Present:
Lieutenant of Reserve and Battalion Adjutant DACHSEL,
as Officer of the Court.
Non-commissioned Officer of Reserve STEIGER, as Clerk of the Court.
LA VILLE-AUX-BOIS LES PONTARVET, _February 2nd, 1915_.
There appeared by order as witness, Assistant-Surgeon Dr.med.
Köckeritz, who, after the importance of the oath had been pointed out
to him and he had been warned to speak the truth, made the following
statement:
As to Person: My name is Albin Werner Köckeritz. I am Assistant-Surgeon
of Reserve, Dr.med.; 28 years old; Protestant.
As to Case: During the night-fighting of August 21st to 22nd, I was in
Dinant. I did not see any cruelties committed by our troops against
the inhabitants, who fired with shot-guns and buck-shot from their
windows. In the further fighting round Dinant also, at the close of
which we moved into Dinant, I saw no misusage whatever of the civilian
population.
That the bodies of inhabitants, who had been shot for taking part in
fighting, were mutilated, is untrue. I saw, however, in a side-valley
a German cavalryman, who had apparently been shot down, lying charred
upon a grating and fastened with wire. This was in the vicinity of the
Field Dressing Station put up by the 22nd and 3rd Battalion, Rifle
(Fusilier) Regiment No. 108 and the 1st Field Artillery Regiment No. 12
and stationed west of Dinant.
The firing, which came from the hospital denoted by a Red Cross flag,
lighted up for a long way the opposite bank of the Meuse.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: Dr. KÖCKERITZ.
The witness was thereupon sworn.
Signed: DACHSEL. Signed: STEIGER.