bitterness of the after years of Lazarus and the mischief Christ
wrought in recalling him from the grave. After his unnatural return
to life there was a blueness as of putrescence beneath his pallor;
an iciness to his touch; a choking silence in his presence; a horror
in his gaze, as if he were remembering his three days in the
sepulchre--as if forbidden knowledge groped behind his eyes. He rarely
looked at any one; there were none who courted his glance, who did not
creep away to die. The terror of his fame spread beyond Bethany. Rome
heard of him, and at that safe distance laughed. It did not laugh
after Cæsar Augustus had sent for him. Cæsar Augustus was a god upon
earth; he could not die. But when he had questioned Lazarus, peeped
through the windows of his eyes, and read what lay hidden in that
forbidden memory, he commanded that red-hot irons should quench such
sight for ever. From Rome Lazarus groped his way back to Palestine and
there, long years after his Saviour had been crucified, continued to
stumble through his own particular Gethsemane of blindness. I thought
of that story in the presence of this crowd, which carried with it the
taint of the grave.
But the band was still playing the Marseillaise--over and over it
played it. With each repetition it was as though these people, three
years dead, made another effort to cast aside their shrouds. Little
by little something was happening--something wonderful. Backs were
straightening; skirts were being caught up; resolution was rippling
from face to face--it passed and re-passed with each new roll of the
drums. The hoarse cries and moaning with which we had commenced were
gradually transforming themselves into singing.
There were some who were too weak to walk; these were carried by the
American Red Cross men into the waiting ambulances. The remainder were
marshalled into a disorderly procession and led out of the station by
the band.
We were moving down the hill to the palaces beside the lake--the
palaces to which all France used to troop for pleasure. We moved
soddenly at first, shuffling in our steps. But the drums were still
rolling out their defiance and the bugles were still blowing. The
laziest man in the French Army was doing his utmost to belie his
record. The ill-shod, flattened feet took up the music. They began to
dance. Were there ever feet less suited to dancing? That they should
dance was the acme of tragedy. Stockings fell down in creases about
the ankles. Women commenced to jig their Boche babies in their arms;
consumptive men and ancients waved their sauce-pans and grotesque
bundles of umbrellas. The sight was damnable. It was a burlesque. It
pierced the heart. What right had the Boche to leave these people so
comic after he had squeezed the life-blood out of them?
All his insults to humanity became suddenly typified in these five
hundred jumping tatterdemalions--the way in which he had plundered the
world of its youth, its cleanness, its decency. I felt an anger which
battlefields had never aroused, where men moulder above ground and
become unsightly beneath the open sky. The slain of battlefields
were at least motionless; they did not gape and grin at you with
the dreadful humour of these perambulating dead. I felt the Galilean
passion which animates every Red Cross worker at Evian: the agony
to do something to make these murdered people live again. This last
convoy came, I discovered, from a city behind the Boche lines against
which last summer I had often directed fire. It was full in sight from
my observing station. I had watched the very houses in which these
people, who now walked beside me, had sheltered. For three and a half
years these women's bodies had been at the Hun's mercy. I tried to
bring the truth home to myself. Their men and young girls had been
left behind. They themselves had been flung back on overburdened
France only because they were no longer serviceable. They were
returning actually penniless, though seemingly with money. The thrifty
German makes a practice of seizing all the good redeemable French
money of the repatriés before he lets them escape him, giving them in
exchange worthless paper stuff of his own manufacture, which has no
security behind it and is therefore not negotiable.
We came to the Casino, where endless formalities were necessary. First
of all in the big hall, formerly devoted to gambling, the repatriés
were fed at long tables. As I passed, odd groups seeing my uniform,
hurriedly dropped whatever they were doing and, removing their caps,
stood humbly at attention. There was fear in their promptness. Where
they came from an officer exacted respect with the flat of his
sword. What a dumb, helpless jumble of humanity! It was as though the
occupants of a morgue had become galvanised and had temporarily risen
from their slabs.
