On one occasion a poor wretch condemned to this torture, after having become unconscious, was taken down, revived, and incarcerated for the night in the guard-room. The next morning he was marched out again and re-tied up to complete his sentence.

Major Bach, as if suddenly inspired, conceived a fiendish means of accentuating the agony of a prisoner condemned to this punishment. The man would be tied to the post about the middle of the morning. The summer sun beat fiercely upon the post and the man's hat was removed. Consequently, as the poor wretch's head dropped forward on his chest, its crown became exposed to the fierce heat of the sun. Thus to the pain of the torture inflicted by the tightly tied ropes, and the strangling sensation produced by the throat pressing against the restraining rope, was added the racking torment of intolerable heat playing upon a sensitive part of the human body. The astonishing wonder is that none of the unhappy wretches suffered sun-stroke or went crazy while bound up in this manner, because the sun's heat intensely aggravated the agonies of thirst. But the sun-bath consummated Major Bach's greatest ambition. It caused the victim to writhe and twist more frantically, which in turn forced him to shriek and howl more vociferously and continuously.

When a prisoner was in the height of his torment the eminent Commandant would stroll up, and from a couple of paces away would stand, legs wide apart and hands clasped behind his back, surveying the results of his devilry with the greatest self-satisfaction. As the prisoner groaned and moaned he would fling coarse joke, badinage, and gibe at the helpless wretch, and when the latter struggled and writhed in order to seek some relief, though in vain, he would laugh uproariously, urge the unhappy man to kick more energetically, and then shriek with delight as his advice was apparently taken to heart only to accentuate the torture.

Sunday was the day of days which the tyrant preferred for meting out this punishment. In the first place it was a day of rest, and so a prisoner's time and labour were not lost. Even if he were strung up to the post all day he could be turned out to work on the Monday morning as usual. But the governing reason for the selection of this day was because it offered such a novel entertainment for the gaping German crowds. The public, as already mentioned, were invited to the camp on Sunday mornings to see the prisoners. Young girls and raw recruits considered a trip to Sennelager on the chance of seeing a writhing, tortured prisoner as one of the delights of the times, and a sight which should not be missed on any account.

They clustered on the path on the opposite side of the road facing the stake, laughing and joking among themselves. The recruits, who openly manifested their intense amusement, cheered frantically when the trussed wretch gave an abnormally wild and ear-piercing shriek of pain. At his moans, groans, and desperate abortive attempts to release himself, the girls would laugh as gaily as if witnessing the antics of a clown at a circus, and were quite unrestrained in their jubilant applause. This was the feature of the punishment which grated upon the nerves of the prisoners who were unable to lift a finger or voice a word in protest. That a fellow-prisoner should be condemned to suffer such hellish torture as was inflicted was bad enough, but that it should offer a side-show to exuberant Sunday German holiday crowds we considered to be the height of our humiliation and a crown to our sufferings.

I shall never forget one prisoner. He was one of our loyal dusky Colonials from the Gold Coast, who had been so unfortunate as to fall into German hands and to be consigned to imprisonment at Sennelager. He was a massive and imposing specimen of his race. He fell foul of authority and incurred Major Bach's displeasure to such a degree as to receive a sentence of eight hours bound to a tree. He was tied up, and his pleadings for mercy, prompted by madness produced by the excruciating pain and semi-consciousness, alternated with loud outbreaks of long-drawn-out, blood-freezing groans, frenzied shrieks, and nerve-racking wails.

As the torture increased with the passing of the hours he gave expression to one solitary cry—"For God's sake shoot me!" The wail, uttered with parrot-like repetition and in a tone which bored into the soul, stirred the prisoners within earshot in a strange manner. They clapped their hands over their ears to shut out the awful sound, and shut their eyes to prevent the revolting spectacle burning into their brains. The man's face was livid: terror such as it is impossible to describe was in his face; the unrelenting clutch of the rope wearing into his throat caused the veins of his neck to stand out like ropes; while streams of perspiration poured down his face. As he became weaker and weaker and the rope ground deeper and deeper into his throat his fights for breath became maniacal in their fury. Indeed, the revolting sight so moved some of the prisoners that the tears welled to their eyes, and it was only by digging their teeth into their lips that they refrained from succumbing to their emotion.

Subsequently, whenever I mentioned a word about the tying-post or tree, this Colonial would look round, with the unfathomable fear of a hunted animal, his nerves would jump and twitch, and the saliva would form like foam around his mouth. He remarked that he was willing to face any punishment. But the tying post! An hour in the bonds of those ropes! He shuddered and entreatingly prayed that if ever again he should be threatened with this punishment one of the guards would shoot him, or run him through with the bayonet. I really believe that, if this penalty had been pronounced on this man a second time, he would have done something so desperate as would have compelled summary and drastic retaliation by force of arms.

Major Bach was methodical in his sentences to the tying-post. He drew up a regular code and the offender was always given a sentence in accordance with this schedule. The slightest offence brought a sentence of two hours. Then in stages of two hours it rose to the maximum of eight hours. I heard that one man had been tied up for twelve hours, but as I did not actually witness the case I cannot vouch for its particulars. The instances I have mentioned came before my notice and can be corroborated by anyone who had the misfortune to be incarcerated at Sennelager after the coming of Major Bach. But knowing as I do Major Bach and his inhuman and ferocious ways, I am quite ready to believe that he did sentence a man to twelve hours at the post. Certainly he would never have hesitated for a moment to exact such a penalty if he had felt so disposed.

After a time the single post failed to satisfy the implacable Commandant. Trees were requisitioned for the punishment, and I have seen as many as three men undergoing the sentence simultaneously. Their combined shrieks and agonised cries penetrated to every corner of the camp. One could not escape them. On one occasion when Major Bach was standing as usual before one of his victims, laughing and jeering at his futile writhings and agonised appeals for mercy, a number of British prisoners who were standing around in mute sympathy for the hapless comrade could not control their feelings. Suddenly they gave expression to fierce hissing of disapproval. Major Bach turned, but not with the mocking triumph that one would have expected. His face wore the look of the characteristic bully who is suddenly confronted with one who is more than his match. He was taken completely off his guard, so unexpected and vigorous was our outburst. But when he saw that he was merely threatened by a few unarmed and helpless Britishers his sang froid returned, although it was with a palpable effort. He glared at us. There was no disguising or possibility of misconstruing the expressions of loathsome disgust and rage upon our faces. One and all wondered afterwards why he did not sentence every man of us to a spell at the post. Possibly anticipating that things might become ugly unless he manifested some semblance of authority, he assumed an anger which we could easily see was far from being real, and ordered us to barracks. We moved away slowly and sullenly, but the guard coming up we were unceremoniously hurried into our domiciles, although it demanded energetic rifle proddings and clubbings from the soldiers who swarmed around us in overwhelming numbers, to enforce the order.

This punishment was by no means confined to the civilian prisoners. It was meted out whenever the opportunity arose to the British soldiers with equal impartiality. But for some reason which we could never fathom, unless it was to cause further pain, torture and humiliation, mentally as well as physically, the revolting task of tying up an unfortunate Tommy was entrusted to one of his own sergeants. He had to perform the repugnant work against his will, but the sergeants eased the poor fellow's plight as much as they dared by tying them up as leniently as possible, while they maintained an ever-watchful, although unostentatious vigilance, over them while suffering the penalty.

By the introduction of this fiendish punishment Major Bach completely subdued the camp into a colony of crushed men. We all went in dire dread of him, the fear of being the victim of such brutality cowing us far more effectively than any other punishment we had encountered. Those who had undergone the torture recited such harrowing stories of their sufferings that we were extremely anxious not to incur the wrath of the devilish Commandant in any way whatever.

