Best Stories of the 1914 European War

“They swore to follow until they came in contact with the enemy and to lay down their lives for their country. A collection was immediately raised among the soldiers. The boys were terribly depressed at being compelled to return home afoot, charged with vagabondage under the military law. The magistrate, with tears in his eyes, acquitted them.”

“PRISONERS NOT WANTED”

Telegraphing from Rotterdam a correspondent of the New York Sun says:

“An American who arrived here from Berlin said to me:

“ ‘As the Berliners have been treated to a long, unbroken series of bulletins announcing German victories and have an invincible belief in the irresistibility of the German army, I asked why there were so few English prisoners.

“ ‘The reply was: “We are not troubling ourselves to take many. The hatred of our men for the British is uncontrollable.” This was accompanied by a gesture which indicated that the wounded fare badly.’ ”

4,000 AUSTRIANS FAST IN BOG

A Petrograd correspondent telegraphs the following: “An engagement at Krinitz, between Lublin and Kholm, where the Austrians lost about 6,000 prisoners and several guns, was decided by a bayonet charge. The Austrians got entangled in a bog, from which, after their surrender, they had to be extricated with the assistance of ropes.”

FRENCH CAVALRY’S FEAT

Quoting from a letter received from a French officer a Bordeaux correspondent tells how a French cavalry division held in check two German corps for twenty-four hours:

“When the Germans were advancing from the north we were ordered to hold a certain village at all costs with a few quick-firing guns and cavalry. It was a heroic enterprise, but we succeeded.

“The German attack began in the morning. A terrific bombardment was maintained all day; shells destroyed every building and the noise was infernal. We had to scream and shout all orders. The church tower was struck by a shell at the stroke of midnight and collapsed.

“Early in the morning we retreated under a hail of shells, after mowing down masses of German infantry. We gave our army in the rear a whole day’s rest and our exploit is mentioned in many orders as a historic rearguard defensive action.”

KILLED AS HIS MEN FLED

A young reserve officer who has returned to Paris, relating how he captured the sword of a Bavarian colonel, said:

“When charging the Bavarians I noticed that their colonel was striking his own men with his sword to prevent them from running away. He was so occupied in this that he forgot the approach of the French and was shot dead.”

THINK OF KAISER AND GOD

A Rouen correspondent has obtained possession of the diary of a German officer, who surrendered to a party of stragglers, and quotes the following from it:

“Aug. 5. – Our losses to-day before Liége have been frightful. Never mind; it is all allowed for. Besides the fallen are only Polish beginners, the spilling of whose blood will spread the war lust at home – a necessary factor. Wait till we put our experts on these deluded people.

“Aug. 11. – And now for the English, who are used to fighting farmers. Vorwärts, immer vorwärts. To-night William the Greater has given us beautiful advice: ‘You think each day of your Emperor; do not forget God.’ His Majesty should remember that thinking of him we think of God, for is he not the Almighty’s representative in this glorious fight for the right?

“Aug. 12. – This is clearly to be an artillery war. As we foresaw, the infantry counts for nothing.

“Aug. 15. – We are on the frontier; why do we wait? Has Russia really dared to invade us? Two hussars were shot to-day for killing a child. This may be war, but it is the imperial wish that we carry it on in a manner befitting the most highly cultivated people.

“Aug. 14. – Every night now a chapter of the war of 1870 is read to us. What a great notion! But is it necessary?”

PENANCE, NOT TENNIS

The Daily Chronicle’s correspondent at Amsterdam telegraphs as follows:

“The Cologne Gazette says: ‘A thousand English soldiers are now prisoners of war at the Döberitz military exercise ground near Berlin.

“ ‘It is proposed to give English officers facilities for tennis and golf, but this plan is opposed by the Gazette, which says that men of the nation which plunged Germany into the war will be better occupied sitting down thinking of their country’s sins.’ ”

CROSS ON PRIEST AS TARGET

“Official couriers arriving here from the American Legation at Brussels witnessed a fresh sample of German atrocity toward the conquered Belgians,” says a correspondent in Antwerp. “Passing slowly through Louvain in an automobile, they saw sitting outside a partly burned house a boy 8 years old whose hands and feet had been cut off at the wrists and ankles. The Americans stopped and asked the child’s mother what had happened.

