Chapter M: De Wiart's Address (1)

Made to the President at the White House, Washington, Sept. 16.

Excellency: His Majesty the King of the Belgians has charged us with a special mission to the President of the United States.

Let me say to you how much we feel ourselves honored to have been called upon to express the sentiments of our King and of our whole nation to the illustrious statesman whom the American people have called to the highest dignity of the Commonwealth.

As far as I am concerned, I have already been able, during a previous trip, to fully appreciate the noble virtues of the American Nation, and I am happy to take this opportunity to express all the admiration with which they inspire me.

Ever since her independence was first established, Belgium has been declared neutral in perpetuity. This neutrality, guaranteed by the powers, has recently been violated by one of them. Had we consented to abandon our neutrality for the benefit of one of the belligerents, we would have betrayed our obligations toward the others. And it was the sense of our international obligations as well as that of our dignity and honor that has driven us to resistance.

The consequences suffered by the Belgian Nation were not confined purely to the harm occasioned by the forced march of an invading army. This army not only seized a great portion of our territory, but it committed incredible acts of violence, the nature of which is contrary to the law of nations.

Peaceful inhabitants were massacred, defenseless women and children were outraged, open and undefended towns were destroyed, historical and religious monuments were reduced to dust, and the famous library of the University of Louvain was given to the flames.

Our Government has appointed a judicial commission to make an official investigation, so as to thoroughly and impartially examine the facts and to determine the responsibility thereof, and I will have the honor, Excellency, to hand over to you the proceedings of the inquiry.

In this frightful holocaust which is sweeping all over Europe, the United States has adopted a neutral attitude.

And it is for this reason that your country, standing apart from either one of the belligerents, is in the best position to judge, without bias or partiality, the conditions under which the war is being waged.

It is at the request, even at the initiative, of the United States that all civilized nations have formulated and adopted at The Hague a law regulating the laws and usage of war.

We refuse to believe that war has abolished the family of civilized powers, or the regulations to which they have freely consented.

The American people has always displayed its respect for justice, its search for progress, and an instinctive attachment for the laws of humanity. Therefore, it has won a moral influence which is recognized by the entire world. It is for this reason that Belgium, bound as she is to you by ties of commerce and increasing friendship, turns to the American people at this time to let it know the real truth of the present situation. Resolved to continue unflinching defense of its sovereignty and independence, it deems it a duty to bring to the attention of the civilized world the innumerable grave breaches of rights of mankind of which she has been a victim. At the very moment we were leaving Belgium, the King recalled to us his trip to the United States and the vivid and strong impression your powerful and virile civilization left upon his mind.

Our faith in your fairness, our confidence in your justice, in your spirit of generosity and sympathy--all these have dictated our present mission.

* * * * *

PRESIDENT WILSON'S REPLY.

Addressed to the Royal Belgian Commission in the White House, Washington, Sept. 16.

Permit me to say with what sincere pleasure I receive you as representatives of the King of the Belgians, a people for whom the people of the United States feel so strong a friendship and admiration, a King for whom they entertain so sincere a respect, and express my hope that we may have many opportunities of earning and deserving their regard.

You are not mistaken in believing that the people of this country love justice, seek the true paths of progress, and have a passionate regard for the rights of humanity.

It is a matter of profound pride to me that I am permitted for a time to represent such a people and to be their spokesman, and I am proud that your King should have turned to me in time of distress as to one who would wish on behalf of the people he represents to consider the claims to the impartial sympathy of mankind of a nation which deems itself wronged.

I thank you for the document you have put in my hands containing the result of an investigation made by a judicial committee appointed by the Belgian Government to look into the matter of which you have come to speak. It shall have my utmost attentive perusal and my most thoughtful consideration.

You will, I am sure, not expect me to say more. Presently, I pray God very soon, this war will be over. The day of accounting will then come, when, I take it for granted, the nations of Europe will assemble to determine a settlement. Where wrongs have been committed their consequences and the relative responsibility involved will be assessed.

The nations of the world have, fortunately, by agreement made a plan for such a reckoning and settlement. What such a plan cannot compass, the opinion of mankind, the final arbiter in such matters, will supply. It would be unwise, it would be premature for a single Government, however fortunately separated from the present struggle, it would be inconsistent with the neutral position of any nation, which, like this, has no part in the contest, to form or express a final judgment.

I need not assure you that this conclusion, in which I instinctively feel that you will yourselves concur, is spoken frankly because in warm friendship, and as the best means of perfect understanding between us, an understanding based upon mutual respect, admiration, and cordiality.

You are most welcome and we are greatly honored that you should have chosen us as the friends before whom you could lay any matter of vital consequence to yourselves, in the confidence that your cause would be understood and met in the same spirit in which it was conceived and intended.

* * * * *

OFFICIAL SUMMARY.

Findings Presented by the Belgian Royal Commission to President Wilson at Washington, Sept. 16.

* * * * *

I.

Acts at Linsmeau and Orsmael.

Belgium, which wanted peace, has been obliged by Germany to resort to arms and to oppose a legitimate defense to an aggression which nothing can justify, and which is contrary to the solemn pledges of treaties.

Belgium is bound in honor to fight loyally and to observe all the rules, laws, and customs of war.

From the beginning of the invasion of its territory by German troops, the Belgian Government had posted each and every day, in all the towns, and the papers have each day repeatedly printed, instructions warning the non-combatant civilians not to offer any resistance to the troops and soldiers invading the country.

