The German white book on the war in Belgium. A commentary

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The German white book on
the war in Belgium

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THE

WHITE BOOK

ON THE

WAR IN BELGIUM.

A COMMENTARY

BY

Professor A. A. H. STRUYCKEN.

ic articles here translated originally appeared in
"Van Onzen Tijd" (Amsterdam) on 31st July,
7th August, 14th August, and 21st
August, 1915.

THOMAS NELSON & SONS,

35 and 36, Paternoster Row, London, E.C.

EDINBURGH. NEW YORK. PARIS.

Price 2d.

THE

GERMAN WHITE BOOK

ON THE

WAR IN BELGIUM.

A COMMENTARY

BY

Professor A. A. H. STRUYCKEN.

The articles here translated originally appeared in

" Van Onzen Tijd " (Amsterdam) on 3 1 st July,

7th August, 14th August, and 21st

August, 1915.

THOMAS NELSON & SONS,
35 and 36, Paternoster Row, London, E.G.
EDINBURGH. NEW YORK. PARIS.

MAY 2 1 1974
TOR'S PREJ^CE.

The charges made against the German army
of misconduct at the time of the invasion of
Belgium during the months of August and
September, 1914, which have occupied so large
a place in the public press, received official con-
firmation in the Reports of the Belgian Com-
mittee. (" La Violation du Droit des Gens en
Belgique" Berger-Levrault, Paris, and Libraires-
Editeurs, Nancy. An English translation has
been published as a Parliamentary Paper :
" Reports on the Violation of the Eights of Nations
and of the Laws and Customs of War in Belgium"
Harrison and Sons, London.) This has been
supplemented by the important evidence collected
in this country among the Belgian refugees, and
published as the report of the Commission on
Alleged German Outrages.

Charges of this kind when made officially by
the government of the country could not be
ignored or left unanswered, and in May, 1915,

the German Government, which had hitherto con-
fined itself to vague and general repudiation of
the accusations, published their official reply. *
Those who wish to investigate one of the most
lamentable episodes in the whole history of war
are therefore now able to compare the case for
what we may call the prosecution and the defence.
But this comparison requires a trained legal mind,
it can only be made by one who is accustomed
to weigh, analyse and test evidence. It is a
comparison which, moreover, can be better under-
taken by the citizen of a neutral state than by
one whose country is a participant in the war.
This is the task which Professor Struycken has
undertaken. No one could be better suited for
the work. For many years a distinguished pro-
fessor in the faculty of Law at the University
of Amsterdam, and now a member of the Council
of State, he belongs to a country which has from
the time of Grotius associated itself with the
effort to bring international relations and the
conduct of war under the influence of Law and

* It should be noted that the Report of the English
Commission did not appear till after the publication of
the German White Book, which, therefore, contains no
.reference to it.

f7994r— 8.)

Justice. In the following pages he has sub-
mitted the German case to a close investigation ;
it is a work that deserves to be more widely
known than it could be so long as it was acces-
sible only in the Dutch Magazine in which it
originally appeared, and this translation has been
issued in the belief that it will be of material
assistance to those English speaking readers who
would desire to understand the nature of the
defence put forward by the German Government
against the charges brought against the German
army.

THE

GERMAN WHITE BOOK

ON THE

WAR IN BELGIUM.

1. — Objects of the White Book, and the legal position.

The Governments of the belligerent States
continue zealously to collect and publish material
with regard to the manner in which the war has
been conducted by their enemies ; and apparently,
so far as the rules of law and humanity are
concerned, importance is still attached to the
opinion of the great public. To a particular
degree, attention continues to be focussed on the
question of the respective behaviour of the German
armies and the civilian inhabitants in Belgium in
the first months of the war. For many people the
reports on these points were decisive in determining
the side to which their sympathies were to be

attached during the war, and perhaps after it too.
The Belgian Official Committee of Inquiry has
already published many batches of depositions to
prove that German troops conducted the war in a
needlessly cruel manner, destroying the lives,
honour and property of innumerable defenceless
civilians, and many of the scientific and artistic
monuments of the Belgian people. The German
Government has now replied to this in an impres-
sive folio qf more than 325 pages bearing the title
" Die Yolkerrechtswidrige Fii.hr ung des belgischen
Volkskrieges," (Offences against international law
in the Conduct of the War by the Belgians), con-
sisting of ah extensive collection of evidence,
mostly on oath, which is intended to prove that
tHe numerous executions, burnings and acts of
devastation carried out by the German troops in
Belgium were a " Kriegsnotwendigkeit " (necessity
of war), necessary as a deterrent in view of the
treacherous and criminal behaviour of the civil
population, which, both at the time of and after
the invasion, transgressed against all rules of law
and humanity.

It is clear that, owing to the failure to entrust
the investigations to neutral commissions, we must

despair of ever learning the whole truth with regard
to what happened in Belgium in August and
September of last year. The evidence collected is
already extensive enough, but is in many respects
contradictory, and each side pours contempt on the
investigations of their antagonists and on the
trustworthiness of the witnesses examined by them.
It would be rash, however, to infer from this
that all neutral investigations is superfluous, and
that the study of the atrocity books published on
either side is a waste of time. On the contrary
the impartial looker-on may find much that has
already been definitely established and which will
go down as historical truth whatever the end of the
war may be ; and, if we are not mistaken the above-
mentioned publication of the German Government
will, in many respects, give considerable assistance
in forming a true view of the attitude adopted by
the German troops towards the population.

This book is entirely different in character from
the reports of the Belgian, French and English
Commissions. The latter purport to be indictments
of the German army, and with that in view present
in an almost monotonous and unbroken series the
declarations of victims and witnesses of German
outrages. The German book on the other hand

8

is a defence, not designed primarily to deny the
outrages which are the subject of this charge — to
some extent they are described therein in all their
details — but to justify them in the very words of
those actually responsible. In it are given the
statements of the officers and soldiers who took
part in the proceedings against the Belgian civil
population. The book, therefore, enables one to
obtain insight into the state of mind in which
officers and soldiers ordered and carried out the
innumerable executions and acts of destruction
which took place. We learn, from their own
mouths, how the troops conceived their attitude to
the inhabitants to be justifiable according to the
law of nations, on what grounds they thought
themselves entitled to carry out their cruel deeds,
what evidence they regarded as sufficient to
establish the so severely punished offences of the
citizens, what relation they established between
punishment and crime, and what procedure was
followed for the ascertainment of guilt or innocence.
So regarded, this book offers interesting material
for the investigation of the criminologist, moralist
and psychologist. Here we can only make a few
general observations presenting themselves on a
first perusal.

