Chapter III

Austria ruined at the battle of Koniggratz—Dr. Bresser with the
wounded—I go to the seat of war to search for my husband—The
scenes on the way—More horrors described—I meet Frau Simon—A night
journey—Am carried back to Vienna exhausted—Return to Grumitz.

The battle of Koniggratz ended in a terrible defeat which seemed decisive. My father told the news in such a tone as though it had been the end of the world. There was neither letter nor telegram from Frederick. Was he wounded or worse? Conrad had reported himself as untouched. The lists had not yet arrived, but the loss in killed and wounded was reported as forty thousand.

I wept for hours when the third day came without a line. While there was hope, I could still weep; had all been over my woe would have been without expression. My father was terribly depressed, and Otto full of revenge. He wished to join a corps of volunteers recruiting in Vienna. It was reported that the victorious commander of the southern campaign was to replace the defeated marshal of the north.

But no news came of Frederick.

A few days later there was a letter from Dr. Bresser, who was busy in the neighbourhood of the battle, and wrote of the infinite misery and need of help, which was beyond imagination. He had joined Dr. Brauer, who had been sent by the Saxon Government, and a Saxon lady, another Florence Nightingale, was to arrive two days later. She came from the hospitals of Dresden to help in Bohemia. The two surgeons were planning to meet the lady at the nearest station to Koniggratz, and Bresser begged us, if possible, to send quantities of bandages and such supplies to this station, that they might be delivered into his hands. This letter awoke in me a resolution which I did not dare tell my family: I would take the box of bandages myself.

I announced that I would go to Vienna and prepare supplies for the doctor, and so managed to get away without difficulty. I could easily announce from there my real intentions to the family without their interference.

I had some doubts as to my want of experience, but I felt the compelling gaze of my husband fixed upon me, and he seemed to be stretching his arms from a bed of pain, and my only thought was: “I am coming, I am coming.”

I found Vienna a mass of confusion. Everywhere my carriage passed vehicles of wounded men. I made my preparations hurriedly and started for the North Station. Here the crowds of wounded and dying were arriving, and the public crowded in with supplies and looking for friends; there were nurses, nuns, physicians, men and women from every rank, and the officials were busy pushing back the crowds. They sent me off too. But I protested: “I want to take the next train north,” but was informed that there were no trains for passengers, in order to keep the lines open for the arrivals of the wounded. Only one train would go out, and that was exclusively for the Relief Corps.

“May I go by that train?”

“Impossible.” The voice within kept calling for me to come. I was about to despair when I caught sight of the President of the Relief Corps. I rushed to him: “For pity’s sake, help me, Baron S——. You know me! Baroness Tilling, General Althaus’s daughter. You are about to send a train to Bohemia. My dying husband needs me there. If you have a heart, let me go with that train.”

With many misgivings he finally arranged to put me in the car of a surgeon who accompanied the train. It would be ready in an hour. I could not stay in the waiting-room; everything was turned into a hospital, and everywhere lay and crouched the wretched neglected forms of the mangled and wounded. And train after train came in with more wounded, and they were as quickly placed and carried away. At my feet was laid a man who gasped unceasingly, making a continuous gurgling sound. I stooped to speak a sympathetic word, but covered my face in horror. He no longer looked like a human being, his under jaw was shot away, and his eyes were hanging from their sockets. He was reeking with decay and corruption. My head sank back against the wall. But the sickening idea came into my head—could it be Frederick? I looked again. No, it was not he.

As they carried the poor gurgling wretch away the regimental doctor said, “He need not go back to the hospital, he is already three-fourths dead.” And with that the agonized creature threw up both his hands in pleading to heaven.

The hour passed, and I started with the two surgeons and four Sisters of Charity and several soldiers. The carriage was hot and filled with a mingled odour of hospital and incense, and I felt deathly sick. I leant back in my corner and closed my eyes.

“Are you ill?” asked the sympathetic young surgeon. “I hear you are joining your wounded husband at Koniggratz. Do you know where to look for him?”

“No, but I expect to meet Dr. Bresser.”

“I know him. We visited the battle-field together three days ago.”

“Visited the battle-field?” I repeated, shuddering. “Oh, tell me about it.”

