The Birmingham age-herald., 1915-05-13

marching them to various places must evidently have been done under the d. iection of a higher military authority The ill-treatment of the prisoners was under the eyes and often under the di- rection and sanction of officers, and off eers themselves took part n it.
 Express Regret
 It Is to be noticed that cases occur in the dispositions in which humane acts by Individual officers and soldiers are men toned, or in which officers are said to have expressed regret at being obliged to carry out orders for cruel action against the civilians. Similarly, we find entries in diaries which reveal genuine pity for the population and disgust at the conduct of the army. 1t appears that a German noncomthissioned officer stated definitely that he was acting under. orders and executing them with great unwilling ness. commissioned officer on being asked al Louvain by witness a highly educated man, about the horrible acts committed by the soldiers. said he was merely executing orders and that he himself would be shot if he did not ex, ecute them.
 We are driven to the conclusion that the marrying of the villages in the dis trlct, the burning of a large part of Louva1n, the massacres there the march ing out of the prisoners, and the trans port 10 Cologne call done without inauiry as to whether the particular persons seized or killed had committed any wrong- ful acb were due to a calculated policy carried out scientifically and deliberately, not merely with the sanction but under the direction of higher military authori- ties, and were not due to any provocation or resistance by the civilian population
 division of the report is given to diaries of German soldiers. The entry of q sergeant of the First Guards regiment who received the iron cross says under date or August 10. A transport of 300 Belgians came through Duisburg in the morning. Of these 80, including the Ober- hurgomaster. were shot according to mar tlai law. The diary of a member of the Fourth company of Jagers says, under date of August 2S, About 220 inhabitants and the village were burnt. Artillery Is continuously shooting. Just now the crossing of the Heuse begins near Dinant All villages, chateaux and houses are burnt down during the night. It is a beautiful sight to see the fires all round us in the distance" Another diary, by a member of the Second Mounted battery First kurhessian Field artillery. regiment No. Il, records an incident which hap pened in French territory near Lille on October Il:
 We had no fight. but we caught about 20 men and shot them.
 The committee says of this last diary: By this time killing not in fight would seem to have passed into a habit,'
 Five Hundred Shot
 The report adds that the most impor- tant entry is contained in diary No 19 This contains no name and address, but names referred to in the diary indicate that the entries were made by an officer of the First regiment of Foot guards. The entry made at Eermeton on August. 2 says. We took about 1000 prisoners: at least 800 were shot The village was burnt because inhabitants had also shot. Two civilians were shot at once.'' The conclusions of the committee, as to the various detailed recitals, are as follows:
 We may now sum up and endeavor to explain the character and significance of the wrongful acts done by the German army in Belgium.
 If line is drawn on a map from | the Belgian frontier to Lege and con- tinned to Chareroi, and second line l drawn from Liege to Malines, a sort of l figure resembling an irregular Y will be l formed. It is along this Y that most of l the systematic (as opposed to isolated) | outrages were committed If the period from August to August 30 is taken it l will be found to cover most of these organized outrages Termonde and Alost extend it Is true, beyond the lines, and they belong to the month of Septem- Der Murder. rape, arson and pillage be- gan from the moment when the German army crossd the frontier. For the first fortnight of the war the towns and vil- lages near Liege were the chief sufferers. From August 19 to the end of the month
 outrages spread in the directions of Char leroi and Maines and reach their period of greatest intensity. There is a certain
 significance in the fact that the outrages around I4iege coincide with the unexpected resistance of the Belgian army in that district. and that the slaughter which
 reigned from August 19 to the end of the month is contemporaneous with the period when the German army's need for a quick passage through Belgium at all costs was deemed imperative.
 Here let a distinction be drawn be- tween two classes of outrages.
 Individual acts of brutality--ill-treat
 ment of civilians, rape, plunder and the l lil<e-were very widely committed. These are more numerous and more shocking than would be expected in warfare be- tween civilized powers, but they differ
 rather in extent than in kind from what
 had happened in previous though not re- 1 cent wars.
 In all wars occur many shocking and | outrageous acts of men of criminal in 1 stincts whose worst passions were Rn- | loosed by the immunity which the condi- | tons of warfare afford Drunkenness, Il moreover, may turn even a soldier who has no criminal habits into a brute. who may commit outrages at which he would him self be shocked in his sober moments, and there is evidence that intoxication was extremely prevalent among the Ger man army. both in Belgium and in France. for plenty of wine was to be found in the villages and country houses which were pillaged Many of the worst outra ges appear to have been perpetrated ! by men under the influence of drink Unfortunately little seems to have been done to repress this source of danger.
 Break All Precedents
 'In the present war, however-and this 1 Is the gravest charge against the Ger | man army--the evidence shows that tht killing noncombatants was carried out Il to an extent for which no previous Wal between nations claiming to be civilized for such cases as the atrocities perpe trated by the Turks on the Bulgarian Il Christians in 1876, and on the Armenian Christians in 1895 and 1S9s do not beons to that category) furnishes any prece dent. That this killing was done as par of a deliberate plan is clear from thu facts hereinbefore set forth regarding l Louvain Aerschot Dinant and othe
 towns. The killing was done under order in each place It began at a certain fixe'
 date Some of the officers who carrie' out the work did it reluctantly and sai' they were obeying directions from thei chiefs The same remarks apply to th destruction of property. House burning
 was part of the programme and villages
 even large parts of a city, were given t
 the flames as part of the terrorizinl