9

The work opens with a " Denkschrift "
(memorandum) by the German Government which
can be regarded as a summary of the conclusions
drawn by them from the evidence in the Appendices.
In the eyes of the German Government it is an
established fact that a " wilder Yolkskampf" (savage
people's war), against the German army, broke out
in Belgium immediately after the invasion, and
that this must be regarded as a flagrant violation
of the law of nations. Civilians of every station in
life, workmen, manufacturers, doctors, teachers,
priests, women and children, were taken with
weapons in their hands. From houses and gardens,
from roofs and cellars, from fields and woods,
civilians fired upon the German troops ; the soldiers
were exposed to a most despicable ill-treatment ;
hot tar and boiling water were poured upon them ;
eyes were gouged out, ears, noses and fingers were
cut off, bellies cut open, &c., &c. ; all this follow-
ing on an apparently friendly reception on the part
of the inhabitants.

In face of this the German army was not only
justified in taking, but obliged to take, the severest
measures (scharfsten Massnahmen) ; the guilty had
to be treated not as soldiers and prisoners of war,
but as criminals and murderers : the innocent had

10

to suffer with the guilty, hostages were taken in
great numbers to be killed if necessary as a de-
terrent, houses had to be burnt down, villages and
towns devastated, &c.

In forming a judgment on all this, the German
Government takes up the standpoint that its troops
as well as the Belgian population were subject to
the Hague Convention of 1907 as to the laws of
war. It therefore makes no use of the formally
correct excuse, first made by Professor F. R. von
Liszt, that since States have come into this war
which did not accept that Convention, it is, accord-
ing to its own rules, not binding upon any party.
Indeed, whether this excuse is relied upon or notr
it makes little difference to the consideration of the
behaviour of the army of the civilian population,
for this would in that case be regulated by the
Convention of 1899 which was signed by all
States, and contains the same rules on this
subject as that of 1907.* In accordance, there-
fore, with article 2 of the Convention, the

* The Convention of 1899 is rather more favourable to
the civilian population in so far as it does not, like that
of 1907, require that they should carry weapons openly
if they are to be regarded as combatants.

11

German Government distinguishes between fight-
ing by the inhabitants in territory already
occupied by the troops (as in Aerschot, Andenne
and Lou vain), in which the unorganised
population taking part in hostilities can never,
according to the laws of nations, claim to be
treated as combatants — that is as soldiers — and
the forcible resistance of the population to the
invading troops in territory hitherto unoccupied
as in the frontier places and in Dinant and it&
neighbourhood, where the unorganised population,
provided that they carry arms openly and respect
the laws and customs of war, must, according to
the Convention, be regarded as combatants, if
on the approach of the enemy they take up arms
spontaneously to resist the invading troops, without
having had time to organise themselves.

A perusal of the evidence of the various
witnesses, however, fails to show that the officers
ever took this legal distinction into account^
or even that it was present to their minds.
Civilians supposed to have taken part in the
fighting were never treated as soldiers, but always
as criminals. One is inclined to seek the reason
for this in the circumstance that the book
" Kriegsbrauch in Landkriege " (i.e., the German

War Book) by means of which the officers are
educated in the law of nations, does not make
this distinction, or rather, bearing in mind what
was settled at the Hague, rejects it, requiring that,
in all cases, in all hostilities in which the people
take part, there should be a military organisation
and military emblems openly worn.

The passage runs as follows : " But the
" organisation of irregulars in military bands and
" their subjection to a responsible leader are not
" by themselves sufficient to enable one to grant
" them the status of belligerents ; even more
" important than these is the necessity of being
" able to recognise them as such and of their
" carrying their arms openly . . . '

" This condition must also be maintained if it
" becomes a question of the 4 levee en masse J the
" arming of the whole population of the country,
" province, or district ; in other words the so-called
" people's war or national war. Starting from the

' view that one can never deny to the population
" of a country the natural right of defence of one's
:t fatherland, and that the smaller and consequently

1 less powerful States can only find protection in
" such levees en masse, the majority of authorities

13

" on international law have, in their proposals for
" codification, sought to attain the recognition on
" principle of the combatant status of all these
" kinds of people's champions, and in the Brussels
" declaration and the Hague Regulations the
" aforesaid condition is omitted. As against this
" one may nevertheless remark that the condition
" requiring a military organisation and a clearly
" recognisable mark of being attached to the
" enemy's troops, is not synonymous with a denial
" of the natural right of defence of one's country.
"It is therefore not a question of restraining the
" population from seizing arms but only of com-
" pelling it to do this in an organised manner.
" ' Subjection to a responsible leader, a military
organisation, and clear recognisability cannot
be left out of account unless the whole recog-
nised foundation for the admission of irregulars
is going to be given up altogether and a
conflict of one private individual against another
is to be introduced again, with all its attendant
horrors, of which, for example, the proceedings in
Bazeilles in the last Franco-Prussian War affords
an instance. If the necessary organisation does
not really become established — a case which i&
by no means likely to occur often — then nothing

" '

" '
" '

" '

14

remains but a conflict of individuals, and those
who conduct it cannot claim the rights of an
" ' active military status. The disadvantages and
" c severities inherent in such a state of affairs
" l are more insignificant and less inhuman than
" i those which would result from recognition.'
" (Professor Dr. C. Luder, Das Landkriegsrecht,
u Hamburg, 1888.)"* The German Government,
however, gives another reason why the troops
in unoccupied territories must treat resisting
inhabitants in the same manner as in occupied
territories, that is, as criminals. Listen to this :
" But the unorganised People's War was also
" impermissible in those places which had not
" yet been occupied by German troops, and
" particularly in Dinant and the neighbourhood,
" as the Belgian Government had sufficient time
" for an organisation of the People's War as
" required by international law. For years the
" Belgian Government has had under consideration
" that at the outbreak of a Franco-German war
" it would be involved in the operations ; the
" preparation of mobilisation began, as can be

* Translator's Note. The version of the passage from
German War Book here given is from Professor Morgan's
translation, pp. 62-63.

15

" proved, at least a week before the invasion
" of the German army. The Government
" was, therefore, completely in a position to
" provide the civil population with military badges
" and appoint responsible leaders, so far as they
" wished to use their services in any fighting which
" might take place."

One has some reason to be astonished at such
scornful remarks addressed to the Belgian
Government by a Government which was a
co-guarantor of Belgian neutrality, and had
repeatedly in recent times, before the invasion,
given the assurance that this would be respected.
In any case, it reveals a misunderstanding as
regards the aims of the Hague Convention. In
the first place it by no means follows from
Article 2 of the convention that the population
taking up arms without fulfilling the conditions
contained therein is acting in conflict with the
law of nations, and at the Conference at Brussels
and at the first Peace Conference it was precisely
the Belgian delegates who took the lead in obviat-
ing the possibility that any such inference should
be drawn from the Convention. Armed resist-
ance riot in accordance with the Hague Convention
does not enjoy the protection of the law of the

16

nations ; those who take part in it have not
the right to be regarded as soldiers, but it does
not by any means follow that their actions are
to be regarded as in conflict with the law. In
the second place it is not a question whether
the Belgian Government was in a position to
organise civilian population for warlike purposes —
this Government did not desire it. No, the
Convention is designed to protect the population
in places where they have, on their own initiative,
taken up arms to repel the enemy, and therefore
the question that must be put is whether the
population had had sufficient time to give them-
selves a military organisation. If one is to assume
that, in the given circumstances, the population
in the Belgian Frontier villages and Dinant had,
in fact, sufficient time for this, one can without
hesitation strike out the provisions of Article 2
of the Convention on the ground that they are
never applicable.