One day three of us experienced a narrow escape, which serves to illustrate how keen were our captors to submit us to this crucial test. We three had been ordered to the field. We packed our few belongings, including our tin pails and other indispensable utensils upon our backs. We were marching abreast and a few paces behind a young German officer, chatting merrily among ourselves, when we met a French soldier approaching. He was unusually gay and as he passed he yelled out the popular enquiry which he had evidently acquired while fraternising with our Tommies in the camp.

"Air ve do'n harted?" he hailed, and he laughed gaily at the loads with which we were struggling. To this we returned an emphatic negative to which one of the party, S——, a schoolmaster who was fluent in French and German, added a joke. Evidently the Frenchman saw the point of the jest because he burst out in a fit of unrestrained merriment which was so infectious as to compel us to participate.

The officer who was ahead of us, whipped round and vehemently declared that we were laughing at him. S—— protested and explained that such would be the very last thing we should ever think of doing. The officer went on ahead quite unconvinced and in high dudgeon. That we should select one of the myrmidons of the All-Highest as a target for our banter was the offence of offences in his estimable conceit. When we reached the entrance to the field we had to pass a small office in which we were registered and we discovered the immature upstart loudly and excitedly dwelling upon the enormous indignity to which he had been submitted by us.

The officer in charge stopped us and repeated the accusation which had been made. S—— gave a full explanation of the whole incident, but the upstart who considered that his pride had been vilely outraged would not listen to it. Then and there he ordered that we should be tied up to the trees for four hours to give us something to laugh about. I can assure you that we trembled in our shoes: our fate hung in the balance. The officer-in-charge of the field, however, was more level-headed and broader-minded, although he could not calm his excited colleague. At last he point blank refused to mete out the desired punishment. He turned to us.

"I accept your explanation. I don't think you would be guilty of such an offence to German honour and dignity!"

We were more profuse than ever in our humble apologies to the young cock-of-the-walk for any offence we might have committed unwittingly but we assured him that our mirth had been entirely provoked by the gay French soldier's joke.

"I believe you," was the officer's reply, "but be very careful. Don't do it again. As you see it is likely to be misunderstood!"

With that he dismissed us. We scurried off like startled rabbits, thankful for our narrow escape, but our last glimpse of the affair was the two officers who had resumed wrangling. It was an extremely fortunate circumstance for us that the officer-in-charge of the field was one of the few reasonable Germans attached to the camp.

The wretches who had to suffer this punishment carried traces of their experiences for weeks. I examined the wrists and ankles of the Russian Pole some hours after his final release. The limbs were highly inflamed, the flesh being puffed out on either side of the deep blue indents which had been cut by the tightened ropes. The slightest movement of the affected limbs produced a sharp spasm of pain and it was only with the greatest difficulty that the poor wretch was able to use his hands and feet for some hours after removal from the post. In the case of the Russian Pole many weeks elapsed before all traces of the terrible weals inflicted by the ropes had disappeared.

When we grasped the depths to which Prussian brutality was ready and willing to descend, we could not refrain from dwelling upon probable future tortures which were likely to be in store for us. We were positive in our own minds that Major Bach would seek other novel and more revolting and agonising methods to wreak his vengeance upon the British. We were not left for very long in this maddening uncertainty. Tying-to-the-stake was but a mild prelude to the "Reign of Terror" which the ferocious Commandant shortly afterwards inaugurated.



CHAPTER XI

THE REIGN OF TERROR

Major Bach, in common with the average Prussian officer, who has suddenly become invested with a certain degree of authority, evinced a weird delight in emphasising his power at every opportunity. He was an unbending apostle of steel-bound discipline, such as is practised in Germany.

Until his arrival we were in the habit of parading once a day—at 6 a.m.—with evening parades, twelve hours later, upon occasion. But Major Bach introduced the third mid-day parade. A little later he suddenly thought that a fourth parade was necessary, the respective hours being six, twelve, two, and six. Even this programme did not satisfy his love of power and arrogance, because at frequent intervals he would suddenly summon two additional parades and for no ostensible reason, except to harass us.

Parade was probably the most irksome duty we had to fulfil inasmuch as we were then treated to insults of every description. The Commandant was a martinet of the worst type. We were supposed to trim ourselves up and to look as spick and span as we could under the circumstances. This was more particularly demanded when a notable visitor—visitors were few and far between—came to the camp to perform a perfunctory inspection to satisfy the authorities in Berlin that the prisoners of war were being well and kindly tended. But some of us were not disposed to bow meekly to the tyrant's despotic orders. Instead of parading upon such occasions in the white convict-like suits, which by the way we were supposed and indeed asked to purchase, so that we might present a smart uniform appearance, we preferred to don our own clothes, although they were now showing sad signs of wear and tear. Naturally the immaculate Major resented our refusal to fulfil his bidding, thus producing vivid blemishes upon the prim appearance of the lines, but we always succeeded in producing an excuse which was so ostensibly reasonable as to escape his wrath and consignment to some punishment.

The most irritating feature of these parades was the length of time we were kept waiting in the scorching sun upon the convenience of his "Excellency." To him it was nothing that we should be kept standing at attention for an hour or more, while the guards, steeped in discipline as they were, took a fiendish pleasure in keeping us up to the mark. I recall one parade very vividly. The heat was intense: the thermometer must have been at least 110 degrees in the sun. We paraded at two o'clock as usual and were brought to attention. Major Bach was momentarily expected, but he did not come upon the scene until 4.45. For 2-3/4 hours we were kept in the broiling sun, and none of us being in the pink of condition owing to the wretched and inadequate food, we soon commenced to betray signs of fatigue. On this occasion, even the German guards could not adhere to the disciplinary rule. When we abandoned the rigid attention attitude for others more or less comfortable they followed our example, although they maintained a discreet alertness for the coming of the Commandant so that we might be brought to attention before he appeared upon the scene.

One of the prisoners had been a Japanese trapezist and juggler. He was very old. He said, and we agreed, he was about 75 years of age. But the German authorities arbitrarily assessed his age at 54 years, and such it had to be so long as it suited their purpose. He had toured the vaudeville theatres and music halls in Germany for over 20 years, but he was rounded up, and despite all his protestations concerning his age was interned at Sennelager.

The age of the poor old fellow was perfectly obvious. He was very weak, and indeed, quite incapable of performing the most simple duties set by our Lord and Master. K——, the captain of our barrack—the Jap formed one of our party—recognising the old man's incapacity and infirmities, eased his unfortunate position as much as he dared. One man had to be detached from each party when it went out to work, to serve as orderly for the day, and his responsibility was to keep the barrack clean and tidy during our absence. At every available opportunity, especially when confronted with a severe day's work, K—— told off the old man as orderly, the light work pertaining to which was within his capacity.

Upon the day of this particular parade the old man, enfeebled with age, weak from want of food, and debilitated, could not resist the merciless blazing sun. From sheer fatigue he sank to the ground. We in our pity left him there, although we closed around him to shield him from the eagle eyes of the vigilant guard. When Major Bach appeared suddenly we all sprang hurriedly to attention. But our aged Japanese friend was not so quick. The Commandant saw him sitting on the ground at the same moment as the guard, also catching sight of him, rushed forward. The old fellow was unmercifully hustled to his feet, although it was with only an extreme effort that he could rise. Then he was treated to an outburst of bullying and cursing from the Commandant such as we had never heard before. He was threatened with this, that, and some other frightful punishment if he dared to disobey any order in future. The old man, his legs bent and quaking beneath him, listened with a pathetically helpless demeanour. The tears coursed down his face as he shivered beneath the string of oaths, curses, and imprecations that were rained upon him. Many of us feared that he would be condemned for four hours to the tying post, so infuriated was the despot of the camp, but he escaped this terrible ordeal.

About four weeks after we had entered Sennelager permission was extended to those who felt so disposed to enjoy the luxury of an open-air bath. Seeing that we never had the chance of more than a wash in the bucket at the pump, and were in urgent need of a dip, we accepted the offer with alacrity. We were escorted under strong guard to a stream some distance from the barracks and were given a quarter of an hour for our pleasure. We hurriedly tore off our clothes and took advantage of every minute to have a roaring joyous time in the water. Thoroughly refreshed we were marched back to camp and told off to our various duties.