The information on which the German Government believes today that it can base its contention that the Belgian population contravenes the law of nations and is not worthy of respect is absolutely unfounded.

The Government protests most vigorously against these allegations and against the odious threats of retaliation. If any deed contrary to the rules of warfare should ultimately be proved, to understand such fact it is only necessary to realize the well-founded excitement which the cruelties of the German soldiers are provoking among the Belgian population--a population which is thoroughly honest but energetic in the defense of its rights and in its respect for humanity.

If we were to publish a list of these atrocities, of which the first ones are here recorded, this would indeed be a long list.

Whole regions have been ravaged and abominable deeds perpetrated in the towns.

A committee attached to the Department of Justice is drawing up a list of these horrors with scrupulous impartiality.

As an example, a few facts are here published, facts which will depict the state of mind and the procedure of certain German troops:

1. German cavalry, occupying the village of Linsmeau, were attacked
by some Belgian infantry and two gendarmes. A German officer was
killed by our troops during the fight, and subsequently buried at
the request of the Belgian officer in command. None of the civilian
population took part in the fighting at Linsmeau. Nevertheless the
village was invaded at dusk Aug. 10 by a strong force of German
cavalry, artillery and machine guns. In spite of formal assurances
given by the Burgomaster that none of the peasants had taken part
in the previous fighting, two farms and six outlying houses were
destroyed by gun fire and burned. All the male population were
then compelled to come forward and hand over whatever arms they
possessed. No recently discharged firearms were found. Nevertheless
the invaders divided these peasants into three groups. Those in one
group were bound and eleven of them placed in a ditch, where they
were afterward found dead, their skulls fractured by the butts of
German rifles.

2. During the night of Aug. 10 German cavalry entered Velm in great
numbers; the inhabitants were asleep. The Germans without
provocation fired on Mr. Deglimme-Gever's house, broke into it,
destroyed furniture, looted money, burned barns, hay, corn stacks,
farm implements, six oxen, and the contents of the farm-yard. They
carried off Mme. Deglimme half-naked to a place two miles away. She
was then let go and fired upon as she fled; without being hit. Her
husband was carried away in another direction and fired upon; he is
dying. The same troops sacked and burned the house of a railway
watchman.

3. Farmer Jef Dierchx of Neerhespen bears witness to the following
acts of cruelty committed by German cavalry at Orsmael and
Neerhespen on Aug. 10, 11, and 12. An old man of the latter village
had his arm sliced in three longitudinal cuts; he was then hanged
head downward and burned alive. Young girls have been raped and
little children outraged at Orsmael, where several inhabitants
suffered mutilations too horrible to describe. A Belgian soldier
belonging to a battalion of cyclist carbineers, who had been
wounded and made prisoner, was bound to a telegraph pole on the St.
Trond road and shot.

4. On Wednesday, Aug. 12, after an engagement at Haelen, Commandant
Van Damme, so severely wounded that he was lying on his back, was
finally murdered by German infantrymen firing their revolvers into
his mouth.

5. On Monday, Aug. 9, at Orsmael the Germans picked up Commandant
Knappen very seriously wounded, propped him against a tree and shot
him. Finally they hacked his corpse with swords.

6. Numerous soldiers, disarmed and unable to defend themselves,
have been ill-treated or killed by certain German soldiers. The
inquiry brings forth new facts of this kind every day.

7. In different places, notably at Hellonge-sur-Geer, at Barchon,
at Pontisse, at Haelen, at Zelk, German troops have fired on
doctors, nurses, ambulances, and ambulance wagons.

8. At Boncelles a body of German troops went into a battle carrying
a Belgian flag.

9. On Thursday, Aug. 6, before a fort at Liége, German soldiers
continued to fire on a party of Belgian soldiers, who were unarmed
and had been surrounded while digging a trench, after these had
hoisted the white flag.

10. On Thursday, Aug. 10, at Vootem, near the Fort of Loncin, a
group of German infantry hoisted the white flag. When Belgian
soldiers approached to take them prisoners the Germans suddenly
opened fire on them at close range.

* * * * *

II.

Report on Aerschot.

Antwerp, Aug. 28, 1914.

The commission of inquiry on violation of the laws of nations and the laws and customs of warfare, after an impartial and careful investigation, can make the following report of its findings:

It appears from precise and concurring testimony that in the entire region of Aerschot the Germans have committed veritable atrocities. The majority of the population fled in terror. On their passage the German troops set fire to farms and houses and furniture, shooting inoffensive citizens whom they found along the road or who were working in the field.

At Hersselt, north of Aerschot, thirty-two houses of the village were set on fire; the miller and his son, who fled, and about twenty-one other persons were killed; and all this while no Belgian troops were visible.

The German troops penetrated into Aerschot, a town of 8,000 inhabitants, on Wednesday, Aug. 19, in the morning. No Belgian forces remained behind. No sooner did the Germans enter the town than they shot five or six inhabitants whom they caused to leave their houses. In the evening, pretending that a superior German officer had been killed on the Grand Place by the son of the Burgomaster, or, according to another version of the story, that a conspiracy had been hatched against the superior commandant by the Burgomaster and his family, the Germans took every man who was inside of Aerschot; they led them, fifty at a time, some distance from the town, grouped them in lines of four men, and, making them run ahead of them, shot them and killed them afterward with their bayonets. More than forty men were found thus massacred.

