As to Person: My name is Wilhelm Westphal. I am 26 years old;
Protestant.
As to Case: When the Reserve Uhlan Regiment No. 2 passed through
Monceau sur Sambre I was acting as cyclist in front of it. In the main
street I immediately came under fire from a house at the moment when I
wanted to ride back in order to report to the regiment that the patrol
under 1st Lieutenant von Guaita had been assailed by a hot fire. With
some men of the Reserve Infantry Regiment No. 15 I forced a way into
the house from which the shots had come, and there saw on the stairs a
civilian with a gun in his hand. We at once shot this man.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: WILH. WESTPHAL.
The witness was sworn.
The above is a true account of the proceedings.
Signed: Dr. BERNHOLD.
Signed: GUNTOWSKY.
App. 47.
MILITARY COURT EXAMINATION of Captain Caspari, Infantry Regiment No.
75.
Present:
President of the Court, Lieutenant STÜRENBERG-JUNG.
Secretary, Acting-Sergeant-Major BANNEHR.
There appeared as witness Captain Caspari, who was examined as follows:
When the head of the 3rd Company, Infantry Regiment No. 75, to which I
belonged, approached Hougaerde, it was met by a person from the small
town in priest's clothing. He greeted me and declared that there were
no more Belgian troops in the place, and that the feelings of the
inhabitants were quite friendly towards us; further, that we had no
reason to fear any surprise attack from them. My request that he should
act as our guide through Hougaerde was obviously distasteful to this
person; nevertheless, he undertook to lead us.
During our march into the village the street was quite empty, the
window-shutters and doors closed, and the window-apertures of a new
house on the right were covered with sacking. Just before we reached a
bend in the street, some 100 to 200 metres behind the railway crossing,
the priest sprang into a doorway. A man at the head of the company,
Musketeer Ernst Block, just managed to seize him by his coat-tails and
dragged him back. At the bend we saw ourselves confronted by a street
barricade at a distance of some 30 to 40 metres, and were at once met
by simultaneous volleys of fire from the houses on all sides, and
even from the rear. The priest was one of the first who was mortally
wounded by shots from the houses. As I subsequently ascertained, the
village had been systematically arranged for defence. Houses and walls
were furnished with concealed and barely visible loopholes, prepared
beforehand by the population for a surprise attack by fire at a fixed
spot. That civilians took part in this fighting I can personally
guarantee, for I saw such persons escaping through the gardens with
weapons in their hands. Moreover, several men were wounded by small
shot.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: CASPARI.
The witness was sworn.
Signed: STÜRENBERG-JUNG.
Signed: BANNEHR, Lieutenant and President of the Court, Secretary.
App. 48.
REPORT of Captain Strauss, Grenadier Regiment No. 12 (3rd Infantry
Division).
CONDÉ, _September 25th, 1914_.
On August 18th, after the retirement of the enemy, I rode through the
village of Capellen with my company and heard shots being fired at my
riflemen from a house behind me--from the house itself and from the
garden. While the garden was being searched, the firing was renewed,
and was replied to by my men. A woman, whose dead body was subsequently
found in the garden, was a victim of this firing. The firing from the
house continued, though from what part I could not determine. We found
two men and some nine women and children, all unarmed. There were no
soldiers in the house. I had the house set on fire, and, during the
conflagration, cartridges exploded four or five times in the burning
house.
After the decision of the regiment had been secured next morning the
inhabitants in question were set at liberty, because they had not
been found with weapons in their hands, nor had any such persons been
discovered in searching the house.
The firing from the house and garden undoubtedly occurred.
Signed: STRAUSS, Captain and Company Leader.
App. 49.
MILITARY COURT EXAMINATION of Musketeer Peter Behle, Infantry Regiment
No. 16, Non-commissioned Officer Otto Biernirth, Reserve Infantry
Regiment No. 213, War Volunteer Willi Kandt, Reserve Infantry Regiment
No. 201, War Volunteer Fritz Blum, Reserve Infantry Regiment No. 233,
and War Volunteer Franz Breidbach, Reserve Infantry Regiment No. 235.
LENNEP, _November 17th, 1914_.
Königliches Amtsgericht.
Present:
Amtsgerichtsrat LANDSBERG, Judge.
Referendar WELTMAN, Secretary.
At the Red Cross hospital at Lennep the under-mentioned witnesses were
met, who, after the importance of the oath had been pointed out to
them, were examined as follows:
1. Peter Behle, 20 years of age, Catholic, foreman builder from Lennep,
musketeer of the 6th Company, Infantry Regiment No. 16, after taking
the oath, made the following statement:
In the middle of August, in a Belgian village called, I think,
Tirlemont, a controlled fire was opened upon us in the dark by the
civil population. No Belgian troops had been there for a long time.
