Where The German Army Has Passed

[Gunner Bailey]

There have been a few forum debates about German Army Atrocities in 1914-1915 and some modern books have been quoted. However, I've just aquired this one which is a contemporary summary from 1915 published by the Daily Chronicle of London. It contains 40 pages of photos and the 'official' reports from the French, Belgium and British Governments, plus a page of 'Terrible admissions by German Soldiers'. It even includes the famous 'baby impaled on a bayonet' report. Most of the photos seen to be shelled churches or gutted and burnt out villages.

Would be glad to hear if others have seen or have this document.

Gunner Bailey

[Gunner Bailey]

Gosh - 5 days on the forum and no comments. Is this a very rare book???

Gunner Bailey

[IanA]

Never seen it or heard of it before. Given the size and rather frail binding, I would be surprised if many have survived.

[sjustice]

There were a number of these publications around in the period 1914-1915 containing largely similar content. I'm not familiar with that particular rendition but notwithstanding Verhaeren's lyrical, "Belgium's Agony" (1915), most of them harness the official reports released at the time to the general war and anti-Germanic hysteria. This was being stirred up, particularly effectively, by the wonderful agitator-extraordinaire, William Le Queux. A novelist who penned such laid-back works as, "The Invasion", the story of how Britain fared in a post-invasion society. It's largely as a result of his agitation that the Battenburgs felt it politic to switch their name to Mountbatten.

You can get the general idea from Le Queux's chapter headings. Here's the index from his, "German Atrocities - A Record of Shameless Deeds" (Note that his foreword was subtitled, "Who were the Huns of Attila?":

Kind Regards,

SMJ

[Gunner Bailey]

Simon,

That's really interesting - many thanks. The document I have is structured thus:

Illustrations depicting wanton damage to or destruction of Cathedrals, Churches, Town Halls and Private Dwelling Houses - Pages 2-40

Essay on German violation of the laws and usages of war - Pages 41-42

Terrible admissions by German Soldiers - Page 43

Belgian Government's Official Report on German Outrages Pages 44-54

French Government's Official Report on German Outrages Pages 55-63

British Government's Official Report on German Outrages Pages 64-66

This report headed 'Butchery - Not War - Massacres by Order' it is the most inflamatory of the three reports and has paragraph headings such as 'Killing the wounded', 'Civilians as screens', Ruthlessly slaughtered' and 'Killing done as part of deliberate plan'

As you say the official reports were probably widely circulated to fuel recruitment, production and general support for the war. A fascinating document and I'm sure it must have had a big affect on readers.

It's quite a large book, at 10 x 12 inches.

The book does give some detail on individual villages with numbers of civilians killed, building burnt / destoyed, and reports witnesses by name.

Gunner Bailey

[AndyHollinger]

I suspect, but I don't know, that it was one of the semi-official propaganda publications that came out in 1915 - 1916 with an American intended audience. I have a 1914 publication about the History of the European War - illustrated which is for the American Christmas Trade which shows interesting Cavalry charges in Belgium, but the text is heavily slanted toward the Allies.

[Gunner Bailey]

I suspect, but I don't know, that it was one of the semi-official propaganda publications that came out in 1915 - 1916 with an American intended audience. I have a 1914 publication about the History of the European War - illustrated which is for the American Christmas Trade which shows interesting Cavalry charges in Belgium, but the text is heavily slanted toward the Allies.

Andy

I think that you are part right on this. The timing could also be related to the slow down of Kitchener recruitment after the first 3 or 4 Divisions. It would help if it had a more precise date than 1915. Certainly there was a concerted effort to gain US support from 1915-16 onwards. Not sure if this could sell for a shilling in the US?

The text is all about saying how beastly the Germans were and how they were breaching all the rules of 'civilised' warfare.

It would be interesting if this was the only UK document that held the 3 Allied reports together in their entirity.

Gunner Bailey

[bob lembke]

Gunner Bailey;

This general topic is one which has long interested me (a bit), but I have not really delved into, aside from noting some of the most astonishing examples of propaganda, and occasionally buying a particularly overt propaganda book or post card.

This material was produced to appeal to every level of sophistication, from those who must be largely brain-dead to believe even a fraction of the material, up to books written by diplomats and Harvard professors aimed at the highly sophisticated and educated.