“ ‘The Germans did it,’ she said with spiritless apathy.

“Evidently in terror lest she had said too much, she refused to answer further questions. The child’s wrists and ankles were bandaged as if the frightful injuries were inflicted recently. Details of the shooting down of one Jesuit priest of Louvain were told to the American couriers by another priest who witnessed the affair.

“It appears that the Jesuit kept a diary in which he had written the following commentary on the sacking of the Louvain library: ‘Vandalism worthy of Attila himself.’

“German officers forced him to read the words aloud, then marked a cross in chalk on the back of his cassock as a target and sent a dozen bullets into his back in the presence of twenty other Louvain priests.”

KAISER’S HEAD SAVED HIM

A wounded sergeant brought from the front told a Paris correspondent that he owes his life to a bust of the Kaiser. The sergeant took it from a village school and stuck it in his haversack. Soon afterward a German bullet struck him, knocking him down. He found the bullet had glanced off the head of the bust, chipping off one of the ends of the Kaiser’s mustache.

WHITLOCK SAVES TEN SCHOLARS FROM DEATH

A Jesuit priest who escaped from Louvain before the destruction of that city has written to his father, Philip Cooley, as follows:

“All our people escaped except eleven scholastics. One of these was shot at once, as he had a war diary on his person. The others were taken to Brussels where they were to have been shot, but the American Minister stepped in and stopped it.

“He told the Germans that his Government would declare war if any of those persons were shot.”

SHOULD SHE HAVE LIED?

In one little town near Clearmont we came in for a strange echo of war. A woman in a high cart drove past quickly. I was talking with a woman of the inn.

There was silence, then an outburst from the handsome Sibyl-faced hostess who had two sons at war. “Think of it,” she said; “three of our soldiers were chased from the fight at Creil. They took refuge with her. She is rich and has a garden. She hid them in a hayloft and threw their uniforms in the garden. The Germans came. They slept in her house.

“They said: ‘We are forced to fight; it is not of our seeking. The French attacked us.’

“They found the uniforms. They put a pistol to her breast.

“ ‘We will shoot you if you do not say where these soldiers are.’

“She cried: ‘In the loft.’

“They shot them all – three traitors – and it would have been so easy to lie.”

GERMAN CAVALRY AFOOT

The London Daily Express’s Paris correspondent says that the British captured seventeen howitzers and a number of smaller guns. The German cavalry losses were appalling. A captured German cavalry officer estimates the wastage of horses, especially in the Belgian campaign, at about two-thirds of the total allotted to the army operating in the direction of Paris.

The army was hampered by a shortage of cavalry scouts, and since it entered France many battery horses have been transferred to the cavalry. As a result guns have been abandoned and have fallen into the hands of the British in large numbers. The horseless cavalrymen are now marching with the infantry.

The officer is despondent over the future, but thinks that the German right intends to stand in the positions prepared during the advance and await reënforcements.

AIRMEN DODGE BULLETS

The London Daily Mail’s Petrograd correspondent sends a description of M. Poiret, a French aviator who is serving with the Russian army, of a flight over the German position, accompanied by a staff captain:

“I rose to a height of 5,000 feet,” said Poiret. “Fighting was in full swing. The Captain with me already had made some valuable observations when the Germans, noticing my French machine, opened fire on it.

“A number of their bullets pierced the wings of the aeroplane and others struck the stays. We still flew on, however, as it was necessary to obtain the exact position of the enemy. Then the German artillery began. Their shells burst near the aeroplane and each explosion caused it to rock. It was difficult to retain control as pieces of shells had seriously damaged two of the stays. The fantastic dance in the air lasted twenty minutes.

“The Captain was wounded in the heel but continued to make observations. Finally I turned the machine and landed home safely. I found ten bullet marks and two fragments of shells in the machine.”

GERMAN SPIES RECKLESS

“The German attempts at spying are amazingly daring near Toulon. Attempt follows attempt with an incredible indifference to the sudden death which follows capture,” writes a correspondent.