Shots were fired from, amongst other places, a fruit garden. My
comrade, Franz Gockel from Wiesdorf, was fatally shot through the back
of his head. The order was then given to collect the weapons in the
houses, to secure the men, and bring the women and children into the
church. In doing this we discovered unfinished revolvers, the wooden
handles of which were still lacking. The houses, from which shots had
come, were set on fire.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: PETER BEHLE.
2. Otto Biernirth, 34 years of age, Protestant, certificated business
instructor of Bremenhaven, non-commissioned officer, Reserve Infantry
Regiment No. 213, after taking the oath, made the following statement:
On October 20th we were in front of the village of Staden (Flanders).
The whole night through we were fighting exclusively with
francs-tireurs, who fired from the houses. In the morning we had to
capture the town. However, some 400 to 500 metres from the town, a
flanking fire came from a single house on the left, whereby our
comrade Fröse was struck by a ricochet bullet. From this house, which
was seized, four francs-tireurs emerged.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: OTTO BIERNIRTH.
3. Willi Kandt, 31 years of age, Evangelical, merchant from Berlin, war
volunteer, 2nd Company Reserve Infantry Regiment No. 201, after taking
the oath, made the following statement:
On the march to Lessen we came under fire from two farms lying
opposite. A reconnoitring company ascertained that the shots came
from a barn. This was set on fire, and one could hear the continuous
explosion of the cartridges stored up in the barn.
On Tuesday, October 20th, 1914, we caught a civilian, who was shot
because he had cartridges in his pocket.
Towards the evening of this day the first four companies of Reserve
Infantry Regiment No. 201 were to go forward on outpost duty, followed
by the remaining companies. When the last companies had passed through
the town of Lessen and the baggage had already arrived on the scene,
it was fired upon on all sides from the houses and the church tower.
Four of our men were wounded. When our artillery received the order to
bombard the church tower, the church was set on fire, and in this way,
probably, a non-commissioned officer and eight men who had been sent to
search the tower were burnt to death. The enemy troops had already left
the place; the only persons still there were civilians.
On the following day we were fired at from a farm, but could find
nobody in the house. After the house had been burnt down, we found
inside the body of a franc-tireur.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: WILLI KANDT.
Continued in the Königliches Amtsgericht at Lennep on November 20th,
1914.
4. Fritz Blum, 17 years of age, Evangelical, a compositor from
Meiningen, war volunteer, 4th Company, Reserve Infantry Regiment No.
233, after taking the oath, made the following declaration:
On October 18th we occupied quarters at Westroosebeek (between Thielt
and Roulers). We there ascertained that both the millers had set the
wings of their windmills in a particular direction, and so furnished a
signal which betrayed our entry. Both the millers were seized, but in
the course of a subsequent fight we lost sight of them.
On October 19th we took Roulers by storm. When we marched in we came
under a hot fire from the houses. In searching the houses I found on
the roof of a house a civilian who had fired with a shot-gun. He was
just trying to escape through the skylight. So, as he paid no attention
to my call, I shot him. He wore wooden shoes, and was otherwise dressed
altogether as a townsman, and differed in no respects from a civilian.
On the stairs we found bullets; they were partly of French origin,
partly "dum-dum" leaden bullets, apparently made at home. The gun that
was found was an old sporting-gun.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: FRITZ BLUHM.
5. Franz Breidbach, 19 years of age, Catholic, Abiturient from
Luttinghausen, war volunteer, 6th Company, Reserve Infantry Regiment
No. 235, after taking the oath, made the following statement:
On October 19th we marched through Roulers, which had previously been
captured by Infantry Regiment No. 233. Our company formed the head of
the column; the entire town was badly injured by artillery fire, and
there was only one street which was fairly intact. From the houses of
this street shots were fired at us, coming more especially from the
cellar windows. My comrade, Kremst of Coblenz, fell in front of me, and
two other comrades were slightly wounded. When we searched the houses
we found six to eight francs-tireurs and a number of revolvers. A large
quantity of ammunition was indubitably stored in the houses, for when
the houses were set on fire a continuous series of explosions occurred.
On October 22nd I arrived at a field hospital in Roulers. There I
heard four or five shots strike the hospital; a wounded Jäger, who
was lying on a stretcher in front of the hospital, was shot dead by
francs-tireurs.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: FRANZ BREIDBACH.
Signed: LANDSBERG. Signed: VELTMAN.
App. 50.
MILITARY COURT EXAMINATION of Ersatzreservist Gottfried Hilberath,
Reserve Infantry Regiment No. 236.
Proceedings at Werne in the hospital, October 31st, 1914.