By this time every man in the camp had been assigned to some particular task. Major Bach did not encourage idleness; it only fomented brooding and moping over our position, was his argument. But he was also a staunch believer in forced labour, which was quite a different thing. Consequently we found ourselves condemned to some of the most filthy tasks conceivable. Incidentally, however, these duties only served to reveal still more convincingly the hollowness of Germany's preachings concerning the principles of health and hygiene to the whole world while herself practising the diametrically opposite. We were commanded to clean out the military hospital.

Now, if there is one building among others in which one would expect to discover scrupulous cleanliness it is a hospital, but this accommodation provided for the German recruits was in an indescribably filthy condition. The conveniences for the patients were in a deplorable state. They had neither been disinfected nor cleaned for months. Faecal matter and other filth had been left to dry, harden and adhere with the tenacity of glue to the surfaces. Its removal not only taxed our strength to the supreme degree, but our endurance as well. The stench was suffocating and nauseating. Even the foul aroma of the strong cheap German tobacco which we were able to purchase at the canteen and to smoke while at this task, if our sentry were genial, failed to smother the more powerful and penetrating foul vapours which arose directly water was applied.

We were also assigned to the repugnant duty of cleaning out the latrines, which were of the most primitive character, and which coincided with the facilities which one might anticipate among savages but not in such a boasting civilised country as Germany. Both these duties were loathsome, but I am afraid no one engaged on the tasks would be able to express a conclusive opinion as to which was the worse.

The duties being so varied, operations often took us a little way from the camp. The chance to get away even for a brief period from our depressing and monotonous surroundings was seized with avidity. Unfortunately, we feared that this system of forced labour would culminate in our being assigned to the work of tending the crops. But we made up our minds irrevocably to do no such thing no matter how we might be punished. The Germans had failed to nourish us in an adequate manner, and we were certainly not going to enable them to secure a sufficiency of food at our expense. Indeed, the one or two attempts which were made to impress us to toil on the land, proved highly disastrous because considerable damage was inflicted from our ignorance of agriculture and gardening.

Some of us were given the garden which belonged to the old General who had been in charge at Sennelager when we first arrived, to keep in condition. This official was an enthusiastic amateur gardener and cherished a great love for flowers. Seeing that during his regime we had received considerate treatment within limitations, we cherished no grudge against him. Again, the fact that his garden was to be kept going led us to hope that the duration of Major Bach's reign over us was merely temporary and that our former guardian would soon be returning. We knew that in such an event our lot would be rendered far easier, so we nursed his little plot of ground with every care and displayed just as much interest in its welfare as if it had been our own. But the old General never came back to Sennelager, at least not during my period of imprisonment there.

There was one party of British prisoners whom Major Bach singled out for especially harsh and brutal treatment. The invincible High Seas Fleet upon one of its sporadic ventures into salt water during the very earliest days of the war, stumbled across a fleet of Grimsby trawlers unconcernedly pursuing their usual peaceful occupation. The whole of the fishermen were made prisoners and were dispatched to Sennelager.

But Major Bach stedfastly refused to believe that they were simple fishermen pursuing their ordinary tasks. To his narrow and distorted mind a man on a trawler was only toiling in the sea for one or both of two purposes. The one was laying mines; the other was mine-sweeping. Consequently he decided to mark these unfortunate hardened sea-salts in a distinguishing manner which was peculiarly his own, thereby rendering them conspicuous and possible of instant recognition, while in the event of an escape being attempted, no difficulty would be experienced in identifying and catching the runaways. Each man was submitted to the indignity of having one half of his head shaved clean, one half of his moustache removed, or one half of his beard cut away. The men branded in this manner presented a strange spectacle, and one which afforded Major Bach endless amusement. In addition a flaming big "Z" was printed boldly upon the back of the coat of each man. This letter comprises the initial of the German word "zivil," and means that the wearer is neither a criminal nor a military prisoner. It will be observed, however, that the Commandant declined to recognise these fishermen as being naval prisoners, which somewhat contradicted his assertion concerning their alleged crime. At a subsequent date, I might mention, every civilian prisoner was branded with the "Z" in a similar manner.

These fishermen were watched very closely, were hunted and harassed at every turn without mercy, and all things considered, experienced an abnormally hard time. Up to the day of my release from Ruhleben on December 6, 1915, but one of those old salts had been released, and had been returned to his country. We were informed at Sennelager that the authorities were determined, at all hazards, to keep these "diabolical fiends" as they were termed, in durance vile, until the termination of the war. However, one of them fell seriously ill after his transference from Sennelager to Ruhleben. His condition became so serious as to bring about his hurried exchange, the authorities dreading that he would die while in their charge, and thus adversely affect the low death-rate reputation of a German prison camp!

Our hair was growing long, owing to the absence of cutting facilities. Mine had almost reached my shoulders, but I was extremely careful to submit it to a thorough wash every morning because I shared the fear of many of my companions that, owing to the congestion of the camp, we should be overrun with vermin. Undoubtedly Major Bach also anticipated such a state of affairs, because one morning he appeared upon parade with a pair of clippers which he had unearthed from somewhere and curtly commanded every man to submit to a hair-cut.

The position of official barber to the camp was assigned to an Englishman named L——, who I think might be accurately described as our official humorist. Armed with this weapon, and although absolutely ignorant of the new calling thrust upon him, delighted to secure some change to the monotonous round of toil, L—— entered upon his work with commendable zest. But he construed the duty into a form of amusement, and played sorry tricks with the heads which came into his hands. Some he shaved so clean as to present the appearance of a billiard ball, but others he evidently considered to be worthy of French poodle treatment. He took a humorous delight in executing some of the most fantastic and weird designs it is possible to imagine, much to the discomfort and chagrin of his unwilling clients. Still his quaint expression of craftmanship and artistry contributed somewhat to the restricted hilarity and mirth of the camp.

I, myself, sternly refused to entrust my head to L——'s hands. I naturally thought that I should receive a smart punishment for thus flying in the face of the autocratic order which had gone forth, but strange to say I found Major Bach somewhat reasonable on this point. This is about the only redeeming feature I can offer concerning Major Bach's rule over us. I think, however, that he was somewhat more closely observant than was generally supposed to be the case, because those of us who escaped the hair-cutting precaution happened to be the very prisoners who were unremitting in their efforts to preserve unassailable personal cleanliness. No doubt L—— was disappointed to be deprived of a few possible heads upon which to demonstrate his quaint skill, but we succeeded in escaping from his clutches.

Although vermin did overrun the camps, not only of Sennelager, but of other prisons of whose interiors I made the acquaintance, I can assert truthfully that I was never troubled with the unsolicited company of body lice, and only once or twice discovered one or two unwelcome strangers in my hair. The coarse and harsh German soap effectively rendered my hair untenantable. But some of the prisoners were overwhelmed and presented terrifying spectacles. It was here that the superiority of the Britisher in matters pertaining to personal hygiene towered over all the varying races by which he was surrounded, not even excepting the Germans. From our own experience and observation it was only too palpable that the Teuton soldiers are quite as careless in this connection as the less enlightened peoples of south-eastern Europe, because they were as severely infested—if not more so—with vermin.

One of the jobs set to us was making hay in an adjoining field and for the purpose of getting away from the camp for a few hours many of us volunteered for this toil. The hay had to be laden upon huge waggons, the load thus easily exceeding that incidental to British hay-making operations, and this had to be hauled to Paderborn for storage in lofts.

