Presse australienne - 1914

The Mercury - 17 août 1914

BATTLE OF BLAMONT.
BAVARIANS DRIVEN BACK.
PARIS, August 16.
An engagement took place yesterday round the village of Blamont, on the river Vesouze, 17 miles from Luneville, and near the German frontier, and in neighbouring villages of Cirey-les Forges and Reion, where the Bavarians had gathered in force.
The French occupied the village of Blamont and the neighbouring heights at the point of the bayonet, and many of the Bavarians were killed and wounded.

The Register - 17 août 1914

French and Bavarians in Touch.
PARTS, August 16.
An engagement between the French and Germans has occurred In the region of Blamont and Cirey les Forges, two villages 17 and 21 miles respectively east of Luneville near the Alsatian border. The Bavarians had gathered in force, when they were attacked by the French troops. Blamont was strongly held by the latter, while other French regiments cleared the neighboring heights of the invaders at the point of the bayonet. Many of the Bavarians were killed and wounded. [...]

The Register - 18 août 1914

GERMAN CANNON CAPTURED.
On Sunday the French operations were directed towards developing a strong line of defence between Rachecourt and the Saint-Marieux mines. Their advance troops made a specially rapid advance into Southern Alsace by way of the Schirmeck Valley, 28 miles from Strassburg. So quickly did the French soldiers move that they were, able to capture 1,000 German troops, in addition to 500 taken on the previous day. They also secured several heavy guns and field. pieces, at Saint-Marie, and 19 transport wagons at Blamont.

Port Pirie Recorder and North Western Mail - 18 août 1914

A GERMAN SUCCESS.
BLAMONT CAPTURED.
PARIS, Sunday,
A force of five hundred Germans captured the village of Blamont, near Luneville, on Friday.

Bendigo Advertiser - 18 août 1914

BAVARIAN TROOPS SUFFER. FRENCH
VICTORY AT BLAMONT
PARIS, 17th August.
The latest details regarding the fighting show that the Bavarian army corps held a strongly-entrenched position before Blamont. The French division opened the attack on Friday night, and after pushing the German outposts back suspended operations, until the dawn of Saturday. The infantry advanced under powerful artillery fire, and soon drove the Germans from Blamont and Cirey. The Germans then occupied the hill overlooking the village from the northwards, but the French advanced, and the Bavarians withdrew towards Saarburg., leaving many dead anpd wounded on the hillside. The French troops occupied positions beyond the frontier.
A French force, four miles further southwards, occupied Donnan, one of the chief summits of the Vosges just beyond the frontier.
Further northward, in the Briey district, the retreating Bavarians pillaged houses and maltreated civilians. The retreating Germans in Alsace burnt many houses and shot a number of the inhabitants.

Bairnsdale Advertiser and Tambo and Omeo Chronicle - 18 août 1914

REPORTED GERMAN SUCCESS.
FRENCH FRONTIER CROSSED AND BLAMONT CAPTURED.
PARIS, Sunday.
Five hundred Germans crossed the south-western frontier of France, and captured Blamont, a small place just inside the border, on Friday.
[Blanmont is near Luneville and near the latter place is a fort.]

Queensland Times - 18 août 1914

THE FRENCH AT BLAMONT.
500 GERMANS CAPTURED.
Paris, August, 16.
Five hundred Germans were captured at Blamont, on the Meuse River, on Friday.
(Blamont, which has a population of 2100 is situated 17 miles to the east of Luneville.)

The Tamworth Daily Observer - 18 août 1914

FRENCH SUCCESSES.
PARIS, Monday.
The French operations are developing along the line from Rechieourt to Sautern and Vineaux. The advance has been specially rapid in the Schirmech valley.
The French made a thousand prisoners in addition to 500 captured the previous day. Several heavy guns and field pieces were captured at Sautemaine, and 19 transport waggons at Blamont.

The Mercury - 19 août 1914

CAPTURED GERMAN FLAG.
ARRIVES AT PARIS.
PARIS, August 17.
The first German flag captured by the French in the battle at Blamont has arrived at Paris.
 

The Mail - 20 août 1914

SAVED FROM DEATH.
MAYOR OF BLAMONT
(Independent Cable Service.)
LONDON, Tuesday.
A report has been received from Paris stating that when the French troops entered the small town of Blamont, in the Vosges Mountains. they found notices on the walls stating that the Mayor and prominent inhabitants would be shot. The sudden arrival of the French and the disorderly retreat of the Germans saved them from death.

