The Republican journal., 1918-10-24
A Record of Infamy.

A Record of 1nfamy.
1t has long been possible, from govern
ment reports and from the stray illusions
of historians, to form some notion OF
what German rule in Africa meant be-
for an arraignment, but no de tail based
on investigation and documentary evil
dence. This defect has now been made
good in Blue Book which ranks in au-
thoritative value with the Bryce report
on Belgium, and bids fair to curb Ger
many's colonial ambitions far into the
future 1t comes from E. II. M. Go ges,
the new administrator of Southwest
Africa, and is based on German official
and other papers found in the government
archives, on sworn statements made by
Europeans familiar with the country, on
testimony given by native chiefs and on
the writings of Gov. Leutwein, Dr. Rohr-
bach, DR.. Karl Dove and other recognized
German authorities
Southwest Africa was annexed by the
Germans in 1890, and for 25 years felt
the weight of policy well defined by DIR.
Dove. for some time director of land
settlement at Windhuk, when he declared:
sit is incorrect to view justice, in regard
to natives, as if they were of the same
Kultur position as ourselves The adj
ministration proceeded in strict accord
ance with that formula. Treaties made
with the native chiefs were regarded as
"scraps of paper" the government de-
prlved the Hereros of their best land, and
German traders under official sanction
robbed them of their cattle until the ma
tives, reduced to pauperlsm, were COM
PEELED to act as herderS of the stock which
was once their own. During the first II
wears after the annexation the Herero
had no sort of redress, and such protec-
ton as the law eventually provided was
granted to him mot from motives of hu-
manity, but because it was at length
recognized that the native was useful
labor asset in the country" The Ger
man game was to GUST the original own
ers of the soil in favor of immigrant
whites, many of whom were German
settlers.
"Leniency toward the natives is cruelty
to the whites" was another of Director
Doves official aphorisms. The settler
who helped to reduce the number OF
Hereros was regarded as performing a
public and patriotic service. During the
period from 1890 to 1904 many of these
natives were done to death as the result
of brutal flogglngs and ill-treatment;
photographs reproduced in the report
show the larcerated backs of Herero
women cut to pieces with German whips.
"Cudgelcure" or "fatherly chastisement"
the officials called it. But the climax was
reached only after the natives, plundered
and pauperized, broke out into open re-
volt. Gen. Won Trotha began his cam :
paign against them by shooting IN cold
blood the Herero chiefs whom he had IN
vited to conference on the preteXt that
the war was over. Then he issued an
order, for the determination of the natives,
instructing that no prisoners must be
taken and that neither sex nor age should
be spared. Eye-witnesses saw the slaugh-
ter 60 on "for days and days." they killed
thousands and thousands of women and
children along the roadside; they bayonet-
ed them and hit them to death with the
butt ends of their guns" One batch OF
twenty five prisoners-'men, women and
children and little girls'-were sprinkled
with oil and burnt alive by the soldiers IN
an enclosure of thorn bushes. Nor did
the German scruple to poison the wells IN
order that no fugitives might escape. A
rising of the Hottentots was Suppressed"
in like manner, and many of the women
of both races suffered the "fate worse
than death. Surrendering at last, the
starving remnants were sent to forced
labor con the barren islets of LuderItz-
bucht and on the moisture laden shores
of Swakopmund," where 1907 out of $500
persisted of exhaustion.
1t is scarcely needful to quote from
this government report that native
opinion is unanimously against any idea
of the territory ever being handed back
to the tender mercies of Germany and
that "any suggestion of the possibility OF
an act of that kind on the part of Great
Britain produces the utmost consterna-
ton" The reflection for US, after what
has happened in Belgium, is that the Ger
man under militarism breeds true to type,
and that IN war drives and peace drives
we are facing the men who inflicted SO
black spot upon Africa as to make the
rest of the Dark Continent seem almost
luminous by contrast. Here is some
thing to remember when Chancellor Max
imilian again sentimentalizes about the
sufferings of humanity and when Dr.
Solf once more utters his pathetic desire
that colonial questions shall be settled
according to the merits which European
nations have shown in the protection OF
the colored races entrusted to their care. i"
Boston Herald.
Herbert Hugh Muldoon, Is, and George
Henry Hartrey, II, were found sutfocated
in a cave in the outskirts of Brewer.
They had gone to play in the cave, which
had been excavated by boys in imitation
of the trench fighters, and used oil to
kindle fire. The smokehole had been
stopped up and before the boys could
escape the flames straneled them.