I have never in war witnessed a greater general pillaging than here in
Suippes. It was plain that we had to live and had to have food. The
inhabitants and storekeepers having fled, it was often impossible to
pay for the things one needed. Men simply went into some store, put
on socks and underwear, and left their old things; they then went to
some other store, took the food they fancied, and hied themselves to a
wine-cellar to provide themselves to their hearts' content.
The finest and largest stores--Suippes supplied a large tract
of country and had comparatively extensive stores of all
descriptions--were empty shells in a few hours.
One of our sappers had for weeks carried about with him a pair of
handsome boots for his fiancée and then had them sent to her in two
parcels. However, the field post did not guarantee delivery; and thus
the war bride got the left boot, and not the right one....
The occupant of one house was evidently a young bride, for the various
pieces of the trousseau, trimmed with dainty blue ribbons, could be
seen in the wardrobes in a painfully spick and span condition. All
the wardrobes were unlocked. We did not touch a thing. We were again
reminded of the cruelty of war. Millions it turned into beggars in
one night; the fondest hopes and desires were destroyed. When, the
next morning, we entered the house again, driven by a presentiment of
misfortune, we found everything completely destroyed. Real barbarians
had been raging here, who had lost that thin varnish with which
civilization covers the brute in man. The whole trousseau of the young
bride had been dragged from the shelves and was still partly covering
the floor. Portraits, photographs, looking-glasses, all lay broken
on the floor. Three of us had entered the room, and all three of us
clenched our fists in helpless rage....
When a man is accustomed to step over corpses with a cold smile on
his lips, when he has to face death every minute day and night, he
gradually loses that finer feeling for human things and humanity. Thus
it must not surprise one that soldiers could laugh and joke in the
midst of awful devastation, that they brought wine to a concert room in
which there was a piano and an electric organ, and had a joyful time
with music and wine. They drank till they were unconscious; they drank
with sergeants and corporals, pledging "brotherhood"; and they rolled
arm in arm through the streets with their new "comrades."...