Königliches Amtsgericht, Langendreer.
Present:
Magistrate HIDDING, as Judge.
District Court Assistant, HARRIES, Secretary.
On the suggestion of the authorities of the hospital at Werne, the
above-mentioned Court Commission visited the hospital in order to
examine a sick soldier.
There was brought before them Gottfried Hilberath, of 60 Moselstrasse,
Cologne, who, after being warned against the giving of a false oath,
was examined as follows:
As to Person: My name is Gottfried Hilberath; hotel waiter; born
at Neuenahr, August 12th, 1893; Catholic; Ersatzreservist, Reserve
Infantry Regiment No. 236, 3rd Battalion, 12th Company.
As to Case: Our regiment marched off on September 13th, 1914. We were
conveyed by rail from our manoeuvre ground. In the middle of October
1914 our detachment lay in the neighbourhood of the Belgian village of
Deynze, near which we had to throw up trenches. During the night we
occupied quarters in the town. At dawn we again entered the trenches.
On the evening of October 25th we brought the wounded into the field
hospital established in a village. At Deynze, with ten to fifteen
comrades, we entered a house which was lighted, and found a number
of our men already there, sitting in the room and drinking coffee.
The housewife made coffee for the party of soldiers, as well as for
ourselves, who came in afterwards. The husband was busily occupied
with his grocery shop. All the soldiers spent the night in the house.
That same evening about eight of our men filled their field flasks
with coffee made by the woman. In the evening some bought themselves
sugar in the shop for 10 centimes. I did this myself, and put it into
my field flask, like the others. The sugar was ready for use in little
packets. It struck me that a sticky mass adhered to the paper, which
looked like gum-arabic. The sugar was made up in twisted pieces of
paper, which were not stuck together and were apparently filled by the
shopkeeper.
On the following day, some ten minutes after partaking of the coffee
in the trenches, I became unconscious, and must have remained in
this condition about five hours. Two cyclists brought me through the
village of Deynze to the field hospital at West-Roosebeck. Here I heard
that the other comrades too had been poisoned, and also that some of
them were already dead. What happened to the grocer and his wife in
consequence of this, I do not know.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: GOTTFRIED HILBERATH.
The examined witness, after once more being warned against the giving
of false evidence, thereupon took the oath.
Proceedings concluded.
Signed: HIDDING. Signed: HARRIES.
App. 51.
Court of the Belgian Government-General.
BRUSSELS, _December 14th, 1915_.
Present:
President of the Court, SÄGER.
Military Court Assistant, DUNVE, as Secretary.
Interpreter FULLES of the Military Court of the Province of Brabant,
once for all put on oath.
There appeared as witness the merchant, Heinrich Bloch, of 35 Rue du
Marché, Brussels, who made the following statements:
As to Person: My name is as given above. I am 68 years old, of the
Jewish faith; a citizen of Baden.
As to Case: Up to 6 a.m. on August 20th, 1914, I was in Brussels.
In the Brussels newspaper there was published a demand that weapons
should be given up. On August 19th, 1914, I sent my man-servant to the
Commissariat, Rue Croisate, with a revolver which he was to hand in.
After a brief interval he returned and used these exact words, "One
must not believe everything one reads in the newspapers" ("Il ne faut
pas croire tout qu'on lit dans les journeaux").
The proclamations were officially issued by the Burgomeister. That
the Commissaire took us to be Belgians, I have no reason to believe.
The Commissaire who had refrained from taking the revolver from my
man-servant fell in Belgium, when and where I cannot say.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: H. BLOCH.
There appeared further as witness, the man-servant Jules Brontine,
38 years of age, Catholic, a Belgian citizen, who made the following
statement:
I can only state what Herr Bloch has already made known. He sent
me on August 19th to the police station, in order to surrender his
revolver. The Commissaire of Police, to whom I handed the weapon, sent
me off with the words, "One must not believe everything one reads in
the newspapers." Thereupon, I returned home again with the revolver.
I said that the weapon belonged to Herr Bloch, who, as a German, was
personally known to the Commissaire of Police. I assumed that the
demand in the newspapers only referred to guns and swords.
Read over in French, approved, signed.
Signed: J. BRONTINE.
The witnesses Brontine and Bloch were sworn according to regulations.
Proceedings concluded.
Signed: SÄGER. Signed: DUNVE.
App. 52.
REPORT of Lieutenant von Manstein, commanding 1st Squadron, Dragoon
Regiment No. 4.
_August 27th, 1914._
On August 9th the patrol, while evading two French squadrons in the
direction of Behême, was fired upon by inhabitants of this village.