However that may be, whether because they
had never been taught anything else, or because
the explanation of the Convention now given by the
German Government was then before them, the
German Officers had no hesitation in applying
the same methods both to occupied and unoccupied

17

territories whenever they imagined themselves to be
confronted by forcible resistance on the part of the
civilian inhabitants. What that meant may be
illustrated by the events at Dinant, as given in the
German White Book.

On the 23rd August Dinant was stormed by the
German troops. They were under the impression
that the part of the town lying on the right hand
side of the Meuse had already been evacuated by
the Belgian troops, As they entered they were
in fact fired upon from all sides, and, as they
thought, out of the houses. In the conviction that
the civilian inhabitants were responsible for this,
house after house was stormed and cleared of
inhabitants. As it appeared impossible to obtain
control of the town in this way it was then
destroyed by artillery.

What had now to be the fate of the civilian
inhabitants who — in the opinion of the German
troops — had offered forcible resistance ? On the
23rd August, even according to the judgment of
the German Government, the town did not form
part of the occupied territory. The population, so
the German troops were convinced, had organised

7994 B

18

armed resistance, and had taken up arms on their
own initiative to resist the invading troops. That
the latter, in this belief, stormed the houses in
order to overcome the resistance, is clear. Had
they met with armed resistance in the course of
this, and repelled it by force, the victims thereof
would have had nothing to complain of. But — by
hundreds and hundreds, men, women and children,
were taken prisoners in the houses, on suspicion of
having fired. What was their fate to be ? If they
fell under the protection of Article 2 of the
Convention they should have been treated as
combatants, as soldiers, i.e., they should have been
made prisoners of war and in accordance with
Article 4 of the Convention, have been treated with
humanity. What happened to them ? They were
all ik niedergemacht" (slaughtered). How? One
deposition out of many, that of ;c stabsarzt " (staff-
surgeon) Dr. Petrenz, shows how. He tells us of
his experiences on the morning of the 24th
August, the day after the assault : — " On the bank
of the Meuse between the river and a garden wall
directly to the left of the pontoon bridge lay a heap
of civilians who had been shot ; I do not know
how many, I estimate about 30 to 40. I do not
know who had shot them. I have heard that the

19

Grenadier Regiment No. 101 carried out an execu-
tion there. Among the people who were shot were
some women, but by far the greater number were
young lads. Under the heap I discovered a girl of
about Jive years of aqe, alive and without any injuries.
I took her out and brought her down to the house
where the women were. She took chocolate, was
quite happy, and was clearly unaware of the
seriousness of the situation. I then searched the
heap of bodies to see whether any other children
were underneath. But we only found one girl of
about ten years of age who had a wound in the lower
leg. I had her wound dressed and brought her at
once to the women."

II. — The Published Evidence.

The German White Book consists of an
•" Auslese " (selection) from the comprehensive
material at the disposal of the German Govern-
ment. It does not by any means deal with the
whole course of the war in Belgium, nor with the
long series of charges which have been made
against the German troops by the Belgians. It
merely deals, by way of example, with the events

in the places concerning which the most serious
charges have been made, especially the frontier
villages and Aerschot. Andenne Dinant and
Lou vain.

In what spirit has this " selection " been put
together ? Has the collection of the most im-
portant data concerning the various events been
made in an impartial manner ? Or have all the
documents tending to inculpate the Germans been
put on one side and the choice been limited to the
reports and declarations which, it was hoped, would
throw a favourable light on the German troops ?
To be in a position to form a considered judgment
on this it would be necessary to know the un-
published'documents as well. Nevertheless, it may
be said that the German Government, however
much it may assert its conviction that its troops
are innocent, at any rate of any more serious
excesses than such as are unavoidable in the best
regulated armies invading an enemy country, mustr
in the compilation of its White Book, have per-
ceived that its perusal was not likely to produce
the same conviction in the mind of every reader.
In one respect, indeed, impartiality has been
exhibited by Berlin, for the White Book is by no
means limited to such declarations as place beyond

21

doubt the guilt of the civilian inhabitants, and the
right of the troops to 'take forcible steps against
them ; on the other hand, however, a one-sided
character has been given to the published material
by excluding from it important documents which
are indispensable for the knowledge of the whole
truth. With regard to this we are not referring
to the peculiar fact that the sworn depositions are
almost exclusively those of Protestant witnesses,
and only in exceptional cases those of Catholics —
that may be a mere coincidence, — but to the fact
that the book contains none of the numerous
depositions made before the German Commissioners
of Enquiry in the occupied territories by Belgian
and neutral citizens, although, surely, no better
means could have been chosen to establish the
truth than to have the events described by the
military also described and explained by peaceful
citizens. Only two such reports are included,
and it is not apparent why precisely these two
have been chosen out of the many that are
available.

The first relates to the examination by a
Lieutenant of the Burgomaster and some inhabi-
tants of the little town of Andenne, where,
according to the report, 200 citizens were killed

22

on the 20th August. The witnesses examined,
who indeed were nearly all prisoners, or wounded,
or hiding in their cellars on the day in question,
have, generally speaking, very little of importance
to impart ; in particular none of them support the
statement of the Military Commander that the
citizens had fired, and had used machine-guns,
bombs and hand-grenades too. With regard to
the Burgomaster, the report indeed says : "He
only knew that at 7 p.m. on the 20th August a
murderous £re was opened on our troops who
wished to cross the bridge at Seilles." But,
when it comes to the point, it does not add
that he declared that this shooting was by
civilians. The observation of the manufacturer
Debrun that at about 7 o'clock an aeroplane
appeared above the town, whereupon the German
troops immediately opened fire, as to which fact
nothing is found in the military evidence, is the
only one which is worthy of remark. The witness
adds that immediately thereon firing commenced
in all parts of the town. Comparing this state-
ment with the military reports — only two of these
are inserted — one cannot escape the inference that
the shooting at the airmen by some of the troops
was thought by the others to be shooting by the

23

civilian inhabitants, and that this mistake gave
occasion to the cruel massacre. When one thinks
of the bullets fired at the airmen falling to earth
again the complaint of shooting from " Dachoff-
nungen " (i.e., " holes in the roof7') is explained,
as is also the remark of the General : " Wonder-
fully enough our losses were slight ; the franc-
tireurs aimed very badly."

