Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1921-05-12
UPPER S|LES|A IN
CIVIL WAR THROES
Ex-kalser's Army Heads Organ
iZe and Arm Force.
IMPERIAL GERMAN FLAG UP
roles Continue Advance in What APP
pears to Be Repetition of the
Fiume and Wilma Moves on
Larger Scale.

Ratibor, May 10-FOrmer German
army officers have taken charge Of the
district on the west bank of the Oder,
in this section of Upper Silesia, and
are issuing rifles, furnishing machine
guns, drilling the population and gar
risoning the town.
The French and Italian troops are
being ignored, and are remaining neu
trail on guard duty, while the entire
east bank of the Oder, as far north as
krappitz, is in possession Of the Poles.
The Germans have Communicated
automobiles and established courier
service. The headquarters staff has
requisitiOned barracks and is accept
ing volunteers, who have been so nu-
merous that guns were issued to only
three men in every fifteen.
At Krappitz, huge flag of the Ger
man empire is flying above the market
place, over the heads of the small
French force there.
The French and Italians in RatibOr
have been on constant guard duty for
three days without sleep, although
they have taken no active part in the
fighting, which has been going on
steadily since 6 p. m. Sunday, when
the Poles began heavy machine gun
and rifle fire, the bullets raking the
street leading from the bridge over
the Oder to the railway station.
A group of Italians crouched behind
a brick barricade on the bridge, bull
lets striking about them. The COM
mander of the Italians, with his troops,
said:
eve are not fighting now, we are
being fought. You can see that, but
heaven help the Poles, if they come
over this bridge"
Fear German-PoIish War.
The Italians have 500 men here. The
French have $50 men, who the Ger
mans claim, are not cooperating, CIV
ing contradictory orders.
From all accounts, civil war now is
spreading throughout Upper Silesia,
the Germans having organized locally
to repulse the invaders.
SO far, the German government has
refused to send government troops to
assist the Silesian Germans, but it is
last long if the supreme council of the
allies does not afford relief from the
situation the Poles have created in
vain of the councils orders
It is considered here that French
and Polish official circles can hardly
continue to sustain the claim that Ger
man propagandists have greatly ex-
aggerated the situation, which is re-
garded in Berlin as a repetition of the
experiments Of D'AnnunziO and Zell-
gouski at Fiume and Wilma, respective
ly, but upon a much larger scale.
Comment in entente circles indicates
that Germany's refusal so far to send
government troops into the district is
creating sympathy for the German
government in those circles, the
French excepted, and the feeling ap-
pears to be growing that the supreme
council will treat Germany generously
in deciding upon the division of Upper
Silesia.
Give Warning to Berlin.
Paris, May 1O-A Berlin dispatch
says that the French ambassador in
that city has Informed the German
foreign office that all incursions Of
| German government troops into Upper
Silesia would be considered by France
as a violation of the Versailles treaty.
France replied to the note which
Germany last week addressed to the
allies in which attention was called to
| the Polish insurgent movement in Up
| per Silesia.
The reply assures Germany that the
allied forces in the district have no
need of outside help.