The Richmond River Express and Casino Kyogle Advertiser - 21 août 1914

PROGRESS OF THE WAR.
[...]
At Paris M. Mirman, Prefect of Meurthe-and-Moselle, reported to the Minister of the interior, M. Malhy, that many women, girls, and old men had been butchered by Germans, and their houses had been looted and burnt at Badonviller, Cirey and Blamont. It was further alleged that an old man had been trussed up and shot at Brenteuil.
The French cavalry passed several burned villages which the Germans had set on fire with petrol. The allies, particularly the Belgians, are maddened by these outrages, and vow to exact the full measure of retribution. The Belgians have nick-named the Prussians “The Red Indians of Europe” owing to their farm burning proclivities.

Port Pirie Recorder and North Western Mail - 21 août 1914

The Fate in Store for Blamont.
MAYOR AND COUNCILLORS TO
BE BUTCHERED BY THE
GERMANS.
FRENCH ENTRY PREVENTS THE MASSACRE.
When the French troops that, in pursuance of the offensive movement against Germany, last week penetrated Lorraine, well beyond the border, entered Blamont, in that Province, they found the town placarded with posters, in German, notifying that it was the intention of the German military authorities to shoot the Mayor, members of the town council, and other Prominent citizens the following morning.

The Register - 21 août 1914

SIGNIFICANT FIND IN A FRENCH TOWN.
PARIS. August 19. 10.55 a.m.
When French troops entered Blamont, a French town in the department of Meurthe-et-Moselle, from which the Kaiser's soldiers had just retreated, the found German posters announcing that the Mayor of the town and other notabilities who had fallen into the hands of the invaders, would be shot next morning.

Kalgoorlie Miner - 21 août 1914

BLAMONT NOTABILITIES.
DOOMED TO BE SHOT. Paris. Aug. 19.
When the French troops entered Blamont last Saturday they found German posters stuck up in the town stating that the mayor and other notabilities would be shot the next morning.

The Brisbane Courier - 21 août 1914

DELAYED EXECUTIONS.
WHAT THE FRENCH FOUND AT BLAMONT.
PARIS, Wednesday
When the French troops entered Blamont, a town in the department of Meurthe-et-Moselle, and 17 miles east of Luneville, they found German posters notifying that the major and other notabilities would be shot next morning

Daily Herald - 21 août 1914

GERMANS EXPELLED FROM BLAMONT
SANGUINARY DESIGNS FOILED
PARIS, August 18, 10.40 p.m.
When the French troops entered Blamont, from which they had expelled the Germans, they found notices posted on the walls stating that the mayor and other prominent inhabitants were to he shot. The sudden arrival of the French and the disorderly retreat of the Germans saved the mayor and the other prominent citizens from death.

Examiner - 21 août 1914

GERMANS AT BLAMONT.
WHAT The FRIENCH TROOPS DISCOVERED
When the French troops entered Blamont they found German posters notifying that the Mayor and notabilities were to be shot next morning.

Hamilton Spectator - 21 août 1914

FRENCH IN BLAMONT.
IN TIME TO SAVE A MASSACRE.
PARIS. Wenesday.
When the French troops entered Blamont they -found German posters notifying that the mayor and other notabilities would be shot next morning.

The Maitland Weekly Mercury - 22 août 1914

GERMANS IN BLAMONT.
PARIS, Wednesday.
When the French troops entered Blamont they found German posters exhibited, notifying that the Major of the town and other notabilities would be shot next morning

Northern Times - 22 août 1914

HREAT AT BLAMONT.
London, August 19.
A report states that when the French troops entered Blamont they found German posters notifying that the mayor and notabilities were to be shot next morning.