The other report is of the examination t of
Professor Albert Lemaire, director of the St. Peter's
Hospital at Louvain. Why his statement is
inserted is not clear. He expressly says that he
did not see " that civilians fired into the streets
from the houses." On the other hand, shots were
repeatedly fired upon himself when he went into
the garden of his house in, the evening. That this
was done by Belgian citizens can hardly be
supposed. The remainder of his declaration : —
" Nearly all the houses of the doctors and
professors in Leopold Street were burnt. On the
following, day for safety's sake I had my family
taken to the hospital by two German soldiers.
On Thursday, 27th August, the bombardment and
destruction of the town was announced. I went
with my family into the country. On my return
I found that my house had also been burnt down,"

24

does not assist the Germans in justifying their
conduct in Louvain.

The gap caused by the absence of depositions
of peaceful Belgians and more important still, of
neutral citizens, must be filled, if the White Book
is to be entirely convincing. There is all the
more reason for the German Government to do
this, for the fact that 'they more than once lay
stress on communications and expressions of
opinion from such quarters which were transmitted
to the Committee of enquiry by German witnesses,
shows that they themselves apparently attach
great importance to the evidence and opinion of
these citizens. Such a reference, for instance, was
made by a captain of cavalry in his evidence with
regard to the events at Aerschot. He had picked
out the " am intelligentesten Aussehenden " (the
most intelligent looking) from a troop of civilian
prisoners — he appeared to be a " Seminar lehrer "
(seminary teacher) — and informed him that all the
guilty prisoners should be shot but that he (the
Captain) would take steps to save the professor's
life provided that he would betray the truth with
regard to the alleged attack by the citizens,
whereupon he is said to have been told : " that it
was a great mistake on the part of the citizens of

Aerschot to have received fugitive Belgian soldiers,
kept them in hiding and put them in civilian
clothes. These had without question united with
the Garde Civique and an attack had then been
undertaken by them." What would it not be
worth to have the statements made by such an
intelligent witness himself before a judge, under
oath, not as a ransom for his life but given in
entire freedom ! So too, Herr Sittart, a member of
the Reichstag, who makes the following
remarkable statement under oath : " On the 31st
August at Louvain, a number of women of
the town complained to me in tears of the
trouble which had come upon them owing to the
bombardment of the town. They expressly
admitted that our troops had been fired upon from
houses and cellars. One of these, a widow of a
doctor, said indeed that those who had done it
belonged to the Garde Civique. When she heard,
however, that in Aix-la-Chapelle, there were
wounded who had been seriously injured by small
shot, she had to admit that civilians had taken
part in the shooting as well. She agreed with me,
too, when I said that neither the Garde Civique
nor the regular troops deserve any consideration
when they fire from an ambush, from cellars and

26

roofs instead of in open and honourable combat.
The Vice-Hector of the University of Louvain,
Mgr. Coenraets, told me that he, as a hostage, had
been ordered to read a proclamation to the people,
to the effect that the hostages would be shot and
the town bombarded if the troops were treacherously
fired upon. He had scarcely read this in one
street when in fact shots were fired upon the
German soldiers accompanying him." — How much
more value would it not have had to hear, not
what an unnamed woman had " admitted " to a
member of the Eeichstag, not what an unnamed
doctor's widow had finally to " admit " to him,
and in what respect she had to " agree " with his
view, but the direct evidence given by civilian
inhabitants before a judge concerning the facts
that they had observed. And so, further, what
would it not have been worth to hear directly what
the hostages could tell us with regard to the
shooting of which they were witnesses, and whether
they really observed that German soldiers were
fired upon by citizens and out of houses. Various
professors of the University, including some
neutrals, have been examined by the German ad-
ministration. To their direct evidence one would
certainly attach more weight than to the hearsay

of a member ot the Reichstag, who had not been
himself a witness of the incidents, though, never-
theless, he had not been able to find any better
consolation for the sorrowing women of Louvain
than to use them for the purpose of obtruding
his opinion that the guilt lay exclusively at the
doors of their husbands and children.

III. — The Nature of the Evidence.

In considering why the German White Book has
in many respects so little convincing power, one
discovers the chief reason in the fact that in justify-
ing the cruel punishments administered to the
citizens of Belgium so little direct evidence with
regard to events observed by the witnesses them-
selves has been collected or, at any rate, published.
What we have before us consists far too much of
suppositions, guesses, - assurances, for the truth of
which no satisfactory grounds are given. It is
inconceivable that the persons charged with the
investigation — a " Kriegsgerichtsrat " or " Ober-
kreigsgerichtsrat," sometimes an " Amtsrichter " or
" Oberamtsrichter " — could have been satisfied with
it ; at every deposition there rises to the lips of the

28

reader of their report question after question, the
answer to which appears to be indispensable to the
forming of a correct judgment, but which, never-
theless, were not put to the witnesses. One would
gladly have had the direct evidence of many of
the soldiers concerned, which, being that of eye-
witnesses, would have the greatest importance —
but their evidence is not found in the White Book.
The possibility of guilt on the part of the civilian
population is certainly not excluded, but the fact
that the military authorities in Berlin are satisfied
with this method of investigation, and apparently
regard the evidence now published as satisfactory,
makes us shudder at the thought of the evidence
on which, in the confusion of the fighting, in the
witches' cauldron of Dinant, in burning Aerschot
and in so many other places in unhappy Belgium,
sentence of death was carried out on thousands of
citizens by officers and by soldiers of lower rank.

" Man hat geschossen " (there has been firing),
was the ordinary signal for death and destruction.
One would expect to find in this dossier abundant
and direct proof of the fact that civilians had fired ;
in such a furious contest as that between the
citizens and the army would have been, there must
have been hundreds of witnesses available who

29

observed the facts themselves. Relatively few
witnesses, however, are produced who make a
direct statement on this ; moreover, their observa-
tion frequently took place under such circumstances
as to magnify the chances of error : as for instance,
when forms were seen in the darkness, shooting
down from the upper storeys of houses, or out of
holes in the roof, or out of trees, or firing took
place from cellars, or loopholes near the ground,
on passing soldiers, &c. With regard to Andenne
and Aerschot not a single direct statement is given.
As a rule the charge rests on hearsay statements,,
or on suppositions, such as : " firing took place out
of the houses, shooting from cellar-holes and
openings in the roof," " the sound of the shot was
not that of a German weapon," " apparently small
shot was fired," " light smoke and dust clouds rose
above the roof," " there were no further Belgian or
French soldiers in the place," or " could not
have been in the place," &c., &c. If one takes
into account that the German troops lived in
a state of constant fear of shooting by civilians, as
to whose treachery and cruelty the wildest rumours
were in circulation, that many places had only very
recently or only partly been evacuated by the
Belgians and the French, that German soldiers

30

were frequently billeted in the houses, that a single
shot and the rumour that it was fired by a civilian
instigated the soldiers to a furious bombardment
of the houses with rifles and machine guns, which
the officers were often unable to stop, one can
attach no great importance to such evidence even
though it was also stated that " Es waren bestimmt
Zivilisten " (it was certainly done by civilians),
and one must still ask for direct evidence.

