Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1914-09-17
SCOUTS 0UTRAGES
AGAINST BELG|ANS
Associated Press Correspond
ent, Who Was Prisoner of
Germans, Describes
War Conditions.

NEW YORK, September 17.-An Asso-
cfated Press staff correspondent or
American birth and antecedents, who
was sent from the New York Office and
was caught in Brussels at the time of
the German invasion, held as prisoner
for several days and finally escaped to
Holland. has sent by mail the following
story Of his experiences:
THE night before the Germans entered
Brussels. when the Belgian civil guards
and refugees began pouring into the city
from the direction of Louvain. they
brought stories of unspeakable German
atrocities, maltreatment of old men and
children and the violation of women.
Reels With Apprehension.
The Belgian capital reeled with APP
prehension. Within an hour the gayety.
the vivacity and brilliancy of the city
went out like a broken arc light. The
radiance Of the cafes was exchanged for
darkness; whispering groups of resi-
dents broke up hurriedly and locked
themselves into their homes, where they
put up, the shutters and drew in their
Belgian city went through state of
morbid CONSERVATION remarkably like
that from which it suffered June IS.
1915. when it trembled with the fear of
a French victory at Waterloo.
In less than twenty-four hours the
Belgian citizens were chatting COM
fortably with the German invaders. and
the allegation of German brutality and
demoniacal torture dissolved into one of
the myths which have accompanied all
wars.
Neither in Brussels nor in it's envi-
rons was single offensive act, so far
as know. committed by German SOL
der. In a city of over half a million
people. invaded by a hostile army of
perhaps quarter of million soldiers.
no act sufficiently fragrant to demand
punisR ment or to awaken protest came
TO my attention
Rumors Not Substantiated.
The frightful reports that had pre-
cedcd the German army into Brussels
included the disemboweling of old men
and the impaling of children on lances
Just outside Louvain. Investigation not
only failed to substantiate these ru-
lnors, hut could not even discover any
one in the immediate vicinity who
credited them. An eyewitness of un-
inpeachable veracity told me that the
worst behavior he had observed during
the first German entry into Louvain
august 19) was that of German SOL
der who leaned from his horse and
brought him glass of beer.
Il marched for days with the Ger
man columns. often only one day be-
hind the fighting. with the, houses that
had been burned still smoldering, the
ground freshly broken by shell and
trampled by horses and men, and the
memory of the German advance vivid
In the minds of the Inhabitants.
Finds But One Case.
II interviewed an average of twenty
persons in each of dozen towns and
found only one instance of a non-com-
Blatant who had been killed without a
justifable provocation. In this case
the evidence did not clearly prove that
the man had been wantonly murdered
He lived in one of the typical small
Belgian countryside houses which COM
bine the comforts of home with the
lure of small public bar. This house
was at the north end of Merbes le-
Chateau, town through which
large part of the German army passed
on the road to Maubeuge. son of
the murdered man, whose name was
Arthur Nicodem. showed me blood
clots on the floor marking the place
where Modem fell. his throat cut by
saw-edged German saber
TT was said by some inhabitants
that the murdered man showed a pair
OF binoculars. but more probable ex-
plantation was that English outposts
.,
from which they poured a rain of fire
upon the first German invaders. The
inference that the shooting was done
by Belgian civilians may have inhamed
the Germans to reprisals. In that
relghborhood four houses had bean
burned and one was still ablaze as
p. ..s,s;l Wednesday,. august IS.
which had been the scene of an unim-
portant skirnish between the Germans
and English on the previous Sunday,
was riddied with rife shots The small
number OF windows intact showed that
the Germans had made a deliberate as
&i'tlt upon the residents of the town
Snt the inhabitants themselves admit
Zone by comparatively small number
OF Germans, and that the firing had
not been begun until English soldiers
who had concealed themselves in the
houses had fired first upon the Ger
mans.
Il have emphasized the one fatality
OF the non-combatant because the news
OF 1t travelled up and down the Sam
bre and across to Hantes-Wiberie and
Solre-Sur-Sambre, multiplying as it
went and developing CHASTITY and in
human details until it seemed an un-
answerable reproach to the whole Ger
man Empire. With this one possible
exception, l did not encounter in Nj
yelies. in Binche, Buissiere or Solre-
/ visited single instance of mistreat-
ment of any sort by German officers or
soldiers.
Bussiere Under Cross-Fire.
neutrality-suspicious. the lower
part of the city-had been virtually
destroyed by cross-are from. French
and German artillery. Tops of brew
cries had been hurled bodily to the
ground, and walls had either disap.
peared or become grotesquely dis.
lodged. The whole city lay in smok-
ing ruins. with only it's drawbridge
across the Sambre and few marble
stations and lighthouses towering
above the debris. But here, two day;
after the battle. women and children
were moving comfortably about thu
town, and not single complaint wal
uttered against German conduct.
The town of Solre-Sur-Sambre is :
small village about five miles south O.
Buissiere. and is important not as {
battlefield, but as a center about which
French and German conflict wageC
steadily for two days-August 23-24-
the French line. after making sporadic
stands heipp fOrced hack steadily over