FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104  
105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   >>   >|  
f Lisognes (Belgian Ardennes) "the Chasseur of Marburg, having placed three women in line, killed them all with one shot." (c) A few lines more, taken from the notebook of the Reservist Schlauter (Third Battery, Fourth Regiment, Field Artillery of the Guard,) (Fig. 8:) Aug. 25, (in Belgium.)--We shot 300 of the inhabitants of the town. Those that survived the salvo were requisitioned as grave diggers. You should have seen the women at that time! But it was impossible to do otherwise. In our march upon Wilot things went better; the inhabitants who wished to leave were allowed to do so. But whoever fired was shot. Upon our leaving Owele the rifles rang out, and with that, flames, women, and all the rest. [Illustration: Figure 8.] IV. Frequently when a German troop want to carry a position, they place before them civilians--men, women, and children--and find shelter behind these ramparts of living flesh. As such a stratagem is essentially playing upon the nobility of heart of the adversary, and saying to him "you won't fire upon these unfortunates, I know it, and I hold you at my mercy, unarmed, because you are not as craven as I am," as it implies a homage to the enemy and the self-degradation of the one employing it, it is almost inconceivable that soldiers should resort to it; it represents a new invention in the long story of human vileness, which even the dreadful Penitentiels of the Middle Ages had not discovered. In reading the stories from French, Belgian, and English sources, attributing such practices to the Germans, it has made me doubt, if not the truthfulness, at least the detailed exactness of the stories. It seemed to me that the tales must be of crimes by men who would be disavowed, individual lapses, which do not dishonor the nation, because the nation on ascertaining them would repudiate them. But how can we doubt that the German Nation has, on the contrary, accepted these acts as exploits worthy of herself, that in them she recognizes her own aptitudes, and finds pleasure in the contemplation; how, I ask, can we doubt this in reading the following narrative signed by a Bavarian officer, Lieut. A. Eberlein, spread out in the columns of one of the best known periodicals of Germany, the Muenchner Neueste Nachrichten, in its issue of Wednesday, Oct. 7, 1914, Page 22, Lieut. Eberlein relates there the occupation of Saint-Die at the end of August. He entere
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104  
105   106   107   108   109   110   111   112   113   114   115   116   117   118   119   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
reading
 

stories

 

German

 
nation
 

Eberlein

 
inhabitants
 

Belgian

 

detailed

 

resort

 

entere


represents

 
truthfulness
 

exactness

 

employing

 

inconceivable

 

soldiers

 

French

 

English

 

discovered

 
dreadful

Middle

 

sources

 
vileness
 

Penitentiels

 

Germans

 

attributing

 

practices

 
August
 

invention

 
ascertaining

Bavarian

 

signed

 

officer

 

spread

 
columns
 

narrative

 

pleasure

 
contemplation
 

Wednesday

 

Nachrichten


periodicals

 
Germany
 

Muenchner

 

Neueste

 

aptitudes

 

Nation

 

repudiate

 

contrary

 

accepted

 

dishonor