Best Stories of the 1914 European War

OSTEND IN PANIC AS FOE CAME

“Gay Ostend is utterly transformed by the shadow of war,” writes the correspondent of the London Standard. “It is crowded from end to end with refugees of all nationalities, who are clamoring for an opportunity to escape seaward. Never have the streets been so thronged, and one might have thought it a fête day but for the strained and anxious faces of the crowds.

“All the large hotels in Ostend are ready on the receipt of instructions to open their doors as hospitals and all necessary arrangements have been made to receive the wounded. Early this morning a number of wounded Belgian soldiers were taken by boat to an unknown destination in order to prevent them from being made prisoners by the Germans.

“Many hundreds of refugees have taken shelter in the bathing machines on the beach, while others are encamped on the race course which adjoins the dike. The King’s summer palace, which looks out over the sea, has also been turned into a hospital. Side by side with all these scenes of war it is a striking contrast to watch the crowds of children paddling and playing war games on the sand.

“At 9 o’clock this morning all the men of the Civil Guard were disarmed, and the Burgomaster issued a proclamation to the inhabitants urging them to be calm and offer no resistance to the invading Germans.

“The Maritime Railway station was held by Belgian soldiers this morning, but they will be removed by boat if the Germans enter the town. The station was full of boxes of coin and banknotes, which were being guarded by the soldiers, pending their transfer to steamers for Folkestone. I am told that all the bankers in Ghent, Bruges and Ostend have sent all their treasure to England for safety.

“In a conversation with a wounded Belgian officer I heard some stirring stories of the bravery of the Belgian troops who were engaged in resisting the advance of the Germans beyond Louvain. He related how, when the order for retreat was given, he and his fellow officers had great difficulty in persuading their men to obey the command. The bugles were sounding the retreat, but the soldiers would not leave the trenches and continued firing on a much larger force of Germans, who were attacking them. This officer ran along the lines shouting to the men that they must obey orders and retreat; but with violent oaths against the detested Germans they continued to fight, with the result that all at this particular spot were killed. The officer himself was wounded just after his last effort to withdraw his men.”

AUSTRIAN CRUISER SHOT TO PIECES

Describing the naval engagement in the Adriatic in which the cruiser Zenta was sunk, a writer in the Corriere d’Italia says:

“A flotilla of Anglo-French torpedo boats was steaming out to sea after recoaling and revictualling on the Piræan coast when it met other warships of the Allies with their decks already cleared for action coming from Malta. The combined fleet proceeded toward the entrance to Cataro Harbor.

“When they were approaching it the British torpedo destroyers which headed the flotilla sighted the Austrian protected cruiser Zenta and three smaller war vessels doing blockade duty. Before they were discovered the allied flotilla opened fire upon the enemy’s cruiser, which, being taken wholly by surprise, was slow in replying. When at last the Zenta began to return the fire it did so at long intervals, with its shots very wide of the mark.

“In the meantime the gunners of the Anglo-French fleet were tearing ugly rents in the Zenta’s flank and within four minutes had flooded her engine rooms. The other three Austro-Hungarian vessels – torpedo boats – then began racing away with many dead aboard.

“Seeing that the Zenta was foundering rapidly while its crew was intent on seeking a way of escape, the largest of the English torpedo boats went alongside and rescued 200 marines who were on the point of drowning.

“Fifty of these men subsequently succumbed to injuries received in the battle. Besides these 200 were wounded by lively rifle fire.”

AEROPLANES GUIDED UHLANS

From the Daily Telegraph’s Dunkirk correspondent: “The Germans seem to be directing their march on three points. In the north they have pushed across to Antwerp, under the shelter of the guns of which the Belgian army which has retreated from Malines has retired. A second body approached the vicinity of Ghent, riding close up to the city. The Uhlans were preceded by two German aeroplanes, which were in quest of the whereabouts of any armed Belgian force. The appearance of the Uhlans practically at the gates of Ghent created something very nearly approaching a panic among those inside the city.