Although I was on the sick list at the time I could not resist the chance to secure a glimpse of new surroundings and a few strange faces. It was on this occasion that I made my first, but abortive, attempt to escape. The sentry was dozing in the hot afternoon sun, having found a soft couch on a haycock. I slunk off towards the trees which surround the camp. Presently I spotted a sentry. I passed him safely and still keeping to the trees pushed forward, only to be surprised to discover another sentry standing on watch with his loaded rifle. Him, too, I eluded, and was congratulating myself upon my success when I was disturbed by the clattering of approaching horses. I peered through the trees and saw a squadron of cavalry trotting towards me. I slipped into the undergrowth to throw myself prone under a sheltering bush. The soldiers passed within twelve feet of me. I held my breath half-dreading that perhaps one of the horses, scenting something unusual, might give a warning. I kept to my cover until the soldiers had disappeared from sight. Then I stole out to wander stealthily forward. But I speedily discovered that the further I got away from the camp the greater the number of cavalry I encountered. Moreover it was easy to see that manoeuvres and training were proceeding upon an extensive scale.

I realised the hopelessness of attempting to break through such a cordon, so with extreme regret I decided to make my way back to the hayfield. But the return was more difficult than the outward journey. I had to slip the guards, who seemed to be uncannily alert and who, if they had caught the slightest glimpse of me, would have blazed away with their rifles without first yelling a challenge. But I dodged them all and regaining the field sauntered up towards my guard with perfect composure. He had missed me and had been looking round to see if I were at a remote part of the field. As I approached he eyed me quizzically and subjected me to a searching cross-examination to discover where I had been. But he secured no satisfaction, beyond the sly hint that he had not noticed me for the simple reason that he had been stealing a snooze. I know he did not believe the answers I vouchsafed, but I was on safe ground. Had he hauled me before the Commandant for attempting to escape he knew very well that I should have retorted with the countercharge that he had been sleeping at his post, in which assertion I should have been supported by my friends. I held the trump card and he was wise enough to realise the fact. Consequently, beyond telling me to get on with my work he never ventured another word, nor did his attitude towards me change in any way.

Afterwards I congratulated myself upon having responded to second thoughts to return to the camp. I learned that the chances of escaping from Sennelager were most slender. Not only were we interned in the centre of a big military centre, somewhat comparable to our Aldershot, but special precautions had been observed to frustrate escape. Sentries were thrown out at distances of a few hundred yards while the system of overlapping these guardians was of the most elaborate character. Such a gauntlet was far too precarious and tight to be run with any chances of success. The hue and cry would have been raised, and have been transmitted to the outer rings of sentries before one had covered a fourth of the danger zone.

We had to bale the hay on the waggon and when a full load had been stowed aboard it was hauled away to the lofts. But we had no horses or traction engines to drag the vehicles; every available beast and machine had been requisitioned for the army. Still this factor did not perturb our captors. British muscle could be used as a substitute for animals and engines. Accordingly, about 30 of the imprisoned British tourists were harnessed up to tug the weighty and cumbersome load over the heavy three miles of road, badgered and baited by the guards. When we slowed down under the effort, which was pretty exhausting upon a basin of cabbage soup, we were spurred into the normal pace by the imprecations of the soldiers.

In addition to the men tugging at the shafts two had to ride on top of the load to keep it in order. The road led through a long avenue, the lower branches of the trees lining which swept the top of the hay. It taxed all our ingenuity and agility to avoid a mishap. Indeed, my companion was swept off and thrown into the road with considerable violence, sustaining severe bruises. It was rather by luck than judgment that I did not share his fate.

When we reached the outskirts of Paderborn the guards called a halt, in order to secure refreshment. We were also permitted, within limits, to purchase eatables from the shops, for which, needless to say, we had to pay exorbitantly.

[*large gap] we were able to secure a highly appreciated relief to our monotonous and insufficient fare.

While the guards were enjoying themselves my companion and I, perched on the top of the load, became the target for the jokes and gibes of the curious crowd which had collected round the vehicle. One fellow in the crowd was particularly impertinent and offensive with the result that we soon became riled. He came close to the side of the wagon to shout some particularly insulting epithet. With a dexterous movement my friend and I, who had been watching patiently, severed the band holding a bale and as it flew apart we gave the bale a smart push. It toppled over the side to fall upon the head of our tormentor with a crash, felling him to the ground and burying him completely. The guard, whom it missed narrowly, gave a savage curse, but the fall appeared to be so obviously accidental that he never for a moment considered the incident to have been premeditated. The bullying, raw-boned young Prussian was extricated with great difficulty and somewhat battered. His mouth, eyes, nostrils and ears were choked with the hayseeds and he spluttered, coughed and yelled in a terrifying manner. But he who a minute before had been so ready with gibes at our expense was now jeered at by his comrades, in which our guards joined boisterously. We, on the top had to give way to mirth. Although we were compelled to gather the hay, remake the bale, and reload it upon the vehicle we were so satisfied with our complete revenge as to perform the task with a light heart.

Whenever we visited Paderborn, or the village of Sennelager, we never omitted to load ourselves up with whatever food we could purchase. Those who did not accompany us invariably gave us the wherewithal to secure victuals for them.

[*large gap]

At first the shop-keepers were not disposed to deal with us, no doubt fearing that they would be charged with complicity in these transactions. [*gap]

As our visits became more frequent all hesitation upon the part of the tradesmen vanished, and they accepted our money without the slightest demur. We speedily discovered that the most rabid anti-British and wildly patriotic German shopkeeper always succumbs to business. When patriotism is pitted against pounds, shillings and pence, patriotism can go hang.

[*large gap]

One of Major Bach's most diabolical acts of savagery was the closing of the canteens in the camp to prisoners. This was the last straw, because now we were compelled to subsist upon the slender and disgusting fare served from the official cook-house. This doubtless was the express reason which influenced the Commandant in his action. But we were not disposed to allow him to have things all his own way. He promulgated the order but it had to be enforced by his myrmidons. We found that the canteen was still available to the guards, so forthwith we resorted to corruption to evade Major Bach's decree. The guards having us in their mercy, bled us unmercifully, the most trivial articles being procurable only at an extravagant price. I paid a shilling for a loaf which I could always obtain before the closing order came into force for twopence! Other articles were in proportion.

But closing the canteens drew the cordon round our stomachs immeasurably tighter. It was not long before the fiendish decree betrayed its fruits. Gaunt figures with pinched faces and staring wolfish eyes slunk about the camp ready to seize anything in the form of food. Our physique fell away, and those already reduced to weakness suffered still further debilitation. Many failed to muster the strength necessary to fulfil the tasks allotted to them. Gradual, systematic and deliberate starvation of the prisoners was prosecuted in grim earnest.

Yet the British prisoners accepted the inevitable with a far more cheerful resignation than the others. Undoubtedly it is a decided trait of the British character never to be cast down when brought face to face with disaster. Our boys were quite as resourceful as Major Bach, although in the opposite direction—to keep ourselves alive. Whenever any of us went out and came within reach of a field growing vegetable crops we did not hesitate to raid it. Supplies of raw carrots, onions, potatoes, turnips and any other roots in the edible line were smuggled into the barracks. Late at night, after all lights had been extinguished and we were supposed to be asleep, we were sitting up munching quietly away at these spoils of war with as much gusto and enthusiasm as if enjoying a table d'hote dinner in the luxury of a crack West End hotel.

One day one of our party came in with a cucumber. Where or how he had got it we never knew, and what is more we did not trouble to enquire. The fact that we had come into possession of a dainty sufficed. We fell upon it with a relish which it is impossible to describe. It was divided among us in accordance with our accepted communal practice, and I do not think any article which we secured in Sennelager was ever eaten with such wholehearted enjoyment as that cucumber. But the incident was not free from its touch of pathos. When we sat down to the cucumber we carefully peeled it and threw the rind away. Two days later two others and myself set out to recover that cucumber rind which had been discarded, the pinch about the waist-belt having become insistent. We found it, soiled and shrivelled, but we ate it ravenously.