The band had been augmented by trumpets. It took its place in the
gallery and deluged the hall with patriotic fervour. An old man
climbed on a table and yelled, "Vive La France!" But they had grown
tired of shouting; they soon grew tired. The cry was taken up faintly
and soon exhausted itself. Nothing held their attention for long.
Most of them sat hunched up and inert, weakly crying. They were not
beautiful. They were not like our men who die in battle. They were
animated memories of horror. "What lies before us? What lies before
us?" That was the question that their silence asked perpetually. Some
of them had husbands with the French army; others had sweethearts.
What would those men say to the flaxen-haired babies who nestled
against the women's breasts? And the sin was not theirs--they were
such tired, pretty mites. "What lies before us?" The babies, too,
might well have asked that question. Do you wonder that I at last
began to share the Frenchman's hatred for the Boche?
An extraordinary person in a white tie, top hat and evening dress
entered. He looked like a cross between Mr. Gerard's description of
himself in Berlin and a head-waiter. He evidently expected his advent
to cause a profound sensation. I found out why: he was the official
welcomer to Evian. Twice a day, for an infinity of days, he had
entered in solemn fashion, faced the same tragic assembly, made the
same fiery oration, gained applause at the climax of the same rounded
periods and allowed his voice to break in the same rightly timed
places. Having kept his audience in sufficient suspense as regards
his mission, he unwrapped the muffler from his neck, removed his coat,
felt his throat to see whether it was in good condition, swelled out
his chest, including his waist-coat which was spanned by the broad
ribbon of his office, then let loose the painter of his emotion and
slipped off into the mid-stream of perfunctory eloquence. With all his
disrobing he had retained his top-hat; he held it in his right hand
with the brim pressed against his thigh, very much in the manner of
a showman at a circus. It contributed largely to the opulence of his
gestures.
He always seemed to have concluded and was always starting up afresh,
as if in reluctant response to spectral clapping. He called upon the
repatriés never to forget the crimes that had been wrought against
them--to spread abroad the fire of their indignation, the story of
their ravished womanhood and broken families all over France. They
watched him leaden-eyed and wept softly. To forget, to forget, that
was all that they wanted--to blot out all the past. This man with
the top-hat and the evening-dress, he hadn't suffered--how could he
understand? They didn't want to remember; with those flaxen-haired
children against their breasts the one boon they craved was
forgetfulness. And so they cowered and wept softly. It was
intolerable.
And now the formalities commenced. They all had to be medically
examined. Questions of every description were asked them. They were
drifted from bureau to bureau where people sat filling up official
blanks. The Americans see to the children. They come from living in
cellars, from conditions which are insanitary, from cities in the
army zones where they were underfed. The fear is that they may
spread contagion all over France. When infectious cases are found the
remnants of families have to be broken up afresh. The mothers collapse
on benches sobbing their hearts out as their children are led away.
For three and a half years everything they have loved has been led
away--how can they believe that these Americans mean only mercy?
From three to four hours are spent in completing all these necessary
investigations. Before the repatriés are conducted to their billets,
all their clothes have to be disinfected and every one has to be
bathed. The poor people are utterly worn out by the end of it--they
have already done a continuous four days' journey in cramped trains.
Before being sent to France they have been living for from two to
three weeks in Belgium. The Hun always sends the repatriés to Belgium
for a few weeks before returning them. The reason for this is that
they for the most part come from the army zones, and a few weeks will
make any information they possess out of date. Another reason is
that food is more plentiful in Belgium, thanks to the Allies' Relief
Commission. These people have been kept alive on sugar-beets for the
past few months, so it is as well to feed them at the Allies' expense
for a little while, in order that they may create a better impression
when they return to France. The American doctors pointed out to me the
pulpy flesh of the children and the distended stomachs which, to the
unpractised eye, seemed a sign of over-nourishment. "Wind and water,"
they said; "that's all these children are. They've no stamina.
Sugar-beets are the most economic means of just keeping the body and
the soul together."