I found it interesting in noting how a great wave of this material was published in the US literally in the month following the American formal entry into the war; books that must have been organized and written before, and seemingly put on the shelf, waiting for the outbreak of a state of war.

My wife, of astonishing literacy, collects children's books, probably having 1000 American and British ones from the period of 1880 to 1920. She is not especially interested in WW I (or any war), but she noted how the tone of children's books in both the US and the UK changed as the war went on. I have bought her a few of these books. One interesting book, of one of the series that were popular (i.e., Boy Allies at Verdun), describing the war adventures of children war heros, wrote about the adventures of a couple of American girls in the Orient in war-time. The girls ended up being almost raped by a Japanese officer (of course our ally at the time; of course their danger was written in a subtle fashion, but unmistakable to an adult), and there was a German officer, a POW; he stated something like "See what happens when you trust those yellow dogs!"; the tone of the book was such that it was apparent that such feelings were really that of the author; German soldiers were evil, but members of the Yellow Peril, even if nominally your ally, were really awful, and liable to rape your children if he has the chance. Interesting hirarchy of villains.

I have posted this before; there is an interesting note on this topic in Deborah Lake's recent book on the 1918 Zeebrugge raid. She tells how the British government subsidized the publication of these propaganda books by main-line reputable publishers; the government had a book commissioned and written, and then major publishers were approached to publish them. The government paid every penny of the costs of publishing, paper, printing, etc., but the publisher could keep every cent of sales. So there was absolutely no financial risk, publishing these books was a surefire commercial success, and feelings of patriotism and "old-school-tie" links overcame any qualms about literary/journalistic ethics and intellectual honesty. Ms. Lake found a document in the IWM that detailed the publication of over 1000 books in this program.

Unfortunately, this material has to some degree poisoned the historical well, in particular as to what actually happened in Belgium. There was and is considerable dispute in Belgium itself as to what actually happened; anyone who only reads English will typically have no such doubts, as book after book lays it out for the reader. I did a little study, and many hundreds of books were published about Belgium during the war; such publication almost totally ceasing at the end of 1918.

Bob Lembke

[Gunner Bailey]

Bob

Many thanks for your comments on this. WW1 propaganda is clearly a huge and complex subject and sadly I expect a lot of the printer's output has disappeared with time. The document I have is printed on low quality paper and is quite fragile.

I think your paragraph about the government subsidising publishers makes a lot of sense and is undoubtedly accurate.

Where you say 'This material was produced to appeal to every level of sophistication' also ties in with this book. It seems to publish all three government reports in full, but other text, plus the photos of churches, cathedrals is all aimed to hit hard at the sentiments of Edwardian England.

Also, 'Unfortunately, this material has to some degree poisoned the historical well', is spot on as with so many other 'myths' of WW1, it is hard to uncover the truth 90 years later.

Again, many thanks

Gunner Bailey

[Robert Dunlop]

Unfortunately, this material has to some degree poisoned the historical well, in particular as to what actually happened in Belgium. There was and is considerable dispute in Belgium itself as to what actually happened; anyone who only reads English will typically have no such doubts, as book after book lays it out for the reader.

Bob, I am not sure if you are suggesting that the 'considerable dispute' means that the English accounts are plain wrong, ie that atrocities were not committed. Over-exaggeration of atrocities is a different issue, and I would not disagree with this at all. I have discussed these issues many times with Belgian people from both a Flemish and Walloon perspective. Almost always, there is a great reluctance to talk about what happened. Obviously the Second World War is freshest in family memories. Some people have talked about what happened to family members in WW1. Though the stories bear the hallmarks of family historical accounts, older French-speaking Belgians speak of relatives who were killed or were 'taken away'. The reluctance to talk about the issues appears to stem from a 'let's forgive and move on' attitude, which I have been very impressed by.

British soldiers and officers often wrote about the difference in attitude towards them between the French- and Dutch-speaking Belgians. The latter appeared, to the British at least, to be much more anti-British and pro-German. Officers who spoke French and German seemed to be most aware of this distinction. If these differences were generalised, then it could explain why there were differences in Belgian experiences of the German occupation.