Major Bach may have wondered why the British civil prisoners did not reveal signs of semi-starvation so readily as those of other nationalities. But we had long since discovered that it was useless to go about the camp with long faces and the bearing of the "All-is-Lost Brigade." We were almost entirely dependent upon our own ingenuity to keep ourselves alive, and we succeeded. The methods adopted may be criticised, but in accordance with the inexorable first law of Nature we concluded that the end justified any means.



CHAPTER XII

THE REIGN OF TERROR—CONTINUED

While for the most part we had been compelled to labour upon sundry duties, we were not hard pushed, being somewhat in the position of the workmen toiling by the hour, except that our efforts went unrewarded in a financial sense. But this system did not coincide with the ideas of Major Bach.

He paraded us one morning and assuming his favourite attitude before us treated us to a little homily. It was a characteristic tirade delivered in the conventional Teuton gramophone manner. But it affected us materially.

Now we were to become slaves in very truth!

The Commandant informed us point-blank that he was extremely dissatisfied with our manner of working. We were too slow: we nursed our tasks. Did we think we were being kept at Sennelager for the benefit of our health or to make holiday? If so that was a fond delusion. Henceforth he was going to estimate a certain time for each task which would have to be completed within the period allowed, even if we had to work every hour God gave us and, if need be, on Sundays as well.

Major Bach never minced matters: he meant every word he said. So upon being dismissed we returned to our barracks looking decidedly glum. Pressure was being applied at every turn now, and it was becoming a pressure which could be felt.

We were soon notified as to the first task which we were to rush through on "contract" time. A big fence was required to enclose a certain area of the camp, and this was to be erected, together with the necessary gates and other details within fourteen days. If we could complete it within a shorter time no complaint would be raised. But he would not allow another day beyond his limit. Major Bach must have been a masterpiece in this particular phase of human endeavour, inasmuch as his anticipated period, as we learned, could not have been reduced by a single day.

The prisoners were divided into gangs, each of which was allotted to a definite operation. Although the erection of this fence constituted the hardest enterprise which we had ever taken in hand we did not flinch. Somehow or other we considered that Major Bach had given expression to an unwarrantable reflection upon our abilities. He practically considered us to be no more nor less than slackers. Well! We would show him what we could do, although prisoners, denied every possible comfort, and half-starved into the bargain. Every man undertook to exert himself to the utmost and to do his level best.

No facilities whatever were extended to us beyond the most primitive of tools. One party was sent into the adjacent woods to fell suitable trees to serve as posts, to trim them of branches, and to the required length of 10 feet. Then they had to be carried by manual effort into the camp where the butt was chamfered and charred in a wood fire as a protection against too rapid decay.

While the posts were being prepared a second party was busily engaged in digging the holes for them. Each hole had to be of a prescribed diameter, by one metre—about 3 feet—in depth, and they were set a certain distance apart. Tree-felling might have been, and undoubtedly was, hard work to inexperienced hands, but hole digging! That was set down as the unassailable limit. Driving the pick and shovel in the rebellious ground was back-breaking in the hot sun and it had to be maintained without pause or slackening.

When the post had been planted the wire-pulling gang came along. The wire used for the purpose was galvanised netting such as is used to enclose chicken runs, game preserves, and tennis grounds, reinforced by one or two equidistantly spaced lines of ordinary wire. It had to be stretched taut by hand and moving the heavy roll by manual effort and uncoiling it as we advanced, demanded not only strength but dexterity. At each post the wire was attached by the aid of a few staples.

Although we laboured zealously the task proved far more formidable than we had anticipated. The fence was 7 feet in height, while I should think that from 600 to 800 yards had to be run. The netting only enclosed three sides of the desired space, the fourth side being fenced in by a belt of trees. In order to get the work done on time and to avoid being compelled to toil on Sundays, we had to labour long and hard. We started shortly after six in the morning, but it was often about half-past six in the evening before we knocked off for the day. We took a strange and inexplicable pride in the enterprise. The fence was not built upon the typical shoddy German lines, but strictly in accordance with substantial British ideas. I may mention that we had good reason to regret this display of zeal and excellent workmanship at a later date.

Seeing that the evening was well advanced before we ceased work we had little time for relaxation. When we stowed our tools for the day we were dog-tired and were hustled into barracks. It was work and sleep in deadly earnest, but we were mighty glad we succeeded in avoiding the threatened Sunday labour, because this was the only day we could devote to our own duties such as mending and washing clothes.

While we were pushing ahead with this task we discussed its coming purposes very animatedly. But none of the guards appeared to have the slightest inkling of its projected application. However, this was immaterial to us. A loud cheer of triumph went up when we had hung the gates, which we had also fashioned at great effort, and the duty was completed. We were beside ourselves with self-satisfaction and delight because we had shown the implacable Major Bach what we Britishers could do when we made up our minds to tackle anything. I very much doubt whether even an equal number of skilled workmen would have completed the fence within the stipulated time, and we for the most part were quite foreign to the trades involved.

When we first entered the camp we were provided with a tolerably satisfactory area of adjacent space in which to exercise ourselves. But as additional prisoners came in this limb-stretching promenade became gradually reduced until at last it was no more than a suburban chicken run in area, being just as long as our barrack by one-half the space between the two rows of buildings. These cramped quarters rather exasperated us because we were denied the pleasure of a little stroll. The exercise yard was also invariably obstructed by clothes hanging on the lines to dry or to air, the result being that within a very short time the British section of Sennelager Camp became vividly reminiscent of a slum in the densely populated districts off the Mile End Road.

The speedy completion of the "big fence" unfortunately set a bad precedent. Major Bach, flushed with the success of his first speeding-up tactics, grew more and more inexorable in this connection. For every job a rigid time-limit was now set, and he did not hesitate to reduce the period to an almost impossible point. The cause was perfectly obvious. He concluded that by setting us an absolutely impossible, though apparently reasonable, enterprise, he would secure the opportunity for which he was so sedulously waiting—to mete us out some new punishment. But somehow or other we always contrived to cheat him in his nefarious designs.

During this period our guard was changed frequently. Men would be withdrawn to make up the losses incurred upon the battlefield. Thus we were brought into contact with the various types of Germans which constitute the Teutonic Empire. Some were certainly not ill-disposed towards us. They mounted guard over us according to their own interpretation of this essential duty. But others slavishly followed the rigid instructions which were laid down, notably the Prussian guards, who were about the most brutal and despicable blackguards it is possible for the whole of Germany to have produced to mount watch and ward over us. One set of guards was withdrawn to bring a Westphalian regiment to fighting strength and proceeded to the front. Afterwards we learned that every man had been lost—killed, wounded or missing.

The severe mauling which the German armies were receiving—we knew nothing about it at the time—undoubtedly was partly responsible for the harsh treatment extended to us. Unable to smash the "contemptible little army," which was certainly proving capable of looking after itself, vengeance was visited upon our defenceless heads.

One day a huge crowd of prisoners was brought in. Whether the Commandant had been advised of their coming or not I am unable to say. But one incontrovertible fact remains—he failed utterly to make any food arrangements to meet the increase in the camp's population. The prisoners reached the camp in the usual famishing condition and were given a small ration. But they were satisfied partially at our expense. The remaining food was only adequate to give us one-half of our usual small dole, and we had to rest content therewith. The canteen being closed we could not make up the deficiency even at our own expense.

