Some Comparisons.
Mr. Gerard, in a note of June 28, 1916 [Miscel. No. 25 (1916)], animadverts strongly on the bad accommodation still provided at Ruhleben. The letter is rather strikingly different in tone from his other reports on Ruhleben.
It is intolerable that people of education should be herded six together in a horse’s stall, and in some of the lofts the bunks touch one another. The light for reading is bad, and reading is a necessity if these poor prisoners are to be detained during another winter. In the haylofts above the stables the conditions are even worse.[24]
Bishop Bury’s account (“My Visit to Ruhleben,” p. 30) reads:
I don’t know whether it was our internment at Newbury,[25] the race-course for Reading, or our using race-courses, such as Kempton Park, for the training of our own men, which caused Ruhleben to be chosen in November, 1914, as a suitable place for civilians’ internment.... Without any description of mine it may be easily understood what they had to suffer until proper arrangements were made.... The loose boxes are now properly fitted with bunks, some being larger than others. The large corridor, with its stone floor, gives air and space, the lofts particularly being extremely well adapted now for their present purpose. I prefer the lofts to the boxes, because they have corridors out of which one can look, whereas the windows in the boxes are usually far above the ground. I went to tea more frequently in the boxes, and on one occasion we sat down sixteen in number—rather a crowd—but we were quite comfortable.
Bishop Bury has seen something on both sides, and his impressions are for that reason all the more important. We must not forget, too, that he lived a week with the prisoners at Ruhleben. It is also only fair to remember that no one has been invited to spend a week in any camp on this side. Bishop Bury also tells us “that when, a little time ago, the authorities proposed to relieve the overcrowding and construct another camp at Havilburg which could accommodate 600 men, the men at once petitioned that this idea might not be carried out, as they preferred, after this length of time to stay where they are.” (l.c., p. 40.)
One caution must, however, be given to the readers of Bishop Bury’s book. The conditions of the camp during the excitement and interest of his visit could not be the normal conditions. The frightful monotony of the long confinement does not obtrude itself in his book. Yet there is no doubt, I fear, that internment everywhere (at Ruhleben, as elsewhere) is becoming “intolerable.” To live, as at Alexandra Palace, day and night, for years in a great hall with more than a thousand others must become almost destructive to any sensitive nature. But (to quote Dr. Siegmund Schulze once more) “We ought not to conclude from this that we are justified in making reproaches.... in respect of the treatment of prisoners, but rather conclude that we should work energetically towards the termination of the war.”
Dr. Cimino, very, and very naturally, anti-German as he is, writes:
The only real suffering we experienced at Ruhleben was from the cold.... The fact is that he (Count Schwerin) was as kind-hearted an old soldier as ever fondled an English wife, and loved his English prisoners.... He used to take part in our daily life as much as possible.... As to the concerts, he was always present, et pour cause; he was passionately fond of music.... at the end of the concert he would make his little speech, and we filed out. But one night we gave him a rousing cheer, and the whole crowd struck up, “For he’s a jolly good fellow.” (“Behind the Prison Bars in Germany,” p. 95).[26]
As to the food question, we must not forget that the blockade against Germany and the pressure upon neutrals have been continually increased in stringency. Up to October, 1915, Mr. Gerard could write as follows of Ruhleben:
The food material is excellent and the cooking, as I have stated, is attended to by the prisoners themselves, those doing the cooking receiving payment from the British fund, with the exception of 150M. weekly allowed for cooks’ wages by the German authorities. The prisoners are given, if they choose, a bread-card, and are allowed to purchase extra bread—the Kriegsbrod, which we all use in Germany and which is quite palatable—at the price of 55 pfennige a loaf. Food also, as I have stated, can be purchased in the canteen at prices very much less than food can be purchased in Berlin, and at very much less than cost.—[Miscel, No. 3 (1916)].
The low price at the canteen, was, however, I take it, owing to the existence of the camp fund contributed to by the British Government.
Lord Newton spoke in the House of Lords on February 22, 1917, on the question of prisoners of war. The following extract is from the Daily Telegraph report:
There was nothing to be gained by exaggerating the conditions of prisoners in Germany or elsewhere. There was neither sense nor truth in representing, as was constantly done, that Ruhleben was a sort of unspeakable hell upon earth, and that a British internment camp was a kind of paradise compared with it. He deplored the hardship that these men underwent, but it was a great mistake to suppose that these civilians at Ruhleben were undergoing greater hardships than those being endured by our military prisoners. Like anyone who ventured to state the facts, he would no doubt be accused of being a pro-German, but certainly the conditions at Ruhleben had greatly improved recently. These conditions had improved, not on account of any action on the part of the German Government, but rather on account of their inaction. They had permitted the British there to organise on their own lines and make the conditions tolerable. Anyone could satisfy himself as to the conditions, because there were men who had arrived here recently who could give the fullest information. In addition, they were able to form their own opinions to a certain extent from independent testimony, for example, the visit of Bishop Bury. He could not understand why this prelate had been subjected to so much attack on the part of certain persons in this country. He went to Germany by permission of the German Government. He went to Ruhleben, lived in the camp, and was able to see what the conditions were. He reported exactly what he saw, and was thereupon denounced as not only being an inaccurate person but obviously pro-German.