They gave up the town to be pillaged, taking from private residences all they could take, breaking furniture, and forcing safes. The following day they lined up, three by three, the villagers whom they had arrested the day before, taking one man out of each line. These they led to a distance of about 100 meters from the town, taking with them the Burgomaster of the town, Mr. Tielmans, and his son, aged 15½ years, and his brother, and shot them.

Later on they forced the remaining villagers to dig holes to bury their victims.

For three whole days they continued to pillage and set fire to everything in sight.

About 150 inhabitants of Aerschot are supposed to have been thus massacred.

The largest part of the city is totally destroyed. Five times the Germans tried to set fire to the large church, the interior of which has been sacked. The records of the town have been carried away.

The ambulance attendants, although wearing the Red Cross badge, were not respected. One of them reports that German troops fired upon him while he was collecting his wounded, and that they continued to fire even though he displayed his Red Cross armband. Moreover, during the entire day of the 19th, while he was engaged in hospital service, he was threatened and ill-used. A German officer, among others, took him by the head, thrusting against his forehead the butt of a revolver. A collector, wearing the insignia of the Red Cross, was killed in the Rue de l'Hospital on the evening of Aug. 19 by Germans.

Deny Any Civilian Attack.

From all the testimony taken it appears that the civil population of Aerschot has in no wise participated in the hostilities, that no shot was fired by them; that all the witnesses agree in pointing out the improbability of the German version, according to which the Burgomaster's son, a youth of 15½ years, and of extremely gentle disposition, is said to have fired upon a superior German officer during the night of Aug. 19. Still more improbable is the version of the conspiracy organized by the Burgomaster. It is to be remarked that if--a thing which is not known--a German officer has been hit on the Grand Place, it might have happened by a stray bullet, German soldiers being engaged in shooting in the neighboring streets in order to frighten the populace.

Moreover, the Burgomaster, a very quiet man, had repeatedly warned his fellow-citizens, by means of posters and circulars addressed to every inhabitant of the town, that in case of invasion they were to abstain from any hostility. These posters were still in evidence when the Germans entered the city, and they were shown to them.

The German troops which were traversing localities situated on this side of Aerschot indulged in the same horrors. They shot fleeing citizens and set fire to and sacked private houses, all this without provocation.

At Rotselaer, for instance, they set fire to about fifteen houses. A German officer, addressing an inhabitant whose house was afire, wanted to make him declare, at the point of a pistol, that the fire had been started by the Belgians. When this inhabitant protested, claiming that the Belgians had left the town the previous evening, this officer declared that if the Germans had set fire to the town it was due probably to the fact that the civilians had fired at them, a fact which is also denied by all the witnesses.

There, too, the German troops pillaged everything they could lay their hands on during their passage.

Up to this writing the Commission of Inquiry has been unable to obtain the testimony of inhabitants of Diest and Tirlemont, which towns were occupied by the Germans on the 18th and 19th of August, 1914, and which are cut off from communication.

However, the inhabitants of Schaffen, a town near Diest, have stated that the same abominations were committed in their locality and in the adjoining communities, Lummen and Molenstede. The whole region has been laid waste. German troops, at an hour's distance from Diest, had begun their work of destruction all along the highway from Diest to Beeringen. Turning upon Diest they set fire to everything they could lay hands on--farms, houses, furniture. Arriving at the village of Schaffen, the Germans set fire to the town, massacring the few inhabitants who remained behind, and whom they found in their houses or in the streets.

The witness gives the names and addresses of eighteen persons whom he knows to have been massacred.

Among them are:

The wife of Francois Luyck, 45 years old, and her 12-year-old daughter, who were discovered in a sewer and shot.

The daughter of Jean Ouyen, 9 years old, who was shot.

Andre Willem, 23 years old, sexton, who was tied to a tree and burned alive.

Joseph Reynders, forty years old, who was killed together with his nephew, a lad of ten years.

Gustave Lodt, forty years old, and Jean Marken, also aged forty, probably buried alive.

The witness testifies that he personally proceeded to exhume these two bodies, and that he afterward buried them in the town cemetery.

The village of Rethy, near Turnhout, was the object of devastation and shooting during the day of Aug. 22 by seventeen cavalrymen who had penetrated into the village. A young woman of fifteen years was killed by a bullet.

Still more horrible crimes, if that were possible, have been committed by the German troops on account of their defeat at the hands of the Belgian Army before Malines. The City of Louvain, with its artistic and scientific riches, has not been spared.

New reports will be submitted very shortly.

GOOREMAN, President, ERNST DE BUNSWYCK, Secretary of the Commission.

* * * * *

III.

Destruction of Louvain.

Antwerp, Aug. 31, 1914

To the Minister of Justice:

Sir: The Commission of Inquiry begs to make the following report on the deeds of which the City of Louvain and the surrounding localities and the vicinity of Malines have been the theatre.

The German Army penetrated into Louvain on Wednesday, Aug. 19, after having set fire to the towns through which it had passed.

From the moment of their entrance into the City of Louvain the Germans requisitioned lodgings and victuals for their troops. They entered every private bank of the city and took over the bank balances. German soldiers broke the doors of houses abandoned by their inhabitants, pillaged them and indulged in orgies.

The German authorities took hostages--the Mayor of the city, Senator Vander Kelm, the Vice Rector of the Catholic University, the Dean of the city; magistrates and Aldermen were also detained. All arms, down to fencing foils, had been handed over to the town administration and deposited by the said authorities in the Church of St. Peter.

In a neighboring village, Corbeek-Loo, a young matron, 22 years old, whose husband was in the army, was surprised on Wednesday, Aug. 19, with several of her relatives, by a band of German soldiers. The persons who accompanied her were locked in an abandoned house, while she was taken into another house, where she was successively attacked by five soldiers.

In the same village, on Thursday, Aug. 20, German soldiers were searching a house where a young girl of 16 years lived with her parents. They carried her into an abandoned house, and while some of them kept the father and mother off, others went into the house, the cellar of which was open, and forced the young woman to drink. Afterward they carried her out on the lawn in front of the house and attacked her successively. She continued to resist, and they pierced her breast with their bayonets. Having been abandoned by the soldiers after these abominable attacks, the girl was carried off by her parents, and the following day, owing to the gravity of her condition, she was administered the last rites of the Church by the priest of the parish and carried to the hospital at Louvain. At that time her life was in danger.

On Aug. 24 and 25 Belgian troops, leaving the intrenched camp in Antwerp, attacked the German Army which was outside of Malines.

The German troops were driven back as far as Louvain and Vilvorde.

Penetrating the towns which had been occupied by the enemy, the Belgian Army found the whole country devastated. The Germans, while retiring, had ravaged and set fire to the villages, taking with them all the male inhabitants, driving them before them.

Old Woman Killed by Bayonets.

Upon entering Hofstade, on Aug. 25, the Belgian soldiers found there the corpse of an old woman who had been killed by bayonet thrusts; she still held in her hands the needle with which she was sewing when she was attacked; one mother and her son, aged about 15 or 16 years, lay there, pierced with bayonet wounds; one man was found hanging.

In Sempst, a neighboring village, were found the corpses of two men partially burned. One of them was found with his legs cut off at the knees, the other was minus his arms and legs. A workman (whose charred body several witnesses have seen) had been pierced with bayonets, and afterward, while still living, the Germans soaked him with petroleum and locked him in a house, which they set on fire. An old man and his son had been killed by bullets; a woman coming out of her house had been stricken down in the same manner.

A witness whose declaration has been received by Edward Hertslet, son of Sir Cecil Hertslet, Consul General of Great Britain in Antwerp, testifies to have seen not far from Malines on Aug. 26 (that is, during the last attack of the Belgian troops) an old man attached by the arms to a beam of a barn. The body was completely burned; the head, the arms, and the feet were intact. Further on was a body all over stabbed with bayonet thrusts. Numerous corpses of peasants were found in positions of supplication, arms lifted and hands folded in prayer. The Belgian Consul to Unganda, who had entered the Belgian Army as a volunteer, reports that everywhere the Germans had passed through the country was devastated. The few inhabitants who remained in the villages told of horrors committed by the enemy. Thus in Wacherzeel seven Germans are said to have consecutively attacked a woman, afterward killing her. In the same village they had stripped a young boy, threatening him with death by pointing a revolver at his breast, piercing him with their lances, and chasing him into the open fields and shooting after him, without, however, hitting him.

Everywhere there was ruin and devastation. At Bulcken numerous inhabitants, including the priest, a man more than 80 years old, were killed.

Between Impde and Wolverthem two wounded Belgian soldiers were lying near a house which was burning. The Germans threw these two unfortunate men into the raging fire.

The German troops repulsed by our soldiers entered Louvain in full panic. Various witnesses assure us that at that moment the German garrison occupying Louvain was advised erroneously that the enemy was entering the town. Immediately the German garrison withdrew toward the station, where it met with the German troops that had been repulsed and pursued by the Belgian troops. Everything seems to indicate that a collision took place between the two German regiments. From that moment, under pretext that the Louvain civilians had fired upon them, a fact which is contradicted by all witnesses, and which would hardly have been possible inasmuch as all the inhabitants of Louvain, for several days past, had been obliged to hand their arms over to the local authorities, the German soldiers began to bombard the city. Moreover, not one of the witnesses has seen the body of a single civilian at the place where the affray happened. The bombarding lasted until 10 o'clock at night. Afterward the Germans set fire to the city.

Burning of the Town.

The houses which had not taken fire were entered by German soldiers, who threw fire grenades, which seem to have been provided for the occasion. The largest part of the City of Louvain, especially the quarters of the Ville Haute, comprising the modern houses, the Cathedral of St. Peter, the University Halls, with the whole library of the university, its manuscripts, its collections, the largest part of the scientific institutions, and the town theatres, were at the moment being consumed by flames.

The commission deems it necessary, in the midst of these horrors, to insist on the crime of lèse humanity which the deliberate annihilation of an academic library--a library which was one of the treasures of our time--constitutes.

Numerous corpses of civilians covered the street and squares. On the route from Louvain to Tirlemont alone one witness testifies having seen more than fifty of them. On the threshholds of houses were found burned corpses of people who, surprised in their cellars by the fire, had tried to escape and fell into the heap of live embers. The suburbs of Louvain have been completely annihilated.

