Turning on their solemn
assurance,
Of treading on Belgium soil
with respect,
Comes account after account,
Of German’s turn to savage
attacks.
But Belgium remains defiant
to stoop,
Below any legitimate warfare
customs.
Crushed or beaten Belgium
quotes
An English King to say
‘we'll never be enslaved.’
The Minister of Belgium
states
That when the invasion
began,
Placards were placed in all
towns (and press),
Villages and hamlets,
warning the people,
To abstain from any kind of hostility,
Towards any movement of
enemy troops.
Meanwhile the German
authorities state
That grave 'imputations'
will be treated,
And dire reprisals will be
made,
Against attitudes of any Belgium
civilian.
Imputations are in
opposition
To the facts and no threats
will stop
Belgium Government protesting
of crimes
Against any children, women
and old men.
Too many accounts have been
given
To their inquiry of German
troops.
The Belgium Ministry of
Justice,
Looks gravely on these war
crimes.
As upon the following
reports
They have received.
The village of Linsmeau
witnessed
The fight of Belgian
infantry and Gendarmes,
Against the occupying German
Cavalry;
With one enemy officer being
killed.
The population took no part
In the fighting of that day,
but the village
Was again invaded on 10
August,
By a German force of
Artillery,
Cavalry and machine guns.
The Burgomaster of Linsmeau
assured
The Germans the villagers
took no part,
In the previous fighting - but
this did not
Pacify the enemy intent on
destruction.
Targeting two farms and six
houses
These were burnt down to the
ground.
Then the male villagers were
made
To come forward to give up
any arms.
None were found, but un-pacified
The enemy divided the men
into 3 groups.
Eleven men being forced into
a ditch.
They were later found with
their heads
Smashed by the butt of German
rifles.
The people of Velm went to
sleep,
On the night of August 10,
when roused,
By a great company of German
Cavalry.
Upon entering their town
they turned
On one particular house -
Breaking in to loot and
destroy belongings,
They turned on the farmyard.
Burning barns, implements
and six oxen.
Then they took the man and
woman,
Two miles away, in opposite
directions.
The half dressed lady they
released.
As she fled the firing of
dancing shots,
Kicked the air and dust
around her;
But she was not hit.
The man being also fired
upon.
Being injured he was left to
die.
At Neerhespen an old man,
Having his arm sliced, was then
hanged,
Upside down, only to be
burned alive.
Elsewhere at a place called Orsmael,
Inhabitants were made to
suffer mutilation.
As the children were brutally
maltreated.
So come accounts of other
atrocities,
On both civilian and
soldiers.
Commandant Van Damme lay
wounded,
As infantry fired revolvers
into his mouth.
So come in stories every
other day,
As they spread across towns,
the people
Flee from their homes in
terror,
Running for their lives, to
become refugees.
by
Jamie Mann
Anon.,
1914. German Savagery - Official Story of Belgium Horrors - Grim Details. The Daily Telegraph, [online] 26 Aug. p.6. Col.5. Available at: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ww1-archive/11034816/Daily-Telegraph-August-26-1914.html
[Accessed: 26th August 2014].
Mann, J., 2014. 100
years Ago - Poems by Jamie Mann. [letter] (Personal communication, 26
August 2014).
