WILLMSBARACKEN, _January 6th, 1915_.
_Deposition._
By order of the (Guards) Grenadier Regiment No. 100, Lieutenant-Colonel
Count Kielmannsegg appeared for examination and, being warned to speak
the whole truth, made the following deposition:
As to Person: My name is Bernhardt Hermann Carl Kedel, Count
Kielmannsegg, born in Celle (Hanover) on July 6th, 1866;
evangelical-Lutheran; Lieutenant-Colonel in the (Guards) Grenadier
Regiment No. 100 and Commander of the 1st Battalion.
As to Case: The town of Dinant was attacked and occupied at about 8
o'clock in the forenoon on August 23rd, 1914, by the 3rd Company,
1st Battalion, 1st (Guards) Grenadier Regiment. No enemy troops were
discovered on the right bank of the Meuse. Notwithstanding this, our
troops were fired on from the houses of the town by persons in civilian
clothing without any military badge or uniform, whereby Captain Legler,
the first of the Guards Company to enter the town, was severely
wounded. Sections of the town were assigned to the companies for the
purpose of searching and clearing, with the injunction to take all
inhabitants, so long as they offered no resistance, to the town gaol;
all those who offered resistance to be dealt with by force of arms. The
occupant of the house, from which Captain Legler was wounded, was shot
by my order.
Infringements of the orders given by me have not been reported from
anywhere. The search took place by patrols under leaders who were
detailed for this purpose by the companies. Several hundred inhabitants
were brought into the town gaol, and there put under guard. Before
leaving the town, in which the three companies had been engaged, from
about 8 o'clock in the morning until about 8 o'clock in the evening, in
constant street and house fighting, with their own losses as indicated,
about a hundred guilty inhabitants of the male sex were shot by my
direction and in accordance with an order given by higher authority.
Our own wounded, as well as the inhabitants who were wounded, chiefly
by the fire of the enemy on the left bank of the Meuse, were bandaged
and taken care of by Chief-Doctor Merx of the 2nd Battalion of the
(Guards) Grenadier Regiment in a house prepared for this purpose.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: KIELMANNSEGG.
Witness was hereupon sworn.
Signed: VON HAUGK, Lieutenant and Officer of the Court.
Signed: BEYMANN, Acting-Sergeant-Major, Clerk of the Court.