A group of seventy-five persons, among whom were several notables of the city, such as Father Coloboet and a Spanish priest, and also an American priest, were conducted during the morning of Wednesday, Aug. 26, to the square in front of the station. The men were brutally separated from their wives and children, and after having received the most abominable treatment, and after repeated threats of being shot, they were driven in front of the German troops as far as the village of Campenhout. They were locked in the church during the night. The following day at 4 o'clock a German officer came to inform them that they might all confess themselves, and that they would be shot half an hour later. But at 4:30 o'clock they were allowed to go, and shortly afterward they were again arrested by a German brigade, which forced them to march in front of them to Malines. Answering a question on the part of one of the prisoners, a German officer told them that they were going to taste some of the Belgian grapeshot before Antwerp. At last they were liberated on Thursday afternoon at the entrance of Malines.

Further testimony shows that several thousand male inhabitants of Louvain who had escaped the shooting and burning were sent toward Germany. We do not at this writing know for what purpose.

The fire continued for several days. An eye-witness, who on Aug. 30 left Louvain, describes the state of the city as follows:

"From Weert St. Georges," he says, "I have seen nothing except
burned towns and crazed villagers lifting to each comer their arms
as a mark of submission. From each house was hanging a white flag,
even from those that had been set on fire, and rags of them were
found hanging from the ruins.

At Weert St. Georges I inquired from the inhabitants the cause of
the German reprisals. They all assured me that absolutely none of
the inhabitants had fired; that all arms had been previously given
up, and that the Germans had taken vengeance on the population
because a Belgian soldier of the Gendarme Corps had killed a Uhlan.

The population which remained in Louvain took refuge in the suburb
of Heverle, where they are all piled up, the population having been
driven from the town by the troops and by the fire.

The fire in Louvain began a little above the American College, and
the city is entirely destroyed, with the exception of the Town Hall
(Hôtel de Ville) and the depot. Today the fire continued, and the
Germans--far from trying to stop it--seem rather to maintain it by
throwing straw into the fire, as I have myself seen in the streets
behind the Hôtel de Ville. The cathedral and the theatres have been
destroyed and have fallen in, also the library. The town resembles
an old city in ruins, in the midst of which drunken soldiers are
circulating, carrying bottles of wine and liquor; the officers
themselves being installed in armchairs, sitting around tables and
drinking like their own men.

In the streets dead horses are decaying, horses which are already
inflated, and the smell of the fire and of the decaying animals is
such that it has followed me for a long time."

The commission up to this writing has been unable to obtain any information regarding the fate of the Burgomaster of Louvain, nor regarding the prominent persons taken for hostages.

Conclusions of the Commission.

By facts which have thus far been brought to its attention, the commission reaches the following conclusions:

In this war, German occupation of territory is systematically
followed by (and is at times preceded by and accompanied by) acts
of violence against the civil population, which acts of violence
are contrary to the conventional laws of war and to the most
elementary principles of humanity.

The procedure of the Germans is everywhere the same. They advance
along the roads, shooting inoffensive passersby, particularly
cyclists and even peasants occupied in the fields which the Germans
traverse.

In the towns and villages where they stop, the Germans first of all
requisition victuals and drinks which they consume to the point of
drunkenness; then they begin to shoot wildly, sometimes from the
interior of empty houses, declaring that the inhabitants have fired
the shots. It is then that the firing scenes begin, and murder and
especially pillage accompanied by acts of cold cruelty set in, acts
which respect neither sex nor age. Even where they claim to know
the perpetrator of the deeds which they allege, they do not content
themselves with executing the culprits summarily, but take
advantage of the occasions to decimate the population, to pillage
all the inhabitants, and to set fire to them.

After a first massacre, somewhat at random, they shut the men into
the church of the town and order all women to go back to the houses
and leave the doors open during the night.

In several localities the civil population has been sent to
Germany, to be compelled there, it appears, to labor in the fields,
as was done in the slave days of olden times. Numerous cases are
known where the inhabitants were forced to serve as guides and to
make trenches for the Germans. Numerous depositions reveal that in
their march, and even in their attacks, the Germans put before them
civilians, men and women, in order to prevent our soldiers from
firing. Other testimony proves that German detachments do not
hesitate to fly either a white flag or a Red Cross flag, so as to
approach our troops without being suspected. On the other hand they
fire on our ambulances and ill-treat our ambulance nurses. They
ill-treat and even kill our wounded. Clergymen seem to be
particularly the object of their attacks. Last, but not least, we
have in our possession explosive bullets left behind them by the
enemy at Wechter, and we are also in receipt of medical
certificates testifying that the wounds must have been inflicted by
bullets of the variety mentioned above.

Documents and testimonials in support of these facts will be
published.

(Signed)

GOOREMAN, President.
COUNT GOBLET D'ALVIELLA.

ERNST DE BUNSWYCK,
ORTS, Secretaries.

* * * * *

FURTHER REPORTS.

Cabled to Royal Commission at Washington from Belgian Foreign Office. Cablegram Received Sept. 8.

