went away apparently satisfied. After their
departure rifle shots were heard in the distance. A little later a
second troop, composed of about thirty men, presented themselves in
their turn, and accused the farm people of having killed a German
soldier. Immediately the farmer, Elly, and one of his guests, M.
Javelot, were seized and taken to a place near, where, in spite of
their protestations of innocence, they were mercilessly shot.

At Louppy-le-Chateau the Germans gave themselves over to immorality
and disgusting brutality during the night of the 8th and 9th in a
cellar where several women had taken refuge from the bombardment. All
these unhappy women were vilely ill-treated. Mlle. X., aged 71; Mme.
Y., aged 44, and her two daughters, one aged 13 and the other 8, and
Mme. Z. were violated.

Hostages have been taken away from many communes. At the beginning of
September, at Laimont, eight persons were obliged to follow the German
troops, and on the 27th of October none of them had returned. The cure
of Nubecourt, who was carried off on the 5th of September, has not yet
reappeared in his parish.

At Saint-Andre, M. Havette, who was among the number of persons
arrested, obtained from an officer permission to watch over the body
of his wife, who had been killed on the previous day by a fragment of
a shell. In the evening the inhabitants were ordered to collect
together in a barn. Havette believed that he was exempt from this
order by reason of the authority he had received, and remained at his
house until 11 in the evening. When he left his house he was struck
down by a rifle bullet.

Of the other villages besides those whose burning we have related,
Vassincourt and Brabant-le-Roi were more or less completely burned. Up
to now it has not been possible for us to ascertain completely the
circumstances of their destruction. Our inquiry so far as it concerns
them will be further pursued.

It has been brought to our knowledge that in the Department of the
Meuse the enemy has committed acts of cruelty toward the French
soldiers who were wounded and prisoners. We will set out the facts of
this at the end of the present report.

MEURTHE-ET-MOSELLE.

We arrived in the Department of Meurthe-et-Moselle on the 26th of
October, and visited a great number of communes in the arrondissements
of Nancy and Luneville.

Nancy, an open town into which the German Army has not been able to
enter, was bombarded without formal war