Although I have some claims to write as a jurist I have here made no attempt to pray in aid the Hague Regulations in order to frame the counts of an indictment. The Germans have broken all laws, human and divine, and not even the ancient freemasonry of arms, whose honourable traditions are almost as old as war itself, has restrained them in their brutal and licentious fury. It is useless to attempt to discriminate between the people and their rulers; an abundance of diaries of soldiers in the ranks shows that all are infected with a common spirit. That spirit is pride, not the pride of high and pure endeavour, but that pride for which the Greeks found a name in the word ὕβρις, the insolence which knows no pity and feels no love. Long ago Renan warned Strauss of this canker which was eating into the German character. Pedants indoctrinated it, Generals instilled it, the Emperor preached it. The whole people were taught that war was a normal state of civilisation, that the lust of conquest and the arrogance of race were the most precious of the virtues. On this Dead Sea fruit the German people have been fed for a generation until they are rotten to the core.
Chapter III
DOCUMENTARY
I
DEPOSITIONS AND STATEMENTS (FIFTY-SIX IN NUMBER) ILLUSTRATING BREACHES OF THE LAWS OF WAR BY THE GERMAN TROOPS, MAINLY OUTRAGES ON BRITISH SOLDIERS
Note.—These documents are here made public for the first time. They have not been published either in the Bryce Report or in the Nineteenth Century and After. I have selected the cases of Bailleul and Doulieu as typical of all the rest. Many other communes, e.g., Meteren, Steenwerck, La Gorgue, Vieux-Berquin, suffered a similar fate. As regards Bailleul itself I have given only one out of some twenty documents in my possession relating to the rapes committed there; the others are in no way inferior in authenticity, nor are they any less horrible. My object is not to multiply proofs, but to exemplify them. It will be observed that the evidence of British soldiers here given is that of eye-witnesses, except, of course, in cases of rape. As regards the latter, the hearsay evidence is fully corroborated by the French depositions of the victims.—J. H. M.
(1)
Private R. R——, 1st Royal Scots:—At Ypres, on November 11th (the day I was wounded), the Germans had made an attack on the trenches in front of us—we were back in the dug-outs. We went up to support and drove them back. In the trench were about a dozen Germans, our men having retired towards us. The Germans were kneeling with one hand up to let us see that they had surrendered; so we thought it was all right, and we turned our attention to firing at those who were retiring. One of the officers of our regiment, but not of my company, was at the side of the trench and had picked up a rifle to fire at the retreating Germans. I saw one of the Germans who had surrendered—I think he was an officer—raise his revolver (we had had no time to disarm them) and shoot at our officer, who dropped. Another man and I then shot the German.
(2)
Private W. M——, 1st Wilts, — Company:—(1) On the Aisne, between September 14th and 22nd, I was in B Company and going to A Company for a wounded man. I am a bandsman and have acted as stretcher-bearer. The Germans came out of a wood with a white flag. The captain (Captain R——) of — Company gave the order to cease fire—the Company was in the trenches. Captain R—— went forward alone towards the Germans, and the German officer then shot Captain R—— with his revolver and the rest of the Germans opened a heavy fire. Number — Company replied and drove the Germans back.
(2) At La Bassée, between October 12th and 27th, the Germans had shelled our trenches and driven us out, their infantry advancing in close formation. By that time only eleven out of B Company, including myself, were left. The Germans were within fifty yards of us and so we retired through a brewery down to a farm-house. We went upstairs—a mixed lot from various regiments (West Kents, Royal Irish Rifles, etc.), and began firing from the windows. From the upstairs we saw the Germans bayoneting those of our wounded who had been left in the trenches or placed under cover by us eleven, behind them, or had crawled along.
(3) At La Coutérie,[92] about 3 kilometres from La Bassée, it must have been before October 12th, because that was the day we got to La Bassée, we took possession of a farm-house for a dressing station. The farmer’s wife frequently took food and clothes down to the cellar, she said it was for her daughter; the daughter would not come up. The mother, who was crying as she told us, made out to us that the “Allemands” had outraged her daughter—she held up five fingers.