Now it should be explained that in the Great War captivity meant confinement in the strictest sense of the term, and the roystering days at Verdun in the Napoleonic Wars were not repeated. In those days prisoners on parole kept their private apartments, their carriages, and their mistresses, and racketed, if they wished to—so long as they kept within a reasonable and elastic law—to their heart’s content. In the Great War it was the wish, rightly and clearly expressed by Lord Grey, that officers should use the privileges of parole to take walks outside the camp only when they could not get sufficient exercise within it to keep themselves fit. When, therefore, in previous camps the British had availed themselves of this privilege, they had been in the habit, before starting on the walk, of handing in a signed card to the Germans on which it was stated that they undertook not to do two things:—to escape or in any way to facilitate future escape, or to damage German property. The arrangement had proved perfectly satisfactory.
But at Holzminden, when the cards were produced for us to sign, there was a whole charter of other things that we must or might not do when we went out for walks. We were required, for instance, to sign to the effect that we would unhesitatingly obey the orders of the German officer or N.C.O. accompanying us; this hit at the whole basis of the parole idea. We were asked to append our names underneath a clause which stated that we knew that the breaking of our parole was punishable with the death penalty; this merely insulted our intelligence. We were determined that we would either take walks on parole on the terms of heretofore or not take them at all. This spirit of dogged conservatism when there was so clearly everything to lose and nothing much to gain might seem petty and unreasonable, were it not remembered, firstly, that any attempt to interfere with our parole was in honour bound to be furiously contested, and secondly, that if in the course of business you conceded the German an inch, he was pretty certain shortly to make overtures for a mile.
Such, at any rate, is the opinion of the senior British officer, as he now bluntly demands the status quo ante in the matter of parole.
The General laughs and turns to his escort. Who are these British after all who should set themselves up on so high a pedestal? It is known that their parole was broken at Schwarmstedt, in the spirit, if not actually in the letter. The Major asks for corroborative detail. It is given and denied roundly.
The high and mighty Stellvertreter Kommandierende General does not lightly brook flat contradiction in his own domain, and begins to lose his temper. In other words, he begins to shout. The word “Baralong,” spat out so that all can hear, floats up to our upper window. He is presumably making some general allegation against the lost British sense of honour. Neither is our Major quite so cool as he was; “Lusitania” counters “Baralong.”
There is no further any attempt at concealment and the Fox bares his teeth in a snarl.
“If every Englishman in this command,” he storms, “got his deserts he would be shot.” And he stalks away with his staff in a white heat of passion.
The senior British officer sends for his Adjutant and an order goes round the camp that all parole cards will be torn up and no walks will take place until an apology is forthcoming.
View from Kaserne B, showing skating rink made in January 1918.