The surgeon told his story, and I put it afterwards into my journal as I remembered it. From there I copy it now. I had remembered it quite accurately, for into every scene my imagination thrust one fixed idea—that there would be found my wounded Frederick, calling for me:—

Behind a little hill the ambulance corps lay protected. Beyond, the
engagement had already begun. The very earth and air trembled with the
heat and explosions. Clouds of smoke and roaring artillery filled
space. Orders came that we should fetch the wounded from the field. It
takes some heroism to march into the midst of a battle when none of
the fury of the conflict is in the mind to urge you on. The corporal
in charge of the relief ordered the men to a point where the enemy had
opened fire. Across the open ground they met groups of wounded and
slightly wounded dragging themselves and helping each other. One fell
insensible, but not from a wound but sheer exhaustion. They explained:
“We have eaten nothing for two days. After an enforced march of twelve
hours and a bit of sleep, we were called to the fight unrefreshed.”

The relief patrol push on. Let them look out for themselves, the
surgeons were urged on to the more desperately wounded. They might be
picked up on the way back, after help had been rendered to those lying
thick in the battle. Everywhere lies a bleeding mass. The wounded
swarm about thicker and thicker, creeping and dragging themselves over
mounds of corpses, all stretched in mangled positions with the
death-writhings still evident—hands clawing the ground, eyes and
tongues projecting, teeth gnashed, and mouths gaping as the last
breath had been drawn. So they lie, with their limbs and bodies
mangled into shapelessness and stiffened with the death-agony.

Down through a little ravine the patrol pushed. Here the dead and
wounded were lying in heaps together. The shrieks for help, the
begging, weeping, and lamenting, mixed with the cries for water. Alas,
the provisions were soon exhausted, and what can a few men do in all
this mass of hopelessness? If every helper had a hundred arms they
could not do half of the rescue work. But they work like heroes till,
suddenly, there comes the signal horn calling to another part of the
field, while the broken wretches piteously beg not to be deserted. An
adjutant comes in hot haste. Evidently a general has been wounded. The
surgeons must follow, begging the poor fellows to have patience for
they will return. But the promise was never meant and never believed.

On, on they must follow the adjutant. Cries and groans to right and
left are unheeded, and though some of the rescuing party falls, they
are left with the rest. Men writhing with horrible wounds, torn by
horses’ hoofs, crushed by passing guns, seeing the rescuers, rear
themselves and call for help with a last effort. But on, on, over them
all!

* * * * *

So it goes on, page after page, in my journal. One account tells how a shell burst over a group of wounded who had just been bandaged and relieved, tearing them to pieces. Again, it tells how the fighting broke out around the ambulances, a fleeing and pursuing troop sweeping down the wounded, dying, and surgeons, all together; or when terrified riderless horses, maddened with agony, rushed over the wounded on the stretchers, throwing them crushed and lifeless to the ground. Again, the most frightful scene of all is described: A hundred helpless men lay in a farmhouse where their wounds had been dressed, when a shell set the place in a blaze, and their shrieks will ever remain in the memory of those who heard it—and in mine, for I fancied again, while the surgeon spoke, that Frederick was there, and I heard his voice out of the place of torture, and I fell back in my seat.

“Oh, dear lady,” the surgeon exclaimed, “I must not try your nerves.”

But I had not yet heard enough to slake my thirst for the horrible; I would hear more, and I said, “No, no, continue: How was the next morning?” So he continued:—

A battle-field by night is hideous enough, but under the glorious sun
the fiendish work of man seems doubly fiendish. What the night made
seem ghostly, the daylight revealed as absolutely hopeless. Then one
first realises the countless dead—in the streets, the fields.

There is no cannonading, no rattle of musketry, no drums or
trumpet-blasts, no flags, no regimentals; the only sound is the low
moaning of the poor wretches who are dying without aid. The steaming
earth is saturated with red puddles that shimmer, reek, and clot in
the sun. Everywhere lie scattered the abandoned sabres, bayonets,
knapsacks, cloaks, broken carriages, waggons, and cannon, the
half-dead horses staggering up and down and hideously bellowing out
their dying shrieks. There is a little hollow into which the wounded
had dragged themselves, but it is clear that a battery had driven over
them, the hoofs and wheels crushing them into a pulpy oozing mass
while still alive—yes, hopelessly alive.

But even more hellish than all this is the certain appearance of that
vile scum of humanity, the ghouls which creep in the wake of the
battle, to plunder and spoil the dead. They slink among the corpses,
mercilessly tearing off their valuables, mutilating and hacking even
the living if they still have life enough to defend themselves,
snatching out their eyes to make them unrecognisable.