Western Star and Roma Advertiser - 22 août 1914

Blamont-Cirey Battle
GERMANS PUSHED BACK.
The Bavarian army corps held a strongly entrenched position before Blamont. A French division opened the attack on Friday night, and, after pushing the German outposts back, suspended operations until dawn on Saturday. Then the infantry advanced under cover of a powerful artillery fire, and soon drove the Germans from Blamont and Cirey. The Germans then occupied a hill over-looking the villages from the northward,. but as the French advanced the Bavarians withdrew towards Saarburg, leaving many dead and wounded oh the hillsides. The French subsequently occupied positions beyond the frontier.
A French force four miles further southward occupied the Donon, one of the chief summits of the Vosges, just beyond the frontier. Further northward, in the Briey district the retreating Bavarians pillaged the houses, maltreating the civilians. Also the retreating Germans in Alsace burned many houses and shot a number of inhabitants.
 

Sunday Times - 4 octobre 1914

FIENDISH GERMAN OUTRAGES
FRENCH CIVILIANS ARE BRUTALLY MURDERED
SEIZED WITH BLOOD FRENZY
CALLOUS TREATMENT OP WOMEN.
LONDON, August 20.
Never in the memory of living man has public indignation been aroused to the extent it has by the reports of German atrocities that pour into the columns of the press daily. A certain amount of cruelty was only to be expected on the part of an invader finding his progress being more bitterly contested than he had imagined; but that presumably civilized men should have permitted themselves the excesses and relentless butcheries that have so far characterized the doings of the Germans passes all understanding.
Every day, every edition, the press, print fresh stories of insane savagery that make the blood run cold in chill horror. Among the most terrible of these is the atrocious murder of five French civilians by German soldiers at Lorrach, in Baden, a few miles from the Franco-German frontier, on August 1, before Germany had declared war on France. The story is told by an eye-witness, M. Gaudefroy-Demonhynes, in a sworn statement to a Paris magistrate published by the “Temps” : -
M. Demonynes, who was attempting to return to France from Baden, found himself detained with other Frenchmen and some Russians at the railway station of Lorrach. The party were arrested by soldiers and taken to the police station, where they and their luggage were searched. They were then led under guard through the town, amid hostile demonstrations by the inhabitants, to the square in front of the railway station, where they found another party of about 30 Frenchmen and 20 Russians. One of this party, a French commercial traveler, a stout man aged about 40, suddenly shouted 'Vive la France !' Instantly the two soldiers guarding him took him before an officer or a non-commissioned officer standing a few paces away from a group of officers. People standing between M. Demonhynes and the scene prevented him from hearing what was said, but a few seconds later a shot - only one shot - rang out. “I don't know who fired,” the witness says, “but I know that just before the report the Frenchman was standing before my eyes against the wall of a restaurant facing, the station, held fast by his two guards in the position of one who is about to be executed. Hardly had the shot rung out than protests arose from our little band. Among those who protested most vigorously were three young Frenchmen from 18 to 20. They looked to me like students leaving Germany like myself. I did not, speak to them, and do not know their names. Just as

THE SOLDIERS SEIZED HIM,
and his comrades one on the young Frenchmen tried to speak to an officer who was wearing a large light grey cloak. This officer did not listen to him. Some order must have been given, I don't know by whom. One of the three Frenchmen, who must have been told of the fate awaiting him, cried out in German: 'Don't hold us; we aren't afraid; we are Frenchmen !' This time the officer replied coarsely, half turning round: 'Shut up !' The three Frenchmen, of their own accord, placed themselves against the wall of the same restaurant. Two lines of soldiers were drawn up on either side of them at right angles to the wall. Other soldiers - how many I did not count - took up their position in front of them, about eight yards away.
A volley rang out. The three Frenchmen fell. Fresh cries arose from our party. Horror stricken women began to weep. I did not see the bodies removed, but I saw them fall to the ground. At this moment a great uproar broke out. Another Frenchman, a big man with a great black beard, whom I did not know, began to shout, 'Cowards. Murderers' Soldiers surrounded him. He struggled with them. They speedily overcame him, and without taking the trouble to stand him up against the wall, without the intervention of any officer, one of the soldiers thrust the barrel of his rifle against his body and shot him down point-blank before my eyes. I saw these same soldiers dragging his body along the ground. The man was struggling still. I had not the strength to look any more. I heard other shots. I don't know if there were any other victims.” M. Demonhynes, who, with the remainder of the party, was eventually allowed to proceed on his journey, says two young man, students returning to Lyons from Germany, told him they had seen