You have received the reports of the commission of Aug. 25 and 31. Since then a great many localities, situated in the Vilvorde-Malines- Louvain triangle, an extremely fertile and densely populated district, have been partially pillaged and totally destroyed by fire. Their inhabitants have fled, while a number of them, among others women and children, were arrested and shot without trial, and without apparent reason, except to inspire the population with terror. This was done in Sempst, Weerde, Elewyt, Hofstade, Wespelaer, Wilsele, Bucken, Eppeghem, Houthem, Tremeloo, Tistelt, Gelrode, Herent. At Wavre, where the population was unable to pay a levy of 3,000,000 francs, fifty-six houses were set on fire. The largest part of Cortenberg is burned. To excuse these attacks the Germans allege that an army of civilians resisted them. According to trustworthy testimony, no provocation can be proved at Vise, Aerschot, Louvain, Wavre, and in other localities situated in the Malines-Louvain-Vilvorde district, where fire was set and massacres committed several days after the German occupation.

Cablegram Received Sept. 15.

Inform the Belgian Commission that the Belgian Committee on Inquiry continues to report ruins and devastations and pillage, systematically organized by German troops in the towns invested by them. The City of Termonde was destroyed without any hostile participation on the part of the civilian population. Out of 1,400 houses, only 295 remain standing, others were destroyed by fire and razed from the ground, after the Germans entered the city. Several civilians were imprisoned and executed with bayonets in the presence of their relatives and fellow-citizens. In Melle nine civilians were killed and forty-five properties destroyed, without any reason.

The re-occupation of Aerschot by the Belgian Army reveals disastrous deeds. Dwellings, which were not destroyed by fire were completely sacked and pillaged on Sept. 6 before the return of the Belgian troops. Four hundred civilians, among them thirty clergymen, were locked since Aug. 30 in the church without food, carried off, and sent to destinations unknown. Localities in the neighborhood are completely destroyed, and everywhere along the road are corpses. Women and young girls were outraged. Systematic pillage.

* * * * *

A SUPPLEMENT.

Published by Belgian Commission of Inquiry on Sept. 10 to Complete Its Report of Aug. 31.

Of the two reports, dated August 28 and 31, which the Commission has had the honor of addressing to you, the former recounted more particularly the events which occurred at Aerschot and in the neighboring district, while the latter dealt with the destruction of the town of Louvain by the German troops. In order to complete its report of Aug. 31, the Commission thinks it its duty to record that after the burning of Louvain the houses which remained standing, the inhabitants of which had been forced to flee, were pillaged under the eyes of German officers. On Sept. 2 the Germans were seen setting fire to four houses.

The "Chastisement" of Louvain.

Another fact which emphasizes the ruthless character of the treatment to which the peaceable population of Louvain was subjected has also been established. On Aug. 28 a crowd of 6,000 to 8,000 persons, men, women and children, of every age and condition, was conducted under the escort of a detachment of the 162nd Regiment of German infantry to the riding school of the town, where they spent the whole night. The place of confinement was so small in proportion to the number of the occupants that all had to remain standing, and so great were their sufferings that in the course of this tragic night several women lost their reason and children of tender years died in their mothers' arms.

A communiqué from the German Great General Staff, the text of which is published in the Cologne Gazette of Aug. 29, declares that the "chastisement" inflicted upon Louvain was justified by the fact that a battalion of Landwehr, which had been left unsupported in the town in order to guard the communications, had been attacked by the civil population, which was under the impression that the main German Army had definitely retired. The same journal has published a narrative purporting to come from a person who was a witness of the occurrence.

The inquiry has established that this statement must be considered false. It is, in fact, ascertained that the people of Louvain, who, moreover, had been disarmed by the Communal Authority, did not provoke the Germans by any act of hostility.

The commission has resumed the inquiry begun at Brussels on the subject of the occurrences at Visé.

This place was the first Belgian town destroyed in pursuance of the system applied subsequently by the invader to so many other of our cities and villages. It is for this reason that we have been careful to determine what truth there is in the German version according to which the civilian population of Visé took part in the defense of the town or rose against the Germans after the town had been occupied.

Several witnesses now at Antwerp have been heard, notably soldiers belonging to the detachment which disputed with the Germans the passage of the Meuse, north of Liége, and a lady of German nationality, who belongs to the religious community of the Sisters of Notre Dame at Visé.

Innocent Vise.

The result is to prove that the inhabitants took no part whatever in the fighting which took place on Aug. 4 at the ford of Lixhe and at Visé itself.

Moreover, it was only in the night of Aug. 15-16 that the destruction of the town began, the signal being given by several shots fired on the evening of the 15th. The Germans asserted that the inhabitants had fired upon them, particularly from a house the owner of which gave evidence before the commission.

The Germans discovered no arms in this house, any more than they did in neighboring buildings, which, nevertheless, were burned after being pillaged, and the male occupants of which were carried off to Germany.

The evidence has brought to light the improbability of any rising among a disarmed population against a numerous German garrison at a time when the last Belgian troops had for eleven days evacuated the district, and the witnesses have declared that the first shots were fired by intoxicated German infantry soldiers at their own officers. This fact appears not to be exceptional. It is, indeed, notorious that at Maestricht, either by mistake or in consequence of a mutiny, Germans about this same time killed one another during the night at a cavalry camp which they had established at Mesch, close to the Dutch frontier in Limbourg.

It is confirmed that the town of Visé was entirely burned, with the exception, it appears, of a religious establishment which seems to have been respected, and that several citizens, both of the town and of the village of Canne, were shot.

A Deliberate System.

