October 4, 1917 
LAND & WATER 
ti 
a journal from a legation 
By Hugh Gibson ( First Secretary of the American Legation in Brussels) 
In this last chapter from " A Journal of a Legation." Mr. 
Hugh Gibson describes Loiivain. when the burning, pillage, 
and massacre iverc acluallv in progress. The full storv cannot 
be told until after the war, but enough is set down to estab- 
lish that the horror of Louvain -was deliberatelv planned 
by the German General Staff and apprmed by the Kaiser. 
iryRUSSELS August zyth, 1914.— There is bad news from 
i~J Louvain. The reports agree that there was seme sort 
of trouble in the square before the Hotel de Ville a 
day or two ago. Beyond that no two reports are alike. The 
Germans say that tlic son of the Burgomaster shot down 
some Staff Officers who were talking together at dusk before 
the Hotel dc Ville. The only flaw in that story is tliat the 
Burgomaster has no son. Some Belgians sa'y that two 
bodies of Germans who were drunk met in the "dusk ; that 
one body mistook the other for French and opened fire. 
Other reliable people tell with convincing detail that the 
trouble was planned and started by the Germans in cold 
blood. However that may be, the affair ended in the town 
being set on fire and civilians shot down in the streets as they 
tried to escape. According to the Germans themselves 
the town is being wiped out of existence. 1 he Cathedral, 
the Library, the University, and other public buildings have 
either been destroyed or have sufifered se\crely. People 
have been shot by hundreds and those not killed are being 
driven from the town. They arc coming to Brussels by 
thousands and the end is not 3'et. This evening the wife of 
the .Minister of Fine Arts came in with the news that her 
mother, a w<jman of eighty- four, had been driven from her 
home at the point of the bayonet and forced to walk with a 
stream of refugees all the way to Tcrvueren, a distance of 
about twelve miles, before st\e could be put on a tram to her 
daughter's house. Two old priests have staggered into the 
— —. Legation more dead than ahve after having been com- 
pelled to walk ahead of the German troops for miles as a 
sort of protecting screen. One of them is ill and it is said that 
he may die as a result of what he has gone through. 
A Column of Grey Smoke 
August 2)>tli.^ Alter lunch Blount- and J decided to go 
out to Louvain to leara for ourselves just how much truth 
there is in the stories wc have heard and see whether the 
•American College is safe. Wc were going alone, but Pousette 
and Bulle, the Swedish and Mexican Charges d'Affaires, were 
anxious to join us, so the four of us got away together and 
made good time as far as the first outpost this side ot Louvain. 
Here there was a small camp by a hospital, and the soldiers 
came out to examine our papers and warn us to go no further 
as there was lighting in the town. The road was black with 
frightened civilians carrying away small bundles from the 
ruins of their homes. Ahead was a great column of dull 
grey smoke which completely hid the city. We could hear 
the muffled sound of firing ahead. Down the little street 
which led (u the town, we Could see dozens of white flags 
which had Ixeu hung out of the windows in a childish hope 
of averting trouble. 
We talked with the soldiers for some time in an effort to get 
some idea of what had really happened in the town. They 
seemed convinced that civilians had precipitated the whole 
business by firing upon the Staff (ji a General who was parley- 
ing with the Burgomaster in the square before the Hotel de 
Ville. They saw nothing themselves and believe what they 
are told. Different members of the detachment had different 
stories to tell, including one that civilians had a machine 
gun installed on top of the Cathedral and fired into the Ger- 
man troops, inflicting much damage. One of (he men told 
us that his company had lost twenty-five men in the initial 
flurry. They were a depressed and nervous-looking crew, 
bitter against the civil population and cursing their ways with 
great earnestness. They were at some pains to impress 
upon us that all Belgiatis were Schwein and that the people 
I'f Louvain were the lowest known form of the animal. 
.\fter talking the situation over with the officer in com- 
mand wc decided to try getting around the town to the station 
by way of the ring of outer boulevards. We got through 
in good shape, being stopped a few times by soldiers and bv 
little groups of frightened civilians who were cowering in the 
shelter of doorways listening to the noise of fighting in the 
town, the steady crackle of machine guns, and the occasional 
explosions. 
