The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1901-01-26
Repetition Of the Savagery Pracced the Americans
- During the Brief War Of 1912.
Some Of the Barbarities Committed "Our American
Cousins" by the Soldiers and Sailors.
Aatreated their Own Kth and Kin in the United States
they Now Maltreat the Beers.

Brutal as is the policy pursued by
the British soldiers in South Africa
toward the Beers, it is in no particular
worse than was experienced by the
Americans in the war of 1912, says
the Washington Post. Today we read
of the burning of the homes of non
combatants, the destruction of all sup
plies in villages and hamlets through
which the British forces pass, which
must mean starvation and death for
the helpless women and children there,
unless, indeed, their fathers, husbands
and brothers can drive off the foreign
invader and bring their families food.
Kitchener and Hamilton, who order
these things, cruel and abhorrent as
3athey are, are but feeble imitators of
Admiral Cockburn, who devastated
the shores of the Chesapeake in 1918,
and afterward sacked and burned our
national capital.
1t is not so very long ago that the
English soldiers and sailors, the hire
ling aliens that accompanied them, and
their savage Indian allies in the West,
waged such war in this fair land as
to receive the condemnation of the
press throughout the civilized world.
So horrible, indeed, were some of
their acts that their own historians
have since found it necessary to con-
demn some and attempt to explain all
of them by fictions as fimsy as the
excuses of the commanding officers
themselves at the time.
1t is not so very long ago that these
things occurred, although at our very
doors. Many men now living who
will read this article had these stories
fresh from the lips of their fathers
or grandfathers, who served in the
militia or were personally cognizant
of the many outrages during the years
1S12-1S14.
Thanks to that sterling patriot, Hen
ry Clay, then speaker of the House of
Representatives, collection of sworn
aftidavits in regard to many of these
barbarities was made, escaped destruc-
ton, and has since been embodied in
the annals of congress, furnishing
complete refutation to the cheap ex-
cuses which the English historians and
apologists have thought it necessary
to make, and establishing the historical
truths, as it was the purpose of Mr..
Clay at the time to do.
These afidavits, to the number of
1913 pages, are embodied in a report
made to the House Of Representatives
in the closing hours of the first session
Of the Thirteenth congress by Repre-
sentative Nathaniel Macon Of North
Carolina, chairman of a special COM
mittee to whom had been referred at
the beginning of the session that part
Of the presidents message (which re-
lates to the spirit and manner in which
the war had been waged by the enc
N.Y."
The session was short one-a little
over two months-but the committee
made the best use of it's time, and al
though of necessity compelled to col
lect the great bulk Of it's testimony
from the neighboring states of Mary
land and Virginia, it found ample evil
dence of the truth of all the published
statements previously made regarding
British barbarities therein, and some
even more damning in character, which
occurred while the committee was in
session.
When this report was presented,
July 81, 1913, it was spoken of in the
proceedings of the House of Represen-
tatives as including "a voluminous
mass Of testimony" and the editor of
the Annals has given it the sub-head,
British Barbarities."
Five thousand copies of this report
were ordered to be printed, and any
one of these copies today would be
worth it's weight in gold.
1t is not unlikely that the greater
portion of them We're destroyed when
the capitol was burned. In 1914 the
report was reprinted in book form at
Worcester, Mass, under the caption,
"Barbarities of the Enemy" A copy
Of this reprint, also extremely rare, is
preserved in the library of congress.
Summed up in brief, the evidence
given before the committee, or sub
mitted to it in the form of letters from
individuals we'll known, or whose truth
and veracity were thoroughly we'll es-
tablished, convicted the British govern
ment, its officers and soldiers of some
Of the atrocities.
Starvation Of prisoners and their con-