“Those who had no pressing business in the city commandeered every kind of vehicle, from automobiles to carts drawn by dogs. Here were military officers in automobiles, citizens rich and poor, influential and humble, town councillors – everybody bent on making his escape as fast as possible toward Bruges.

“I interviewed several of the officers, and they told me that, while the city was still free, the Uhlans had come in from the south, and a larger force was hourly expected. They believed that the occupation of the city by the Germans was a question of only a few hours.”

BLEW UP FORT AND DIED A HERO

The Paris Ministry of War issued the following communique concerning the holding out of the Liége forts:

“The Chaudefontaine fort at Liége was the scene of an act of heroism which brilliantly affirms once more the valor of the Belgian army.

“Major Nameche commanded the fort which controls the railway from Aix-la-Chapelle to Liége via the Verviers and Chaudefontaine tunnel. The fort was bombarded continuously and very violently by the Germans. When it was only a heap of débris and the commander judged that resistance was impossible he blockaded the tunnel by producing collisions between several locomotives which had been sent into it. Then he set fire to the fuses of mines in the tunnel.

“His task thus done, Major Nameche did not wish to see the German flag float ever over the ruins of his fort. He therefore exploded all the remaining powder and blew up everything, including himself. Such an act of heroism is beyond all comment.”

BRITISH “TOMMIES” COOL IN BATTLE

The coolness and nerve of the British soldier on the firing line is the subject of a cable message to the Central News of London:

“The shooting of the British infantrymen on the firing line was wonderful. Every time a German’s head showed above a trench and every time the German infantry attempted to rush a position there came a steady, withering rifle fire from the khaki-clad men lying in extended formation along the wide battle front. Their firing was not the firing of nervous men shooting without aiming; rather it was the calm and careful marksmanship of men one sees on English rifle ranges firing with all the artificial aids permitted to the most expert.

“When quick action was necessary the men showed no nervousness; they showed the cool, methodical efficiency for which the British army is noted.

“If the British lost heavily, the Germans must have lost terribly. One of the German prisoners said: ‘We never expected anything like it; it was staggering.’

“The British troops went to their positions silently but happily. There was no singing, because it was forbidden, but as the men deployed to the trenches there were various sallies of humor in the dialects of the various English, Irish and Scotch counties. The cockney was there with quips about ‘Uncle Bill,’ and every Irishman who went into the firing line wished he had money to buy a little Irish horse, so that he might ‘take a slap at the Uhlans.’

“As for the cavalry, the officers declare, their charges against the Germans were superb. They charged as Berserks might have done. They gave the Uhlans the surprise of their lives.”

5,000 GUESTS IN SMALL TOWN

This story of a thrilling trip by a party of American tourists in Finland is told by one of them after their safe arrival in Stockholm:

“Our party left Stockholm on July 31 on a steamer for St. Petersburg but was stopped by a Russian warship and compelled to return to Hango, where we were lodged in a hotel. The steamer was taken in charge by a Russian warship and blown up in the harbor channel. At the same time several cranes and other harbor works were dynamited to block the channel to the Finnish harbor. The explosions made a spectacular sight for the Americans.

“Our party was unable to leave until August 3 because the roundhouse and other buildings near the railway station were in flames.

“Starting for Stockholm by train, we traveled in cars already overcrowded with refugees. Arriving at Hyvinge we found at least 3,000 persons waiting for the next train north. The town was already filled and people were sleeping on the staircases of the overflowing hotels and in the parks. We finally found lodging in a sanitarium outside of the town. The next day we continued our trip in a train loaded with Germans who had been expelled from the country.

“We next arrived at Seinajoki, a hamlet near Tammerfors, which boasts of only one hotel but was trying to entertain 5,000 strangers. Every private house was filled to its capacity, and we would have been compelled to spend the night in the streets had it not occurred to the manager of the hotel to suggest that we proceed to Nicolaisadt, a seaport fifty miles to the west.

“We took this good advice and found comfortable lodgings in that place. We also had the good fortune to discover an American freight steamer, on which we were permitted to sail on August 5. The voyage was dangerous, as all the beacon lights had been removed from the passage outward, which is narrow and made hazardous by shoals.

