Acts at Linsmeau and Orsmael.
Belgium, which wanted peace, has been obliged by Germany to resort to
arms and to oppose a legitimate defense to an aggression which nothing
can justify, and which is contrary to the solemn pledges of treaties.
Belgium is bound in honor to fight loyally and to observe all the rules,
laws, and customs of war.
From the beginning of the invasion of its territory by German troops,
the Belgian Government had posted each and every day, in all the towns,
and the papers have each day repeatedly printed, instructions warning
the non-combatant civilians not to offer any resistance to the troops
and soldiers invading the country.
The information on which the German Government believes today that it
can base its contention that the Belgian population contravenes the law
of nations and is not worthy of respect is absolutely unfounded.
The Government protests most vigorously against these allegations and
against the odious threats of retaliation. If any deed contrary to the
rules of warfare should ultimately be proved, to understand such fact it
is only necessary to realize the well-founded excitement which the
cruelties of the German soldiers are provoking among the Belgian
population--a population which is thoroughly honest but energetic in the
defense of its rights and in its respect for humanity.
If we were to publish a list of these atrocities, of which the first
ones are here recorded, this would indeed be a long list.
Whole regions have been ravaged and abominable deeds perpetrated in the
towns.
A committee attached to the Department of Justice is drawing up a list
of these horrors with scrupulous impartiality.
As an example, a few facts are here published, facts which will depict
the state of mind and the procedure of certain German troops:
1. German cavalry, occupying the village of Linsmeau, were attacked
by some Belgian infantry and two gendarmes. A German officer was
killed by our troops during the fight, and subsequently buried at
the request of the Belgian officer in command. None of the civilian
population took part in the fighting at Linsmeau. Nevertheless the
village was invaded at dusk Aug. 10 by a strong force of German
cavalry, artillery and machine guns. In spite of formal assurances
given by the Burgomaster that none of the peasants had taken part
in the previous fighting, two farms and six outlying houses were
destroyed by gun fire and burned. All the male population were
then compelled to come forward and hand over whatever arms they
possessed. No recently discharged firearms were found. Nevertheless
the invaders divided these peasants into three groups. Those in one
group were bound and eleven of them placed in a ditch, where they
were afterward found dead, their skulls fractured by the butts of
German rifles.
2. During the night of Aug. 10 German cavalry entered Velm in great
numbers; the inhabitants were asleep. The Germans without
provocation fired on Mr. Deglimme-Gever's house, broke into it,
destroyed furniture, looted money, burned barns, hay, corn stacks,
farm implements, six oxen, and the contents of the farm-yard. They
carried off Mme. Deglimme half-naked to a place two miles away. She
was then let go and fired upon as she fled; without being hit. Her
husband was carried away in another direction and fired upon; he is
dying. The same troops sacked and burned the house of a railway
watchman.
3. Farmer Jef Dierchx of Neerhespen bears witness to the following
acts of cruelty committed by German cavalry at Orsmael and
Neerhespen on Aug. 10, 11, and 12. An old man of the latter village
had his arm sliced in three longitudinal cuts; he was then hanged
head downward and burned alive. Young girls have been raped and
little children outraged at Orsmael, where several inhabitants
suffered mutilations too horrible to describe. A Belgian soldier
belonging to a battalion of cyclist carbineers, who had been
wounded and made prisoner, was bound to a telegraph pole on the St.
Trond road and shot.
4. On Wednesday, Aug. 12, after an engagement at Haelen, Commandant
Van Damme, so severely wounded that he was lying on his back, was
finally murdered by German infantrymen firing their revolvers into
his mouth.
5. On Monday, Aug. 9, at Orsmael the Germans picked up Commandant
Knappen very seriously wounded, propped him against a tree and shot
him. Finally they hacked his corpse with swords.
6. Numerous soldiers, disarmed and unable to defend themselves,
have been ill-treated or killed by certain German soldiers. The
inquiry brings forth new facts of this kind every day.
7. In different places, notably at Hellonge-sur-Geer, at Barchon,
at Pontisse, at Haelen, at Zelk, German troops have fired on
doctors, nurses, ambulances, and ambulance wagons.
8. At Boncelles a body of German troops went into a battle carrying
a Belgian flag.
9. On Thursday, Aug. 6, before a fort at Liége, German soldiers
continued to fire on a party of Belgian soldiers, who were unarmed
and had been surrounded while digging a trench, after these had
hoisted the white flag.
10. On Thursday, Aug. 10, at Vootem, near the Fort of Loncin, a
group of German infantry hoisted the white flag. When Belgian
soldiers approached to take them prisoners the Germans suddenly
opened fire on them at close range.
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