Cabled to Royal Commission at Washington from Belgian Foreign Office.
Cablegram Received Sept. 8.
You have received the reports of the commission of Aug. 25 and 31.
Since then a great many localities, situated in the Vilvorde-Malines-
Louvain triangle, an extremely fertile and densely populated district,
have been partially pillaged and totally destroyed by fire. Their
inhabitants have fled, while a number of them, among others women and
children, were arrested and shot without trial, and without apparent
reason, except to inspire the population with terror. This was done in
Sempst, Weerde, Elewyt, Hofstade, Wespelaer, Wilsele, Bucken, Eppeghem,
Houthem, Tremeloo, Tistelt, Gelrode, Herent. At Wavre, where the
population was unable to pay a levy of 3,000,000 francs, fifty-six
houses were set on fire. The largest part of Cortenberg is burned. To
excuse these attacks the Germans allege that an army of civilians
resisted them. According to trustworthy testimony, no provocation can
be proved at Vise, Aerschot, Louvain, Wavre, and in other localities
situated in the Malines-Louvain-Vilvorde district, where fire was set
and massacres committed several days after the German occupation.
Cablegram Received Sept. 15.
Inform the Belgian Commission that the Belgian Committee on Inquiry
continues to report ruins and devastations and pillage, systematically
organized by German troops in the towns invested by them. The City of
Termonde was destroyed without any hostile participation on the part of
the civilian population. Out of 1,400 houses, only 295 remain standing,
others were destroyed by fire and razed from the ground, after the
Germans entered the city. Several civilians were imprisoned and executed
with bayonets in the presence of their relatives and fellow-citizens. In
Melle nine civilians were killed and forty-five properties destroyed,
without any reason.
The re-occupation of Aerschot by the Belgian Army reveals disastrous
deeds. Dwellings, which were not destroyed by fire were completely
sacked and pillaged on Sept. 6 before the return of the Belgian troops.
Four hundred civilians, among them thirty clergymen, were locked since
Aug. 30 in the church without food, carried off, and sent to
destinations unknown. Localities in the neighborhood are completely
destroyed, and everywhere along the road are corpses. Women and young
girls were outraged. Systematic pillage.
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