The Land of Deepening Shadow: Germany-at-War

by D. Thomas Curtin

CHAPTER XXIII

HOW GERMANY DENIES

Germany, according to Reichstag statements, is spending millions of pounds upon German propaganda throughout the universe. The trend of that propaganda is:—

1. To attempt to convince the neutral world that Germany cannot be beaten; and

2. Above all, to convince Great Britain (the chief enemy) that Germany cannot be beaten.

The only factors really feared by the Germans of the governing class are the Western front and the blockade.

I went into Germany determined to try to find out the truth, and to tell the truth. I had an added incentive to be thorough and work on original lines, since I was fortunate enough to secure possession of an official letter which advised those whom it concerned to give no information of value to Americans in general. I also got accurate information that the Wilhelmstrasse had singled me out as one American in particular to whom nothing of value was to be imparted.

The German, with his cast-in-a-mould mind, does not understand the trait developed among other peoples of seeing things for themselves. He is unacquainted with originality in human beings. He thinks a correspondent does not observe anything unless it is pointed out to him.

Last summer, for example, one could learn in the Wilhelmstrasse that the potato crop was a glittering success. By walking through the country and pulling up an occasional plant, also talking to the farmers, I concluded that it was a dismal failure, which conclusion I announced in one of the first newspaper articles I wrote after I had left Germany. Recent reports from that country show that I was right, which increases my conviction that the confidential tips given by Germany's professional experts, who instruct neutral visitors, do very well to make Germany's position seem better than it actually is, but they seldom stand the acid test of history.

Seeking to invent excuses is not peculiar to the Germans, but it is more prevalent among them than among any other people that I know. In this one respect the German Government is a Government of the people. Some of the diplomatic explanations which have emanated from Berlin during the war have been weird in their absurdity and an insult to the intelligence of those to whom they were addressed.

President Wilson did not accept the official lie concerning the sinking of the Arabic, in view of the positive proof against Germany, and Germany backed down. President Wilson did not accept the official lie concerning the sinking of the Sussex. Incomprehensible as it is to the Teutonic mind, he attached greater weight to the first-hand evidence of reliable eye-witnesses, plus fragments of the torpedo which struck the vessel, than to the sacred words of the German Foreign Office, which had the impertinence to base its case on a sketch, or alleged sketch, hastily made by a U-boat manipulator whose artistic temperament should have led him to Munich rather than to Kiel. The crime and the lie were so glaring that Germany once more backed down.

Germany lied about the Dutch liner Tubantia. As in the case of the Sussex, the evidence of the fragments of torpedo was so incontrovertible that Berlin had to admit that a German torpedo sank the Tubantia. Indeed, one fragment contained the number of the torpedo. During my travels in the Fatherland at that time I found no doubt in the minds of those with whom I discussed the matter that a German submarine sank the vessel, though many were of the opinion that it was a mistake.

The Wilhelmstrasse is tenacious, however, and we awoke one morning to read, what was probably its most remarkable excuse. To be sure, a German torpedo sank the Tubantia, but it was not fired by the Germans. The expert accountant who was in charge of the U-boat learned upon consulting his books that he fired that torpedo on March 6. It did not strike the Tubantia until March 16. So that it had either been floating about aimlessly and had encountered the liner, or perhaps the cunning British had corraled it and made use of it. At any rate, Berlin disclaimed all responsibility for its acts subsequent to the day it parted company with the German submarine.

The path of the torpedo, however, had been observed from the bridge of the Tubantia.

I remarked to one of my well-informed confidants among the Social Democratic politicians that although it is perfectly true that a rolling stone gathers no moss, it is equally true that a moving torpedo leaves no wake.

"Yes," he said with a twinkle in his eye, "our Foreign Office is well aware of that. Have you not noticed the significance of the two dates, March 6, when the torpedo is said to have been fired, and March 16, when it struck? Do you not see that our diplomats have still one more loop-hole in case they are pressed? Is it not clear that they could find a way out of their absurd explanation by shifting the responsibility to the man or the men who jotted down the date and transferred it? The question in my mind is: Who lost the 1 from the 16?"

Be that as it may, little Holland, enraged at the wanton destruction of one of her largest vessels, was not in a position to enforce her demands. Therefore Germany did not back down—that is, not publicly.

My description of the return of the Prussian Guard to Potsdam naturally aroused the wrath of a Government which strives incessantly, to hide so much from its own people and the outside world.

Directly the article reached Germany the Government flashed a wireless to America that no members of the Potsdam Guard returned to Potsdam from Contalmaison. This is a typical German denial trick. I never mentioned the Potsdam Guard.

I had referred to the Prussian Guard.

If any reader of this chapter cares to look into the files of English newspapers at the time of the Contalmaison battle, for such it was, they will find confirmation of my statements as to the presence of the Prussian Guard in the English despatches published in the second week in July.

The Contalmaison article has in whole or in part been circulated in the United States, and also in the South-American Republics, and probably in other neutral countries. This has now called forth a semi-official detailed denial, which I print herewith.