My health was now giving way, as a result of my privations in Wesel prison, accentuated by the indifferent and insufficient food and hard work at Sennelager. I was assigned to various light duties. One of these brought me into the cook-house, where I was ordered to cut up the black bread—one brick loaf into five equal pieces, each of which had to last a man through six meals. I was either unfitted for kitchen work or else my presence was resented. At all events I soon realised that my first day in the cook-house would undoubtedly be my last. I had to serve out the bread, and ostensibly, either from lack of experience or nervousness, I bungled my task. The men had to go by the boiler in single file, passing on to the table to receive the bread, where serving was carried out so dexterously that the moving line never paused—until it got to my table. But there was method in my bungling. I was zealously striving to double the bread ration to the British prisoners. Consequently the pieces of bread persisted in tumbling to the ground, thereby hindering and upsetting the steady progress and rhythm of serving. But each man as he stooped to recover a fallen piece received a second hunk surreptitiously, as was my direct intention. However, unfortunately for me, the bread did not go far enough, the outcome being an outburst of further trouble. As I had expected, my room was preferred to my company in that kitchen and I was deposed.

While in Sennelager I had been sedulously keeping an elaborate diary in which I entered details of every incident that befell the camp. I had also recovered my original diary which had played such a prominent part at my trial in Wesel prison.

[*gap]

Now diaries were the one thing in Sennelager which were rigorously debarred. To have been caught with such a record of the doings and my opinions of the German authorities would have brought me an exemplary sentence of solitary confinement or penal servitude in a German prison, if not something worse. Consequently I was compelled to post my diary in secrecy. I discovered a hiding-place which would never have occurred to the guards, even if they had gained an inkling that such a document was in existence.

One of our party fell a victim to chronic asthma, and was isolated, being given a room under the officer's quarters. Someone was required to accompany him to extend assistance and constant surveillance, and selection fell upon me. Locking myself in this room at night, with my sick companion, I used to while away the time preparing some rough notes which I was keeping for a specific purpose in addition to the diary proper, which, however, I left in its original hiding-place.

By some means or other the guard suspected my engagement in some such task. They made several surprise entrances but failed to catch me in the act of writing. The heavy tread of their coming feet always gave me ample warning so that I could get my notes into safe hiding. But one night they burst open the door suddenly and I was caught red-handed. On my knees was my pad at which I was writing feverishly. But the pad was inscribed with notes which I regarded as of an emergency character. Realising the object of their unexpected entry I clapped the pad on the table, thus covering up the prepared and detailed notes which I desired to keep. The guard sprang forward delirious with joy at having made a capture, snatched the loose sheets from the pad, and went off in high glee to report my heinous offence. But the man in his haste left the proper notes on the table. He was too thick-brained to think for a moment that I should ever trouble to prepare two diaries, one for myself and one for capture if detected, so I still held the treasured original, which I instantly hid away safely.

As luck would have it not a word was included in the captured notes to offer written evidence of my private and candid opinion of my captors, their methods and our life. The fact that I had written nothing detrimental to the authorities apparently appeased the Commandant, notwithstanding the enormity of my delinquency. At all events I received nothing worse than a stern admonition and threats of severe punishment if I were caught infringing the regulations again, to all of which I listened humbly, but with my tongue in my cheek.

My diary was posted up fully in due course, and what is more to the point I got the voluminous and incriminating evidence away from Sennelager. At a later date I became somewhat apprehensive as to its safety, and was anxious to get it to England. For some time I was baffled in my efforts, but at last a friendly neutral offered to take it and to see that it was delivered to my friend who has chronicled this story, to whom I had addressed it. This diary wandered about Germany considerably, the person in question preferring to make haste slowly to disarm all suspicion. At last the neutral, after having been searched several times without yielding anything incriminating, got as far as the frontier. About to pass into the adjacent friendly country the carrier was detained, and by some mischance the diary happened to be unearthed.

The neutral was arrested upon some trumped-up charge to afford the authorities time to peruse the incriminating document. Cross-examined the go-between protested ignorance of the contents: the parcel was found just as it had been received from the consignor, the seals were all intact, and it was under delivery to the person whose address was written upon the outside. There was nothing attached to associate myself with the document, although my friend at home would have known instantly whence it had come. The upshot was that the diary was confiscated. I was bitterly mortified to learn its fate when within a stone's throw of safety, because it contained incidents of all descriptions set out in regular sequence, and in a plain unvarnished manner. Its perusal must have stung the Germans pretty severely since it was decidedly unpalatable to Teuton pride. It was a comprehensive indictment of the German treatment of the British prisoners, relative more particularly to Sennelager, which the authorities were firmly determined should never become known to the world at large, and to conceal which they used unceasing efforts. Had that diary got home it would have created a tremendous sensation. My vexation was completed by the thought that the diary contained many episodes and incidents which I can now only recall hazily, but I thanked my lucky stars that I had taken the precaution to keep a precis of the contents which I myself brought away with me, and which has proved of valuable assistance in setting forth this narrative.

A few days after having completed the famous "big fence" we were paraded. Major Bach strode up, obviously in a terrible temper—it was the six o'clock parade—and facing us, roared:

"You English dogs! Barracks are too comfortable for you! You should be made to feed from the swine-tub! Bring all your luggage out—everything you've got, and your sacks of straw! I'll give you ten minutes to do it. Then you'll parade again! Hurry up!"

We were thunderstruck at this order. What was in the wind? Major Bach was adept in springing surprises upon us, but this excelled anything to which we had been treated hitherto.

Speculation was idle. We had only ten minutes to do as we were bidden, and we bustled around to be on parade as demanded. The excitement was intense. We collected every stick to which we could lay a claim, and with all our worldly belongings, as well as our sack of straw, on our shoulders, we trotted out and formed up.

As we paraded, the guards made a diligent search of the barracks to see that we had left nothing behind. Also to make sure that no prisoner was lurking in hiding.

We received the order to march. We tramped along under our bulky and ungainly loads, and found we were being escorted to the enclosure which we had fenced in. We swung through the gate, which was closed behind the last man, and a soldier mounted guard over it. In a flash the truth burst upon us.

We were clapped into the barbed wire prison which we had built with so much energy and in which we had taken such pride!

The look of dismay which settled upon the faces of the more lugubrious members of our party at this typical Teutonic illustration of adding insult to injury was perfectly justifiable. Here were we turned into an open field surrounded by netting, as if we were so many cattle, and in which there were no tents or other buildings except a single small shed. Some of us scurried to this little tumbledown shanty to stow our belongings. We had to parade and were curtly commanded to empty the straw from our sacks. We did so though our spirits dropped to zero at this summary deprivation of our beds. We were told to keep the empty sacks and to secure them against loss or theft, which injunction we did not fail to take to heart.

Then we were left. No one appeared to know what to do with us. We were informed that instructions would be given later. We kicked our heels about in the broiling sun, sprawling here, and lolling there. The hours passed but there was no further development. When noon came and we received no summons for the mid-day meal we commenced to grow apprehensive in spite of ourselves. Fortunately the weather was glorious, although the hot sun, which we could not escape, proved distressing.

As the time wore on we spurred our interpreters to exert themselves on our behalf. They constituted our only means of mediating with our superiors, and we urged them to go to the Commandant to enquire about our rations.

The interpreters went off and succeeded in gaining an audience with Major Bach, who was found in his office conferring with his juniors. Directly he espied our interpreters he yelled testily:

"Dolmetscher! Dolmetscher! I cannot attend to any Dolmetscher now!"

"But," persisted one of the interpreters, "how about the food for—"

"Don't come worrying me now," was the savage interruption. "Get out!"

Our intermediaries came back and their doleful faces told us more eloquently than words that their interview had proved barren.

Some of the prisoners were giving way. A basin of acorn coffee and a small piece of black bread was all we had eaten for breakfast, and we were commencing to feel the pangs of hunger disconcertingly.

In an adjacent field were some British Tommies from Mons. Some of us, tiring of sprawling about on the grass, and with a queer pain gnawing at our stomach, strolled off towards them to secure some distraction and smother the call of "little Mary." The soldiers were hugely delighted to see us and we were soon engrossed in a spirited conversation.

Suddenly our fraternising was observed by some officers who came hurrying up in high dudgeon.

