The commercial. (Union City, Tenn.) 190?-193?, 1918-03-22


bridge. At one period Of the German
occupation Of Montigny, eight nuns
of the Order of Ste. Marie were cap
tives on the bridge. House burning
was accompanied by murder, and on
the Monday morning twenty-seven
civilians from one parish alone were
seen lying dead in the hospital.
Other outrages committed at
Jumet, BoufHoulx, Charleroi. Mar
chiennes-au-Pont, Couillet, and
Maubeuge are described in the depo-
sitions given in the appendix.
DINANT.
A clear statement of the outrages
at Dinant, which many travellers will
recall as a singularly picturesque
town on the Mouse, is given by one
witness, who says that the Germans
began burning houses in the Rue
st. Jacques on the 21st of August,
and that every house in the street
was burned. On the following day
an engagement took place between
the French and the Germans, and
the witness spent the whole day in
the cellar of bank with his wife
and children. On the morning Of
the 23d, about o'clock, firing
ceased, and almost Immediately
afterward a party of Germans came
to the house. They rang the bell
and began to batter at tho door and
windows. The witness wife went to
the door and two or three Germans
came in. The family were ordered
out into the street. There they
found another family, and the two
families were driven with their
hands above their heads along the
Rue Grande. All the houses in the
street were burning. The party was
eventually put into forge where
there were a number of other pris
oners, about a hundred in all, and
were kept there from II a. m. till
2 p. m. They were then taken to
the prison. There they were as
sembled in courtyard and search
ed. No arms were found. They
were then passed thru into the pris-
on itself and put into cells. The
witness and his wife were separated
from each other. During the next
hour the witness heard rife shots
continually, and noticed in the
corner of a courtyard leading off
the row of cells the body of young
man with a mantle thrown over it.
He recognized the mantle as having
belonged to his wife. The witness
daughter was allowed to go out to
see what had happened to her moth
er, and the witness himself was al
lowed to go across the courtyard
half an hour afterward for the same
purpose. He found his wife lying on
the floor In a room. She had bullet
wounds in four places, but was alive
and told her husband to return to
the children, and he did SO. About
5 o'clock in the evening he saw the
Germans bringing out all the young
and middle-aged men from the cells,
and ranging their prisoners, to the
of forty, in three rows in
the middle of the courtyard. About
twenty Germans were drawn up OPP
posite, but before anything was done
there was a tremendous fusillade
from some point near the prison and
the civilians were hurried back to
their cells. Half an hour later the
same forty men were brought back
into the courtyard. Almost immedi- |
ately there was a second fusillade |
like the first and they were driven
back to the cells again. About Z |
o'clock the witness and other pris- |
oners were brought out of their cells |
and marched out of the prison. They |
went between two lines Of troops to |
Roche Bayard, about a kilometer
away. An hour later the women and |
were separated and the
prisoners were brought back to
Dinant, passing the prison on their
way. Just outside the prison the
witness saw three lines of bodies
which he recognized as being those
If neighbors. They were nearly all
lead, but he noticed movement in !
jome of them. There were about 120
bodies. The prisoners were then
aiken up to tho top of the hill out
tide Dinant and compelled to stay
here till 8 o'clock in the morning,
IN the following day they were put
nto cattle trucks and taken thence
o Coblenz. For three months they
emained prisoners In Germany.
Unarmed civilians were killed in
masses at other places near the pris-
IN. About ninety bodies were seen
ying on the top of one another in
grass square opposite the convent.
they included many relatives of a
whose deposition will be
ound in the appendix. This witness
/