“One of the patrol thought he saw a movement down among the vines on the side of a deserted road and knew that something was wrong. He immediately gave a hail. As there was no reply he fired two shots among the vines. Some one gave a scream, and the soldier ran up with his bayonet at the ready.

“Three men jumped out from among the vines and one of them fired twice at him with a revolver or automatic pistol. He was not hit and went right at them with his bayonet, firing again as he ran. He killed one man. More soldiers ran up and they chased the two men that were left down the deserted road to the little bay. There was a small petrol launch lying close in shore. Immediately afterward the launch put her bow around and went out to sea.

“But that’s not the most dramatic part of this evening’s business. It was suspected that more men had come ashore from the launch. A general alarm was sent out immediately. This precaution was well justified, for two men were caught trying to blow up one of the railway bridges.

“These two men were given exactly one minute to prepare themselves. They were shoved against the pier of the bridge and the firing party shot them from so close a distance that one man’s clothes caught fire. He didn’t seem to know that he was hit at first, for he started trying to put out the places where his coat and vest were burning. Then he went down plump on the ground. The other man died instantly.

“When the German was trying to put out his burning clothes just before he slipped down he kept saying in broken English (not German, mind you), ‘I vill burn! I vill burn!’ He seemed quite unable to realize he was shot.”

LIKE A MELODRAMA

“The French bluejacket is a fine fellow but in every way presents a big contrast alongside his present war mates of the British navy,” says a correspondent.

“To begin with, he must dramatize all his emotions. I saw a ship from foreign parts coming to Boulogne. One man, evidently expected, for there was a large crowd, stepped ashore. There was tremendous earnestness in his face. Courage, patriotism, duty – all these shone out, transfiguring a somewhat slovenly figure. Several women embraced him as he stepped ashore. This he accepted as a tribute due to him. When he had taken enough he waved the rest aside and pointed in the direction of the Marine Department Office.

“I go!” he called out. He made a brief speech, fiery, religious, earnest. Then he kissed his mother, said good-by to everyone, and crossed the quay to the Marine Department of War. His shipmates looked on admiringly. The customs authorities did not search him for contraband. He was the brave patriot going to serve his country afloat.

ALL FOLLOWED THE BOTTLE

Here is a delightful story from a correspondent in France:

“A party of British bluejackets were being entertained by their future allies ashore. A middy came off with the leave boat at 10 o’clock. He noticed some of the men were half seas over and all were jolly.

“One of the bluejackets he saw had a bottle concealed beneath his jumper. He directed a petty officer to take it from him and throw it overboard. This was done – and the owner of it promptly jumped in after it. The next moment half the boat’s company had dived overboard; the other half were restrained by the officers. Fortunately every man was saved. Next morning there was a parade on the quarter deck. The captain complimented the men on their exploit of the night before, thanked God they were safe and expressed pleasure that he had such a body of men under him. The men received his praise stolidly. Then one spoke out:

“ ‘Sorry we were unsuccessful, sir,’ he said, saluting.

“ ‘But – but!’ said the captain, ‘I understood Seaman Robert Hodge was saved.’

“ ‘Yes, sir, but we dived after the whiskey, sir. We knew Bob could look after himself.’ ”

“JACQUES DID HIS DUTY!”

Details of how his son was wounded have just reached the French Foreign Minister, Delcassé.

Lieutenant Jacques Delcassé, his sword in one hand and a revolver in the other, was charging at the head of his company when a German bullet struck him down. Gallantly struggling to his feet, Delcassé again dashed at the enemy, but a second ball placed him out of action.

To his wife, who arrived at Bordeaux to-day, the Foreign Minister said: “I’m proud of Jacques; he did his duty.”

“THE SCOUNDRELS!”

In the hospital at Bordeaux a soldier of the Second French Colonial Regiment was operated upon for a horrible wound in the thigh, caused by an explosive bullet. The orifice made by the bullet on entry was clean and narrow, whereas at the exit it was several centimeters wide, while the intermediate flesh was a mass of bruised and torn tissues, which were entirely destroyed. As the surgeon cut away the flesh the wounded man remarked:

“The blackguards! To think that I served two years in Morocco without a scratch, and now these German scoundrels have served me like this.”