And so they lie, day after day, these poor wretches, for the Sanitary
Corps, though they work untiringly, cannot stop for the hopeless ones
who beg that they be shot or stabbed in their helpless misery. From
above the carrion crows are watching from the trees, preparing to
descend for their dinner. Even the starved village dogs come and lick
the open flesh.

Then comes the great interment. They dig long shallow trenches, and
the bodies are thrown in helter-skelter, heads up and heads down. Also
they heap the bodies into mounds and cover them with a few feet of
dirt. Let the rain wash it away, who cares?

“Now, will you hear what happened the next day?”

“Oh, I can tell you that,” I interrupted. “In the capital of the victorious country the reports have arrived. In the forenoon, while the hyenas of the battle-field work round the trenches, the people in the churches are singing “Praise God from whom all blessings flow,” and in the evening, wife and mother of those who have been buried—while yet breathing perhaps—put lighted candles on their window-sill, for the city has to be illuminated for a sign of joy.”

“Yes,” said the surgeon, “such comedy is marked in the cities—and yonder the tragedy continues....”

* * * * *

What a terrible journey it was! Long after the surgeon ceased to tell his story we caught glimpses from the windows of the effects of the war. True, there were no scenes of devastation, but everywhere families were hurrying with their belongings, leaving home to go they knew not where, for the cry, “The Prussians are coming,” filled them with terror. We passed many trains carrying the wounded to the inland hospitals. The stations were crammed with men waiting to be carried farther. They had been brought by waggons and cots from the field, and were waiting to get either to the hospitals or cemeteries. At every halt the Sisters of Charity in our party immediately busied themselves, but I was useless. The uproar about the stations was like a bewildering dream; people were running about confusedly, the troops were taking the trains to go farther, the wounded and bleeding were swarming everywhere, and the screams of women added to the frightful conditions. Cannons and baggage waggons rumbled by; trains followed, carrying the reserves from Vienna. The soldiers were crammed in cattle-trucks and freight-cars—just as cattle are sent to the slaughter—and were they not, I could not help thinking, were they not being sent to the big political shambles where the official butchers seek their profits? They rushed by on the rattling wheels like the wind, and a howling war-song pealed from the cars. An armed host marching through the fields or roads on foot or horse, with flags flying, has a certain antique touch of the poetic, more of the movement of free will in it; that the railroad track, this symbol of modernism and civilisation which brings the nations nearer together, should be used to thrust men into the battle to let barbarism loose is a hideous contradiction. And even the clicking telegraph, mastering the lightning to do man’s will, to advance his interests, to relieve his anxieties, to bring his life into immediate and close touch with his fellows—to think that it should be used in the service of barbarity! Our boast before the barbarians is, “Behold our civilisation, our railroads, our telegraph lines,” and then we debase these things by using them to enforce and multiply our own savagery.

Such thoughts deepened and embittered my sorrow. Happy were they who were simply weeping and wringing their hands, whose souls did not rise up in wrath against the whole hideous comedy, who did not accuse nor arraign any one with the blame—not even that Lord of Armies whom they believed to be the loving author of all their misery!

Late in the evening I arrived at Königinhof, my companions having left me at an earlier station. What if Dr. Bresser failed to meet me? My nerves were quite shattered by the night’s experiences, and only my extreme anxiety about Frederick sustained me.

The station in Königinhof was overflowing with wounded men; they were lying everywhere—in every nook and corner, on the ground, and on the stones. The night was very dark, there was no moon, and only a few lanterns lighted the station. I sank on to a bench, put my luggage on the ground before me, overcome with the desire for sleep. I began to realise the absurdity of my coming. What if Frederick were already at home, or perhaps dead and buried? Oh, to be able to sleep and forget it, and perhaps even never wake again to behold all this world of horror! At least, let me not live on and find Frederick among the “missing.” Was perhaps my boy at home calling for me? What if I did not find Dr. Bresser? What should I do in that case? Luckily I had a little bag with money about my neck, and money always affords some help out of difficulties. And I involuntarily felt for the bag. The fastenings were torn off—it was gone. What a blow! Still, the floods of misfortune on all sides made my loss seem slight to me. I rose to look for the station-master, and suddenly caught sight of Dr. Bresser. In my excitement I fell about his neck.