The lights are going out in the Casino. It is the hour when, in
the old days, life would be becoming most feverish about the gaming
tables. In little forlorn groups the repatriés are being conducted
to their temporary quarters in the town. To-morrow morning before it
is light, another train-load will arrive, the band will again play
the Marseillaise, the American Red Cross workers will again be in
attendance, the gentleman in the top-hat and white-tie will again make
his fiery oration of welcome, his audience will again pay no attention
but will weep softly--the tediously heart-rending scene will be
rehearsed throughout in every detail by an entirely new batch of
actors. Twice a day, summer and winter, the same tragedy is enacted at
Evian. It is a continuous, never-ending performance.
Poor people! These whom I have seen, if they have no friends to claim
them, will re-start their journey to some strange department on which
they will be billeted as paupers. Here again the American Red Cross is
doing good work, for it sends one of its representatives ahead to see
that proper preparations have been made for their reception. After
they have reached their destination, it looks them up from time to
time to make sure that they are being well cared for.
If one wants to picture the case of the repatrié in its true misery,
all he needs to do is to convert it into terms of his own mother or
grandmother. She has lived all her life in the neighbourhood of Vimy,
let us say. She was married there and it was there that she bore
all her children. She and her husband have saved money; they are
substantial people now and need not fear the future. Their sons are
gaining their own living; one daughter is married, the others are
arriving at the marriageable age. One day the Hun sweeps down on them.
The sons escape to join the French army; the girls and their parents
stay behind to guard their property. They are immediately evacuated
from Vimy and sent to some city, such as Drocourt, further behind
the Hun front-line. Here they are gradually robbed of all their
possessions. At the beginning all their gold is confiscated; later
even the mattresses upon their beds are requisitioned. For three and
a half years they are subjected to both big and petty tyrannies,
till their spirits are so broken that fear becomes their predominant
emotion. The father is led away to work in the mines. One by one the
daughters are commandeered and sent off into the heart of Germany,
where it will be no one's business to guard their virtue. At last
the mother is left with only her youngest child. Of her sons who are
fighting with the French armies she has no knowledge, whether they are
living or dead. Then one day it is decided by her captors that they
have no further use for her. They part her from her last remaining
child and pack her off by way of Belgium and Switzerland back to her
own country. She arrives at Evian penniless and half-witted with the
terror of her sorrow. There is no one to claim her; the part of France
that knew her is all behind the German lines. A label is tied to her,
as if she was a piece of baggage, and she is shipped off to Avignon,
let us say. She has never been in the South before; it is a foreign
country to her. Poverty and adversity have broken her pride; she has
nothing left that will command respect. There is nothing left in life
to which she can fasten her affections. Such utter forlornness is
never a welcome sight. Is it to be wondered at that the strangers to
whom she is sent are not always glad to see her? Is it to be wondered
at that, after her repatriation, she often wilts and dies? Her sorrow
has the appearance of degradation. Wherever she goes, she is a threat
and a peril to the fighting morale of the civilian population. Yet in
her pre-war kindliness and security she might have been your mother or
mine.
The American Red Cross, by maintaining contact with such people, is
keeping them reminded that they are not utterly deserted--that the
whole of civilised humanity cares tremendously what becomes of them
and is anxious to lighten the load of their sacrifice.
* * * * *
I have before me a pile of sworn depositions, made by exiles returned
from the invaded territories. They are separately numbered and dated;
each bears the name of the region or town from which the repatrié
came. Here are a few extracts which, when pieced together, form a
picture of the life of captured French civilians behind the German
lines. I have carefully avoided glaring atrocities. Atrocities are
as a rule isolated instances, due to isolated causes. They occur, but
they are not typical of the situation. The real Hun atrocity is the
attitude towards life which calls chivalry sentiment, fair-play a
waste of opportunity and ruthlessness strength. This attitude is
all summed up in the one word Prussianism. The repatriés have been
Prussianised out of their wholesome joy and belief in life; it is this
that makes them the walking accusations that they are to-day. In
the following depositions they give some glimpses of the calculated
processes by which their happiness has been murdered.