A large number of places situated in the triangle between Vilvorde, Malines, and Louvain--that is to say, in one of the most populous and, a few days ago, one of the most prosperous regions in Belgium--have been given over to plunder, partially or entirely destroyed by fire, their population dispersed, while the inhabitants were indiscriminately arrested and shot without trial and without apparent reason, the sole object being, it seems, to inspire terror and to compel the migration of the population.

This was notably the case in the communes or hamlets of Sempst, Weerde, Elewyt, Holstade, Wespelaer, Wilsele, Bueken, Eppeghem, Wackerzeele, Rotselaer, Werchter, Thildonck, Boortmeerbeek, Houthem, Tremeloo. In this last village only the church and the presbytery remained standing. On the few houses which have been spared may be seen the following inscriptions: "Nicht abbrennen," (do not burn,) "Bitte schonen," (please spare,) "Gute leute, nicht plundren," (good people, do not plunder.) These houses, however, were sacked afterward.

In all these villages the women who have been unable to escape are exposed to the brutal instincts of the German soldiers.

The district immediately adjoins that of Aerschot, the devastation of which was described in an earlier report. It extends at present to the northwest of Brussels, where the important towns of Grimberghen and Wolverthem have been sacked, while southeast of the capital, more than twenty-five kilometers from the scene of military operations, the town of Wavre, which was unable to furnish the exorbitant war levy of 3,000,000 francs (£120,000) imposed by the General Staff of the enemy, has seen fifty-six of its houses destroyed by fire.

We must also record that on Sept. 4 and 5 bombs were hurled from an aeroplane upon Ghent and Escloo, which are open and undefended towns.

Finally, you are aware, M. le Ministre, that the town of Malines, after it had been completely evacuated by Belgian troops on Aug. 27, was subjected for several days to a bombardment which has seriously damaged the cathedral church of St. Rombaut, the pride of this ancient city. The town of Heyst-opden-Berg was also bombarded without mercy, though there was no strategic interest to warrant such an act.

The Plea of Armed Resistance.

The Germans, in order to excuse their violence, declare that, wherever they have shot civilians or burned and pillaged towns and villages, armed resistance has been offered by the inhabitants. While there may possibly have been isolated instances of this kind, that is nothing more than occurs in all wars, and if they had confined themselves to executing the guilty persons we could only have bowed before the rigor of military law. But in no case could individual and absolutely exceptional acts of aggression justify the wholesale measures of repression which have been adopted against the persons and the property of the inhabitants of our towns and villages--the shooting, the burning, the pillaging which has proceeded pretty well everywhere in our country, not only by way of reprisals but with a refinement of cruelty. Moreover, no provocation has been proved at Visé, Marsage, Louvain, Wavre, Termonde, and other places which have been entirely and deliberately destroyed several days after being occupied, not to mention the systematic burning of isolated buildings situated in the line of march of the troops, and the shooting of the unfortunate inhabitants who fled.

The Germans have asserted in their newspapers that the Belgian Government distributed to the civil population arms which were to be used against the invaders. They add that the Catholic clergy preached a sort of holy war and incited their flock everywhere to massacre the Germans. Finally, they have declared, in order to justify the massacres of women, that women showed themselves as ferocious as the men, and went so far as to pour boiling oil from their windows upon the troops on the march.

A Tissue of Falsehoods.

All these allegations are so many falsehoods. Far from having distributed arms, the authorities everywhere on the approach of the enemy disarmed the inhabitants. The Burgomasters everywhere warned the townspeople against acts of violence, which would involve reprisals. The clergy have unceasingly preached calm to their flock. As for the women, if we except a story in a foreign newspaper, the source of which is suspected, everything shows that their only anxiety was to escape the horrors of a ruthless war.

The true motives for the atrocities the moving evidence of which we have gathered can only be, on the one hand, the desire to terrorize and demoralize the people in accordance with the inhuman theories of German military writers, and, on the other hand, the desire for plunder. A shot fired, no one knows where, or by whom, or against whom, by a drunken soldier, or an excited sentry, is enough to furnish a pretext for the sack of a whole city. Individual plunder is succeeded by war levies of a magnitude which it is impossible to satisfy and by the taking of hostages who will be shot or kept in confinement until payment of the ransom in full, according to the well-known procedure of classic brigandage. It must also be stated that in order to establish the German case all resistance offered by detachments of the regular army is laid to the account of the civilian population, and that the invader invariably avenges himself upon the civilians for the checks or even the disappointments which he suffers in the course of the campaign.

In the course of this inquiry we use only facts supported by trustworthy evidence. It should be noted that up to the present we have been able to record only a small part of the crimes committed against law, humanity, and civilization, which will constitute one of the most sinister and most revolting pages in contemporary history. If an international inquiry, like that which was conducted in the Balkans by the Carnegie Commission, could be conducted in our country, we are convinced that it would establish the truth of our assertions.

[Signed by M. Gooreman, Minister of State, President.]

* * * * *

"NOT A WORD OF TRUTH."

Denial of Belgian Charges by Count von Bernstorff, German Ambassador at Washington, Sept. 17.

All that I care to say about the Belgian charges is that I have officially informed the State Department in Washington that there is not one word of truth in the statements made to the President yesterday by the Belgian Commission.

* * * * *

GERMANY'S VERSIONS.

Official Dispatch from Berlin to German Embassy at Washington, Aug. 29.