They were patheti'; in their conlidenc; that the United 
stales was coming to save' them. In some way word has 
travelled all 'over Belgium that we have entered tbe war on 
the side of Belgium and they all seem to believe it. Nearly, 
every group we talked to asked hopefully when our troops 
were coming, and when we answered that we were not in- 
volved they asked wistfully if we didn't think we should 
be forced to come in later. A little boy of about eight in a 
group that stopped us asked me whether we were English, 
and when I told him what we were he began jumping up and, 
down clapping his hands and shouting : 
Les Americains sont arrives ! Les Americains sont arrives 
His father told him to be quiet, but he was perfectly happy 
and clung to the side of the car as long as we ttayed, his eyes 
shining with joy, convinced that things were going to be all 
right somehow. 
About half way around the ring of boulevards we came 
to burning houses. The outer side of the boulevard was a 
hundred feet or so from the houses, so the motor was safe, 
but it was pretty hot, and the cinders were so thick that we 
had to put on our goggles. A lot of the houses were still 
biu-ning, but most of them were nothing but blackened wall 
with smouldering timbers inside. Many of the front doors 
had been battered open in order to start the fires or to rout 
out the people who were in hiding. 
Slaughtered Citizens 
We came to a German ammunition wagon half upset against 
a tree where it had been hurled when the horses had turned to 
run away. The tongue was broken and wrenched out. Near- 
by were the two horses dead and swollen until their legs stood 
out straight. Then we began to see more ghastly sights — 
poor civihans lying where they had been shot down as they 
ran — men and women — one old patriarch lying on his back in 
the sun, his great white beard nearly hiding his swollen face. 
All sorts of wreckage scattered over the street, hats and 
wooden shoes, German helmets, swords and saddles, bottles 
and all sorts of bundles which had been dropped and aban- 
doned when the trouble began. I'or three-quarters of a 
mile the boulevard looked as though it had been swei)t by a 
cyclone. The Porte dc Tirleinont had evidently been the 
scene of particularly bloody business. The telegraph and 
trolley wires were down ; dead men and horses all over the 
square, the houses still burning. The broad road wc had 
travelled when we went to Tirlemont was covered with 
wreckage and dead bodies. 
Some bedraggled German soldiers came out from under 
the gate and examined our passes. They were nervous and 
unhappy and shook their heads gloomily over the horrors 
through which they were passing. They said they had had 
hardly a minute's sleep for the past three nights. Their 
eyes were bloodshot and they were almost too tired to talk. 
Some of them were drunk "in the sodden stage when the 
effect begins to wear off. They told us we could proceed in 
safety as far as the station, where we would find the head- 
(luarters of the commanding officer. Here wc cf)uld leave 
the motor and learn how far we could safely go. This crowd 
varied the wording a little by saying that the Belgians were 
all dogs and that these particular dogs were being driven out 
as they should be -that all that part of the town was being 
cleared of people— ordered to leave their homes and go to 
Brussels or some other town so that the destruction of Louvain 
could proceed systematically. We thought at the time that 
they were exaggerating what was being done, but were en- 
lightened before we had gone much further. 
We continued down the boulevard for a quarter of a mile 
or so till we came to the station. Sentries came out and 
looked through our passes again. We parked the motor 
with a number of (ierman military cars in the square and set 
off on foot down the Kue de la Station, which we had admired 
so nmch when we had driven down its length just ten days 
before. . 
The houses on both sides were cither partially destroyed or 
smouldering. Soldiers were systematically removing what 
was to be found in the way of valuables, food, and wine, and 
then setting fire to the furniture and hangings. It was all 
most businesslike. The houses are substantial stone build- 
ings, and fire will not spread from one to another. There- 
fore the pnKedure was to batter down the door of each house, 
clean out what was to be saved, then pile furniture and 
hangings in the middle of the room, set them afire, and move 
on to the next house. 
It was pretty. hot, but we made our way down the street, 
showing our passes every hundred feet or so Ut soldiers in- 
stalled in comfortable armchairs which they had draggpd into 
