now for what purpose.

I got into this house without any difficulty, because the door was
smashed in. I stayed there from Saturday, Aug. 22, up to Wednesday, the
26th, a little more comfortable. There was nothing to eat left in the
house. I lived on what a few women who remained in Aerschot could give
me. I was forced to go with the soldiers into the cellars of M.X.,
director of a large factory, to hunt for wine. As recompense I got a
loaf. It was not much, but at this moment it meant very much for me.

On Wednesday, Aug. 26, we were all once more locked up in the church. It
was then half-past four in the afternoon. We could not get out, even for
our necessities. On Thursday, about 9 o'clock, each of us was given a
piece of bread and a glass of water. This was to last the whole day. At
10 o'clock a Lieutenant came in, accompanied by fifteen soldiers. He
placed all the men who were left in a square, selected seventy of us and
ordered us out to bury the corpses of Germans and Belgians around the
town, which had been lying there since the battle of the 19th. That was
a week that these bodies had remained there, and it is no use to ask if
there was a stench. Afterward we had to clean the streets, and then it
was evening.

They just got ready to shoot us. There were then ten of us. The guns had
already been leveled at us, when suddenly a German soldier ran out
shouting that we had not fired on them. A few minutes before we had
heard rifle firing and the Germans said it was the Aerschot people who
were shooting, though all these had been locked up in the church and we
were the only inhabitants then in the streets, cleaning them, under
surveillance of Germans. It was this German who saved our lives.

Picture to yourself what we have suffered! It is impossible to describe.
On Aug. 28 we were brought to Louvain, always guarded by German
soldiers. There were with us about twenty old men, over eighty years of
age. These were placed in two carts, tied to one another in pairs. I and
about twenty of my unfortunate compatriots had then to pull the carts
all the way to Louvain. It was hard, but that could be supported all the
same.

On arriving at Louvain I saw with my own eyes a German who shot at us.
The Germans who were at the station shouted "The civilians have been
shooting," and commenced a fusillade against us. Many of us fell dead,
others wounded, but I had the chance to run away.

I now took the road to Tirlemont, marchi