In consequence of a sudden attack of Belgian troops from Antwerp the German garrison at Louvain meets the enemy, leaving only one battalion of the last reserve and army service corps in Louvain. Thinking that this meant the retreat of the German troops, priests at Louvain gave arms and ammunition to the civilians, who began, at different places, suddenly to shoot out of windows at unsuspecting German troops, of whom many were wounded. A fight of twenty-five hours between German soldiers and the civil population of Louvain took place. Parts of Louvain were burning. Civilians met with arms are killed. The manifesto of the Chief General speaks of bestial cruelties committed on wounded and makes the magistrates responsible for the provocation and for providing people with arms.

The German Army protests against the news spread out by enemies about the cruelty of German warfare. The German troops had to take severe measures sometimes when provoked, the population making treacherous attacks upon them and bestial atrocities against the wounded. The responsibility for the recourse of warfare falls entirely upon the authorities of the occupied territories who gave arms to the civil population and stirred them up to take part in the war wherever the population was not hostile. The German troops never did harm people or property. The German soldier is not an incendiary nor pillager. He only fights against a hostile army. The news published in foreign papers about the Germans chasing the population means the characterizing immorality of the authors.

* * * * *

Official Communication of the German General Staff.

BERLIN, Aug. 30, 1914.

The City of Loewen (Louvain) had surrendered and was given over to us by the Belgian authorities. On Monday, Aug. 24, some of our troops were shipped there and intercourse with the inhabitants was developing in a quite friendly manner.

On Tuesday afternoon, Aug. 25, our troops, hearing about an imminent Belgian sortie from Antwerp, left in that direction, the Commanding General ahead in a motor car, leaving behind only a Colonel with soldiers to protect railroad, (landsturm battalion "neuss.")

As the rest of the Commanding General's staff, with the horses, was going to follow, and collected on the market place, suddenly rifle fire opened from all the surrounding houses, all the horses being killed and five officers wounded, one of them seriously.

Simultaneously fire opened at about ten different places in town, also on some of our troops, just arrived and waiting on the square in front of the station, and on incoming military trains. A designed co-operation with the Belgian sortie from Antwerp established beyond doubt. Two priests caught in handing out ammunition to the people were shot at once in front of the station.

Street fights lasted till Wednesday, the 26th, in the afternoon, (twenty-four hours,) when stronger forces, arrived in the meantime, succeeded in getting the upper hand. Town and northern suburbs were burning at different places and by this time have probably burned down altogether.

On the part of the Belgian Government a general rising of the population against the enemy had been organized for a long time; depots of arms were found where to each gun was attached the name of the citizen to be armed.

A spontaneous rising of the people has been recognized, at the request of the smaller States at The Hague Conference, as being within the law of nations as far as weapons are carried openly and the laws of civilized warfare are being observed; but such rising was only admitted in order to fight the attacking.

In the case of Loewen the town had already surrendered and the population renounced, without any resistance, the town being occupied by our troops. Nevertheless the population attacked on all sides and with a murderous fire the occupying forces and newly arriving troops, which came in trains and automobiles, considering the hitherto peaceful attitude of the population.

Therefore there can be no question of means of defense allowed by the law of nations, neither of a warlike guet-apens, (ambush,) but only of a treacherous attempt of the civil population all along the line, and all the more to be condemned as it was apparently planned long beforehand with simultaneous attack from Antwerp, as arms were not carried openly, as women and young girls took part in the fight and blinded our wounded, sticking their eyes out.

The barbarous attitude of the Belgian population in all parts occupied by our troops has not only justified our severest measures, but forced them on us for the sake of self-preservation. The intensity of the resistance of the population is shown by the fact that in Loewen twenty-four hours were needed to break down their attack.

We ourselves regret deeply that during these fights the town of Loewen has been destroyed to a great extent. Needless to say that these consequences are not intentional on our part, but cannot be avoided in this infamous franc-tireur war being led against us.

Whoever knows the good-natured character of our troops cannot seriously pretend that they are inclined to needless or frivolous destruction.

The entire responsibility for these events rests with the Belgian Government, who with criminal frivolity have given to the Belgian people instructions contrary to law of nations and incited the resistance, and who, in spite of our repeated warnings, even after the fall of Luettich, (Liége,) have done nothing to induce them to a peaceful attitude.

* * * * *

Official German Statement Published in Berlin, Sept. 7.

Belgium is officially spreading false representations about the occurrences through which the City of Louvain was made to suffer. It is claimed that German troops, having been repulsed by Belgians making a sortie from Antwerp, were fired upon by mistake by the German garrison of Louvain and that in this way fighting occurred there. But events prove incontestably that the Germans repulsed the Belgian sortie.

During this battle before Antwerp an undoubtedly organized attack was made upon the German troops at many places in Louvain, after apparently friendly relations between the Germans and the citizens of the town had seemed for twenty-four hours to be beginning. The attack was at first against a Landwehr battalion composed of older men of quiet disposition and themselves mostly fathers of families; also against sections of the General Staff that had remained in the city, and upon moving columns of troops. The Germans had many wounded and killed. They won the upper hand, however, owing to the arrival of fresh troops by rail, who were fired upon at the station. The truth of the foregoing statements is established beyond all cavil. The City Hall was saved, but further attempts to extinguish the fire were unsuccessful.

* * * * *

LOUVAIN'S ART TREASURES.

Official Report by Superior Confidential Councilor von Falke After Inspection of Louvain, Sept. 17.