"Here! None of that," they bawled. "Military and civilians must not talk together!" saying which they bundled the soldiers away and evidently reported our offence. At least our guards came up shortly afterwards, marshalled us, and led us through a small wood into a low-lying field. It was apparently another fiendish inspiration of Major Bach to confine us here, because the field was nothing but a swamp. It was not so soddened as to allow the feet to sink ankle deep into the mire, but was like a wet sponge. It was impossible to sit down or one would have got wet through.

We were left standing in this uninviting quagmire for four solid hours. The interpreters were pestered unmercifully to secure us something to eat and to drink, but they were as helpless as ourselves. They were well-nigh distracted at the ugly turn which things were taking. Matters were certainly becoming alarming among the weaker prisoners, who were now in a pitiable condition.

It was not until five o'clock in the afternoon that the authorities suddenly remembered us. Then we were lined up to secure some food. But we passed three hours in that queue only to receive a small dole of filthy looking thin cabbage soup. This was all that had passed our lips since the wretched black coffee served fifteen hours before!

Yet we were thankful for such a meagre mouthful. We were all so famished that we took no heed of the noisomeness of the ration. Now we began to grow anxious as to the arrangements for enabling us to pass the night. Our interpreters had been questioning one or two of the younger officers who were mounting guard over us in this field.

"Oh! That'll be all right," was the retort. "We're going to put you into tents!"

"But where are the tents?" persisted the interpreters, looking around wonderingly.

"Oh," was the evasive reply, "they have commenced to put them up. But we find we shall not get all the tents for a few days. They haven't come in yet! You'll be a bit crowded at first but it'll soon be straightened out."

Again our faces fell. We had been turned out of our barracks before our tents had been procured. This was a dismal look-out, but we hoped that, as the officers said they were putting up tents, we should be able to squeeze under cover, if in discomfort.

We were lined up again in the twilight to receive marching orders. We were escorted into the field, which is set upon the side of a hill, and as we swung into this space we could not suppress an exclamation. The field was alive with men. All the other prisoners had been evicted from their barracks, and had been turned into this open enclosure. The hill-side was black, with a sullen, heaving, listless mass of humanity, numbering over 1,500 all told, and of every conceivable enemy (to Germany) nationality. We scanned the field for a glimpse of the tents, but the only signs of canvas we could see was one large marquee which was lying on the ground ready for erection upon the brow of the hill.

We stood wondering how we were going to spend the night when orders were bawled out that we were to sleep in the open! This intimation was received with a wailing and groaning which sounded ominous to me. But the guard, which had been strongly reinforced, was in overwhelming array so that all discontent and protest counted for naught. A bewildering string of orders was yelled, the substance of which was that we were to shake ourselves down upon the grass in long regular rows, with a narrow passage between each two. I think this was the first occasion upon which I had ever seen so many prisoners give way, since in the majority of cases the men were devoid of any means of making themselves comfortable for the night in the open air. Some of us, including myself, had taken the precaution to bring our blankets with us: indeed, we considered the blanket such an inestimable boon and companion that we never parted with it even for a moment. We rolled ourselves in these, and although the grumblings and growlings which rose and fell over the field recalled the angry murmuring of the sea and were disturbing, I was so exhausted that I soon fell sound asleep.

So far as I was personally concerned I was not particularly sorry that Major Bach, in his devilish intention to exasperate us, had conceived the idea of compelling us to sleep in the open. The weather was intensely hot and the night became insufferably sultry. It must have been about midnight when I awoke for the first time. For the moment I could not collect my thoughts and sat up somewhat surprised at the unusual brilliancy of the light playing upon my face, which was in striking contrast to the dismal blackness of the barracks. Then I realised that we were in the open and that a glorious full moon was shining upon us from a cloudless sky.

I got on my feet and looked around. It was a strange, albeit extraordinarily impressive sight. Guards were patrolling the lines, their bayonets flashing sharply as they caught the glittering silvery light of the moon. My guard came along and ordered me to lie down, but I refused, and, in fact, walked along between the rows of prostrate forms. The air was uncannily still, broken only by the twitterings of night birds, the hooting of the owls, the subdued clanging of rifles, the footsteps of the guards, and the groans of many of the sleepers who were twisting and turning upon the ground. The hill-side was crowded with the restless forms; they seemed so thick and densely packed as to cover every inch of space.

As I surveyed the scene the loneliness and helplessness of our position did not strike me. All was so quiet and apparently peaceful. Now and again a sleeper would stir, mutter something in his sleep about his poor wife and children at home, and would sit up to ascertain what light was playing upon his face, would turn to the moon and then completely satisfied would lie down and relapse into slumber. As I observed the heavy dew which had dressed the grass and sleeping forms with beads which sparkled like diamonds I could not repress a feeling of thanks that the weather was kind to us. Supposing it had rained! I shuddered at the thought.

At 4.30 we were all roused, lined up, and ordered to prepare to receive our breakfast. We formed queues as instructed but we had to wait patiently until eight o'clock before we received our rations—the acorn coffee looking more sickly and watery than ever. Only a few basins were available so we had to drink successively out of the self-same vessel, as rapidly as we could swallow the liquid upon the spot. We closed our eyes to the fact that a hundred or more people of all nationalities, from Frenchmen to Poles, German recruits to Slavs, had drunk a few moments previously from these basins which were not even rinsed after use. The thought was revolting, but it was either drink with a blind trust in the Fates or go without.

During that day the erection of the single marquee was hastened. It was the only tent available, and there were sufficient of us on the field to have packed it to suffocation ten times over! We were compelled to go without our mid-day meal, but this did not disconcert us very pronouncedly. Our peace of mind was being racked by another impending aggravation of our predicament. Dark heavy clouds were gathering in the sky. Was the weather which had been merciful to us during the previous night now going to break?

When the marquee was completed a few trusses of straw were thrown in and distributed thinly over the ground. Then ensued a wild stampede to secure a place beneath the canvas, a rabble of several hundreds fighting frantically among themselves to seek a couch in the absurdly inadequate temporary canvas dwelling. The men stowed themselves in so tightly in close serried rows that when lying down they were unable to turn over. Once a position had been seized the tenant never dared to leave it for an instant for fear it would be seized by some one else. The guards demanded and succeeded in maintaining for a time a narrow gangway between the rows, but the crush became so terrible that even this space was soon occupied and the soldiers were prevented from moving within the tent.

The marquee was packed to suffocation, and the fact that the greater part of the seething mass of humanity was filthy dirty and thickly infested with lice and other vermin from causes over which they had no control caused the atmosphere within to become so hot and foetid as to make one's stomach jump into one's throat.

One glance at the packed marquee sufficed to make up my mind for me. Come what might it would never see me within its walls. Were a light carelessly dropped among the loose straw a fearful holocaust must ensue. Few if any could have got out alive. This thought haunted me so persistently that I moved as far away from the tent as I could.

We received no further rations that day until the evening, when another small dole of watery greasy coffee was handed round as in the morning. But we never glanced at this noisome liquid. The terror which we had been dreading so fearfully had burst upon us. It was raining hard! At first only a gentle refreshing shower, it developed into a torrential downpour, and gave every indication of lasting for an indefinite period. Consider the situation—approximately two thousand human beings stranded upon a bleak exposed field, absolutely devoid of any shelter, except the solitary paltry marquee. Little wonder that our faces blanched at the prospect before us. How should we be able to sleep? What horrors would the dawn reveal? God only knew.



CHAPTER XIII

"THE BLOODY NIGHT OF SEPTEMBER 11"

By ten o'clock in the evening the rain was falling in sheets and the water coursing down the slope to collect in the depression speedily formed a shallow lake at the bottom end of "the field." No one can form the slightest impression of the wretchedness of those who were exposed to the full fury of the elements through the ferocious and brutal inhumanity of Major Bach. The little food which had been served out to us so sparingly failed to keep our bodies warm, let alone fortify us against the visitation by which we were now being overwhelmed.