* * * * *
"Lately copper, tin, and zinc have been removed in the factories and
amongst the traders, and quite recently in private houses. For all
these requisitions the Germans gave Requisition Bonds, but private
individuals who received them never got paid the money. To force men
to work 'voluntarily' and sign contracts the Germans employed the
following means: the Germans gave these men nothing to eat, but
authorised their families to send them parcels; these parcels once in
the hands of the Germans are shown to these unhappy men and are not
handed over until they have signed. About a week ago young boys from
the age of fourteen who had come back from the Ardennes had to present
themselves at the Kdr to be registered anew; a number of the young
people work in the sawmills, etc.; some have died of privation and
fatigue."
* * * * *
"A week after Easter this year the population of LILLE was warned by
poster that all must be ready to leave the town. At three o'clock in
the morning private houses were invaded by the German soldiers; they
sorted out women and girls who were to be deported. There then took
place scandalous scenes: young girls belonging to the most worthy
families in the town had to pass medical visits even with the speculum
and had to endure most atrocious physical and moral suffering. These
young girls were segregated like beasts anywhere in the rooms of the
town halls and schoolhouses, and were mingled with the dregs of the
population."
* * * * *
"For a certain time the Germans did not requisition milk and allowed
it to be sold, but now this is forbidden under a fine of 1,000 marks
or three months' imprisonment. Recently WIGNEHIES was fined 100,000
frcs., and as the whole of this sum was not paid the Germans inflicted
punishment as follows: Several inhabitants of WIGNEHIES were caught in
the act of disobeying by the gendarmes and were struck, and bitten by
the police dogs of the gendarmes because they refused to denounce the
sellers.... Brutal treatment is due more to the gendarmes than to the
soldiers. About six weeks ago Marceau Horlet of WIGNEHIES was
found, on a search by the gendarmes, to have a piece of meat in his
possession. He was brutally beaten by them and bitten by the police
dogs because he refused to say who had given it to him. In 1915, the
youth Rémy Valléi of WIGNEHIES, age 15, was walking in the street
after 6-9 p.m., which was forbidden; he was seen by two gendarmes and
ran away. He was straightway killed, receiving six revolver bullets in
his body."
* * * * *
"At PIGNICOURT during the CHAMPAGNE offensive the village was
bombarded by the French, who were attempting to destroy the railway
lines and bridges. The Commandant, by name Krama, of the Kdr, forced
men and youths, and even women, to fill up the holes made by the
bombardment during the action. A German general passed and reprimanded
them on the ground that there was danger to the civilians; they were
withdrawn for the moment, but sent back as soon as the general had
left."
* * * * *
"As regards the Hispano-American revictualling, it may be said with
truth that without this the population of Northern France would have
died of hunger, for the Germans considered themselves liberated from
any responsibility. During the first months of the war before this
Committee started, the Germans put up posters saying that the Allies
were trying to starve Germany, who in turn was not obliged to feed the
invaded territory.... When informant (who is from ST. QUENTIN) left at
the general evacuation of this town, no requisition bonds were given
for household goods. As the inhabitants left, their furniture was
loaded on to motor lorries and taken to the station, whence it was
sent by special train to Germany. This shows clearly that requisition
bonds issued by the Germans show only the small proportion of what has
been suffered by the inhabitants.... Informant was the witness of the
execution of French civilians whose only fault was either to hide
arms or pigeons: several who had committed these infractions of
requisitions were shot, and the Germans announced the fact by poster
of a blood-red colour. In other cases the men shot were British
prisoners who had dressed in civil clothes on the arrival of the
Germans. Informant had a long conversation with one of them before
his execution. He told informant how he had been unable to leave ST.
QUENTIN, viz., by the 28th August. Some passers-by offered to hide
him. It appears that, through his ignorance of the French language,
he was unaware that the Germans threatened execution to all men found
after a certain date. He was discovered and condemned to death for
espionage. It is obvious, as the man himself said, that one could not
imagine a man acting as a spy without knowing either the language of
the country or that of the enemy."
* * * * *
"Before the evacuation of the population the Germans chose those who
were to remain as civilian workers, viz., 120 men from 15 to 60.
