It would be difficult to surpass, in this respect, an article which appeared in the January number of Kunst und Künstler. It gives the reproduction of an engraving by Callot: a camp in which musketeers are putting to death condemned men bound to stakes. "Execution of francs-tireurs," says the legend in German. That there should be a question of "francs-tireurs" in the time of Callot, who died in 1635, may in itself seem somewhat strange. But the engraver has taken care to inscribe, under his work, some lines describing the scene which it represents, which may be translated as follows:—
"Those who to give their evil nature sway,
Failing in duty, take the tyrant's way,
Infringing right, delighting but in ill,
Whose acts are full of treason and self-will,
Cause in the camp full many a bloody brawl,
So die this death, the end of traitors all."
It is enough to read this legend to realize that they are traitors who are being punished; but the German mind of to-day is so steeped in the idea of "francs-tireurs" that the artists no longer understand what their predecessors wrote, and, like the soldiers, they see francs-tireurs everywhere.
Responsibility of the Leaders.
But it is above all the great massacres of Andenne, Tamines, Dinant, Termonde, Aerschot, Louvain, and Luxemburg, which are for ever inexcusable, and will remain, an eternal disgrace, as a stain upon the German flag. Their appetite whetted by the atrocities committed during the first days of the invasion, the soldiers themselves invented or simulated attacks of "francs-tireurs," in order to have the pleasure of afterwards repressing them, killing, pillaging, and burning entire cities. Let us say, to be just, that not the soldiers but their leaders will bear, before the bar of history, the responsibility of this revival of the monstrosities of barbarism. Is it not obvious that in an army as highly disciplined as the German, an army in which the officers drive their men into battle under the threat of their revolvers, and in which the soldiers obey such injunctions, such deliberately prepared tragedies as that of Louvain are possible only with the complicity of the officers, or rather by their orders? How else can we conceive that soldiers would post themselves in a garden and thence fire their rifles into the streets? (N.R.C., 10th September, 1914, evening edition). And it is not the subaltern officers that we have to call to account for these butcheries, but the generals, such as Baron von Bissing, since become Governor-General of Belgium, who counsels the soldiery to show themselves pitiless, and not to allow themselves to be swayed by any humanitarian consideration, for compassion would be an act of treason (compare p. [336]). The soldiers are advised that it is permissible for them "to make the innocent suffer with the guilty" (p. [84]); that they may hang, without further ceremony, those who have committed the crime of being found present, for whatever reason, in a house where munitions or arms have been found (p. [335]); and also those who have attempted to escape while they were being held as hostages (p. [151]). The previous Governor-General of Belgium announced that soldiers need not be sure whether suspects are accessories or not, but that "if any hostility is displayed towards them they may raze a city to the ground." Such is the fate that General von Bülow promised the city of Brussels. The same general thought it incumbent upon him officially to inform the people of Brussels, Liége, and Namur that it was with his consent that the town of Andenne was burned, and about one hundred persons shot (6th Report, IV).
By these proclamations and others equally sanguinary the military authorities wished to influence both the Germans and the Belgians. The former were absolved beforehand of the horrors they committed, and were assured of impunity for all the "reprisals" they might be pleased to undertake. Moreover, they were kept in perpetual horror of "francs-tireurs." Are they assailed unexpectedly by soldiers of the enemy's army? They fall back without assuring themselves of what has really happened, and return with the main body of the army to expend their rage against the "francs-tireurs." This is what took place at Tamines where more than four hundred citizens were shot down by rifle or machine-gun fire, and also in a dozen villages of Bas-Luxembourg, which were razed to the ground, and in which a thousand inhabitants were shot.
Animosity toward the Clergy.
The military chiefs bear an especial grudge against the clergy. In the manifestoes against "francs-tireurs" the priests are specially mentioned, which amounts to recommending them quite specially to the savagery of the troops. The latter are convinced that the priests incite their flocks from the pulpit, and that they place machine-guns in the belfries. So, in the sack of a village, the worst treatment is always reserved for the priests and the churches.
The pastoral letter of His Excellency Cardinal Mercier gives a list of forty-three priests shot or executed.[15]