And this all the more since there is so much, in
the story of the resistance by the population, to
arouse astonishment and compel suspicion. If the
stories are true, the Belgian population in various
places has made an incomprehensible display of
insane heroism. Although the town is occupied
by the Germans, and as a punishment for the
supposed firing on the troops is set on fire in all
directions and blown to ruins, although hundreds
of citizens are taken prisoners and shot, although
every citizen knows what his fate will be if the
merest suspicion arise that his house has been fired
from, nevertheless, they continue, day after day,
day and night, greybeards, men, women, priests,
children, down to little girls of 10, without
hesitation, to fire on the troops as they pass by,
although they know with certainty that it can

31

only lead to their own destruction. But — and the
contrast is remarkable — whenever the houses in
which the firing took place are stormed and the
soldiers force their way in, all their courage
appears to vanish : there arises no hand-to-hand
fight between civilians and soldiers in which many
are killed on either side ; no, the civilians are
merely " niedergemacht " (cut down), or, indeed,
•defenceless and helpless, taken prisoner and driven
along, with upraised hands, into the market place
or square to meet their fate.

And how bad the shooting of the civilians was !
Various officers themselves were amazed at this ;
the losses of the Germans were always very small.
In narrow winding streets the citizens opened fire
on the troops as they marched past, from the
surrounding houses they fired on the columns
which were halted on the square, not in single
shots, no, a "lebhaftes Schnellfeuer " (lively rapid
firing) a " sehr heftiges (very violent) "kolossales"
"rasendes " (furious), " morderisches " (murderous),
" wiitendes " (fierce), rifle fire, a " mad," " devasta-
ting " " Schieszerei " (firing), " es krachte von
alien Seiten, aus alien Hausern wurde geschossen,
von alien Hangen blitzte es auf " ; (it burst from
all sides, all the houses were fired from, it flashed

from every slope) ; they fired with pistols, sporting
guns, rifles, machine guns, bombs and , hand
grenades. One would have expected an innumer-
able list of victims — but hardly any are heard of.
In some places they are not referred to at all, in
other cases only few are mentioned.

The Belgian civilian population was guilty of
cruel outrages on German wounded and therefore
deserved no consideration. As an example one
might instance the fact, which has attracted much
attention and has been exploited by the German
press to arouse hatred against the Belgians who
were defending their country, and which also
occasioned a cry of horror from many neutrals — the
gouging out of the eyes of the wounded, even
by women and young girls. The White Book
declares this fact to be established, and
speaks of the '" bestialische Verhalten der
Bevolkerung " (bestial behaviour of the popula-
tion) ; many neutrals believed it too. One refers
to the report expecting to find the depositions
of doctors, especially in military hospitals, or the
depositions of those who themselves had been
maltreated, and nothing of the sort is to be found.
Has no single wounded or dead man whose eyes
may have been gouged out, been examined by

33

a medical man ? Has no single one of the many
who were maltreated survived so as to be able
to give evidence of his maltreatment ? As long
as such evidence is not published it cannot
seriously be imagined that the allegation is proved.
The only evidence is that of about eight soldiers
and an officer that they saw wounded men or
corpses on the ground whose eyes had been
gouged out. How they knew that the eyes had
been gouged out and not destroyed by shell
splinters, by birds of prey, or by decay, is not
stated. A reservist, whose calling is that of
a book-keeper, declares indeed positively " the
nature of the wound showed with certainty that
the eyes had been gouged out deliberately and
not in the course of fighting," and without
hesitation the u Kriegsgerichtsrat " accepts his
statement without any enquiry as to why this book-
keeper possessed such remarkable knowledge. He
will blush for it some day.

For the ascertainment of the nature and cause
of wounds of that kind expert investigation is
indispensable. The charge that the eyes of
wounded have been gouged out has been
circulated both in the west and in the east, but
we have never heard that the fact has been

7994 C

34

scientifically established ; on the contrary, we
have repeatedly seen the accusation repelled by
experts as deliberately untrue.* In the absence
of further evidence, the repetition of such charges
can only be indulged in at the risk of being
guilty of calumny.

As may be conceived, strong measures were
taken whenever the German troops believed that
•firing by the civil population had taken place.
On what principle did they act in such cases ?
Did the officers act in accordance with the Hague
Convention which, with special reference to the
measures to be taken with regard to combatant
civilians, admonishes belligerents that the popula-
tion, even where the convention does not protect
them, " remains under the protection and govern-
ance of the principles of the law of nations, de-
rived from the usages established among civilised
peoples, from the laws of humanity, and from the

* The case of the wounded in hospital at Aix-la-
Chapelle is known to everyone. With regard to the
hospitals at Vienna, Prof. Lammasch reports in the
•" Deutsche Revue " that he has investigated several cases,
in which maltreatment of this kind has been alleged,
"but that investigation revealed that the loss of the
soldier's eyes was attributable to shell splinters.

35

dictates of public conscience," a warning which
enabled many States to join in the convention
which otherwise in their opinion did not afford
sufficient protection to the population ? Did they,
in particular, bear in mind Article 50 of the Con-
vention, which expressly prescribes that " no
collective penalty . . . shall be inflicted upon the
population on account of the acts of individuals for
which it cannot be regarded as collectively respon-
sible " ? Or did they remember the lessons given
them by the great General Staff by means of
the German War Book, in which they were warned
against the " humanitaren Anschauungen "
(humanitarian views) of the day which not seldom
degenerate into " Sentimentalitat " and " weich-
licher Gefuhlschwarmerei " (flabby emotion), and
are in entire opposition (volkommenem Wider -
spruch) to the nature and object of war, and which
have already found moral recognition in some of
the rales of the Hague Convention ?* And did

* In the modern usages of war one can no longer
regard merely the traditional inheritance of the ancient
etiquette of the profession of arms, and the professional
outlook accompanying it, but there is also the deposit of
the currents of thought which agitate our time. But
since the tendency of thought of the last century was

36

the fact that Article 50 of the Convention is not
referred to in the booklet issued by the General
Staff and that, on the contrary, the suppression of
armed resistance by the population by means of
the most ruthless measures and terrorism is
recommended by reference to Napoleon and

dominated essentially by humanitarian considerations
which not infrequently degenerated into sentimentality
and flabby emotion (Sentimentalitat und weichlicher
Gef uhlschwarmerei) there have not been wanting attempts
to influence the development of the usages of war in a
way which was in fundamental contradiction with the
nature of war and its object. Attempts of this kind will
also not be wanting in the future, the more so as these-
agitations have found a kind of moral recognition in some
provisions of the Geneva Convention and the Brussels
and Hague Conferences. Moreover, the officer is a child
of his time. He is subject to the intellectual tendencies
which influence his own nation ; the more educated he is
the more will this be the case. The danger that, in this
way, he will arrive at false views about the essential
character of war must not be lost sight of. The danger
can only be met by a thorough study of war itself. By
steeping himself in military history an officer will be able
to guard himself against excessive humanitarian notion? ;
it will teach him that certain severities are indispensable
to war — nay more, that the only true humanity very often
lies in a ruthless application of them. (German War
Book. See Professor Morgan's translation, pp. 54-55 il.)