MOVIE THRILLER OUTDONE

Here are two instances of individual French heroism:

“In a village on the point of occupation by German cavalry, a French soldier, the last of his regiment there, heard a woman’s cries. He turned back. At that moment a Uhlan patrol entered the village. The soldier hid behind a door and then shot down the first officer and then one of the soldiers.

“While the rest of the patrol hesitated, the soldier rushed out, seized the officer’s riderless horse, swung himself into the saddle and, hoisting the woman behind him, rode off amid a hail of bullets. Both reached the French lines unscathed.

“The second act of bravery cost the hero his life. On the banks of the Oise a captain of engineers had been ordered to blow up a bridge in order to cover the French retreat.

“When a detachment of the enemy appeared on the other side of the bridge the officer ordered his men back and then himself running forward fired the mine with his own hand, meeting a death which he must have known to be certain.”

DUG WAY TO SAFETY

A remarkable story of a soldier caught in a trap amid a rain of bullets, who dug his way to safety with his bayonet, was told in a hospital at Petrograd.

“A body of Russian troops was lured into the open through the flying of a white flag,” the soldier said, “when the bullets began to rain upon us. There was no cover in sight and I began to dig a hole with my bayonet. Either it would be my grave or my protection from the rifle fire.

“One bullet hit me, but I continued to dig. A second bullet hit me and this went clear through my lungs.

“The hole was half finished when a third bullet struck me in the leg. Finally I finished the hole and tumbled into it just as a fourth shot hit my other leg. I became unconscious and remembered nothing more until I woke up here.”

BRITISH DRAGOON’S EXPLOIT

A Reuter despatch from Paris says that a British soldier of the 6th Dragoons, suffering from bullet wounds in the hip, told of a grim incident at Compiègne.

The night before the battle the dragoon’s squadron was on outpost duty. Some firing had been heard, and he rode ahead of his squadron to find out what was happening, in the belief that French cavalry were engaged with the Germans close at hand.

The dragoon cantered along the moonlit road, until suddenly, in the shadow of the trees, he found himself in the midst of a group of horsemen – Germans. He had a carbine across the neck of his horse and fired point blank into the breast of a German trooper, with whose horse his own collided. The German was as quick with his weapon and both men fell to the ground, the German dead, the British soldier with a bullet through his hip.

An instant later the British squadron came clattering up and cut the German detachment – about thirty strong – to pieces.

SAVED HIS COMMANDER

In the orders of the day made public at Bordeaux numerous cases of bravery are cited. Two of them follow:

“Private Phillips of the Second Battalion of riflemen, during the battle ran out under fire to his captain, who was mortally wounded, and brought him in. Private Phillips went eight times to the firing line under violent shelling to give water to the wounded and he also assisted his commandant to rally riflemen dispersed by the enemy’s fire.

“Bugler Martin of the 14th Hussars, a member of a patrol commanded by Lieutenant de Champigny, in a fierce skirmish with a German patrol, seeing his commander wounded and captured, charged the German officer who had made a prisoner of De Champigny, killed him with his own hand and rescued De Champigny.”

GETTING REAL CRUSTY

“Vienna Bakeries” all over France have now changed their title to “Parisian Bakeries,” says a Paris correspondent.

BATTLES QUITE THE THING

When fighting was general about Brussels smart women of the Belgian capital motored out to watch battles in the cool of the afternoon as gaily as though going to the races, says an Ostend correspondent.

CHILD PLAYED AMID DEAD

Here is part of the description of scenes on the battlefields on the banks of the Marne as told to a Paris correspondent by an eyewitness:

“The greatest optimism reigns. I saw the remains of blown-up bridges and hundreds of lifeless horses and mules in the deserted trenches. Dead soldiers had been buried and the wounded cared for, and some priests were throwing burning brushwood on carcasses.

“In the blazing sunshine not far away I saw a little boy, son of a Turco – for the Turcos often bring their wives and children on or near the battlefield.