There is no doubt in my mind that some terrible things happened during the German military occupation. Many British soldiers regarded this as one of the prime reasons why they went to war - not the specifics necessarily, but the notion that free countries should be subjected to such occupation and the repercussions. Even before the war broke out, I have seen anecdotal stories from serving British officers who regarded what was reported about the German occupation of France during the Franco-Prussian War as personal justification for wanting to stop Germany from repeating this again. It is no surprise that these sentiments were appealed to when the Entente were seeking America's entry into the war. Even if the detail of the propaganda on atrocities was not strictly accurate, the general notion of the injustice of military occupation was correct IMHO.

Robert

[bob lembke]

I mentioned this with trepidation. I have a very imperfect grasp of the events in Belgium, and I fear that I would have to devote the rest of my life to the question before I could come to a satisfactory state of knowledge on this topic.

Bob, I am not sure if you are suggesting that the 'considerable dispute' means that the English accounts are plain wrong, ie that atrocities were not committed. Over-exaggeration of atrocities is a different issue, and I would not disagree with this at all. I have discussed these issues many times with Belgian people from both a Flemish and Walloon perspective. Almost always, there is a great reluctance to talk about what happened. Obviously the Second World War is freshest in family memories. Some people have talked about what happened to family members in WW1. Though the stories bear the hallmarks of family historical accounts, older French-speaking Belgians speak of relatives who were killed or were 'taken away'. The reluctance to talk about the issues appears to stem from a 'let's forgive and move on' attitude, which I have been very impressed by.

BL - Clearly very serious events occurred. My grand-father was a staff officer in Belgium during the invasion, and I have his correspondence to his son, written on the spot, and also extensive family oral history. He repeatedly mentioned that they were almost constantly being sniped at in urban areas by apparent civilians. Once he had to dive out of his staff car and crawl under it for cover. At the same time he once mentioned that a number of people who had supposedly done this had been shot. He also mentioned specific Belgian war crimes, including Belgians taking over a German first aid post "in the next village" and killing 43 wounded German soldiers. He was a high-ranking staff officer, very intelligent, very candid; his letters from the Belgian battlefields are the best of the family correspondence. Many other contemprary primary sources from reputable participants report the same events. But I have no good grasp of the balance of events. One source which reported many alleged German atrocities suggested that my grand-father's army corps (III. Reservekorps) committed few of the excesses.

As to not mentioning bad experiences, the death rate among my immediate family members in the six months that followed WW II was about 6000% of the rate among the civilian and military members of the family during the six years of the war. All or almost all of the surviving women were gang-raped. But they never once mentioned these matters to me when I visited and lived with them after the war, only, for example, telling funny stories about the occupying Russians. My father, who of course knew them better, and who visited them more often, questioned them closely and told me what happened.

British soldiers and officers often wrote about the difference in attitude towards them between the French- and Dutch-speaking Belgians. The latter appeared, to the British at least, to be much more anti-British and pro-German. Officers who spoke French and German seemed to be most aware of this distinction. If these differences were generalised, then it could explain why there were differences in Belgian experiences of the German occupation.

Yes, I have noticed this distinction. Several Belgians of my aquaintance have told me of the bitter differences between the Flemish and Walloons that exist to the present day. Every serious Belgian student of WW I that I have exchanged with seem, amazingly, to be quite "pro-German", whatever that means. But I come across them mostly on English-language fora, and I believe that they all are Flemish. There must be many Walloons who are interested in WW I, but they may congregate on Francophone web-sites, and quite likely have very different takes on the same topics.

There is no doubt in my mind that some terrible things happened during the German military occupation. Many British soldiers regarded this as one of the prime reasons why they went to war - not the specifics necessarily, but the notion that free countries should be subjected to such occupation and the repercussions. Even before the war broke out, I have seen anecdotal stories from serving British officers who regarded what was reported about the German occupation of France during the Franco-Prussian War as personal justification for wanting to stop Germany from repeating this again. It is no surprise that these sentiments were appealed to when the Entente were seeking America's entry into the war. Even if the detail of the propaganda on atrocities was not strictly accurate, the general notion of the injustice of military occupation was correct IMHO.