A communication dated August 8th was seized, in which the Chief of
the Gardes Forestiers writes to the Burgomeister that Gendarmes
and Verderers were instructed to organise the inhabitants for
armed resistance. An inhabitant of Chiny informed me on August
10th, in answer to my questions--he took me for a Frenchman or an
Englishman--that on the previous day the Garde Civile had been in the
village and carefully instructed the inhabitants in the handling of
weapons and the defence of the village.
On August 24th the inhabitants of Peissant had placed strong
barricades across all the entrances to the village, shut the doors and
window-shutters of every house, and furnished them with loopholes.
They refused to open me a passage through, because they knew I wanted
to avoid a company of English infantry, which was quite close to the
village, and had with me only a single dispatch rider. During the
night they then divulged to the English artillery the names of the
farms occupied by the 1st Squadron, Uhlan Regiment No. 1, and the 1st
Squadron, Dragoon Regiment No. 4, and also the houses in which our
valuable goods had been stored, so that the next morning the English
artillery brought these farms and houses under shell-fire.
Signed: VON MANSTEIN, Lieutenant, Uhlan Regiment No. 10,
commanding 1st Squadron,
Dragoon Regiment No. 4.
App. 53.
MILITARY COURT EXAMINATION of Lieutenant of Reserve Bohme, Infantry
Regiment No. 165.
Court of the 7th Infantry Division, Cherisy.
Present:
President of the Court, Dr. WELT.
Secretary, LORENZ, as Recorder of the Court.
_November 25th, 1914._
There appeared as witness Lieutenant of Reserve Bohme, Infantry
Regiment No. 165, who, after the importance of the oath had been
pointed out to him, was examined as follows:
When I was quartered at Retinne, an officer of the Rhine Regiment
came to me, and showed to myself and other officers a Bond, which,
according to his account, had been found in the Burgomeister's office,
in a neighbouring village. The Bond was typewritten, and contained the
demand issued by the Belgian Government to the populace, that they
should carry on armed resistance for payment. A fixed sum of money was
mentioned in the Bond. The Bond was stamped with an official seal. The
Bond was seen at the time by my comrades Pusch and Kurt Wagner, as
well as by Lieutenant of Research Bloch, Infantry Regiment No. 27, and
Lieutenant Brohm, Jäger Battalion No. 4.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: BOHME.
Proceedings concluded.
Signed: Dr. WELT. Signed: LORENZ.
App. 54.
MILITARY COURT EXAMINATION of Reservist Richard Weise, Fusilier
Regiment No. 36.
BLANKENBURG (HARZ), _November 13th, 1914_.
Herzogliches Amtsgericht.
Present:
Oberamtsrichter Dr. SCHILLING, Judge.
Gerichtsobersecretär HORNIG, Secretary.
There appeared as witness the reservist Richard Weise, 6th Company,
Fusilier Regiment No. 36, born March 29th, 1890, at Hohenmölsen,
District of Weissenfels, at present in the hospital of this place.
There were read over to him the following statements made by 1st
Lieutenant Reyner on October 31st, 1914:
"In the early days of August, it may have been the middle of the month,
I was on officer-patrol duty near the Belgian frontier, with orders to
occupy a bridge. A brief engagement took place, and after an hour and a
half the patrol retired. I, with some fusiliers, received some special
orders, and for that reason left the patrol.
"During our retirement over a meadow we noticed in a street-trench,
near a group of houses, several civilians who remained there. When we
approached nearer, we saw lying in the trench a German soldier whose
eyes had both been cut out. Thereupon we attacked the civilians, who
ran off into the adjacent houses, and from these opened fire upon us.
What became of the cruelly treated soldier I cannot say."
The witness thereupon declared: This statement is correct. I adopt it
also as my own statement to-day, and make the following addition to it.
I did not see the three or four civilians (who, in fear of us, ran away
from the wounded German soldier into the adjacent houses) put out the
eyes of the soldier. That these men, however, were guilty is clear from
the fact that our wounded German comrade implored us, "Take me with
you; they have just put out my eyes."
The attention of the witness was then called to the importance of the
oath, and he accordingly gave his sworn testimony.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: RICHARD WEISE.
Signed: Dr. SCHILLING. Signed: R. HORNIG.
App. 55.
MILITARY COURT EXAMINATION of the Reservists, Gustav Voigt, Fritz
Marks, and Heinrich Hartmann, Infantry Regiment No. 165.
Proceedings at Quedlinburg, in the Reserve Hospital.
Present:
President of the Court, KEIL.
Secretary, FAHLBERG.
SCHILLING, _November 11th, 1914_.
In the Reserve Hospital at Schilling, to which the above-mentioned
Court officials had proceeded, the following examinations took place
after the witnesses had been individually warned as to the importance
of the oath: