMS</h3> - -<p>“There were about twenty of the worst cases in the -ward, on mattresses, all more or less in a sitting position, -strapped up against the walls. Their faces, arms, and -hands were of a shiny, gray-black color. With their -mouths open and leaden-glazed eyes, all were swaying -slightly backward and forward trying to get breath. -It was a most appalling sight. All these poor black -faces struggling for life, the groaning and the noise of -the efforts for breath was awful.</p> - -<p>“There was practically nothing to be done for them -except to give them salt and water and try to make -them sick. The effect the gas has is to fill the lungs -with a watery frothy matter, which gradually increases -and rises until it fills up the whole lungs and comes to -the mouth—then they die. It is suffocation, slow -drowning, taking in most cases one or two days. Eight -died last night out of twenty I saw, and the most of the -others I saw will die, while those who get over the gas -invariably develop acute pneumonia.</p> - -<p>“It is without doubt the most awful form of scientific -torture. Not one of the men I saw in the hospital -had a scratch or wound. The Germans have given out -that it is a rapid, painless death—the liars. No torture -could be worse than to give them a dose of their own -gas.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef31_2">“TRENCH GAS” AT YPRES</h3> - -<p>Asphyxiating gases seem to have been first used by -the Germans in the fighting around Ypres in April, -1915. The strong northeast wind, which was blowing -from the German lines across the French trenches,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page288">[288]</a></span> -became charged with a sickening, suffocating odor -which was recognized as proceeding from some form -of poisonous gas. The smoke moved like a vivid green -wall some four feet in height for several hundred yards, -extending to within two hundred yards of the extreme -left of the Allies’ lines. Gradually it rose higher and -obscured the view from the level.</p> - -<p>Soon strange cries were heard, and through the -green mist, now growing thinner and patchy, there -came a mass of dazed, reeling men who fell as they -passed through the ranks. The greater number were -unwounded, but they bore upon their faces the marks -of agony.</p> - -<p>The retiring men were among the first soldiers of -the world whose sang-froid and courage have been -proverbial throughout the war. All were reeling -like drunken men.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef31_3">AWFUL FORM OF SCIENTIFIC TORTURE</h3> - -<p>“The work of sending out the vapor was done from -the advanced German trenches. Men garbed in a -dress resembling the harness of a diver and armed with -retorts or generators about three feet high and connected -with ordinary hose-pipe turned the vapor loose -toward the French lines. Some witnesses maintain -that the Germans sprayed the earth before the -trenches with a fluid which, being ignited, sent up -the fumes. The German troops, who followed up this -advantage with a direct attack, held inspirators in -their mouths, these preventing them from being overcome -by the fumes.</p> - -<p>In addition to this, the Germans appear to have<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page289">[289]</a></span> -fired ordinary explosive shells loaded with some chemical -which had a paralyzing effect on all the men in the -region of the explosion. Some chemical in the composition -of these shells produced violent watering of the -eyes, so that the men overcome by them were practically -blinded for some hours.</p> - -<div class="scr"> - -<div class="centerblock w600"> - -<div class="split4060"> - -<div class="leftsplit4060"> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo321a.png" alt="" width="228" height="471" /> -</div> - -</div><!--leftsplit--> - -<div class="rightsplit4060"> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo321b.png" alt="" width="315" height="312" /> -</div> - -<p class="fsize80"><i>Right-hand figure: British soldier -wearing respirator with air valve on top</i>.</p> - -<p class="fsize80 blankbefore2"><i>Left-hand figure: German with respirator -and goggles armed with burning-oil-distributor</i>.</p> - -</div><!--rightsplit--> - -<p class="thinline allclear"> </p> - -</div><!--split4060--> - -</div><!--centerblock--> - -</div><!--scr--> - -<div class="hh"> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo321b.png" alt="" width="315" height="312" /> -</div> - -<p class="fsize80"><i>Right-hand figure: British soldier -wearing respirator with air valve on top</i>.</p> - -<div class="figcenter"> -<img src="images/illo321a.png" alt="" width="228" height="471" /> -</div> - -<p class="fsize80"><i>Left-hand figure: German with respirator -and goggles armed with burning-oil-distributor</i>.</p> - -</div><!--hh--> - -<p class="thinline allclear"> </p> - -<div class="centerblock w600"> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Using Deadly Gas as a Weapon in War</span>.</p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">The German use of poisonous gases that asphyxiate soldiers of the enemy -against whom they are directed, has made it necessary to devise a new defense. -The pictures show the devices used by those who direct the use of the -gases and those who have to meet their deadly vapors.</p> - -</div><!--w600--> - -<p class="blankbefore1">The effect of the noxious trench-gas seems to be<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page290">[290]</a></span> -slow in wearing away. The men come out of their -violent nausea in a state of utter collapse. How -many of the men left unconscious in the trenches when -the French broke died from the fumes it is impossible -to say, since those trenches were at once occupied by -the Germans.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef31_4">REPORT OF MEDICAL EXPERT</h3> - -<p>Dr. John S. Haldane, an authority on the physiology -of respiration, who was sent by the British government -to France to observe the effect of the gases, examined -several Canadians who had been incapacitated by the -gases.</p> - -<p>“These men,” he said, “were lying struggling for -breath, and blue in the face. On examining their -blood with a spectroscope and by other means I ascertained -that the blueness was not due to the presence -of any abnormal pigment. There was nothing to -account for the blueness and their struggles for air but -one fact, and that was that they were suffering from -acute bronchitis, such as is caused by the inhalation -of an irritant gas. Their statements were to the effect -that when in the trenches they had been overwhelmed -by an irritant gas produced in front of the German -trenches and carried toward them by a gentle breeze.</p> - -<p>“One of the men died shortly after our arrival. A -post-mortem examination showed that death was due -to acute bronchitis and its secondary effect. There -was no doubt that the bronchitis and accompanying -slow asphyxiation was due to irritant gas.</p> - -<p>“Captain Bertram, of the eighth Canadian battalion, -who is suffering from the effects of gas and from wounds,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page291">[291]</a></span> -says that from a support trench about six hundred -yards from the German lines he observed the gas. He -saw first of all white smoke rising from the German -trenches to a height of about three feet. Then in -front of the white smoke appeared a green cloud which -drifted along the ground to our trenches, not rising -more than about seven feet from the ground.</p> - -<p>“When it reached our first trenches, the men in these -trenches were obliged to leave, and a number of them -were killed by the effects of the gas. We made a -counter-attack about fifteen minutes after the gas -came over, and saw twenty-four men lying dead from -the effects of the gas on a small stretch of road leading -from the advanced trenches to the supports. He, -himself, was much affected by the gas, and felt as -though he could not breathe.</p> - -<p>“These symptoms and other facts so far ascertained -point to the use by the German troops of chlorine or -bromide for the purpose of asphyxiation. There also -are facts pointing to the use in German shells of other -irritant substances. Still, the last of these agents are -not of the same brutality and barbarous character as -was the gas used in the attack on the Canadians.</p> - -<p>“The effects are not those of any of the ordinary -products of combustion of explosives. On this point -the symptoms described left not the slightest doubt in -my mind.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef31_5">KIND OF GAS EMPLOYED</h3> - -<p>Various have been the opinions of chemists as to the -kind of gas employed. Sir James Dewar, President of -the Royal Institution, was of the opinion that it was<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page292">[292]</a></span> -liquid chlorine. Dr. F. A. Mason, of the Royal College -of Science, considered it to have been bromine. Dr. -Crocker, of the South-Western Polytechnic, said it -may have been either carbon monoxide or liquid -peroxide. Dr. W. J. Pope, Professor of Chemistry, -Cambridge, and Sir E. Rutherford, Professor of Physics, -Manchester University, agreed in thinking the gas to -have been phosgene, a compound of carbon monoxide -and chlorine, largely used in dye production in Germany.</p> - -<p>“For some years,” stated Sir James Dewar, “Germany -has been manufacturing chlorine in tremendous -quantities. . . . The Germans undoubtedly have hundreds -of tons available. If several tons of liquid are -allowed to escape into the atmosphere, where it immediately -evaporates and forms a yellow gas, and if the -wind is blowing in a favorable direction, it is the easiest -thing for the Germans to inundate the country with -poison for miles ahead of them.</p> - -<p>“The fact that the gas is three times heavier than -air makes escape from its disastrous effects almost -impossible, for it drifts like a thick fog-cloud along the -surface of the ground, overwhelming all whom it -overtakes.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef31_6">ALLIES FORCED TO USE SIMILAR METHODS</h3> - -<p>Of the German attack on the allied front near Ypres, -Secretary of War, Earl Kitchener, speaking in the -House of Lords on May 18, said:</p> - -<p>“In this attack the enemy employed vast quantities -of poisonous gases, and our soldiers and our French -allies were utterly unprepared for this diabolical<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page293">[293]</a></span> -method of attack, which undoubtedly had been long -and carefully prepared.”</p> - -<p>It was at this point that Earl Kitchener announced -the determination of the Allies to resort to similar -methods of warfare.