Behind the Scenes in Warring Germany

by Edward Lyell Fox

Graduated from a military academy at sixteen, appointed to the infantry as a lieutenant before 1866, he fought in the war against Austria. He first came to the attention of the eyes of the German army at the Battle of Königgrätz when with fifty of his men he charged an Austrian battery. A grape shot grazed his skull and he fell stunned. Lifting himself up, he saw that his men had gone on and had captured two of the Austrian guns. The other three field pieces were being dragged away by the Austrians. Staggering to his feet, young Von Hindenburg, his face streaming with blood, rallied his men and with a wave of his sword charged after the fleeing Austrians. On their heels for more than a mile, he finally attacked them, although outnumbered three to one, and captured them. For this he was decorated with the Red Eagle Order.

There came the Franco Prussian war. Von Hindenburg was now an Ober-Lieutenant. He came through the battles of Gravelotte and Sedan; he was in the siege of Paris and when LeBourget was stormed, the young officer led a charge—and they gave him the Iron Cross. From that time on his rise was rapid. A captain on the General Staff, then Major, so up through the grades of the Chief of Staff of the Eighth Army Corps to the Commander of the Fourth Army Corps to a General of Infantry, which high office he held until 1911.

During the period of his retirement which came in 1911, he began to study the farm lands of East Prussia socketed with the lakes and swamps. This was to be the battleground of an inevitable war with Russia. He began to study the region until he knew every square mile by heart from Königsberg on the Baltic down through the network of lakes south of Tannenberg. On paper he fought there a thousand different campaigns. It is said that he became almost fanatical on the subject. In his classes at the War Academy where he was an instructor he became known as The Old Man of the Swamps. He used to go round Berlin with a folder of maps, and any officer whom he could buttonhole, he drew him aside and talked of the Masurian lakes. He became so obsessed with this subject that officers fled at his approach. They began to call him Swampy Hindenburg. But as he rose in rank and as he commanded troops during the maneuvers in East Prussia, the General Staff realized that Hindenburg knew the country.

There came a day when Von Hindenburg was appointed umpire of a big maneuver in East Prussia. The Army of the Red—so the story runs—was commanded by the German Emperor, opposing him was the Army of the Blue. The sham battle ended rather undecisively. The Emperor and all the lesser generals met in the center of the field at the Grosse Kritic to hear the criticisms of umpire Von Hindenburg. Hindenburg was unmerciful. He tore the reputation of the General of the Blues to tatters. He demonstrated that this officer had made the grossest blunders. For half an hour in unsparing language Hindenburg, who had his own ideas about how every battle in East Prussia should be fought, criticized the General. It occurred to the Emperor that Von Hindenburg was concentrating his criticism upon the Army of the Blue and that he had said nothing whatever about the Army of the Red, which the Kaiser himself commanded. The Kaiser asked Von Hindenburg about this, remarking that it was noticeable that nothing had been said about his army and adding that for the benefit of all the officers the Army of the Red should also be criticized. Von Hindenburg continued to say nothing about it. Again the Emperor asked him.

"Your Majesty," Von Hindenburg said bluntly, "I deliberately refrained from criticizing your army. That is why I took the leader of the Blues so severely to task. For if I had been he, with his opportunities, I would have driven Your Majesty's troops into the Baltic Sea."

The Emperor concealed his displeasure. Presently Von Hindenburg was retired. Though retired, Von Hindenburg managed to obtain a detachment of grumbling troops from Königsberg and led them down into the Masurian swamp region to work out his problems. He would insist upon the cannon being pulled through the muddiest parts of the lake district and when they became mired fast it always seemed to please him. After several days he would bring the exhausted soldiers and horses and muddy guns back to Königsberg where the officers would tell each other that the "old man" was quite mad.

In those few years Von Hindenburg got the reputation for being a bore. All he would talk about was the swamps. They even say in Berlin that he would pour the blackest of beer on a table top to indicate swamp water, and then would work out a military problem during his dinner. Absurd exaggerations obviously, but still there must have been some basis for it. One day one of those members of the Reichstag who believe that all a country has to do is to make money, proposed that the Masurian lakes be filled in, and that the ground be given over to intensive farming. Von Hindenburg read the news that night in Posen and caught a train for Berlin. He was in a rage. Fill in his pet lakes and swamps! Unglaublich! Not to be thought of! They say he went to see the Emperor about it, that he brought with him all his maps and battlelines.

They say that he told the Emperor that if Masurenland was filled in it would be the greatest military crime in the history of the German nation. He did not go away until the Emperor promised that the swamps should remain.

Then came the war. The Russians were mobilized. They were on the frontier. The Old Man of the Swamps offered his services to the Emperor. He was a retired general, though. The Emperor had his regular generals to the army of East Prussia. There was General von Prittwitz, for instance. The Russians got into East Prussia. General von Prittwitz was soon deposed. Everybody in military Germany knows that through the blunders of certain high officers the small army that the Germans had in the field against Russia early in August was very nearly annihilated. I personally know of one atrocious blunder when a single unsupported cavalry division was sent from Insterburg to rescue a Landwehr division that was outnumbered eight to one by the Russians. The cavalry knew that there was so few that they could do nothing. Still the orders were to go and they had to go. Such was the campaign of East Prussia.

The Emperor went to Moltke, then his Chief of Staff. The Emperor said that the German troops in East Prussia were not being handled properly. He demanded another general. Moltke named one man after another and the Emperor shook his head. Moltke was at the end of his list. "Is there no one else you can recommend?" asked the Emperor.