January ii, 1917 
LAND & WATER 
13 
throughout the evidence submitted : Here is the testi- 
mony of .an eye- witness -in the case , of one; nrjan out of 
many hundreds. 
" For the first 3 J days he was given nothing whatever 
to eat. On the fourth day one or two biscuits. The 
same the day after that. A German doctor came in every 
morning to see how much he could stand, and order 
exactly how much food he was to have, just enough to 
keep him alive." 
Here is another . 
" At this camp they hang prisoners up by their wrists. 
They become unconscious after two hours of it." 
Here is a third : 
" I have heard from many prisoners that another 
punishment was to scrub them with very hard brushes 
and sand. They say it was a torturo." 
Here is a fourth : 
" They were beaten until they were unconscious, 
and you heard their cries getting weaker and weaker until 
they subsided." 
Here is another English witness : 
" The Germans then starved them (certain Russian . 
prisoners) for a week to reduce them to submission " (that 
is, to dig trenches in aid of the enemy) "and forced them 
to go. Four were killed and twelve wounded before 
they could be got to go." 
Another English witness : 
" The Russians were made to dig trenches just behind 
the front. They stood it for some time and then refused, 
and several were killed." 
Another English witness : 
" Having refused to work at trench digging they were 
confined for three days without food, and when they 
mutinied one .was killed and seventeen wounded." 
And here is one last signed statement out of so hiany, 
also the statement of an Englishman, detailed, and deal- 
ing with what he saw with his own eyes : 
"On the Saturday the Russians in Company 3 were 
paraded and were told off for work, which turned out to be 
trench digging against their own army.' They refused, 
and said they would do any reasonable work, but not that. 
The Germans placed a number of them under close arrest 
without food or drink. Next day they were paraded 
again a number of times. They still refused and were still 
kept without food and drink. On the third day all the 
prisoners, English, French and Russians together were 
paraded ; the Russians still refused, whereupon the 
English and the French were locked in. The "Russians 
were then paraded again, and as they came out of their 
barracks the Germans clubbed them with their rifles, 
knocked them down, stabbed them with their bayonets, 
shot them in the arms, and to finish with they loosed 
savage dogs to worry them. Then they fetched carts 
and threw the dead and \vourided in together and took 
them away. After this things settled down again as 
usual." 
Remember that this is something that an Englishman 
saw with his own eyes and repeats without violence or 
exaggeration. If is plain fact. 
Here is another English witness with regard to the 
Russians refusing to make munitions against the Allies : 
" On their refusing to do so they were made to stand 
at attention every day for seven days, without food of 
any kind." (That is without food during the whole 
of the days on which they were subjected to this torture). 
, " At the expiration of seven days what were left of them, 
75 out of 200, were brought back to the camp by a back 
entrance. Some of them died at once, and the rest were 
taken to the hospital where sixteen died that night. This 
awful spectacle was witnessed by English and French 
prisoners." 
Here is another Englishman speaking : 
" On one occasion I saw a Russian who refused to work 
made to stand at attention before a sentry from about 
7 a.m. until 6.30 p.m., in bitter cold and snow with only 
thin clothing. He collapsed about 6.30." 
Here is another Englishman : 
" I saw the officer in charge step forward and address 
the Russians. A Russian stepped forward and was 
dragged by about half dozen German soldiers into a 
kitchen, and another man was then pulled out by a 
German officer who beat him with the flat of his sword 
over the head and shoulders until he fell down. The 
Le Soliloque du Deporte 
By Emii.e C,-vmm.\erts. 
A great number of Belgian deportees have been sent on 
the Western front and comfellcd to dig trenches, 
Le dos craque, le ventre gemit 
Je ne beche plus . . . tant pis ! 
Je n' eleverai pas un rempart protecteur 
Centre mes freres, 
Je ne souleverai pas le sol du pays 
Contre ses liberateurs. 
Je n' offenscrai plus notre commune Mere. 
Je ne lutterai plus contre moi-meme, 
^les mains ne trahiront plus mon cceur. 
Je m' affranchirai de cet anatheme 
l)e fange et de sueur ! 
All ! tu cognes, geolier, tu cries : 
Schwcinhund ! Vorwaerts ! ■ — tant pis 1 
Advienne que pourra, 
Je me croiserai les bras. 
Je ne blesserai plus ma Patrie 
Du tranchant dc ma pelle, 
Je ne pcrccrai plus son sein maternel 
De la pointe de ma pioche, 
Et je baiserai, a la barbc des Bodies, 
Cette terre qu' ils m' ont fait profaner, 
Et je la prierai, £t genoux 
Sous leurs coups, 
De me pardonner ma lachete. 
Des menaces, encore ? Arrete ! . . 
N' entends-tu pas les obus chanter ? 
Une main plus puissante que la tienne s' apprete 
A nous frapper. 
dare ft la casse ! C'est nous qui paierons. 
Toi et^noi, esclave et geolier, 
Unis enfin dans le memc danger. 
Mais ce tonncrre de fer et dc plomb 
Qui tc fait palir 
Exalte mon courage, 
Et j ' appelle a grands cris 1' oragc 
Qui finira mon martyre. 
Au diable le travail, jetez vos outils ! 
A genoux, 
A genoux, mes amis. 
Mains jointes, sous nos coups ! 
Trop long . . . trop court . . . nous y voilul 
Les tortionnaires sont au supplice. 
Vive la Belgique ! Vive le Roi ! 
La tranchee est rouge du sang du sacrifice ! 
^'[All Rights Reserved.] 
officer then stuck his sword into the Russian several times.'' 
Here is another piece of British evidence : 
" A Russian officer attempted to escape from a camp. 
As he reached the barbed wire a sentry came up to him. 
The officer seeing that he was caught (it was broad day- 
light) put up his hands. The sentry took no notice of 
this but got his riffe ready to fire, and the officer lay 
down in the ditch that was there and in the water of it, to 
save himself. The sentry then placed the rifle within a 
foot of the officer a;id fired, the bullet passing through the 
right arm and right side. The sentry then reloaded his 
rifle and resumed his patrol as though nothing had hap- 
pened. A German non-commissioned officer then came 
up, hearing the report, looked at the officer in the ditch, 
marked him out to the dogs, and made no effort for his 
removal. A French doctor who offered to, help was 
refused. When at last this French doctor's insistence 
was rewarded and he was allowed to help, the uniortunate 
man was beyond succour. He died at eight that evening. 
The case was reported to the Camp Commandant by the 
Russian officers. The Commandant inter\-iewcd the sentry 
and complimented him upon shooting the officer. 
"This cold blooded murder occurred about two yards 
to the left of the window, etc." 
It is one of the innumerable stories of eye-witnesses — 
and not the most repulsive. It shall be our last in this 
brief glimpse of what the Allies arc comliating to destroy. 