37

Wellington,* give them the impression that the
considerations referred to above apply to this
Article also ?

* By war rebellion is to be understood the taking up of
arms by the inhabitants against the occupation ; by war
treason, on the other hand, the injury or imperilling of the
enemy's authority through deceit or through communi-
cation of news to one's own army as to the disposition,
movement, and intention, &c., of the army in occupation,
whether the person concerned has come into possession
of his information by lawful or unlawful means (i.e., by
espionage).

Against both of these only the most ruthless measures
are effective. Napoleon wrote to his brother Joseph,
when, after the latter ascended the throne of Naples, the
inhabitants of lower Italy made various attempts at
revolt : " The security of your dominion depends on
how you behave in the conquered province. Burn down
a dozen places which are not willing to submit them-
selves. Of course, not until you have first looted them ;
my soldiers must not be allowed to go away with their
hands empty. Have three to six persons hanged in every
village which has joined the revolt ; pay no respect to
the cassock. Simply bear in mind how I dealt with
them in Piacenza and Corsica." The Duke of Wellington,
in 1814, threatened the South of France ; " he will, if
leaders of factions are supported, burn the villages and
have their inhabitants hanged." In the year 1815, he
issued the following proclamation : " All those who after

38

The White Book gives a few instances of
humane treatment, especially of women and
children, and no one will doubt that many other
instances could have been given — the German
soldier is still a man — nevertheless it does not
appear from these instances that the many acts
of inhumanity with which the Germans are
accused, in the Belgian, French and English
reports, did not take place. But if one asks what
system was followed in suppressing the actual or
supposed resistance of the civil population, the
answer can only be that it was one of " terrorism"
slaughter and destruction of both the guilty and the
innocent, on a large scale utterly disproportionate,

the entry of the (English) army into France leave their
dwellings and all those who are found in the service of
the usurper will be regarded as adherents of his and as
enemies ; their property will be used for the maintenance of
the army." " These are the expressions in the one case of
one of the great masters of war and of the dominion founded
upon war power, and in the other, of a commander-in-
chief who elsewhere had carried the protection of
private property in hostile lands to the extremest
possible limit. Both men as soon as a popular rising
takes place resort to terrorism." — J. von Hartmann,
Kritische Versuche, II, p. 73. (German War Book. See
Prof. Morgan's version, pp. 121-122. Translator.)

39

to the measure of guilt found or thought to be found,
and designed not only for the suppression of the
supposed resistance but as a deterrent for the future.
Clearly the humanitarian principle contained in
Article 50 of the Convention was not regarded as
binding.

In conclusion, we may test the general observa-
tions given above by reference to a particular
instance, namely, the series of events at Aerschot.

IV. — Aerschot.

Aerschot is an old town of about 8,000 inhabi-
tants, and lies to the North of Lou vain. On the
morning of the 19th of August there took place
in its immediate neighbourhood, an engagement
between German and Belgian troops, as a result of
which the former entered the town.* In the
course of the day the place became crowded with
soldiers — infantry and cavalry, supply artillery and

* For all that follows the White Book is the exclusive
source. Even where we give our own explanation of the
facts this is exclusively founded on the German statements.
The use of statements from other sources would lead one
to a conclusion not wholly coincident with this.

40

ammunition columns. About five o'clock the staff
arrived. Colonel Stenger, commanding the brigade,
together with his adjutant, Captain Schwarz, and
his orderly officer, Lieutenant Beyersdorf, took up
quarters in the house of the Burgomaster on the
Market Square. Captain Karge, of the military
police, went to the house of the Burgomaster's
brother, situated in a narrow street, which ran
towards the market place in a northerly or north-
westerly direction. Captain Folz, of the 49th
Infantry Regiment arrived at the same time as the
latter, and shortly after came Colonel Jenrich,
who acted as local commandant, and Captain
Schleusener, with his machine gun company.

With the exception of Colonel Stenger, who was
killed, these are the witnesses whose statements
are contained in the White Book. The book
contains no evidence given by citizens of Aerschot.

The troops were well received by the inhabitants.
Immediately after his arrival. Colonel Jenrich
summoned the Burgomaster, warned him against
any hostile behaviour on the part of the inhabitants,
and impressed upon him " that he would suffer the
penalty of death if an attack were made on the
German troops by the population."

41

At 8 o'clock in the evening shots were suddenly
heard in the neighbourhood of the market place.
The first shots were followed by volleys, and then
by lively rapid firing. The soldiers, who filled
the narrow winding streets and the market place,
fell into great disorder and fired without inter-
mission ; the mounted men and drivers left their
horses in the lurch, the horses bolted and the
waggons ran into each other. The officers
hurried out, attempted by orders and signals to
make the soldiers cease firing, a task in which
they only succeeded with difficulty.* The houses
were fired upon with rifles and machine guns,
some were stormed and set on fire, the fleeing

* " I, too, with Captain Schwartz, left the room at the
first shot in order to restore order in the market place
among the troops, who had fallen into disorder owing
to the shooting " (Beyersdorf).

u The drivers and artillery soldiers had in the mean-
time left their horses and waggons and taken cover from
the shots in the entrances of the houses. The waggons
to some extent had run together, because the horses
becoming restless, had sought their own way without
the drivers " (Karge).

" After a short time I seemed to notice that the firing
was being answered by our troops from the direction of
the market place. Soon after signals and shouts 4 Cease

42

towns-folk were taken prisoners and a large
number of them shot.

Did the townspeople fire ? Not one of the
witnesses examined deposes to having seen this ;
not one of them found a citizen with arms in his
hands ; not one of them had heard from anyone
else that he had done this. Nevertheless they
were convinced of it. On what did their con-
viction rest ?

Captain Schwarz and Lieutenant Beyersdorf,
when, in the house of the Burgomaster, they heard
the first shots, were of opinion, to begin with, that
these emanated from the enemy, who had been
reported in the North. This appeared to be
incorrect. Soon shots fell in their immediate
neighbourhood ; and the Burgomaster's house itself
was fired upon. By citizens or soldiers ? Both
officers state positively "Von den eigeiien Truppen

fire ! ' were heard. The firing then ceased for a time, but
was re-opened apparently from both sides, though not so
heavily " (Karge~).