</p> - -<p>“The Germans,” said Earl Kitchener, “have persisted -in the use of these asphyxiating gases whenever -the wind favored or other opportunity occurred, and -His Majesty’s government, no less than the French -government, feel that our troops must be adequately -protected by the employment of similar methods, so as -to remove the enormous and unjustifiable disadvantage -which must exist for them if we take no steps to meet -on his own ground the enemy who is responsible for -the introduction of this pernicious practice.”</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page294">[294]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXXII</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">“USAGES OF WAR ON LAND”: THE -OFFICIAL GERMAN MANUAL</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef32_1">CRIMES IN BELGIUM EXPLAINED BY INSTRUCTIONS -TO GERMAN OFFICERS</a>—<a href="#SecRef32_2">UNLIMITED DESTRUCTION -THE END OF WAR</a>—<a href="#SecRef32_3">RULES OF CIVILIZED -WARFARE CLEARLY STATED</a>—<a href="#SecRef32_4">OTHER EXCELLENT -RULES.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef32_1">The black crime of Louvain, the world-lamented -destruction of the cathedral of Rheims, the denudation -of the fair land of Belgium, with all its horrible attendant -crimes, is explained, in part at least, by “Usages -of War on Land,” the official manual of instructions -to military officers compiled by the general staff of -the German army. It is an authoritative exposition -of the rules of war as practiced by the Germans.</p> - -<p>Two general principles bearing directly on the -question of the invasion of Belgium are clearly stated -in this guide:</p> - -<p>“A war conducted with energy cannot be directed -merely against the combatants of the enemy state -and the positions they occupy, but it will and must in -like manner seek to destroy the total intellectual -and material resources of the latter. Humanitarian -claims, such as the protection of men and their goods, -can only be taken into consideration in so far as the -nature and object of the war permit.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page295">[295]</a></span></p> - -<p>“The fact that such limitations of the unrestricted -and reckless application of all the available means -for the conduct of war, and thereby the humanization -of the customary methods of pursuing war, really -exist, and are actually observed by the armies of all -civilized states, has in the course of the nineteenth -century often led to attempts to develop, to extend, -and thus to make universally binding these pre-existing -usages of war; to elevate them to the level -of laws binding nations and armies; in other words, -to create a law of war. All these attempts have hitherto, -with some few exceptions to be mentioned later, -completely failed. If, therefore, in the following -work the expression ‘the law of war’ is used, it must be -understood that by it is meant not a written law -introduced by the international agreements, but only -a reciprocity of mutual agreement—a limitation of -arbitrary behavior, which custom and conventionality, -human friendliness and a calculating egotism have -erected, but for the observance of which there exists -no express sanction, but only ‘the fear of reprisals’ -decides.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef32_2">UNLIMITED DESTRUCTION THE END OF WAR</h3> - -<p>Put in plain language, these passages mean that -there is no law of war which may not be broken at the -dictates of interest. Unlimited destruction is the -end, and only fear of reprisals need limit the means. -The sentimental humanitarianism and flabby emotion -which prevail elsewhere have no place in the bright -lexicon of the German officer. “By steeping himself -in military history,” the manual clearly states, “an<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page296">[296]</a></span> -officer will be able to guard himself against excessive -humanitarian notions” and learn that “certain severities -are indispensable in war,” and that “the only -true humanity often lies in a ruthless application of -them.” Then there is laid down this comprehensive -general rule:</p> - -<p>“All means of warfare may be used without which -the purpose of war cannot be achieved. On the other -hand, every act of violence and destruction which is -not demanded by the purpose of war must be condemned.”</p> - -<p>Interpreted by other passages in the volume, this -implies that the end justifies the means. Barbarities -may be forgiven if only they are useful. Thus “international -law is in no way opposed to the exploitation -of the crimes of third parties—assassination, incendiarism, -robbery and the like—to the prejudice of -the enemy.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef32_3">RULES OF CIVILIZED WARFARE CLEARLY STATED</h3> - -<p>It must not be assumed, of course, that the German -war manual is a defense of unlimited rapine. The -rules of civilized warfare are usually stated clearly -enough. But there are so many exceptions to the -application of them that a zealous officer might well -be pardoned if he regarded them as not binding whenever -it was to his interest to ignore them. Thus, -after a careful statement of the right of the inhabitants -of an invaded country to organize for its defense, -the advantages of “terrorism” are candidly set -forth as outweighing these considerations in many -instances. That policy has been illustrated in Belgium<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page297">[297]</a></span> -very significantly. The difference between precept -and practice is also seen in the prohibition of the bombardment -of churches and unfortified towns. Regarding -the latter the manual says:</p> - -<p>“A prohibition by international law of the bombardment -of open towns and villages which are not -occupied by the enemy or defended was, indeed, put -into words by The Hague regulations, but appears -superfluous, since modern military history knows of -hardly any such case.”</p> - -<p>Military history has been made since then, particularly -by the German air raids on English seashore -resorts.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef32_4">OTHER EXCELLENT RULES</h3> - -<p>Several other excellent rules in the manual may be -contrasted with German practice in the present war.</p> - -<p>“No damage, not even the smallest, must be done -unless it is done for military reasons.</p> - -<p>“Contributions of war are sums of money which -are levied by force from the people of an occupied -country. They differ in character from requisitions -in kind because they do not serve an immediate -requirement of the army. Hence, requisitions in -cash are only in the rarest cases justified by the -necessities of war.</p> - -<p>“The military government by the army of occupation -carries with it only a temporary right to enjoy -the property of others. It must, therefore, avoid every -purposeless injury, it has no right to sell or dispose -of the property.”</p> - -<p>“Usages of War on Land” makes interesting reading<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page298">[298]</a></span> -throughout, though the conclusions that the impartial -reader will draw from it will not be in every case -those which the German military authorities would -have him draw.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page299">[299]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXXIII</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">THE SACRIFICE OF THE HORSE IN -WARFARE</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef33_1">DUMB ANIMALS PRESSED INTO SERVICE</a> — <a href="#SecRef33_2">PART -PLAYED BY HORSE IN WAR</a> — <a href="#SecRef33_3">AMERICAN STOCK -DEPLETED.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef33_1">So overwhelming has been the thought of -human suffering in Europe, so anxious has the world -been to relieve it, that little thought has been bestowed -on the dumb sufferers. Various war photographs have -shown us the novel sight of the dogs of Belgium impressed -into service for dragging the smaller guns; but -all contestants use horses, and when we reflect that the -average life of a cavalry horse at the front is not more -than a week, if that, we gain some idea of the sacrifice -of animals which modern warfare demands.</p> - -<p>One of the pleaders for the horse is John Galsworthy, -the English novelist, who gives in the London Westminster -Gazette this moral aspect of the use of the horse -in warfare, with the attendant obligation:</p> - -<p>“Man has only a certain capacity for feeling, and -that has been strained almost to breaking-point by -human needs. But now that the wants of our wounded -are being seen to with hundreds of motor ambulances -and hospitals fully equipped, now that the situation -is more in hand, we can surely turn a little to the companions -of man. They, poor things, have no option<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page300">[300]</a></span> -in this business; they had no responsibility, however -remote and indirect, for its inception; get no benefit -out of it of any kind whatever; know none of the sustaining -sentiments of heroism; feel no satisfaction in -duty done. They do not even—as the prayer for them -untruly says—‘offer their guileless lives for the well-being -of their countries.’ They know nothing of -countries; they do not offer themselves. Nothing so -little pitiable as that. They are pressed into this -service, which cuts them down before their time.”</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef33_2">PART PLAYED BY HORSE IN WAR</h3> - -<p>The horse still plays an important part in war, as -every army service corps officer who has had anything -to do with them well knows. The men love their -mettlesome beasts, and much trouble and worry is -pardoned and lost sight of in the comradeship which -arises between man and beast. The great part played -by motors and motor-driven vehicles in the present -war has tended to draw attention away from the work -of horses at the front, yet motor cavalry has not been -evolved. While recognizing that for moving big guns -along a well-made road motor power is very valuable, it -is still equally true that once the roads are left it is -found in practice of little use.</p> - -<p>A remarkable feature of the European war, new, -so far as we know, to military experience, has been the -use upon an extensive scale of the heavy draught horse, -whose stately pace admits of no hurrying, but whose -great strength permits of his hauling very heavy weights -where the nature of the road does not admit of the use -of the motor.