Present:
Military Magistrate, HUNERSDORF.
Military Court Secretary, MÜLLER, Clerk of the Military Court.
CORBENY, _December 12th, 1914_.
In the investigation concerning the violations of International Law
committed against German troops, there appeared as witness Captain
Nitze, who, after reference to the significance of the oath, was
examined as follows:
As to Person: My name is Otto Hermann Oswald Nitze. I am 34 years old;
Protestant; Company Leader, Machine-Gun Company, Infantry Regiment No.
177.
As to Case: On August 23rd, 1914, as we were marching into Leffe, I
found myself several hundred metres in front of the company, and was
all at once fired at from the surrounding houses.
I first rode back to the company and confirmed the order already given
to bring the houses under fire. I then rode to the Detachment Leader,
Lieutenant-Colonel von Zeschau, reported the attack, and received the
order to have the houses searched and, in case any male persons were
found in them with arms, to set the houses on fire.
In the search there were discovered by Lieutenant-Colonel Reichel in my
presence two persons of forty years of age who had hidden themselves in
a room and were armed with a Belgian pistol and a rifle of an ancient
pattern.
As I heard, a third man had also been found in the house. The first
two men were immediately shot. While Lieutenant-Colonel Reichel went
on farther to search other houses I saw how at least eight rifles were
discharging on the search-parties a brisk fire from the first floors of
at least two houses. The marksmen stood behind windows barricaded with
mattresses. I saw the flash of the shots and heard the bullets whistle;
as far as I could judge from the reports, they were using partly
bullets, partly small shot. Only the horse of Assistant Doctor Sippel
was wounded.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: NITZE.
The witness was sworn.
Signed: HUNERSDORF. Signed: MÜLLER.