GERMAN SOLDIERS KILL TWO ITALIANS
in the train in which he was travelling and in which he heard the sound of shots. One Italian was shot, they said, because he wanted the windows shut, and protested when his request was refused; the other because he repulsed a soldier who tried to sit down on him by way of a joke. Inhuman hate appears to possess these Prussian invaders, whom terror alone can curb. Belgians who have, dealt with them at close quarters declare that these Uhlans fought with the bitterness of personal fury, and, not contented with killing those who manfully resisted them in fight, assassinated numbers who had laid down their weapons and held their hands up. Many of the corpses have their hands raised and their elbows on a level with the shoulders. The wounds of these brave defenders are horrible, having been inflicted with weapons fired at a distance of a couple of inches from the mouth or breast. At Orsmael, Uhlans shot ten peasants, the occupants of a house from which, the Germans alleged, they fired at and wounded a priest who was trying to give Extreme Unction to a dying man. Dormael appears to have been singled out for specially violent treatment. Three brothers named Sevenans, who had fired upon the Ger mans, were shot dead, and their home burned down. Some Uhlans met a Belgian chemist who was riding a bicycle near Jodoigne. Arresting him, they inquired their way, to the town hall, placing the muzzles of revolvers to his head while they listened. He gave them the required information and was allowed to pass on, but before he had gone ten yards they

SENT THREE BULLETS INTO HIS BACK,
and he was mortally wounded. On the arrival of M. Michel de Smeth, Mayor of the village of Pontillac, between Liege and Namur, at Brussels, he related further stories of German atrocities. M. De Smeth states that 5000 men belonging to the 17th, Hussars from Mecklenburg entered the village, having met with no resistance. They demanded food, which the inhabitants freely gave them, but after eating and drinking, the troopers commenced to ride through the streets like drunken cowboys, emptying their carbines at the windows of the houses. Two Belgian soldiers secreted in the village returned the fire, and the Germans in revenge killed an innocent man, one of their officers emptying a six-chambered revolver into his head. The Mayor adds that the Germans having discovered that their pointed bullets do not inflict a sufficiently severe wound, have been filing them, making the ends jagged, and practically converting them into “dum-dums.” It is further stated that ever since the invasion of Belgium, and particularly since the Germans met with such a determined resistance, they have committed most horrible outrages on the civil population. Thousands of cases have been investigated and proved.

TERRIBLE TREATMENT OF WOMEN.
News from St. Petersburg reports that Russian ladies had been stripped naked by German soldiers in the presence of officers. In one instance a father of one of the ladies so treated, was shot, dead for intervening, and other Russian gentlemen, upon protesting, were threatened with the same fate. From the same city it is reported that the Germans seized the wife of a Russian chief of gendarmery and demanded that she should reveal the movements of the Russian troops. Having refused she was shot dead. Barbarities are also said to have occurred at Kalish, in Russian Poland, where the Germans have published a proclamation announcing that every tenth inhabitant will be shot in the event of further resistance.
In reading these awful incidents it is hard to realize that we are still living in the twentieth century. Indeed the most ruthless barbarian conqueror would scarcely be guilty of such deeds of shame as to-day mark every foot of progress made by the inhuman Uhlans and their fellows.
Most of us now drink to “The Day” that will see such things, for ever put out of the possibility of happening again.
A Rennes telegram to the 'Matin' this week gives a graphic account of the shooting of three Frenchmen in Hanover. M. and Mme. Guillon, who live in the province of Lille et Vilaine, went to Germany for their holidays, and were staying at Holberg, on the borders of the Baltic, when the storm burst, and French mobilization was ordered. The couple immediately started on an attempt to return to their country, but were refused passports, and were arrested. After four days of continual vexations and troubles M. and Mme. Guillon arrived at Hanover, whence they hoped to reach France after certain formalities. Unfortunately, however, Mme. Guillon was there guilty of an indiscretion in addressing to her husband a few words in English. Her words were immediately remarked by police officers standing near, and the couple were hauled to the police station and there

DENOUNCED AS SPIES.
Mme. Guillon on the way to the station could not suppress cries of 'Vive la France,' and in this cry was joined with equal enthusiasm by two young Frenchmen. The latter were also arrested. A firing party was then immediately summoned, and M. Guillon and his two compatriots were ranged up against a shop and shot on the spot. After this terrible experience Mme Guillon thought of nothing but flight, and finally reached Dentheim, a frontier station on the Dutch border. Here, however, after being robbed by German soldiers of £400, the unfortunate lady was imprisoned in the local gaol.
Stories received through Holland of the burning of Vise by Germans seemed at first

TOO TERRIBLE
to believe, and even now, though they are confirmed by a correspondent of the 'Handelsblad,' who. was an eye-witness of the scene, they seem hardly credible.
The correspondent telegraphs:-
“It was an awful sight Every house was a mass of flames, through which the streets were hardly visible. At the entrance of the Grand Hotel were three disarmed soldiers, bound hand and foot. Entering the hotel I found the floor covered with dead bodies.
“In the hall of the dead several soldiers stood on guard. The uniform of one was covered with blood and dirt. From this

AWFUL, NAUSEATING SCENE.
I hurried back to the blinding glare and suffocating heat of the burning villages.. The houses of the villagers were burning wildly, while they locked on helpless, victims of the Prussian might.
Along the pavements, splitting and crackling with the heat, we hurried. Here and there groups of soldiers were looting and chasing in and out of the burning houses. Beer shops had the most attention.
Paris advices tell of more outrages in the Luneville district. The Prefect of Meurthe and Moselle, Monsieur Mirman, has made the following report to the Minister of the Interior relative to German brutality :-
“To-day I paid a visit to the districts of Badonville, Cirey, and Blamont, in the Luneville area. It is impossible to cite all the acts of savagery and brutality on the part of the German troops which have come under my notice. I could make a long list of women, young girls, and old men and women who have been executed, without any reason and at the slightest pretext.
“Houses have been systematically burned by the Germans as they advance, and then again as they retreat. These wanton acts are not only in the form of pillaging and creating havoc wherever possible, but money and personal property have been looted.
“At Badonviller, for example, eleven inhabitants have been murdered, amongst whom was the wife of the mayor. Seventy-eight houses have been burnt with petrol and specially prepared faggots.
“Throughout my journey

THE PITIFUL, SHAMEFUL STORY
was the same. At Bremenil five inhabitants were butchered, including an old man of 74, who was trussed and then shot like a rabbit. The Communal Hall was razed to the ground.
“At Blamont there were three victims, including a young girl. A large chocolate factory belonging to a Swiss subject was ransacked.”
French war news issued from the Eiffel Tower wireless station and received by the Marconi Company states that numerous letters found by victorious French troops on German soldiers corroborate the stories of looting and outrage practiced by the Germans. Thus, according to one epistle, the writer “shot down inhabitants of from 14 to 60 years of age and accounted for 30 head, every one killed.” The German soldiers admit that no civilians fired upon them.
“Early this afternoon,” writes a Brussels correspondent, “Germans entered Tirlemont, in the vicinity of which they have been for some days. They were in strong force, mostly cavalry and artillery. The big guns shelled the place, and the cavalry played at war by attacking the flying and panic-stricken populace.

SHOOTING THEM AND STICKING THEM AT RANDOM.
“Never have I seen such a picture of woe as a peasant woman and five, children who stood be wildered in the Place de la Gare, all crying as if their hearts would break. It was a terrible story the woman had to tell. 'They shot my husband before my eyes,' she said, 'and trampled two of my children to death. I am the mother of nine, and I have only, five with me; two others are lost'”

Leader - 7 octobre 1914

German atrocities
There are many persons in our community who will not place any credence in the cabled reports of the brutalities committed by the German soldiers on the unarmed peasantry in France and Belgium women especially. There are also patriotic news paper writers of high standing who have the courage to aver that the reports of violations of young women, wives and maids, are emanations of the war correspondents, whose papers live and make fortunes out of sensationalism. But how, in the name of Heaven, do they reconcile the statements enclosed in letters from private sources, and from eye witnesses, testifying to these acts of savagery on the part of the German soldiery ? We were inclined to believe ourselves that the reports were exaggerated, but are now of the opinion that there is more than a modicum of truth in them. Take the following letter from the correspondent of the London "Daily Mail" as an instance of the brutality of the enemy : - "Today (August 21) I paid a visit to the districts of Badonviller, Virey, and Blamont, in the Luneville area. It is impossible to cite all the acts of savagery and brutality on the part of the German troops which have come under my notice. I could make a long list of women, young girls, and old men and women who have been executed without any reason and on the slightest pretext. Houses have been systematically burned by the Germans as they advance, and then again as they retreat. These wanton acts are not only in the form of pillaging and creating havoc wherever possible, but money and personal property have been looted. At Badonviller, for example, eleven in habitants had been murdered, among whom was the wife of the mayor. Seventy eight houses have been burned with petrol, and especially prepared faggots. After the town was pillaged the church was fired and demolished, and fifteen of the inhabitants were taken away as hostages. These included a judge, and none has returned. Throughout my journey the pitiful, shameful story was the same. At Bremenil five inhabitants were butchered, including an old man of seventy-four who was trussed and then shot like a rabbit. The Communal Hall was razed to the ground. Nearly all the houses were fired, not during the battle, but by the soldiers on their arrival. Four men were executed; two others have disappeared. One of the victims is a little lad who was killed by being entombed in a burning house. At Blamont there were three victims, including a young girl. A large chocolate factory belonging to a Swiss subject was ransacked. All this evidence has been given me by reliable witnesses without any striving after effect."
Since the foregoing letter was written, we have all read in the cables of further atrocities, all of which are in direct contravention of the war agreement of the Hague, which was signed by Germany in common with the other nations concerned. It bears out In all its gruesomeness the dishonorable tactics of Germany, and what value can be placed on her word. Is it any wonder that she should violate the agreement contained in the "little scrap of paper," when she resorts to such uncivilized savagery in modern warfare, as we are led to believe she is doing. Certain it is that there are in Germany men and women equally as kind-hearted and true as any in Britain or its dependencies, and we have had innumerable instances in our own country of German citizens whose word is their bond, and who are now in a state bordering on despair to think that their military dignitaries should stand for such wanton destruction of life and property, and for the rape and rapine which is being carried on. Speaking to a well known German resident yesterday on the subject, he said that "it was appalling to even contemplate that his countrymen could be guilty of the offences attributed to them, but he was sorry to say that the letters from private sources lent color to the veracity of the statements." "Why they are as bad as the Huns," he concluded, whose cruelty has been a by-word the world over, ever since the Tartar demons over-ran Europe from 372 to 453 A.D., and who were responsible for giving to Hungary its name. A terrible retribution will be exacted on the Germans when the Cossacks commence to over-run their country - too terrible even to contemplate. The Cossack spares nobody - man, woman or child; they are all the same to him; and, although the slaughter will be frightful, the unfortunate villagers of rural Germany, who had nothing whatever to do with the making of the war, can only visit the blame on their Prussian militarists and the Kaiser. God help them and their families, what time the Russians swarm over their fields, towns and hamlets. . "The Terrible Turk" has given way now to "The Terrible Teuton” whose massacres are on a par with those of the Porte on the Americans.