On the very day of the evacuation they kept back at the station 27
others. These men are now at CANTIN or SOMAIN, where they are employed
on the roads or looking after munitions in the Arras group. The others
at DECHY and GUESNIN are in the VIMY group and are making pill-boxes
or railway lines. A certain number of these workers refused to carry
out the work ordered, and as punishment during the summer were tied to
chairs and exposed bareheaded to the full blaze of the sun. They were
often threatened to be shot."
* * * * *
"After the bombardment of LILLE the Germans entered ENNETIÈRES on
the 12th October, 1914. On the next Monday 200 Uhlans occupied the
Commune, and houses and haystacks were burned.... At LOMME every one
was forced to work: the Saxon Kdnt. Schoper announced that all women
who did not obey within 24 hours would be interned: all the women
obeyed. They were employed in the making of osier-revêtement two
metres high for the trenches. The men were forced to put up barbed
wire near Fort Denglas, two kltrs. from the front. A few days after
the evacuation of ENNETIÈRES the Uhlans shot a youth, Jean Leclercq,
age 17, son of the gardener of Count D'Hespel, simply because they had
found a telephone wire in the courtyard of the château."
* * * * *
"Informant, who has lost his right arm, was nevertheless forced to
work for the Germans, notably to unload coal and to work on the roads.
He had with him males from 13 to 60. Having objected because of his
lost arm, he was threatened with imprisonment. At LOMME squads of
workers were given the work of putting up barbed wire; women were
forced to make sand bags. In cases of refusal on either side the Kdr.
inflicted four or five weeks' imprisonment, to say nothing of blows
with sticks inflicted by the soldiers. In spring 1917 a number of
men were sent from LOMME to the BEAUVIN-PROVINS region to work on
defences.... Those who refused to sign were threatened and struck with
the butts of rifles, and left in cellars sometimes filled with water
during bombardments. Several of them came back seriously ill from
privation."
* * * * *
"Young girls are separated from their mothers; there are levies made
at every moment. Sometimes these young girls have barely a few hours
before the moment of departure.... Several young girls have written
to say that they are very unhappy and that they sleep in camps amongst
girls of low class and condition."
* * * * *
"For a long time past women have been forced to work as road
labourers. These work in the quarries and transport wood cut down by
the men in the mountain forest. A number of women and young girls have
been removed from their families and sent in the direction of RHEIMS
and RETHEL, where it is said (although this cannot be confirmed) that
they are employed in aerodromes."
* * * * *
These extracts should serve to explain the mental and physical
depression of the returning exiles. They have been bullied out of the
desire to live and out of all possession of either their bodies or
their souls. They have been treated like cattle, and as cattle they
have come to regard themselves. Lazaruses--that's what they are! The
unmerciful Boche, having killed and buried them, drags them out
from the tomb and compels them to go through the antics of life. Le
Gallienne's poem comes to my mind:
"Loud mockers in the angry street
Say Christ is crucified again--
Twice pierced those gospel-bearing feet,
Twice broken that great heart in vain...."
That is all true at Evian. But when I see the American men and girls,
leaning over the Boche babies in their cots and living their hearts
into the hands and feet of the spiritually maimed, the last two lines
of the poem become true for me:
"I hear, and to myself I say,
'Why, Christ walks with me every day.'"
The work of the American Red Cross at Evian is largely devoted
to children. It provides all the ambulance transportation for the
repatriés, to and from the station. American doctors and nurses do
all the examining of the children at the Casino. On an average, four
hundred pass through their hands daily. The throat, nose, teeth,
glands and skin of each child are inspected. If the child is suspected
or attacked by any disease, it is immediately segregated and sent to
the American hospital. If the infection is only local or necessitates
further examination, the child and its family are summoned to present
themselves at the American dispensary next day. Every precaution
is employed to prevent the spread of infection--particularly the
infection of tuberculosis. Evian is the gateway from Germany through
which disease and death may be carried to the furthest limits of
France. Very few of the repatriés are really healthy. It would be
a wonder if they were after the privations through which they have
passed. All of them are weakened in vitality and broken down in
stamina. Many of them have no homes to go to and have to be sent to
departments of the interior and the south. If they were sent in an
unhealthy condition, it would mean the spread of epidemics.