“Two other steamers left port at the same time. The first was commanded by a Russian pilot. It ran aground and was wrecked. The other vessel narrowly escaped the same fate. Our steamer, however, got safely clear and we arrived without accident at Hernosand, Sweden.”

CHARLEROI A CITY OF DEAD

Describing the entry of the French into the unhappy town of Charleroi, whence, after previous fighting, they drove the Germans across the Sambre, a Times correspondent writes:

“Outside an inn was to be seen the dead figure of a German officer with his head bowed over a basin and soap lather dry upon his face, where he had been shot in the act of washing.

“There was another who lay across a table, while a cup of coffee which he had been in the act of raising to his lips at the moment when death found him lay broken on the ground.

“In every part of the city houses were smouldering or in flames. Every cellar was occupied by the terror-stricken inhabitants. This is the account given of the struggle for Charleroi by the French troops which took part in the operations.

“After listening to these accounts the correspondent heard the town was surrounded by German troops. Anxious to ascertain the truth of this report, he started in the direction of Namur. A few miles out of Philippeville he met a Belgian officer and the paymaster-general of Namur, who told him that the town of Namur was occupied by Germans. It had been subjected to a furious bombardment, and the fire of the enemy had been so well regulated that the first few shots had silenced two of the forts.”

HANSI REBUKES HIS CAPTOR

Hansi, the Alsatian caricaturist who was arrested by the Germans some months ago because of his pro-French sentiments, escaped and fled to France to avoid imprisonment. He is now in a French regiment acting as an interpreter. The German officer who had caused his arrest was the first prisoner brought before him. The officer complained of the treatment he had received and Hansi replied:

“It was certainly better than you gave me at Colmar.”

“GAVE GERMANS WHAT FOR”

Philip Gibbs, the London Daily Chronicle correspondent, describing his railway journey from Paris to Boulogne, says:

“On the way we fell into many surprising and significant scenes. One of these was when we suddenly heard a shout of command in English and saw a body of men in khaki with Red Cross armlets suddenly run along the platform to an incoming train from the north with stretchers and drinking bottles. A party of English wounded had arrived from the scene of action between Mons and Charleroi.

“We were kept back by French soldiers with fixed bayonets, but through the hedges of steel we had the painful experience of seeing a number of British soldiers with bandaged heads and limbs descending from the troop train. They looked spent with fatigue and pain after the journey, but some of them were sufficiently high spirited to laugh at their sufferings and give a hearty cheer to the comrades who came to relieve them with medical care.

“I had a few words with one of them and questioned him about the action, but like all British soldiers he was very vague in his descriptions, and the most arresting sentence in his narrative was the reiterated assertion that ‘we got it in the neck.’

“I understood from him, however, that the British troops had stood their ground well under terrific fire and that the Germans had been given ‘what for.’

“I saw the British soldier on this journey in many unexpected places and adapting himself to his unusual environment with his characteristic phlegm. I saw him at dawn in small camps, surrounded with haystacks and farmyard chickens, drinking the fresh milk offered to him by French peasant women, with whom he seems to have established a perfectly adequate ‘lingua Française.’

“I saw him scrawling up the words ‘hot water’ and ‘cold water’ above the taps in French railway stations, carrying the babies of Belgian refugees, giving cigarettes to German prisoners and rounding up French cattle which in due time will be turned into French beefsteaks.”

LIGHT BRIGADE OUTDONE

Returning from the front a correspondent of the London Times sends the following under a Paris date:

“Near Charleroi I heard some stories of the bravery of the French soldiers. The Germans were bombarding the city. The French troops made what amounted to a mediæval sortie, but, finding the enemy in much greater force than was expected, were compelled to withdraw. The bombardment continued relentlessly, whereupon the French Turcos – picked troops from Algeria – debouched from the town, and, with a gallantry which surely must live in history, charged the German battery, bayoneting all the German gunners.

“Their losses, it is said, exceeded those of the Light Brigade at Balaklava. Of a whole battalion only 100 men, it is reported, returned unscathed. Their bravery, however, was powerless against the German advance, which crept, foot by foot, through the outskirts of Charleroi to the very heart of the town.