" Near the Mairie, which was to be used as an artillery
depot, there stood a Captain of the Infanty Regiment
No. 140, who had the signal ' Halt ! ' blown continuously.
Clearly, this officer desired, in the first place, to stop the
shooting of our men " (Folz).

riihrten die Schiisse nicht her." (The shots did Dot
come from our own troops.) How could they know
that ? All the other witnesses declare that their
own troops fired without intermission, and princi-
pally on the market square itself. It follows,
therefore, that the statement of the two officers,
positively as it is expressed, is, in its sweeping
terms, certainly not correct. And how, in the
given circumstances, the streets and the market
place being full of thousands of disordered soldiers,
horses and waggons, could they, whether from their
room in the burgomaster's house, or from the street
itself, ascertain with certainty that, neither from
the side streets nor on the market place, firing by
their own soldiers had taken place ?

It first occurred to Captain Karge that there had
been some carelesness on the part of a soldier in
the baggage train, but he soon changed his mind.
On what grounds ? When, at the first shot, he
looked out of the window, he noticed in the distance
near the roof of the house, which stood at the corner
of the market place and the street in which his
quarters were situated, " leichte Rauch- und Staub-
wolken aufsteigen" (light clouds of smoke and
dust rising), a phenomenon which was repeated at
the next volley. No firing took place from the

44

windows, and hence he inferred from the dust and
smoke clouds that firing had taken place through
openings in the roof. Apparently he regarded
this inference as obvious. When the rapid firing
followed the first volleys, it appeared to him that
it came from other houses also. On what grounds
he made this inference is not stated by him.

That is all. Further evidence, that townspeople
fired on and near the market place, is not given.
Serious doubts are indeed raised, that the soldiers
themselves were guilty of it.

There arose a rumour, also mentioned by Captain
Schwarz, that Belgian troops made an attack on
the town. This rumour originated among the
troops at the northern gate of the town, who
thereupon retired to the market place in disorder,
firing as they came. Is it possible that the soldiers
in the market place, and in the narrow winding
streets around it, hearing that shooting, but being
unable to see who fired, took it for firing by the
townspeople ? This is, at any rate, made likely by
the evidence of Captain Folz, y^ho thus describes
the first incidents : — " It was between three and
four o'clock in the afternoon when we rode into

45

the place.* Of German troops the 3rd Infantry
Division had before this partly come through, and
the whole of the narrow and angularly built little
town was full of provision, artillery and ammunition
columns. We had been about three hours in the
town when suddenly mad firing began. This firing
came from about the north-west entrance of the
village. Immediately afterwards the Ambulance
Company, I think it was the second, with
a part of the transport of the 3rd Division,
came to us and reported that they had been
fired upon ; and that a Belgian battalion was
approaching."

There was, accordingly, a double rumour by
which the soldiers were brought into a state of
excitement, both that the town was being attacked
by the Belgians and that the townsfolk were firing
on the soldiers. The houses were now stormed
and fired upon from all sides, a part were set on
fire, and the townspeople driven or dragged out of
them. It is conceivable that during these pro-
ceedings in the narrow winding streets of the town,

* This must be a mistake. Captain Folz entered the
town contemporaneously with the Stan2 Officers and
Colonel Jenrich, all of whom declare that it was
five o'clock.

46

firing took place in and through the houses, and that
thus the impression was produced that firing was
taking place from the houses. Captain Folz. who
at the beginning of the firing refers only to firing
by soldiers, declares DOW — about an hour later—
that he had heard or seen shots coming from
houses. Captain Schleusener also makes the same
observation at this stage. There is nothing to
show that the shots emanated from citizens, and
not from soldiers in the streets and in the houses.
How great was the confusion appears from the
evidence of Captain Schleusener himself. On the
rumour that the Belgians were approaching, he
with difficulty assembled his machine gun com-
pany and marched through the village to the open
country. Captain Folz went with him. About
three kilometres from the village it was perceived
that no trace of the enemy was anywhere to be
found, and they immediately returned. Captain
Folz returned on foot, and therefore came back
later than the others. As Captain Schleusener
with his company entered the town he heard
firing ; he met " the cavalry battalions dashing
backwards and forwards and the transport waggons
of the Third Infantry Division which were trying
to turn round," and were firing hard. He sought

47

to stop the firing, was of opinion that he had
succeeded, and heard further shots coming from
the houses. On this he ordered "the machine guns
to be unlimbered and the house fronts on the left
to be fired upon." He is told %4that shots had also
been fired from a house on the right." What does
he do ? "I had the guns turned round to open
fire when a medical officer indicated that wounded
were lying in that house." For this reason the
house was not fired upon. It can well be con-
ceived that Captain Folz, when he entered the
village just afterwards, was also of opinion that
firing was taking place from the houses and indeed
can distinguish " that the firing was from both
rifle and machine guns."

Apparently the losses of the Germans, even with
all this were very slight. Only one is mentioned
as being killed. This was Colonel Stenger, who
was found shot dead in his room in the Burgo-
master's house with wounds in the face and chest.
The balcony doors were open ; on the wall opposite
them traces of bullets were found ; window panes
were smashed. Probably, therefore, the Colonel
was killed by bullets from outside.

Was this done by civilians, or by the German
soldiers who had been firing wildly on the houses ?
An autopsy was made on the following day by an
army surgeon, bat neither his evidence nor his
report on the post mortem are included in the
documents. Captain Folz, indeed, declares that he
heard from this doctor that the wound in the
Colonel's face was not attributable to an infantry
bullet, and that he himself is of the opinion that
the breast wound must have been caused by a shot
from a muzzle loader. But is one, on this state-
ment alone, without even hearing the medical man,
to assume that the Colonel was killed by the
citizens of Aerschot ?

How did the military proceed in the suppression
of the supposed insurrection of the populace ?
How many citizens were killed by the continuous
firing on the houses is not mentioned. The
manner in which they went about it is best shown
in the vivid narrative given by Captain Karge.
This officer, as above mentioned, had suspicion of
the red corner house by the market place, on
account of the light smoke and dust clouds near
its roof. During a short " Feuerpause " (interval
in the firing) he left his house, in order to
communicate his discoveries to a Colonel standing

49

in the market place, and at the same time asked
for permission to set the house in question on fire,
since in his opinion " The ringleaders of the whole
affair were collected in this house." The Colonel
refused to give his consent. Thereupon, so he him-
self tells us, u I DOW took some soldiers who were
near me and went with them towards the house
from which the shooting had first taken place, and
in the loft of which I still presumed the originators
and leaders to be. In the meantime, a lieutenant
of the regiment also came up, and having taken
the officer and men under my command I ordered
the doors — the house had a house and a shop
door — and the windows of the ground floor, which
were securely locked, to be broken in. Thereupon
I pushed into the house with the others, and using
a fairly large quantity of turpentine, which was
found in a can of about 20 litres capacity, and
which I had poured out partly on the first storey
and then downstairs and on the ground floor,
succeeded in setting the house on fire in a very
short time. Further I had ordered the men not
taking part in this to guard the entrances of the
house and to arrest all male persons escaping from
it."