The Brisbane Courier - 7 octobre 1914

THE BARBARITY OF GERMAN TROOPS.
SINS AGAINST CIVILISATION.
THE SPY SYSTEM.
In war time all stories told by one side (even if it be our own side) against the other must be read und listened to with caution. When people are excited they believe easily what they wish to believe. They even suffer from delusions, and give detailed accounts of events which they persuaded themselves they saw but which really never happened (writes H. Hamilton Fyle from Paris, August 19, to the London "Mail”).
Therefore I have been sceptical about the tales of horror which appear in the French newspapers accusing the Germans of murder and brutality. I hate to think that any soldiers could be so devilish as to kill unarmed civilians in blind rage, or any officers so wicked as to permit it. I should infinitely prefer to be able to say, "I am convinced these are exaggerations. Do not put any faith in them."
Unfortunately there is no room for doubt any longer that the Germans have been making war in a manner which is very far indeed from being civilised. To call it "savage" or "barbarous" would be doing a monstrous injustice even to uncivilised races. There is only one word, I have used It already. Do not think I mean to apply it to all the German soldiers, or even to most of them. But that a large number have acted not like men but like devils is now lamentably put beyond dispute. And the French War Office declares that letters found on dead and captured Germans prove these actions to have been deliberate, to have been ordered by officers as high in rank as colonels and majors, and to be part of a general plan.
Take the case of the village of Badonviller, in one of the French frontier departments. Ghastly rumours of what happened here when the Germans captured it have been floating about for days. From an official report from the prefect of the department, and from the story told by a Red Cross war nurse, we have learnt the truth. According to the nurse, one of the Emperor's sons was there and made a speech to the troops. "The French are savages," he said. "Strike hard and make examples." The troops needed no further exhortation. They set about killing and burning without delay. To begin with, they had bombarded an unfortified village, an outrage which civilised warfare forbids. When they entered they found the inhabitants crowded into the cellars. They fired into the windows, they fired down into the hiding places of the terrified folk. Then they pulled out those who were left alive and set them up against a wall, where they amused themselves by pointing their rifles at them, filling women and children with wild terror.
"Eleven persons assassinated," says the official repart. One was the wife of the mayor, another a poor woman with a child in her arms. All were innocent of any offence even against the laws of warfare. The Germans set up the defense that civilians fired upon them. They could hardly plead that excuse for shooting women, and it is proved false as regards the men. These poor villagers were as truly and shamefully murdered as if a number of Germans had entered their village and done them to death in time of Peace.
Then the burning and blowing up of houses began. Sometimes it is necessary for an enemy to clear away buildings-always, of course after warning the inhabitants to leave. If the Germans had been defending themselves in Badonviller there might have been good reason for what they did. But they had no such pretext. In shame wanton rage they destroyed the church, they destroyed 80 houses, they pillaged and ransacked the rest
Then they had news at a French force drawing near, and left the smoking ruins, left the dead bodies covered with bullet-wounds, left a population hating the very name of Germans as dwellers in the jungle hate the name of wild beasts that kill and tear and maim.
And now for the part of the story which lifts the heart again and fills the eves with tears. Next day a German prisoner was brought in by a French patrol. As soon as the villagers heard of it they gathered with black vengeance in their minds They would have dragged him away from his captors they would have rent his wretched body a pieces but between their fury, not unnatural or unjustified, and their victim stood the mayor.
Major Benoit whose wife bad been murdered was the man who might have cried for vengeance most loudly of all. Instead he pleaded for the prisoner. He fought down the will of the people. He saved the man s life. If ever there was an action that could rightly be called Christ-like it was that. One hears an echo of “Forgive them ; they know not what they do”. One sees the nobility of the human soul triumphing over the animal instinct of revenge
So deep an impression did his magnanimity make upon the President and his Ministers that they immediately made M. Benoit a Knight of the Legion of Honour “for heroic behaviour” (so the declaration rends) in that his wife having been assassinated and his house burned he continued to discharge his duties with cool devotion, and also saved the live of a prisoner threatened by the just wrath of the inhabitants, giving thus a magnificent example of energy and greatness of soul”. M Benoit will live in history. His action will light up one of the most inspiring pages in the record of the war
In another little place called Blamont, from which the French drove out the Germans by a sudden attack, they only just saved the mayor and other leading residents from being shot; On the walls were papers stating that they had been "condemned to death.” Far from being able to carry out their sentence the Germans suffered in great number the pains of death themselves. There was a thrilling charge of French cavalry from a mile away. So violent was the shock that the Germans were utterly broken
Another terrible accusation brought against the Germans is that of killing the wounded. Again, one would like to dismiss it as a wild horror. But It rests upon appallingly solid testimony. Names are given by a committee charged with inquiring into any lapses from the civilised code of war. A Belgian sergeant was even told by an officer taken prisoner that '”the Germans wanted no prisoners". That cannot certainly be taken as expressing the general view of the German Army, but there are many who have acted up to it. A French non commissioned officer wrote to his parents in Toulouse that a wounded officer of chasseurs had been “finished off” on the battlefield, and that this was declared by the murderer to be "according to orders ".
Such sins against humanity are bound to meet with awful retribution. So, too, will the widespread German spy system make life very unpleasant in future for Germans living abroad It has been discovered that the German Consuls were empowered to call upon any subject of the Kaiser to employ himself in the mean and degrading capacity of a spy. Note-books were supplied in which the information required was set down, strength of garrisons, names of regiments composing them, names of local officials, resources of the locality, names of wealthy people and estimates of their possessions, amount of food stored in neighbourhood, and so on
The number of spies who went thus systematically to work in Franco and Belgium was enormous, and in England the system is said to have been carried on also. No country will feel cordial towards people who are capable of abusing hospitality and friendship in this sinister and cynical way