“There in the narrow streets the carnage was indescribable. A French infantryman told me that the roads became so jammed with dead that the killed remained standing upright where they had been shot, supported by their dead comrades.”

WOMAN GETS COUNT’S SWORD

This incident occurred during the fighting before Charleroi, cables a war correspondent:

“Yet another band of Uhlans was captured Sunday at the gates of Courtrai by a detachment of French chasseurs. Their chief officer was found to be Lieut. Count von Schwerin, a nephew of the Kaiser. The young commander is only 25 years old and has been married only seven months. The officer commanding the French detachment found that the Count’s sword was a present from the Emperor himself and bore an inscription to that effect on the blade.

“The Count’s saber, belt and helmet were brought to-day to St. Ouen and presented to the wife of the officer who made the capture. The sword was blood-stained and its point twisted.”

“CRIME TO SPARE SPY’S LIFE”

The correspondent of the Paris Temps, who had occasion to follow them on the way to the front, is loud in his admiration of the British soldiers’ discipline, equipment and commissariat arrangements. But what he admired most was the summary methods of dealing with spies, every one convicted being shot immediately. A British captain explained his attitude through a French interpreter as follows:

“You French pride yourselves on your humanity in cases where humanity is a mere useless sentimentality. To spare the life of a spy by postponing his trial is a crime against our own troops. A spy may be able by some means to convey a harvest of news to his own side, so as to enable the enemy to surprise us precisely when we hoped to surprise him. In such cases, inopportune indulgence may cost the lives of several hundreds of our own troops.”

CHANGE SCHMIDT TO SMITH

Naturalized German shopkeepers in London are taking unusual precautions against possible boycotts. The following notice, posted on a bakery in Soho, is being copied by other dealers:

“Two hundred and fifty dollars reward will be given to any charitable institution upon the discovery by any persons of adulteration in the bread sold in this establishment.

“God bless our King and country. The proprietor of this business wishes to inform the public that he is a naturalized British subject of many years standing and his loyalty is equal to that of any of the most gracious Majesty’s subjects, whom he treats and respects as man to man.”

One German banker in South London, whose name was “Schmidt,” promptly changed it to “Smith.”

CAMP FOR GERMAN SUSPECTS

A huge concentration camp for the thousands of German suspects who have been rounded up by Scotland Yard in all parts of England is being constructed at Blackdown near Aldershot. The corral, which covers forty acres, is fenced by barbed wire strung on ten-foot posts. Outside is another circle of barbed wire entanglements and between the two sentries will pace with loaded rifles.

The prisoners will be housed in quarters built of galvanized iron and will be fed on ordinary army rations.

HEROISM OF PRINCE

Wounded soldiers arriving at Frankfort-on-Main relate that Prince Frederick Charles of Hesse, the Emperor’s brother-in-law, while leading his regiment during a recent battle seized a flag from the hands of the wounded flag bearer and carried it on to victory.

“GOOD-BY, MR. FLYING MAN!”

The London Daily Mail correspondent at Rouen obtained a description of the British fighting from a wounded man belonging to the Berkshire regiment, who said:

“We marched into Mons about 10 o’clock, and were just going to be billeted when the order came for us to fall in again and get a move on. We’d been marching since 4 o’clock. It had been blazing hot and still we were wanted. We were to advance under cover of artillery fire; but in the meantime the enemy were doing a bit of artillery practice, too, so we threw up trenches and snuggled down in them.

“They did not keep us waiting long. The German gunners were over a ridge two or three miles in front, and their shells soon came whistling round us. I got what they call my baptism of fire, and at first I did not like it. In the daytime they had aeroplanes to tell them where to drop their shells. They were flying about all the time. One came a bit too near our gunners. He was a long way behind us. They waited and let him come on. He thought he was all right. Two thousand feet he was up, I dare say. We could hear his engine.