7994

50

How many of the citizens thus taken prisoner
were shot, does not appear. The above-named
Captain caused at least 88 to be shot down.
What investigation was made ? What proofs
were there of their guilt ? He tells himself how
it happened, " When I left the burning house
several civilians, including a young priest, had
been arrested from the adjoining houses. I had
these brought to the market place, where in the
meantime my company of field gendarmes had
collected. I then put the columns on the march
out of the town, took command of all prisoners,
among whom I set free the women, boys and girls.
I was commanded by a Staff Officer (a Section
Commander of the Field Artillery Regiment
No. 17) to shoot the prisoners. Then I made my
gendarmes arrange the columns and keep some of
them in motion out of the town. I ordered the
rest to escort the prisoners and take them out of
the town. Here, at the exit, a house was burning,
and by the light of it I had the culprits — 88 in
number, after I had separated out three cripples-
shot."

On the following day many others were shot
dead. On this we get nothing beyond the state-
ment of Colonel Jenrich^which speaks for itself.

51

" In the meantime the houses were searched by the
troops, and a considerable number of inhabitants
arrested, whose complicity in the attack on the
troops was proved. Of the arrested male inhabi-
tants the burgomaster, his son, the brother of the
burgomaster, and every third man were shot on
the following morning."

From the foregoing declaration it appears that
the burgomaster was also shot, the Colonel thus
carrying out his threat, although there was nothing
to show any guilt or complicity on the part of the
burgomaster in the supposed insurrection of the
population. Why were his son and his brother
also killed ? The depositions give only slight
indications on this point.

After Captain Schwarz had found Colonel Stenger
dead in his room, he thought it necessary to
institute a search of the house in the presence of
the wife and daughter of the Burgomaster, the
latter not being present. In the course of this
they forced their way into the cellar, and there
found, in front of the window opening on to the
street, an " auffalliges Gestell " (a remarkable
stand) while the window pane was shattered. The
Captain concluded from this that firing must have

taken place from the cellar. We are not told *w hat
the stand was like, and still less are we informed
why the pane must have been broken by a shot
from within and not by a shot from without. It
is true that Captain Karge declares that coming to
the market place in the evening, he saw a rifleman
standing in a " Toreingang " (porch), who assured
him that he had just distinctly seen that a shot
had come from a house situated on the opposite
side, and pointed in the direction of the Burgo-
master's house. Assuming that the observation
was accurate, was accurately communicated and
accurately understood, then it would by no means
follow that firing had taken place from the cellar of
the house ; indeed, it is very improbable that the
rifleman, standing on the opposite side of the
market place, which was crowded with soldiers and
carts, could have perceived that the shot came from
the cellar.

However, that may be, the Captain in the
further course of his search of the house, found the
son of the Burgomaster, a lad of 15, in one of the
living rooms, and handed him over to the guard in
the market place. On the following day this
youth together with his father and uncle were shot.

With regard to these shootings there is undeni-
ably a serious omission in the depositions. The
" Militar-Untersuchungs-stelle fur Yerletzungen
des Kriegsrechts " * (Military Department for
Inquiry into Breaches of the Laws of War),
apparently felt this too, and therefore in their
" Zusammenfassender Bericht" (Summary) they
have to some extent " clothed " the subject matter.
The summary justifies the shooting of the Burgo-
master together with his son and brother as follows :
" That the family of the Burgomaster himself not
only had knowledge of the hostile acts, but also
took part in them, was established by the immediate
search of the house ; there had been firing into the
street from the locked cellarf the key ot which
the family pretended to have lostj and which
had to be forced open, a trestle had even been
pushed up to the cellar window to make a con-

* Major Bauer and Kainmergerichterat Dr. Wagner
sign in its name.

t This was observed by nobody.

t The witness merely said " Zu der der Schltissel
angeblich night zu finden war." (The key of which it
was alleged could not be found.) It will be remembered
that the burgomaster was not at home.

54

venient position for a rifleman^ ; a musketeer had
observed with the greatest distinctness a shot fired
from the house. The son of the Burgomaster,
who had been concealed by the family)* and had
been dragged out of a dark room J was the only
person who could possibly be held guilty of this.§
As the family were in all respects accomplices
in the murder of the Colonel || who had been
" hospitably " received according to the Belgian
story, father and son were shot on the following
day, August 20th. The brother of the burgomaster
in whose house Cavalry Captain Karge, in command

* Free rendering by the Commission of the words
" ein auffalliges Gestell " (a remarkable stand).

t Statement by the Commission, not made by any of
the witnesses.

J The witness said : " Beim Absucheri dor Wohn-
zimmer kam mir der Sohn des Biirgermeisters aus einen
dunkleii Rimeau entgegen." (In the course of searching
the living rooms the son of the burgomaster came towards
me out of a dark room.)

§ The Commission's inference, not made by any of
the witnesses.

I In taking this view is not the Commission closer to
the blood feud of the ancient Germans than to Article 50
of the Hague Convention ?

55

of the second company of Field Gendarmes had
been billeted, on the proposal of the chief magistrate
of the town, and who had been attacked* shared
this fate.

In this way the matter is reconstructed by a
Commission in Berlin, which was neither present
when the events took place, nor heard the witnesses
themselves. The climax of the report of the
Commission is reached in the final conclusion —
" The complicity of the whole of the burgomaster's
family proves how systematically the Belgian
officials co-operated in this . treacherous treatment
of the German troops, which was so regrettably
frequent."

Nothing is given beyond a supposition based on
very unreliable grounds, that the burgomaster's
son fired a shot ; and there is no evidence of the
complicity of the father. Nevertheless, according
to the view of the Commission the whole family
had to suffer. And because they all had to suffer
for it, it is assumed that they all took part in the
attack, and this amounts to a proof that the

* The witness himself said merely that "Schiisse
einschlugen " (shots fell) near him.

56

Belgian "officials" "systematically" co-operated in
such plots.

It has on many previous occasions in the course
of the war been noticeable that the Germans
have apparently formed a low estimate of the
insight and critical judgment of the neutrals whom
they seek to convince of the justice of their cause.
The German White Book furnishes a fresh instance
of this. If neutrals are to be convinced that the
extreme severities carried out against the popula-
tion in Belgium were justified, it will be necessary
for much clearer evidence to be brought forward
than that contained in this book. We are anxious
to receive enlightenment as to the events which
have occurred, and do not wish to found our judg-
ment solely on Belgian, French and English reports
into which exaggerations may easily have found
their way, but desire that the Germans too may
bring forward evidence which will stand the test of
criticism, and will in fact prove that which it is
desired to prove, instead of proving the exact
opposite.

PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE
CARDS OR SLIPS FROM THIS POC

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO LIBRAI

D Struycken, Antonius A]

626 Hendrikus

B4G2827 The German white be

the war in Belgium