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page301">[301]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef33_3">AMERICAN STOCK DEPLETED</h3> - -<p>That the European war threatened to deplete the -stock of horses even in the United States is emphasized -by a careful computation which fixed at 185,023 the -number of horses shipped to the warring nations from -July 1, 1914, to March 31, 1915. The value of the -animals, according to an inventory compiled from the -manifests of ships transporting the horses is placed at -$40,695,057. During that same period 26,976 mules, -valued at $5,143,270, were sent abroad.</p> - -<p>Buyers representing the British, French and Russian -governments were reported as searching the country -for more, and, according to estimates made by shippers, -at least 120,000 animals were to be shipped to Europe -during the summer of 1915.</p> - -<p>Frank L. Neall, statistician, asserted that few persons -realized the extent of the raid made by European -buyers on the horse market. “Shipments,” he said, -“have been made from New Orleans, Newport News, -Portland, Boston and New York. During the month -of March, 33,694 horses were shipped, representing a -value of $8,088,974.”</p> - -<p>Shippers were deeply interested when it became -known for a certainty that the German government -had representatives purchasing horses in the West. -Wood Brothers, the largest horse dealers in Nebraska, -were asked to bid on a 25,000-head shipment. Ruling -prices for the grade of horses desired by foreign buyers -have ranged from $175 to $200 per head.</p> - -<p>The stockyards in New Orleans, where these animals -were assembled, cover about eight acres and shed 3,500 -animals. Horses were thoroughly examined as to<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page302">[302]</a></span> -their fitness for service, both at the point of purchase -and at New Orleans.</p> - -<p>The last step before placing the horses on shipboard -was to adjust special halters to them, so that, as in the -case of many horses purchased by France, it was only -necessary, when the animal reached the other side, to -snap two straps to his head-stalls and make him instantly -ready to be hitched to a gun limber or a wagon of a -transport train.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page303">[303]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXXIV</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">SCOURGES THAT FOLLOW IN THE WAKE -OF BATTLE</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef34_1">THE COMMON ENEMY, DISEASE</a> — <a href="#SecRef34_2">SCOURGES OF MODERN -WARFARE</a> — <a href="#SecRef34_3">RAVAGES OF TYPHUS IN SERVIA</a> — <a href="#SecRef34_4">NO -WORD OF COMPLAINT</a> — <a href="#SecRef34_5">AMERICA TO THE RESCUE.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef34_1">In many campaigns of the past, disease has slain -its thousands where bullets and shells have killed -hundreds, and even the twentieth century with its -marvelous science of sanitation has not defeated the -direful common enemies of allies and foes. Why -disease should attack masses of men in the prime of -life, living in the open air, and on the whole well fed -and clothed, at first sight seems strange, but when we -remember that modern fighting begets an intolerable -thirst, which the soldier is naturally tempted to slake -as best he can and when he can, at least one reason is -not hard to find.</p> - -<p>All modern armies, since the striking experience of -Japan in the Manchurian campaign, pay special -attention to the drinking water, and with good -results. But an irremovable source of disease remains -in the typhus-carrying vermin, in the myriads of flies -bred in the rotting carcases of men and horses and in -the filth that inevitably collects around perpetually -shifting camps and bivouacs. As everyone now knows,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page304">[304]</a></span> -these insects are ceaseless and tireless carriers of -infection, and it is difficult to see how, under conditions -of war, the plague of them can be utterly wiped out.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef34_2">SCOURGES OF MODERN WARFARE</h3> - -<p>Of the diseases which assail an army in the field, -a few stand out so prominently that all others may -practically be neglected. These are cholera, typhus, -typhoid fever, dysentery, and pneumonia; and they -have this in common, that they are all caused by -specific bacilli. Thus cholera is the child, so to speak, -of the dreaded vibrio, and pneumonia that of the -pneumococcus; while typhus, typhoid and dysentery -have each their own special microbe. The modes of -attack are, however, different, for the pneumococcus -can enter the organism by the nose and mouth only; -typhoid and dysentery through the alimentary canal; -while the way in which cholera is propagated is at -present unknown. All have this in common, that -while the microbes causing them are probably always -present—that of cholera being a doubtful exception—they -seem only to assault a subject previously weakened -by exposure, bad food, or intemperance.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef34_3">RAVAGES OF TYPHUS IN SERVIA</h3> - -<p>The dread aftermaths of war made their first visitations -upon the Servian nation. One read with dismay -that Belgium was later outdone by Poland, and Poland -seemed almost fortunate beside Servia. The account -sent by Captain E. N. Bennett, Commissioner in -Servia for the British Red Cross Society, of the conditions -prevailing in Servian hospitals and prisoners<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page305">[305]</a></span>’ -camps filled the whole world with dread. “Fires are -needed to clear Servia of typhus, just as fires were -needed to stop the great plague in London,” reported -Sir Thomas Lipton, who spent considerable time in -that country. He said:</p> - -<p>“I met on the country roads many victims too weak -to crawl to a hospital. Bullock-carts were gathering -them up. Often a woman and her children were -leading the bullocks, while in the car the husband and -father was raving with fever. Scarcely enough people -remain unstricken to dig graves for the dead, whose -bodies lie exposed in the cemeteries.</p> - -<p>“The situation is entirely beyond the control of the -present force, which imperatively needs all the help -it can get—tents, hospitals, doctors, nurses, modern -appliances, and clothing to replace the garments full -of typhus-bearing vermin.”</p> - -<p>His picture of the hospital at Ghevgheli, where Dr. -James F. Donnelly, of the American Red Cross, died, -is appalling. Sir Thomas called Dr. Donnelly one of -the greatest heroes of the war:</p> - -<p>“The place is a village in a barren, uncultivated -country, the hospital an old tobacco factory, formerly -belonging to Abdul Hamid. In it were crowded 1,400 -persons, without blankets or mattresses, or even straw—men -lying in the clothes in which they had lived in the -trenches for months, clothes swarming with vermin, -victims of different diseases, typhus, typhoid, dysentery, -and smallpox were herded together. In such a -state Dr. Donnelly found the hospital, where he had a -force of six American doctors, twelve American nurses, -and three Servian doctors. When I visited the hospital<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page306">[306]</a></span> -three of the American doctors, the three Servian -doctors, and nine of the nurses were themselves ill.</p> - -<p>“The patients were waited on by Austrian prisoners. -The fumes of illness were unbearable. The patients -objected to the windows being opened, and Dr. Donnelly -was forced to break the panes. The first thing -Dr. Donnelly did on his arrival was to test the water, -which he found infected. He then improvised boilers -of oil-drums, in which to boil water for use. The -boilers saved five hundred lives, said Dr. Donnelly. -He also built ovens in which to bake the clothes of the -patients, but he was not provided with proper sterilizing -apparatus.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef34_4">NO WORD OF COMPLAINT</h3> - -<p>“No braver people exist than the Servians. They -have never a word of complaint. In one ward I saw -a fever patient, his magnificent voice booming songs -to cheer his comrades. Some were in a delirium, calling -for ‘mother.’</p> - -<p>“One source of infection is the army black bread, -which is the only ration of the troops. The patients -in the hospital receive only a loaf each, which they -put in their bed or under their pillow. Later the -unused loaves are bought by pedlers and are resold, -spreading disease among the people, who are mediæval -in so far as sanitation is concerned. A Servian soldier -receives a rifle, some hand-grenades, and perhaps part -of a uniform, but otherwise looks after himself.</p> - -<p>“The street-cleaning and hospital-waiting are done -by Austrians, who are rapidly thinning from typhus -and other diseases.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page307">[307]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef34_5">AMERICA TO THE RESCUE</h3> - -<p>“The best hospital in the Balkans is at Belgrade, -under Dr. Edward W. Ryan, of the American contingent, -where there are 2,900 patients. Dr. Ryan kept -the hospital neutral during the Austrian occupation, -and accomplished wonders diplomatically at that time. -He is worshiped by the people.</p> - -<p>“Dr. Ryan says that the greatest task is to keep -the hospital free from vermin. The typhus affects -men the most severely. Women come next, and children -for the most part recover. The symptoms begin -like those of grip. The disease lasts fifteen days, with -fever and delirium.”</p> - -<p>In the spring of 1915, a large sanitary commission -was organized by the American Red Cross and the -Rockefeller Foundation, each of these organizations -donating $25,000 to the prosecution of the work. -The commission included a group of distinguished -bacteriologists and physicians, among them William -C. Gorgas, surgeon-general of the U. S. A. An initial -supply of 10,000 anti-cholera treatments was carried -to Servia by the commission, for there was danger not -only of a spread of typhus but also of an outbreak of -Asiatic cholera or some other infectious disease that -might sweep across all Europe. Heavy indeed is the -price of warfare.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page308">[308]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXXV</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">WAR’S REPAIR SHOP: CARING FOR THE -WOUNDED</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef35_1">EFFICIENCY OF THE RED CROSS SERVICE</a> — <a href="#SecRef35_2">THE -BANDAGING CAMP</a> — <a href="#SecRef35_3">THE SANITATION COMPANY</a> — <a href="#SecRef35_4">THE -HOSPITAL BARGE.