“He may have made a lot of notes, but they weren’t any use to him or anybody, for all of a sudden our gunners let fly at him. We could see the thing stagger and then it dropped like a stone, all crumpled up. ‘Good-by, Mr. Flying Man!’ That was the end of him.

“In the dark they turned on searchlights. We could see them hunting about for some one to pot at. Uncanny, that was, to see a blooming big lane of light working round and round until it came to something. Then we heard the shells whistle, and when it came round to us and lit us up so that we could see each other’s faces, it made my blood run cold, just like I used to feel when I was a nipper and woke up and saw the light and thought it was a ghost, and we lay there wondering what would happen next.”

WOMAN SAW ZEPPELIN WORK

In the crowd of refugees arriving in London from Ostend were a dozen Americans, who made their way out of Antwerp with hand baggage only. Among them was Mrs. George Sparrow of New York, who had left Liége soon before that city was besieged by the Germans. She said:

“In Antwerp I was aroused one night by a loud boom, which I imagined was caused by a cannon firing in the fort, but, looking out of a window, I saw a Zeppelin airship, apparently quite near. I could plainly hear the buzz of its motor. A bomb from it fell only a few blocks away, the explosion of which was followed by an outbreak of fire.

“Many persons ran from the houses panic-stricken. Some of the women were hysterical. It was a fearful night. I got out of the city next morning with several other Americans and went to Ostend, where I spent last night.”

SAW WOMEN SHOT

A woman refugee from Framerie, near Mons, told the following story to the relief committee in Paris:

“My husband is with the Belgian army and I was left with my three babies in our cottage. All was quiet until Monday, when the Germans came. They sacked and destroyed everything in the house. There remains of our poor village nothing but ruins. I saw one of the soldiers strike one of my neighbors in the breast with his sword. Then he flourished the bloody blade as though proud of the feat. Some women who had hidden in their cellars were shot.

“A woman from Peronne le Bincher started out with one of her neighbors who carried a young baby at her breast. Suddenly the mother perceived that the little one was dead. She could not bear this new shock and lost her reason. When she was helped out of the train on reaching Paris she still held and was crooning over the body of her child.”

FOUGHT SINGING MARSEILLAISE

A correspondent of the London Times at Ostend says:

“I have obtained the following details of the siege of Namur from two Belgian soldiers. They informed me that the Germans attacked the town during a dense fog, and for two days the bombardment never ceased. The open town was reduced to ruins and the carnage among the inhabitants was appalling. The forts of Cognelee and Marchovelette were silenced by heavy German siege guns of 11-inch caliber.

“The 148th French Regiment of the line, coming from Givet, proudly marched into the town to the strains of ‘The Marseillaise’ – this during a murderous hail of projectiles. Alas, they had arrived too late! Namur had become an inferno, and at midday the order was given to retreat.”

RODE INTO DEATH’S JAWS

A correspondent describing the fighting before Malines says:

“I could see dark blue masses of Belgian infantry falling back, cool as on a winter’s morning. Through a mistake, two battalions of carbineers did not receive the order to retire and were in imminent danger of destruction. To reach them a messenger would have had to traverse a mile of open road swept by shrieking shrapnel. A Colonel summoned a gendarme and gave him the orders and he set spurs to his horse and tore down the road, an archaic figure in towering bearskin. It was a ride into the jaws of death.

“He saved his troops, but as they fell back the German gunners got the range and dropped shell upon shell into the running column. Road and fields were dotted with corpses in Belgian blue.

“At noon the Belgians and Germans were in places only fifty yards apart, and the rattle of musketry sounded like a boy drawing a stick along the palings of a picket fence. The railway embankment from which I viewed the battle was fairly carpeted with corpses of infantrymen killed yesterday. I saw peasants throw twelve into one grave.”

TROOPER BROKE GIRL’S JAW

An old man sitting in a corner of a stack of straw told the following story to a correspondent in Paris:

“People call me Jean Beaujon. I have a little wine shop just across the river from Liège, in the town of Grivegnee. When the mobilization order was announced my two sons, both fine fellows, went off to join their regiments. My daughters – I have two, this one here and another – remained with their old father.”