“Baroness Tilling!” he exclaimed. “What on earth are you doing here?”

“I have come to assist. Is Frederick in one of your hospitals?”

His negative reply was a relief as well as a disappointment. But how could he know of all the wounded? I would search for myself. I asked for Frau Simon.

“She is here, and a splendid woman—quick, decisive, prudent. She has discovered that the need is the greatest in a near village. We are going there together.”

“Let me go along with you, Doctor.” He tried to dissuade me, but after some argument he introduced me to Frau Simon as an assistant, and in a few minutes we started on our journey in a hay-waggon which had just brought some wounded men to the station. We sat upon the straw, possibly still wet from blood, and started on our long uncomfortable ride. The ricketty waggon with its straw-covered boards was pure torture to me, accustomed to springs and cushions. I was sound and well, what must it have been to the mangled and shattered bodies which were carried over rough roads in this waggon? My eyes were heavy; the discomfort and excited nerves prevented sleep, but leaning on the Doctor’s shoulder, half dreaming, I heard bits of the conversation which my companions carried on half aloud.

They spoke of the lack of surgeons and instruments. Even bread was not to be had, and in many places the water had been so polluted that it could not be used. Every roof-covered space was crammed with wounded men dying and raving in their last agonies, and in their ravings they blasphemed God.

“Mr. Twining of London must have heard these curses,” said the Doctor, “when he proposed to the Geneva Red Cross that, when the condition of the wounded is hopeless, they should be offered the consolations of religion and then be put out of their agony in the most humane manner, thus preventing them from dying with curses of God upon their lips.”

“How unchristian,” cried Frau Simon.

“Unchristian to give them such gracious relief?”

“No, but the idea that such curses are a sin. The christian God is not unjust, he takes the fallen soldiers to Himself.”

“Mohammed promises paradise to every Turk who slays a christian,” replied Dr. Bresser. “Believe me, dear madam, the gods that are represented as both inciting war and blessing murder are deaf both to curses and to prayers. Look up and see the planet Mars overhead. Every two years it shines there, and is unconscious of its consecration to the god of war. That same blood-red star shone down upon Marathon and Thermopylæ, the curses of the dying were heaped upon it, but it indifferently and peacefully kept its perfect circuit round the sun—even as to-day. Unlucky stars? There is no such thing—man is the only enemy of man—and his only friend.”

But finally sleep overcame me, and it was a relief to get rid of the unendurable images that filled my brain. How long I slept I do not know, but I was suddenly roused as by a shock. But no, it was not a noise or vibration which woke me; it was a pestilential, stifling odour that filled the air. By the clear light of the moon, which had risen, we saw the cause of the intolerable stench; a church wall which had served as a breastwork was banked up with countless corpses, from which a black cloud of fluttering ravens rose as we approached, and fluttered back again upon their feast as we passed on.

The driver whipped up the horses, and we jolted madly out of the range of the frightful odour. Terror held my throat like a screw, or I should have shrieked.

* * * * *

As we arrived at our destination, Frau Simon complained that I should be more of a burden than a help, but I roused all my courage and begged to be allowed to assist. We found ourselves in the middle of the village, at the gate of a chateau which had been deserted by its owners and filled from cellar to roof with wounded men. We got out, and I pulled myself together with all my force. We passed the gate of the chateau, meeting stifled sounds of woe on all sides. Everything was dark, and we had forgotten to bring along any means of lighting. Some matches from the Doctor’s pocket served for a few seconds to give us a flash of the terrible picture. Our feet slipped in the bloody slime, and we could do nothing but add our despair to the multitude groaning and sighing about us.

Frau Simon and the Doctor hurried out to search for the village priest, and left me alone in the dark among these wailing people, and in this stifling odour, shuddering to the bones. But the Doctor returned, saying, “No, you must come with us, you shall not stay in that purgatory.” I waited in the open air in the waggon for half an hour, when the expedition came back quite unsuccessful. The pastor’s house was in ruins and no light was to be found. We must wait for the daylight, and how many of these miserable creatures would perish after all the hope our coming had wakened in them?