It is signed by the Head Staff Doctor at Potsdam, one Geronne, by name. He divides his contradiction into ten clauses. Each of the first nine contains an absolute untruth.

The last is a mere comment on a well-known, German statesman, who told me that as I was seeking the truth in Germany I had better go and find it at Potsdam.

I wish to deal with the denials one by one, as each is a revelation of German psychology.

1. The hospital train, This says "Hospital
which reached Potsdam on train" (singular). I
August 4, and was there described hospital trains
unloaded, brought wounded (plural). It may be true
men from various troop that one train did not
divisions. There were no contain any Prussian Guards.
Prussian Guards among them. I did not happen to see
that train. All the trains
that I saw unloaded Prussian
Guard Reserves.

2. No wounded man is I have never said that
kept concealed in Germany. any wounded man was
All are consigned to kept concealed in Germany.
public hospitals or I have pointed out
lazarets, where they may that the whole system of
at any time be visited the German placing of the
by their relatives and wounded is to hide from
friends. the German population,
and especially in Social
Democrat districts, the
extent of their wounded.

3. Hospital trains travel This is absolutely untrue.
by day as well as by night, The number of wounded arriving
and, in accordance with at the depots in Germany is
instructions, are unloaded now so great that the trains
only in the daytime. In are obliged to be unloaded
case they reach their whenever they arrive, by day
destination during the or by night. I have witnessed
night, the regulations both.
provide that they are to
wait until the following
morning before unloading.

4. In order that the loading The whole of this paragraph
or unloading of the vehicles is a transparent distortion
which transport the wounded of fact. What happens at
to the lazarets may proceed Potsdam and what happens
as rapidly as possible, it everywhere else is that a
is necessary to keep the cordon of police surrounds
surroundings of the train the scene and, drives the
clear. The wounded must public by force in the usual
also be spared all annoyance Prussian way, if necessary,
and curiosity on the part from the scene. I described
of the public. the method by which I
witnessed what was going on
at the railway station from
the railway station
refreshment room itself.

5. Dead men have never been I saw the dead men removed. unloaded from the lazaret trains at Potsdam—therefore there could have been none on August 4, 1916. The principle of transporting the wounded is based upon the ability of the wounded to bear transportation. All those who suffer during the journey are removed to a hospital at the frontier.

6. The furniture vans A transparent untruth
used for transporting on the face of it. If only
wounded to the hospitals one train came into Potsdam
at Potsdam and other why use furniture vans at
cities have proved a great all? The furniture vans
success. These vans, are used for purposes of
moreover, all bear the sign concealment, and because
of the Red Cross, and may the very large ambulance
easily be recognised as supply always on duty at
hospital vehicles. the great military
hospitals at Potsdam was
unequal to the task. I saw
no Red Cross indications.

7. That men who are My statement is that all
seriously wounded should the German wounded at
give one an impression of the present stage of the
weariness goes without war, lightly or otherwise,
saying. Lightly wounded compare badly with the
men who travel from the English and French
Somme to Boulogne may wounded, whom I have
make a better appearance seen. They are utterly
than the seriously wounded war weary and suffering
who have made the long not so much from shell
journey from the West shock as from surprise
front to Potsdam. shock, the revelation of the
creation of a British
Army that had never
occurred to the German
soldiers.

8. As to the great "Hush! I have made inquiries hush! machinery"—what is of British officials, and one to call the attempt they tell me that it is to keep the truth from absolutely untrue that the neutrals by closing channel is closed to English harbours near the neutral shipping when the Channel to neutral shipping English hospital transports for whole days at a proceed to England. time—during which the This untruth is on a par English ship-transports of with the others. wounded proceed to England?

9. The figures published An interesting revelation
by the Ministry of War as to German casualty lists.
concerning the numbers of It is stated by this head
men dismissed from lazarets medical officer of Potsdam
(hospitals) are based upon that these lists are drawn up
unquestionable statistics. from the men dismissed from
These statistics remain as lazarets (hospitals), that is
given—despite all the to say, this doctor admits
aspersions of our enemies. that the custom is now to
keep back the casualty lists
until the man is discharged,
whereas your British lists, I
am informed on authority, are
published as speedily as
possible after the soldier is
wounded. The whole of the
German wounded now in hospitals
have not yet, therefore, been
included in casualty lists—the
casualties which are forcing
the Germans to employ every
kind of labour they can
enslave or enroll from
Belgium, Poland, France,
and now from their own
people from sixteen up to
sixty years of age of both
sexes.

10. It would prove interesting For obvious reasons I to learn the name of the decline to subject my "patriotic German Statesman," friend to the certain who is said to cherish the punishment that would follow same opinions as this writer disclosure of his name. in the Daily Mail.

I regret to burden readers with a chapter so personal to myself, but I think that anyone who studies these German denials with the preceding chapter on the Contalmaison wounded will learn at least as much about the German mind as he would by studying the famous British White paper of August, 1914.