“He had a rifle of some wounded soldier which he was hugging in his little arms as if it were a toy. He was perfectly happy surrounded by evidences of death, destruction, suffering and blood. His father was lying wounded in a village close by. The child had strayed away.”

POISONING WATER

A Petrograd correspondent says:

“Wounded officers who have returned from East Prussia charge that the Germans are poisoning the water. A woman brought water to soldiers and they immediately became ill. Their officer tendered the water to a German, who refused to drink it, and when analyzed it was found to have contained arsenic.”

TRIED TO ROW TO WAR

Four gunners of the Royal Field Artillery at Folkestone had an experience which has set all the Channel town to laughing, says a London correspondent. The gunners recently hired a small boat and rowed out into the Channel.

The following morning a boat from Calais, the French city just across the Channel, swung the missing rowboat down to the dock at Folkestone and the four gunners sheepishly followed.

Nervous because of the delay in getting to the scene of war, the four men had decided they would row to Calais. They had failed to provide food and water and found the thirty-mile pull under a hot sun a task they had not expected. Finally they hailed a French fishing vessel.

DECORATED ON BATTLEFIELD

A correspondent in Limoges cables:

“On a train loaded with wounded which passed through here was a young French officer, Albert Palaphy, whose unusual bravery on the field of battle won for him the Legion of Honor.

“As a corporal of the 10th Dragoons at the beginning of the war Palaphy took part in the recent violent combat with the Germans. In the thick of the battle the brigadier, finding his colonel wounded and helpless, rushed to his aid. Palaphy hoisted the injured man upon his shoulders, and under a rain of machine gun bullets carried the colonel safely to the French lines. That same day Palaphy was promoted to be a sergeant.

“Shortly afterward, although wounded, he distinguished himself in another affair, leading a charge of his squad against the Baden Guard, whose standard he himself captured. Wounded by a bullet which had plowed through the lower part of his stomach and covered with lance thrusts, he was removed from the battlefield in the night. Then he learned that he had been promoted to be a sub-lieutenant and nominated chevalier in the Legion of Honor.

“This incident of decorating a soldier on the battlefield recalls Napoleonic times.”

HUSSAR LED 30 °CAPTIVE

The following incident is told by a Paris correspondent:

“Near a little village in Lorraine a German lieutenant was effectively using his artillery on the French. A Hussar had been taken a prisoner to the village, which was defended by 300 Germans. Under cover of their own artillery fire the French infantry advanced irresistibly.

“The German officer, who saw that he could not hold out, asked the Hussar’s advice. Of course the French soldier answered, ‘If you resist you’re all dead.’ ‘Yes,’ says the German, ‘but if we surrender, still we will all be shot.’ The Hussar assured him that France respects the laws of war, that prisoners are well treated and every one of them would be safe. The German officer quickly resolved to stop his resistance.

“Then the brave little French Hussar, with the German officer beside him and followed by 300 pointed helmets, marched to the first French officer and handed over his prisoners.”

WHAT’S WAR TO DICTIONARY?

A Paris correspondent cables: “Ten members attended the French Academy’s regular meeting this week and discussed the word ‘exode’ for the dictionary. ‘Exode’ means exodus.

“Marcel Prévost, the writer, who is an artillery captain, gave his confrères a description of the Paris defenses.”

HAYFORK PART OF DINNER SET

“The scene is a village on the outskirts of Muelhausen,” says a correspondent in Bordeaux. “A lieutenant of German scouts dashes up to the door of the only inn in the village, posts men at the doorway and entering, seats himself at a deal table.

“He draws his saber and places it on the table at his side and orders food in menacing tones.

“The village waiter is equal to the occasion. He goes to an outhouse and fetches a hayfork and places it at the other side of the visitor.

“ ‘Stop, what does this mean?’ roars the lieutenant furiously.

“ ‘Why,’ says the waiter innocently, pointing to the saber, ‘I thought that was your knife, so I brought you a fork to match.’ ”

LAST DRINK KILLS HIM

Says a Paris correspondent:

“One Parisian, seeing his supply of absinthe was reduced, with no chance for obtaining more, drank his last bottle almost at one drink and died.”