Those three hours seemed endless, marked not by the ticking of the clock, but by the fitful groans and helpless cries of the wounded. At last the day broke. Now for duty. First the frightened, hiding villagers must be found and made to help. Some buried the dead, others cleared the choked wells, everything was collected that would furnish food and clothing. A Prussian surgeon with his staff arrived, and before long some of the general distress was relieved. First we visited the crowd of wounded in the castle—my husband was not among them; then I went with Dr. Bresser into the village church, where a hundred men, mangled and feverish, lay on the stone floor. I almost fainted with terror as I looked for the one beloved face—it was not there. I sank beside the altar, filled with inexpressible horror. And this was the temple of the eternal God of Love! The niches were full of pious images—saints with folded hands and lifted faces which were crowned with circlets of gold. I heard a poor soldier cry: “O Mother of God, Holy Mother, one drop of water, have mercy!” All eternity he might have called to that painted image. Ah, miserable men, your petitions to God will be in vain till you obey the law of love which He has stamped upon your own souls. So long as hate and murder are not subdued in your own hearts, you can hope for no compassion from Heaven.

Oh, the experiences of that dreadful day! At the sight of one scene, which my pen shrinks to describe, I heard Mrs. Simon exclaim:—

“It is astonishing what human nature can endure.”

What is most astonishing to me is that human beings will bring each other into such situations of agony; that men will not swear before God that war shall cease; that, if they are princes, they do not break their swords; and, if they have no other power, that they do not, in thought and words and deeds, devote themselves to the one passionate cry, “Disarm! Disarm!”

I remember that in a barn, where we found a heap of wounded and dead who had been forgotten there for more than a week, my poor strength finally forsook me and I swooned away.

When my consciousness returned I found myself in a railway car, Dr. Bresser sitting beside me. He was bringing me home. I had not found my husband—thank God I had not found him among those terrible scenes—and a faint hope took possession of my heart that some news of him was awaiting me in Grumitz.

* * * * *

Whatever the future held for me in sorrow or joy, it would never be able to blot out the memory of the gigantic misery which I had witnessed, and I was resolved that I should cry it into the ears of my human brothers and sisters until they should no longer look upon war as a fatality, but as an unspeakable crime.

I slept nearly the entire way to Vienna; at the station my father met me, embraced me silently, and said to the Doctor:—

“How can I thank you for taking this crazy young woman under your protection——”

“I must be off. Put the young woman to bed. Do not scold her, she has been terribly shaken. Give her orange-flower water and rest. Good-bye.”

We picked our way through the long rows of ambulance waggons and carriages to our own conveyance. I had only one question on my lips, but had not the courage to ask it till we were started: “Any news from Frederick?”

“Not up to yesterday, when I came here in answer to the telegram to meet you,” was the reply. “However, when we get home there may be news. How silly of you to give us such a fright! To go right into the midst of those savage enemies and needle-guns—the worst might have happened; but never mind, the doctor said I should not scold you.”

“How is my boy, my Rudolf?”

“He is crying for you, and hunting all over the place. But you seem strangely indifferent about the rest of us.”

“How are they all? Has Conrad written?”

“The family is all well, and a letter came from Conrad yesterday. So Lilli is happy, and you, too, will see Tilling back all safe and sound. There is nothing good to report from the political centre. Have you heard of the great calamity?”

“I have seen and heard nothing but calamity and misery.”

“Oh, beautiful Venice has been given—handed over on a platter—to the intriguing Louis Napoleon, and in spite of winning the victory of Custozza. Venice as well as Lombardy lost! But that gives us peace in the south, and Napoleon on our side, and a chance to revenge ourselves yet on the Prussians. But you are not listening, so I will obey Bresser’s orders, and see that you rest.”

“Martha, Martha, he is here,” shouted my sisters from the chateau garden as they rushed to meet us.

“Who?”

“Frederick.”

* * * * *

It was true. He had arrived the evening before, having been transported with other wounded from Bohemia. A slight bullet wound in the leg was all, and he was never in danger.

But joy was hardest of all to bear. The terrors of the day before did not more completely rob me of my senses. I had to be lifted from the carriage to bed, and for several hours lay in delirious unconsciousness. When I found myself conscious in my own bed, I believed I had only wakened from a terrible dream, and had never been away. My aunt recalled me to realities:—

“Quick, Martha, get up. Frederick is dying with impatience to see you.”

“Frederick, Frederick.” All these days I had called this name with pain, and now it was with a cry of joy. It was not a dream—I had been away, had come back, and would see my husband.

Alone I went to his room, and sank sobbing upon his breast:—

“Frederick!”

“Martha!”