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef35_1">Amid the dreadful welter of carnage and its attendant -agony which spells modern warfare one ray of brightness -appears in the universal gloom in the shape of the -highly organized efficiency of the Red Cross Service, -which waits upon battle. Die Umschau, of Berlin, -printed an admirable description of its activities -from the pen of Professor Rupprecht, one of the chief -organizers of the German Military Hospital Service, -of which we give an abstract:</p> - -<p>“The stretcher-bearers of the infantry—four to each -company—who bear the Red Cross symbol on the arm, -when a battle is on hand, gather at the end of the -battalion (sixteen men with four stretchers) and then -proceed to the Infantry Sanitation Car. As soon as the -‘bandaging camp’ is made ready . . . they go to the -front with stretchers and knapsacks in order to be -ready to give aid to the wounded as soon as possible. -Musicians and others are employed as assistant -stretcher-bearers. These wear a red band on the -sleeve but do not come under the provisions of the -Geneva Treaty.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page309">[309]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef35_2">THE BANDAGING CAMP</h3> - -<p>Similar arrangements are made for the cavalry. -The so-called “bandaging camp” is for the purpose of -gathering the wounded and examining and classifying -them. It should be both protected and accessible, -and if possible near a water supply. At the end of a -battle it is the duty of the troops to search trenches, -woods, houses, etc., for the wounded, protect them -against plunderers and carry them to the bandaging -camp, as also to bury the dead.</p> - -<div class="figcenter w600"> - -<img src="images/illo341.png" alt="" width="600" height="220" /> - -<p class="caption main"><span class="smcap">Quicker and Easier Than Bandages: The “Tabloid” Adjustable -Head-Dressing.</span></p> - -<p class="caption secondjust">This dressing for head-wounds in the form of a cap, can be applied in a -few seconds, and remains comfortably in position. It can be washed, sterilized, -and used repeatedly. The diagrams show the method of adjusting -and the dressing in position.</p> - -</div><!--figcenter--> - -<p>“At the bandaging camp the surgeons and their -assistants must revive and examine the men and make -them ready for transport. Operations are seldom -practicable or necessary here. The chief concern is to -bandage wounds of bones, joints, and arteries carefully. . . . -Severe hemorrhages usually stop of -themselves, on which account it is seldom desirable<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page310">[310]</a></span> -to bind the limb tightly above the wound. The wound -itself must never be touched, washed, or probed. After -the clothing is removed or cut away it must merely be -covered with the contents of the bandage package.”</p> - -<p>Every soldier carries two of these packages in a -pocket on the lower front corner of his left coat-tail. -Each package contains a gauze bandage enclosed in a -waterproof cover. There is sewed to this bandage a -gauze compress saturated with sublimate and of a red -color. It is so arranged that the bandage can be -taken hold of with both hands without touching the -red compress.</p> - -<p>It is strongly impressed upon the stretcher-bearers -and all assistants that cases having wounds in the -abdomen are not transportable and must on no account -be given food or drink; also that bleeding usually -stops of itself. They are taught, too, that touching, -washing, or probing the wound is injurious, and that -only <i>dry</i> bandages must be placed on the wound—never -those that are damp or impervious.</p> - -<p>“The wounded who are capable of marching leave -their ammunition, except for a few cartridges, at the -bandaging camp, are provided if need be with a simple -protective bandage, and march first to the nearest -‘camp for the slightly wounded,’ or to the nearest -‘resting-camp.’ The rest of the wounded are removed -as soon as possible directly to the field hospitals or -lazarets. If obliged to remain for a while before -removal they are protected by portable tents, wind-screens, -etc. . . . If it is impossible to carry the -wounded along in a retreat they are left in care of the -hospital staff under the protection of the Red Cross.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page311">[311]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef35_3">THE SANITATION COMPANY</h3> - -<p>In case of a big battle a sanitation company remains -near the bandaging camp. Every army corps has -three of these companies, which, together with the -twelve field lazarets of the corps, form a sanitation -battalion.</p> - -<p>As soon as it is apparent that the troops will remain -in one locality for some length of time the smaller -bandaging camps or stations are supplemented by a -chief bandaging station some distance in the rear, and -if possible, near a highway and near houses. At this -spot there are arranged places for the entry and exit of -the wagons carrying the wounded, for the unloading -of the wounded, for the dying and the dead, for cooking, -and a “park” for wagons and horses.</p> - -<p>Each field lazaret is capable of caring for two hundred -men, but this capacity may be extended by making -use of local aid. The supplies carried are very comprehensive, -including tents, straw mattresses and woolen -blankets, lighting materials, clothing and linen, tools, -cooking utensils, soap, writing materials, drugs and -medical appliances, sterilization ovens, bandages, instruments, -and an operating-table. As fast as possible -the patients treated are sent home on furlough or -removed to permanent military hospitals. The very -perfection of this system but deepens the tragic irony -that occasions it.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef35_4">THE HOSPITAL BARGE</h3> - -<p>One very important development in the care for the -wounded is the introduction of the hospital barge. -The rivers and canals of France offer splendid opportunities<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page312">[312]</a></span> -for conveying wounded from point to point. -This new method of transport was foreshadowed in an -article in the London Times, in which the writer, in -describing the hospital barges, said:</p> - -<p>“The north of France, as is well known, is exceedingly -rich in waterways—rivers and canals. The four great -rivers, the Oise, the Somme, the Sambre, and the -Escaut (Scheldt), are connected by a network of -canals—quiet and comfortable waterways at present -almost free of traffic. So far as the reaching of any -particular spot is concerned these waterways may be -said to be ubiquitous. They extend, too, right into -Belgium, and have connection with the coast at various -points—for example, Ostend. Here, then, is a system -of ‘roads’ for the removal of the wounded, a system -which, if properly used, can be made to relieve greatly -the stress of work imposed upon the ambulance motor -cars and trains. Here also is the ideal method of -removal.</p> - -<p>“The Ile de France is lying at present at the Quai -de Grenelle, near the Eiffel Tower. This is a Seine -barge of the usual size and type, blunt-nosed, heavily -and roomily built. You enter the hold by a step-ladder, -which is part of the hospital equipment. This -is a large chamber not much less high from floor to -ceiling than an ordinary room, well lighted, and ventilated -by means of skylights. The walls of the hold -have been painted white; the floor has been thoroughly -scrubbed out for the reception of beds, of which some -forty to fifty will be accommodated.</p> - -<p>“The forward portion of the barge can accommodate -more beds, and there is no reason why a portion of it<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page313">[313]</a></span> -should not be walled in and used as an operating room, -more especially since in the bow a useful washing -apparatus is fitted. The barge is heated by stoves, -and a small electric plant could easily be installed. -The barges are used in groups of four, and a small tug -supplies the motive power. In favorable circumstances -about fifty kilometers a day can be traveled.”</p> - -<p>The barges employed are big, roomy barges one hundred -and twenty feet long, sixteen feet broad, and ten -feet high. Care is taken to use only fairly new and -clean barges which have been used in the conveyance -of timber or stone or other clean and harmless cargoes.</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page314">[314]</a></span></p> - -<h2><span class="chapno">CHAPTER XXXVI</span><br /> -<span class="chaptitle">WHAT WILL THE HORRORS AND ATROCITIES -OF THE GREAT WAR LEAD TO?</span></h2> - -<p class="subjects"><a href="#SecRef36_1">WAR, A REVERSAL TO THE PRIMITIVE BRUTE IN -MAN</a> — <a href="#SecRef36_2">THE SPREAD OF DEMOCRACY</a> — <a href="#SecRef36_3">DECLINE OF -THE WAR SPIRIT</a> — <a href="#SecRef36_4">THE DAWN OF UNIVERSAL PEACE.</a></p> - -<p id="SecRef36_1">In the mobilization of armies, in the appropriation -of colossal funds and consequent imposition of intolerable -taxes, in the disregard of the neutrality of lesser -nations, in the “emergency measures” that tear apart -a home to give its bread-winner to the reeking shambles—in -all these phenomena original incentives quickly -are forgotten, as though they had never been.</p> - -<p>What imperial chancellery now remembers, or now -cares, that a sovereign’s nephew and his morganatic -wife were done to death in an obscure dependency -upon the Adriatic shores? Their hands and steel are -at each other’s throats on that pretext, but they improve -the occasion to settle all old scores that rancorous -racial antagonism in an interminable blood-feud have -created. War has thrown down the barriers of social -restraint; it has abolished the delimitations of political -adjustment; international decorum, propriety, all that -is signified in the German tongue under the untranslatable -name of “Sittlichkeit” are no more; landmarks -set in place with a thankful sense of achievement and a -pious aspiration are obliterated.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page315">[315]</a></span></p> - -<p>None will deny to our heroes living, nor to those who -after warfare rest in peace, the sublimity of their -utmost pattern of devotion and of the sacrifice they -made. But with all that selfless devotion implies and -patriotism means, with all that the bugle sings or -flaunting pennons inspire, with all that the sight of old -and tattered battle-flags conveys, with all that the -histories tell, with all the exemplary careers of conquerors -that were not ruthless and armies that sang -psalms and nations whose quarrel was just and kings -who laid their crowns before the throne of God in -prayer, and their laurels in the dust of the profoundest -self-abasement—the nature of war is not changed.