Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1918-01-17

''iG All America Could Hear Horrible
Tales" Says an American Soldier,
"There Would Be Five Million Men
Training for War and Loans Would
Be Oversubscribed by Billions Of
Dollars.
Crucifxion Of Canadian and Scot
fish soldiers by Germans on the west
ern front, with wholesale outrages on
nuns In captured converts, are given
by members of the Eleventh United
States Engineer regiment in letters re-
ceived in this country as the causes Of
a determination they express to fight
quarter.
"If all of America could hear the
horrible tales these refugees tell and
see the country about us here" says
one letter, "there would be five mill
lion American soldiers training for
war and war loans would be over
subscribed by billions"
Makes the Blood Boil.
One o. the officers Of the regiment,
in letter to Robert Ridgeway of the
public service commission, wrote:
1.-THE devastated country and viii
lagos destroyed by shellfre, I sup
pose, must be expected. But the thing
that makes one boil is the absolutely
unnecessary and wanton destruction
wrought by the retiring Hun. His
usual wonderful and systematic meth
DDS have been applied to this destruc-
ton. Whole towns that have hardly
been touched by shellfire have been
completely destroyed by dynamite. We
find notches cut in the few standing
walls and marked with the size of the
charge to be used. Evidently every
building had been Systematically pre-
pared in that way, long in advance,
for blowing up upon retirement.
$50 homes, beautiful chateaus, gar
den walls, little summer houses are
all blown up. Shade trees, Towering
shrubs are cut down or the bark cut,
so the trees will die. Cemeteries have
been ranSacked; graves and vaults
opened; bones thrown about or in
heaps on the ground. I have seen the
cemeteries, that are awful sights; one
body dragged halfway out Of the cask-
ct; collins broken open and the bones
from several dumped into one. Evil
IDENTIFY the bOche was looking for jew
elry, was simply malicious, or both.
"ThoSe things could not be done
without the knowledge and permission
of the officers, and the thing is so
complete that it looks as though it was
all a part of an official program. I
never did believe the stories we got
in America of the OUtrages. | have to
believe them now, and they are many
times worse than the stories that
heard at home. Certain Canadian and
Scottish battaliOns take no prisoners.
They give and ask no quarter. The
reason is that the BOche has several
times crucified the Canadian and
Scotch prisoners and held them above
the trenches in view Of their bat
talions. In one such case q Canadian
battalion went right over the top after
the Boches without orders. Very few
of them have come back. A British
chaplain told me that he knows per-
sonally Of a Belgian convent where
they found that tifty-seven out Of
eighty-two nuns had been violated
when the Boches fell back.
Looks Like WrathfuI Spite.
81 cannot understand what the men
tai operations or processes of the Hun
can be. I cannot understand what his
object can be. 1t must be the wrath
full spite of a disappointed, degenerate
mind. In fairness to our many very
fine acquaintance of German birth in
America I will say that the German
prisoners I have seen appear to be
largely different type from the Ger
man in America. They look not of
particularly high type. Major -
does not agree with me in this. He
says he can see among them the coun-
terpart Of every German he ever knew.
1.-THE prisoners will not believe that
we are American troops. They say,
NO, it is impossible. Our submarines
have stopped all traffic between Amer
lea and Europe That is the way with
the German soldier, and I suppose ev-
cry one in Germany is kept in ignor-
ance Of the true situation"