Court of the Commander at Altona.
Present:
President, Dr. STEENGRAFE.
Secretary, KAHL.
ALTONA, _December 28th, 1914_.
On citation there appears as witness Captain of Landwehr II. Hermansen,
who, after the sanctity of the oath had been pointed out to him, makes
the following statement:
As to Person: My name is Richard, aged 37; Protestant; Public
Prosecutor at Düsseldorf; at present in the Reserve Battalion, Infantry
Regiment No. 76, Hamburg.
As to Case: I arrived at Louvain on August 25th at about 9 o'clock p.m.
after a railway journey of 55 hours.
At the moment of alighting a violent fire was opened upon the station
and its vicinity from the houses lying round the station. I also heard
a mechanical noise, which I took to be machine-gun fire.
We took part in the searching and the burning down of houses from which
firing had taken place.
Some of the houses were furnished with regular loopholes, among them
also houses which, as I saw on the following morning, had flown white
flags.
On September 1st, at Lombeek, St. Catharinen, near Ternath, west of
Brussels, I made the acquaintance of a priest, to whom I expressed my
approval of the quiet bearing of the inhabitants of Lombeek towards our
company.
He said, "Yes, for weeks I have been preaching this from the pulpit,
and my flock listens to me. I have told them that if they wished to
fight, they should go to Antwerp, put on uniform, and obtain a rifle.
The enemy is only doing his duty; his soldiers are children of the same
heavenly Father."
I replied that, if all his colleagues in office had acted thus, much
that was disagreeable would have been avoided both for the Belgians and
for us. He did not contradict me; we remained talking a little while
longer, and when I took my leave of him, he blessed me.
Read over, approved, signed.
Signed: HERMANSEN.
The witness was then sworn according to regulations.
Signed: STEENGRAFE, President.
Signed: KAHL.