</p> - -<p>With all the Te Deums that have risen in cathedrals, -and hosannas that were sung for conquering Caesars -when earth and sky were shaken like a carpet with -their welcome at the gate; with all the splendor of -shining accoutrements of guardsmen and Uhlans and -cuirassiers; with all the investiture of romance that -poet and painter and even the sensitive historian have -been able to confer upon it—war remains what it is: -an abysmal and sickening reversion to the primitive -brute in man. It must still be a sight “to grieve high -heaven and make the angels mourn” that men created -in the image of their Maker, endowed with a diviner -instinct beyond the body’s need or transient existence, -could sink so far, and in the slough of primordial -animality forget the very light of life and their immortal -destiny for the sake of the mere fiction of power on -land, sea and even in the throbbing and embattled air -through which the prayers of women ascend like silent -flame to God.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page316">[316]</a></span></p> - -<div class="intellect"> - -<p class="center fsize200">The World’s Best Intellects -on War</p> - -<p class="body">JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU: War is the foulest fiend -that ever vomited forth from the mouth of hell.</p> - -<p class="body">THOMAS JEFFERSON: I abhor war and view it as the -greatest scourge of mankind.</p> - -<p class="body">BENJAMIN FRANKLIN: There never was a good war -or a bad peace.</p> - -<p class="body">WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON: My country is the -world; my countrymen are all mankind.</p> - -<p class="body">NAPOLEON BONAPARTE: The more I study the world, -the more am I convinced of the inability of force to create -anything durable.</p> - -<p class="body">PAUL ON MARS HILL: God hath made of one blood all -nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth.</p> - -<p class="body">ANDREW CARNEGIE: We have abolished slavery from -civilized countries, the owning of man by man. The -next great step that the world can take is to abolish war, -the killing of man by man.</p> - -<p class="body">GEORGE WASHINGTON: My first wish is to see the -whole world at peace, and the inhabitants of it as one -band of brothers, striving which should most contribute -to the happiness of mankind.</p> - -<p class="body">ABRAHAM LINCOLN: With malice toward none, with -charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives -us to see the right, let us strive<span class="nowrap"><span class="padl3">*</span><span class="padl3 padr3">*</span><span -class="padr3">*</span></span>to do all -which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace -among ourselves and with all nations.</p> - -<p class="body">EMANUEL KANT: The method by which states prosecute -their rights cannot under present conditions be -a process of law, since no court exists having jurisdiction -over them, but only war. But through war, -even if it result in victory, the question of right is not -decided.</p> - -</div><!--intellect--> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page317">[317]</a></span></p> - -<h3 id="SecRef36_2">THE SPREAD OF DEMOCRACY</h3> - -<p>We are apt, in thinking of the consequences of the -European war, to consider the readjustment of national -boundaries as of prime importance. Such a thought -betrays a wrong perspective, or a narrowness of vision, -or both. Territorial definition is a small, material -factor. The larger, spiritual considerations that affect -all mankind are the momentous things. And probably -of all the consequences that are evolved out of the -horrors and atrocities of the great war, the spread of -the democratic spirit must be the most momentous. -Despite the fact that the ambitions of the people and -the dynasties are in accord, the effect of the war upon -monarchical institutions must be momentous. The -spirit of democracy is abroad. It has practically -abolished the British House of Lords. It has forced -the establishment of a parliament in Russia. It is so -active and alert in Germany that the Social Democratic -party is the largest and most powerful political organization -in the empire. In France it overturned the -monarchy nearly half a century ago, and is now so -firmly established that only the wildest dreamers ever -imagine that republican institutions can be displaced. -It is regnant in Portugal and nearly so in Spain. A -nation in arms, as Germany now is, will not long be -content to remain a nation without a ministry responsible -to its Parliament. The democratization of German -institutions is inevitable after the war, whatever -the result. The people, even in Russia, are no longer -driven serfs. They think, they reason, and a demonstration -of the power of 5,000,000 men on the battle-field -will not be lost on the patriots who wish also to demonstrate<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page318">[318]</a></span> -the power of the same number of millions in -deciding at first hand the causes for which they will -take up arms. Whether the kings and the emperors -remain on their thrones matters little. Great Britain, -though it retains the fiction of a monarchy, is as -democratic as the United States, and its Parliament -responds with greater precision to popular sentiment -than the American Congress. The war means the end -of autocracy whether the kings remain or not.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef36_3">DECLINE OF THE WAR SPIRIT</h3> - -<p>It is significant that the most democratic nations -are likewise the most peace-loving. With the spread -of democracy must come the decline of the war spirit. -The teaching that war is a biological necessity for the -preservation of the heroic virtues in men has met its -fate in this war, for we have found men, whole regiments -of them, who had only been in warlike training -a few months, showing just as cool courage and just as -stubborn fighting powers as men who had been trained -to war from their youth. Even from the standpoint -of effectiveness in war the war spirit is unnecessary.</p> - -<p>And we have a right to insist that the bravery of the -battle-line is not the highest bravery, and that the -deliverance wrought by bayonet and shrapnel is not -the most necessary to the welfare of humanity. The -courage which is unmoved by the roar of great guns -and undaunted by the gleam of advancing bayonets -is good, but it is no better than the courage of the -timid woman who faces death upon the operating-table -without shrinking or complaint; and it is in<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page319">[319]</a></span> -nothing superior to the courage which, in the daily -life of our people, takes up patiently the burden of the -day, and in the face of poverty, sorrow, and pain, and -bearing also the contempt of many, goes forward -without bitterness and even with cheerfulness to the -end of the journey, faithful unto death.</p> - -<h3 id="SecRef36_4">THE DAWN OF UNIVERSAL PEACE</h3> - -<p>Finally, as the spirit of democracy rises and the -spirit of war declines, the vision of universal peace -begins to crystallize. While to many it may seem that -this must always remain a vision, the real seers of the -world do not doubt that, when the awful conflict in -Europe is ended, the warring nations, viewing their -dead and their devastated countries, will welcome a -plan which promises an end of such disasters. The -practicability and feasibility of the idea of an international -tribunal is shown by the successful operation -of the American Constitutional Courts of Arbitration, -which have settled controversies between the states, -and by the so-called general arbitration treaties to -submit justiciable disputes to arbitration. And if an -international arbitration court is feasible, an international -police, to give force to the decrees of the -tribunal, is also feasible. We have only to come to -believe this and the plan itself can be formulated. -All great achievement in the world has been a matter -of great faith.</p> - -<p>The hope of humanitarianism and civilization rests -on the very enormity of the present calamity. The -horrors and atrocities of the war are so great, its waste -and devastation so enormous, its scars so deep, that<span class="pagenum" id="Page320">[320]<span -class="fnanchor"><a href="#Footnote1">[1]</a></span></span> -no one who is touched by it can want war again. The -disaster is so overwhelming that peace when it comes -must be lasting.</p> - -<div class="footnote" id="Footnote1"> - -<p><span class="label">[1]</span> The 32 pages of illustrations contained in this book are not included in -the paging. Adding these 32 pages to the 320 pages of the text makes a -total of 352 pages.</p> - -</div><!--footnote--> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="tnbot" id="TN"> - -<h2>Transcriber’s Notes</h2> - -<p>Inconsistent and unusual spelling and hyphenation have been retained, except as listed below.</p> - -<p>p. 139, Todeshusaren (Death’s-Head Hussars): either the English translation should -be Death’s Hussars, or the German name should be Totenkopfhusaren.</p> - -<p>p. 148, Haybes (Belgium): Haybes is in France (albeit close to the border with Belgium).</p> - -<p>p. 153, Mme. X.: probably an error for Mme. Z.</p> - -<p>p. 155, Bignicourt-sur-Saultz: probably Bignicourt-sur-Saulx.</p> - -<p>p. 234, “A WASTEFUL WAR”: there is no such section.</p> - - -<p class="blankbefore1">Changes made:</p> - -<p>Some illustrations have been moved out of text paragraphs.</p> - -<p>Some minor obvious typographical and punctuation errors have been corrected silently.</p> - -<p>Accents have been corrected and standardised on French and German words (Châlons, château, -Hôtel de Ville, Liège, Visé, Jäger, Pêcheurs, Pégoud), but not on English words -(debris/débris); the capitalisation of German nouns has not been corrected.</p> - -<p>p.34: several section titles added to the list of subjects cf. the actual text</p> -<p>p.109: Onsmael changed to Orsmael</p> -<p>p. 159: BURNING OF CITY SYSTEMATIC added to list of subjects</p> -<p>p. 179: Poekappelle changed to Poekapelle</p> -<p>Illustration caption after page 200: Fort Loucin changed to Fort Loncin</p> -<p>p. 280: RAPID FIRING added to list of subjects</p> - -</div><!