Not trying to be offensive, but there is a certain irony if British officers were, in 1914, complaining about countries occupying other countries, as at that time the British Empire was, by far, the largest Empire that the world has ever seen. The Brits entered Iraq in 1914, and only left, if I remember correctly, in 1959. (If there wasn't a prohibition on mentioning current affairs, I might mention that they seem to have returned, to their regret. I read the Guardian every day.)

I am not an expert on the Franco-Prussian War, but I am not ignorant about it, and I am not familiar with large-scale German atrocities against the French. Everyone seems to agree that there was a high level of franc tirailler (literally, "independent snipers") activity, a capital war crime then and now, which the French literature on that war and WW I frequently boasted about.

I might add that in 1871 the local French paper in Versailles, outside of besieged Paris, commented editorially, paraphrased: "Well, finally, the women-folk of Versailles are finally free of insult and offence. The uniforms in the street are now German, not French."

I might add that I am as English and Danish as I am German, on both sides of my family, and I was raised on roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, and blazing rum-soaked plum puddings at Christmas.

Robert

Bob Lembke

[Max]

GB

The pamphlet looks like quite a find, interesting but no doubt the contents need to be taken with at least a small pinch of salt....I wish I had it in my modest collection.

Bob

I don't really want to drag up the subject of German misbehaviour in Belgium yet again because it would be hijacking this thread, and also because I don't think it would be constructive given your apologist attitude. However, I would like to make just one comment regarding your grandfathers correspondence with his son. You comment that "He repeatedly mentioned that they were almost constantly being sniped at in urban areas by apparent civilians." Surely this is the whole point, "apparent" is such a meaningful word in the context of the situation, and was the basis and excuse by which men, women, and children of all backgrounds were dragged out of their houses and shot. "Sniped" is also an interesting word. By definition a sniper is someone who shoots from a concealed position......how could your grandfather or anyone else for that matter know whether the shooters were civilians or not?....maybe it was just wishful thinking on his part, and excused the savage behaviour of the German occupying army of which he was a part.

Andy

[bob lembke]

I would like to make just one comment regarding your grandfathers correspondence with his son. You comment that "He repeatedly mentioned that they were almost constantly being sniped at in urban areas by apparent civilians." Surely this is the whole point, "apparent" is such a meaningful word in the context of the situation, and was the basis and excuse by which men, women, and children of all backgrounds were dragged out of their houses and shot. "Sniped" is also an interesting word. By definition a sniper is someone who shoots from a concealed position......how could your grandfather or anyone else for that matter know whether the shooters were civilians or not?....maybe it was just wishful thinking on his part, and excused the savage behaviour of the German occupying army of which he was a part.

Andy

Max;

I mentioned "apparent civilians" because they were being fired upon by people wearing civilian clothes. By the internationally recognized rules of war of the period, individuals wearing civilian clothes firing upon uniformed military forces commit a capital offense war crime, and may be shot. It does not matter whether or not the shooter is actually a civilian or a soldier in civilian clothes. (I have read that the standard field pack of a Belgian soldier of the period included a set of civilian clothes. Is this true?) This seems to be the doctrine to this day; two days ago I heard a detailed discussion of current military law doctrine, and one authority stated that "intent to resist" on the part of the civilians of an occupied country may be countered by the summary execution of that civilian, and that is the military law doctrine of an un-named great power; another authority disputed this, saying that the civilian had to have the capacity to inflict harm before they could be summerily executed. Neither expert held it necessary that the civilian had actually attempted to fire, or had fired, upon uniformed occupying forces.

Two days ago, reading Capt. Dunn's excellent The War as the Infantry Knew It, the history of 2. Battalion, Royal Welsh Fusiliers, I read his observation, when based in Allied held Belgium, how the French Army in their sector, when their officers' club was shelled by the Germans, arrested a Belgian farmer as a spy who ordered the shelling, signalling to the Germans by plowing with a white horse. (How this conveyed the coordinates of the officers' club was not explained.) It seemed that the French shot the Belgian for plowing with a white horse. Dunn, a horseman, observed that in this part of Belgium a great percentage of the agricultural horse stock was white, seemingly not the case in France. Dunn mentioned repeated spy scares by the British and French in Northern France and Belgium, with seemingly innocuous civilians being tried, including two Belgian women shop clerks that he knew. It is clear from the way he mentions these scares that he thought that these scares were rubbish.

Bob Lembke

[truthergw]

Looks like a nice find. I have a couple of German ones of the same vintage. They don't let facts get in the way of a good story either. The spreading of propaganda and the ' spinning ' of news was seen as a patriotic duty by authors and editors in all the combatant countries. Censors enforced it if needful but this was a task which newspaper editors in particular, embarked on with great enthusiasm. French headlines of the time would curl your hair. With regard to the English propaganda being aimed at US consumption. This may have been true at times Andy but throughout the war, the government was anxious to keep the British public onside. There was never the wholehearted, unthinking support for the war or the government, that the propaganda implied, either here or in France.

[Robert Dunlop]

Many other contemprary primary sources from reputable participants report the same events.

Bob, undoubtedly the German forces came under fire, and were on the receiving end of other actions. I have read many accounts that support this. The fundamental difference, however, is that German forces invaded and occupied Belgium, a neutral country. This does not condone 'criminal' actions against the invaders. But, while I respect the difficulties that your grand-father experienced, I do not rank these difficulties in the same league as those experienced by the civilians in the four years of the occupation. Just a personal opinion, FWIIW.

I fully understand the other points that you make. In the final analysis, it all points to the futility of war. On that point, I suspect we may both agree.

Robert

[bob lembke]

Robert;

I am sure that I agree with you at least 95% on these matters.

My all-wise wife laughs at all this sort of argumentation and nit-picking. She holds that the war itself is the crime, and the devolving events are simply foot-notes. Her family, Anglo-Saxon (she actually has very good Anglo-Saxon also very good Latin, and only fair Old Norse, or "Viking-speak") farmers in New England for 373 years, are armed to the teeth (they make their own .45 caliber sniper/target rifles in their large machine shop, and shoot them in meets with great success at 500 and 600 yard ranges with iron sights), but have evaded almost all military involvement in almost 500 years. (One ancestor did lose a thumb in the Civil War.) But they did massacre a band of French-Canadian Lake Champlain pirates, who were a local nusance, led my Megan's great-great aunt Martha. (Incidentally, the name of my first wife. Fitting.)

As I study WW I, I also learn more about my own family, and some of my findings have helped convert me from a properly PC, cringing, self-hating German-American into a rather crusty Hun. About 1940 a drunken wife-beater tried to force his way in our apartment while looking for his wife to apply proper husbandly violence, and in the process assaulted my much larger, fitter, ex-storm trooper father, and received his just desserts. He slunk off to the FBI with a preposterous story about how we were Nazi agents, and how he saw (thru our 3rd or 4th story apartment window!) my father receiving his instructions from Germany, while throwing Nazi salutes at his short-wave radio, and the FBI were on us for five years, searching our house about 50 times. (The FBI actually came to our house after the war, and told us these details.) In 1943 Naval Intelligence almost put my mother and I in a camp. After the war I started public school and was beaten in front of the class as an announced patriotic exercise; after two years my parents pulled me out and put me in a private school for my protection. As I started my more serious historical study, these and other matters gradually came into focus, assisting the cranky process.

In order to really get a reliable grasp of what actually happened would, I estimate, take the rest of my life. I have other primary interests. I do know that a lot of what is stated that happened in Belgium in 1914 is rubbish, and that there seems to be more dispute about that in Belgium than there is in the English-reading world. I followed a dispute on this Forum, over what happened in Louvain. On one side was a person that in many posts has never suggested that he can read anything but English (this is important, as there are almost no primary sources on this topic in English); on the other hand there was an internationally recognized expert on Belgium, author of several books on the topic (I have a 400 page book of his in Dutch/Flemish on my shelves), vice-chairman of an international society on military archeology, works well in six relevant languages, possessor of an amazing library on Belgium and WW I, and not only a Belgian, and a former staffer for the Belgian Senate, but a graduate of the University of Louvain! In a brusing exchange he refused to be told what happened in Louvain 93 years ago by a person with none of the skills, resources, or temprament to actually look into the matter in a useful fashion. As a result, the Belgian will not post on this Forum again, I believe, a great loss to the Forum. His opponent has drifted away, perhaps to career in football holiganism, or perhaps he has adopted yet another persona.

This Forum generally has a very civil and constructive tone, and a lot of good things happen here. My participation is an important part of my life, probably in balance to the detriment of my work. Although I wall only meet a few of you personally, I have very warm personal feelings for many of the Pals. I hope that most of you will be understanding when I "get my elbows out". I will tend to take shots occasionally at some religeously held sacred cows.

Very Warmest Regards,

Bob lembke

[Gunner Bailey]

GB

The pamphlet looks like quite a find, interesting but no doubt the contents need to be taken with at least a small pinch of salt....I wish I had it in my modest collection.

Andy

Hi Andy

Yes I'm very pleased to have found it. I've searched the internet and been unable to find another, or a reference to it. I do take it as a group of reports wrapped in the propaganda of the time. Clearly none of the reports are objective, and as I said earlier, they were aimed at stirring the emotions of the British (and maybe American publics). However there is a lot of detail and clearly there are facts at the core, though I suspect heavily padded.

I think we also have to look at it with the eyes of the Edwardians whose values of honour, respect and law were very different from our 21st Century views. We are also a generation that has seen war and destruction on our doorsteps, either via WW2, terrorist acts or the constant mediums of television and a graphic press that did not exist at that time.

Gunner Bailey

[bob lembke]

I am currently starting to fold my notes on Captain Dunn's excellent book about 2. Battalion / Royal Welch Fusiliers into my time-lines, and have reached my notes on the event I mentioned earlier, the French shooting Belgian civilians as alleged spies. Looking at my notes, I see more details. (Incidentally, the book is actually titled The War the Infantry Knew 1914 - 1919, by Captain J. C. Dunn, R.A.M.C.. An absolutely splendid book, one of the best memoirs of WW I that I have read, and I have read hundreds. About 700 pages in the common edition.)

The French shooting a Belgian farmer for plowing for a white horse incident actually took place in late 1914, not later, as I had thought, but not expressed, I think. The author notes that most of the agricultural horses in Flanders were white, as opposed to France. The French were shelled, noted that the farmer was plowing with a white horse at the time, so they decided that the white horse was a signal to the German artillery. The French went out and forceably rounded up the majors of Fleurbaix and the surrounding communities and they were forced to watch the execution of the farmer. Nice touch.

The book, mostly written by Dunn, but with contributions from about 20 officers and senior NCOs of the battalion, in all mentions some dozens of similar "spy scares", as the book puts it, many equally rediculous; but they rarely detail the resultant executions.

Dunn's book is really fantastic.

Bob Lembke

[Paul Hederer]

On the subject of propoganda in America, and especially the role of the British before America's entry into the war see:

"The Illusion of Victory: America in World War I," by Thomas J. Fleming. He gives a fairly detailed account of this.

Paul

[nige]

G'day Bob,

Your post, no. 16, well written and very interesting.

Its amazing what you can learn on this forum, and you input has always been informative and interesting.

Its so important to have discussion from people from all sides of the scope and yours is second to none, well thought out and well put.

Keep up the important input as it is welcomed by all.

By the way, can I ask who was the Belguim who no longer inputs to the forum, as it seems a sad loss.

Regards

Nige

[nige]

Heelo all,

My last post to Bob, doesn't finish with Bob. There are so many here who put forward very interesting and detailed posts, again well thought out and written well.

I do hope on my next trip to England, Belguim and France that my wife and I can meet up with some of you.

Regards to the forum

Nige

[egbert]

By the way, can I ask who was the Belguim who no longer inputs to the forum, as it seems a sad loss.

Regards

Nige

You can read his last post ever here on this forum in a related thread. Also check his preceding posts in this relevant thread.

You may even recognize a certain "m.x" who still has a sense of myth mission on all Huns w/r of cutting off the hands of children, raping nuns and hanging innocent priests.

This is only a reply to Nige as I will not actively participate in such threads anymore on the same reasons like AOK4

[Gunner Bailey]

You can read his last post ever here on this forum in a related thread. Also check his preceding posts in this relevant thread.

You may even recognize a certain "m.x" who still has a sense of myth mission on all Huns w/r of cutting off the hands of children, raping nuns and hanging innocent priests.

This is only a reply to Nige as I will not actively participate in such threads anymore on the same reasons like AOK4

Egbert - You are always welcome in my threads !

Gunner Bailey