--tnbot--> - - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Horrors and Atrocities of the Great War, by -Logan Marshall and Gilbert Parker and Vance Thompson and Philip Gibbs - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HORRORS AND ATROCITIES *** - -***** This file should be named 55503-h.htm or 55503-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/5/5/5/0/55503/ - -Produced by Brian Coe, Harry Lam, Hathi Trust (for some -illustrations) and the Online Distributed Proofreading -Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from -images generously made available by The Internet Archive) - - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions -will be renamed. - -Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no -one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation -(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without -permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, -set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to -copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to -protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project -Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you -charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you -do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the -rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose -such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and -research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do -practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is -subject to the trademark license, especially commercial -redistribution. - - - -*** START: FULL LICENSE *** - -THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE -PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK - -To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free -distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work -(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project -Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project -Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at -http://gutenberg.org/license). - - -Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic works - -1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to -and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property -(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all -the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy -all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. -If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the -terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or -entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. - -1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be -used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who -agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few -things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works -even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See -paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement -and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic -works. See paragraph 1.E below. - -1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" -or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the -collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an -individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are -located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from -copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative -works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg -are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project -Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by -freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of -this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with -the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by -keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project -Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. - -1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern -what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in -a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check -the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement -before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or -creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project -Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning -the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United -States. - -1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: - -1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate -access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently -whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the -phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project -Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, -copied or distributed: - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with -almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or -re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included -with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org/license - -1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived -from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is -posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied -and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees -or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work -with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the -work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 -through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the -Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or -1.E.9. - -1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted -with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution -must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional -terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked -to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the -permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. - -1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this -work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. - -1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this -electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without -prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with -active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project -Gutenberg-tm License. - -1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, -compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any -word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or -distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than -"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version -posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), -you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a -copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon -request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other -form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm -License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. - -1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, -performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works -unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. - -1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing -access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided -that - -- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from - the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method - you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is - owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he - has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the - Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments - must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you - prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax - returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and - sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the - address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to - the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." - -- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies - you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he - does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm - License. You must require such a user to return or - destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium - and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of - Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any - money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the - electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days - of receipt of the work. - -- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free - distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. - -1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm -electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set -forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from -both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael -Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the -Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. - -1.F. - -1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable -effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread -public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm -collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic -works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain -"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or -corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual -property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a -computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by -your equipment. - -1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right -of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project -Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all -liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal -fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT -LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE -PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE -TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE -LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR -INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH -DAMAGE. - -1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a -defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can -receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a -written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you -received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with -your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with -the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a -refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity -providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to -receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy -is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further -opportunities to fix the problem. - -1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth -in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER -WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO -WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. - -1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied -warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. -If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the -law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be -interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by -the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any -provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. - -1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the -trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone -providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance -with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, -promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, -harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, -that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do -or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm -work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any -Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. - - -Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm - -Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of -electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers -including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists -because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from -people in all walks of life. - -Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the -assistance they need, are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's -goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will -remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project -Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure -and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. -To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation -and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 -and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. - - -Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive -Foundation - -The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit -501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the -state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal -Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification -number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at -http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent -permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. - -The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. -Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered -throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at -809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email -business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact -information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official -page at http://pglaf.org - -For additional contact information: - Dr. Gregory B. Newby - Chief Executive and Director - gbnewby@pglaf.org - - -Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg -Literary Archive Foundation - -Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide -spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of -increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be -freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest -array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations -($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt -status with the IRS. - -The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating -charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United -States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a -considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up -with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations -where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To -SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any -particular state visit http://pglaf.org - -While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we -have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition -against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who -approach us with offers to donate. - -International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make -any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from -outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. - -Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation -methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other -ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. -To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate - - -Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic -works. - -Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm -concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared -with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project -Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. - - -Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed -editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. -unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily -keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. - - -Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: - - http://www.gutenberg.org - -This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, -including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary -Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to -subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. - - -</pre> - -</body> -</html> diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/cover.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index cab7396..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/cover.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/cover_sm.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/cover_sm.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 0852e96..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/cover_sm.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo001.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo001.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 8914ddf..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo001.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo010.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo010.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index d4f6903..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo010.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo011a.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo011a.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 2ed8878..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo011a.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo011b.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo011b.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index ed99769..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo011b.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo014.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo014.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 91ac3a4..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo014.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo028.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo028.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index a283e7f..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo028.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo029.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo029.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index e20f6a2..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo029.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo030.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo030.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 3234f65..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo030.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo042.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo042.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 08c5fce..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo042.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo046.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo046.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index b4efc8a..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo046.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo047.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo047.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index f843eaa..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo047.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo060.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo060.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 127d5e7..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo060.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo064.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo064.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index dd6d064..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo064.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo065.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo065.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 32a8ecd..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo065.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo072.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo072.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index e93b494..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo072.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo080.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo080.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 52f8beb..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo080.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo082.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo082.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index f212150..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo082.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo083.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo083.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 209841c..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo083.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo100.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo100.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 78c64dd..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo100.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo101.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo101.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 20c1e25..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo101.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo110.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo110.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 8d64abb..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo110.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo111.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo111.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index be87126..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo111.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo111_lg.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo111_lg.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index ced0eb2..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo111_lg.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo112.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo112.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index b7cbd2c..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo112.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo115.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo115.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 4470d49..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo115.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo135.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo135.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 605132e..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo135.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo151.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo151.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index fefcf0c..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo151.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo153.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo153.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 0a17287..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo153.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo154.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo154.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 978abf4..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo154.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo158.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo158.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 9e250c8..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo158.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo165.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo165.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 713320e..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo165.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo171.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo171.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index a3c2d9b..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo171.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo172.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo172.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index f4f5151..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo172.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo173.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo173.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index f56d38b..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo173.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo181.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo181.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index b05718b..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo181.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo189.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo189.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 1515554..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo189.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo190.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo190.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index ee2e99d..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo190.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo193.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo193.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index c9843f4..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo193.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo203.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo203.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 9e994cd..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo203.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo207.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo207.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index c09082d..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo207.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo208.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo208.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index c9c52be..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo208.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo221.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo221.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 106f2ae..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo221.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo225.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo225.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 52dad35..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo225.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo226.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo226.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 670f03c..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo226.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo237_lg.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo237_lg.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 3797ab1..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo237_lg.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo237a.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo237a.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 9a879fe..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo237a.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo237b.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo237b.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index faaed49..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo237b.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo243.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo243.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 1bc8354..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo243.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo244.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo244.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index a1188de..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo244.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo251.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo251.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 9083ad5..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo251.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo257.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo257.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 09ba481..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo257.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo261.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo261.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index b0d5c6e..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo261.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo262.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo262.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 1b63b92..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo262.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo265.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo265.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 921fe7f..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo265.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo271.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo271.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 446b44a..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo271.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo279.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo279.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index c644e80..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo279.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo280.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo280.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 9703b67..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo280.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo285.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo285.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 3369d64..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo285.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo293.jpg b/old/55503-h/images/illo293.jpg Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index df63b8e..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo293.jpg +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo300a.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo300a.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index a58c73e..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo300a.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo300b.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo300b.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 7f528cc..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo300b.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo300c.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo300c.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 8cc4664..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo300c.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo304.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo304.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 2883cb5..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo304.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo313.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo313.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 11d7a46..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo313.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo321a.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo321a.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index fcb3b6e..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo321a.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo321b.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo321b.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 2d15aa8..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo321b.png +++ /dev/null diff --git a/old/55503-h/images/illo341.png b/old/55503-h/images/illo341.png Binary files differdeleted file mode 100644 index 36e0544..0000000 --- a/old/55503-h/images/illo341.png +++ /dev/null |