The wind increased in fury until at last it was blowing with the force of a gale. The trees creaked and bent beneath its onslaughts, and those who had ventured to seek the slight protection afforded by the overhanging branches, trembled with fear lest the trees should be torn up by the roots or heavy limbs be wrenched free and tossed among them.

Those who had secured the shelter offered by the solitary marquee and who, notwithstanding the irrespirable and filthy atmosphere, considered possible suffocation and the danger of fire to be preferable to the drenching rain, were confronted with a new and far more terrifying menace.

The wind catching the broad surface which the tent offered commenced to flap whatever loose ends of the canvas it could pick up, with a wild, nerve racking noise. The whole marquee swung and reeled to and fro, the sport of the boisterous gusts. The main poles creaked as they bent beneath the enormous strains to which they were being put. The guy ropes, now thoroughly saturated and having contracted, groaned fiercely as if about to snap. Hurried efforts were made to slacken the ropes slightly, but the wind, driving rain, and inky blackness of the night, as well as the swollen hemp, hindered this task very effectively. Indeed the tension upon some of the stakes became so acute that they either snapped or else were uprooted.

As the supports gave way the ungainly marquee commenced to totter and rock far more threateningly. The wind driving into the interior flapped the roof madly. The herded humanity within feared that the whole of the canvas above them would be blown off to be carried away by the gale. The inmates who had fought so desperately among themselves for the shelter it offered were now crouching and shivering with fear. Some highly strung individual raised a cry of danger. The next instant there was a wild panic which lasted a considerable time. There was a wicked combined rush to get outside, the men fighting among themselves fiercely.

Outside, upon "the field," bedlam was let loose. The seething mass of humanity was now soaked to the skin. The men walked up and down, their teeth chattering madly, in a desperate effort to keep warm. Indeed it was necessary for many of them to persist in unwilling exercise since this was the only way to keep alive: to stop was to sink down from sheer fatigue. In the darkness I had discovered and kept company with a South African, Moresby White.[5] But it was almost impossible to converse, since we had to shout with all the force of our lungs to make our voices heard above the roar and rattle of the wind and rain. We were compelled to tread warily, because in the Cimmerian darkness it was impossible to distinguish the groaning forms crouching upon the ground.

[Footnote 5: This gentleman has since been released and at the time of writing is recuperating in Great Britain.]



We linked our arms tightly together to form mutual support and persistently plodded hither and thither. The spectacle was terrifying and tested the nerves of the strongest among us. If ever humanity were cast adrift and left to its own devices, it was that night upon "the field." Some of the prisoners were rushing to and fro frantic with fear. Others huddled together as if to keep one another warm. Some were on their knees praying fervently, while other parties were singing hymns in voices which made the strongest-hearted among us blench. Here and there were men stamping furiously up and down cursing at the top of their voices, hurling fierce imprecations to the wind and consigning the Commandant, his superiors, and all their works to everlasting torment. Some of the most exhausted prisoners had congregated together and crouched with their heads bowed to the storm, shivering with cold, afraid to speak, hungry and terror-stricken, yet completely resigned to the fate which they felt convinced must be theirs and absolutely inevitable. A few, whose nerves were highly strung, were striding up and down laughing demoniacally, waving their arms madly, and gesticulating as if their senses had indeed given way. A few of the rougher spirits were blaspheming, and to such a tune that even the most hardened among us were forced to turn our backs to escape their blood-curdling oaths.

As midnight approached the wind and rain increased in fury. Even the guard failed to stand against it. The sentries were drenched from head to foot. The conditions became so bad that an order was suddenly circulated to the effect that the guard was to be changed every two hours, instead of at four-hour intervals. The sentries were quite powerless to assist us even if they had been disposed to come to our aid to mitigate our wretched condition in any way. One guard, his compassion evidently aroused by a scene such as he had never witnessed before, secured some thin stakes and thrust them through the wire netting to form a support to a large blanket. With this he thought that perhaps a little shelter might be obtained. We crowded beneath this precarious protection, but the first blast of the gale which swept the field after its improvisation, whisked the blanket and the stakes into the air. They were never seen again.

About twelve o'clock I was on the verge of collapse. My friend supported me, but even he was faint from lack of food and exposure. We decided to roll our soddened bodies in our saturated blankets, to lie down on the ground and to strive to woo sleep. We stretched ourselves on the flat, but the wind and rain beat unmercifully upon us. Although we were dead-beat the angel of sleep refused to come to us. As a matter of fact, when we stretched ourselves in the mud we did not care two straws whether we ever saw the light of day again or not.

After lying about two hours upon the ground I put out my hand to discover that we were lying in two inches of water. But not only this. The floodwater, in its mad rush to escape to the depression at the lower end of the field, had carved a course through the spot where we were lying. The result was that the rushing water was running down our necks, coursing over our bodies beneath our clothes, and rushing wildly from the bottoms of our trousers. We were acting unconsciously as conduits, but we did not serve in this capacity any longer than we could help.

We regained our feet, our clothes now so water-logged as to bear us down with their weight. We tramped laboriously to the top of the field and as the wind bore down upon us it carried upon its bosom a mad madrigal of hymns, prayers, curses, blasphemy, and raucous shouting. Groups of men were now lying about thickly, some half-drowned from immersion in the pools, while others were groaning and moaning in a blood-freezing manner. Small hand-baggage and parcels, the sole belongings of many a prisoner, were drifting hither and thither, the sport of rushing water and wind. At the lower end of the field the water had sprawled farther and farther over the depression, and therein we could descry men lying in huddled heaps too weak to rise to their feet.

It was a picture of misery and wretchedness such as it would be impossible to parallel. I recalled the unhappy scenes I had witnessed around the railway terminus at Berlin under similar conditions, but that was paradise to the field at Sennelager Camp on the fateful night of September 11. It appeared as if the Almighty Himself had turned upon us at last, and was resolved to blot us from the face of the earth. We were transformed into a condition bordering on frigidity from rain-soaked clothes clinging to bodies reduced to a state of low vitality and empty stomachs. Had we been in good health I doubt whether the storm and exposure would have wreaked such havoc among us.

While my friend and I were standing on a knoll pondering upon the utter helplessness and misery around us, singing and whistling were borne to us upon the wind. We listened to catch fragments of a comic song between the gusts. There was no mistaking those voices. We picked our way slowly to beneath the trees whence the voices proceeded, glad to meet some company which could be merry and bright, even if the mood had to be assumed with a desperate effort.

Beneath the trees we found a small party of our indomitable compatriots. They received us with cheery banter and joke and an emphatic assurance that "it is all right in the summer time." They were quite as wretched and as near exhaustion as anybody upon the field, but they were firmly determined not to show it. A comic song had been started as a distraction, the refrain being bawled for all it was worth as if in defiance of the storm. This was what had struck our ears.

This panacea being pronounced effective a comprehensive programme was rendered. Every popular song that occurred to the mind was turned on and yelled with wild lustiness. Those who did not know the words either whistled the air or improvised an impossible ditty. Whenever there was a pause to recall some new song, the interval was occupied with "Rule, Britannia!" This was a prime favourite, and repetition did not stale its forceful rendition, especial stress being laid upon the words, "Britons never, never, never shall be slaves!" to which was roared the eternal enquiry, "Are we down-hearted?" The welkin-smashing negative, crashing through the night, and not entirely free from embroidery, offered a conclusive answer.

It takes a great deal to destroy a Britisher's spirits, but this terrible night almost supplied the crucial test. We were not only combating Prussian atrocity but Nature's ferocity as well, and the two forces now appeared to be in alliance. The men sang, as they confessed, because it constituted a kind of employment at least to the mind, enabled them to forget their misery somewhat, and proved an excellent antidote to the gnawing pain in the vicinity of the waist-belt. Once a singer started up the strains of "Little Mary," but this was unanimously vetoed as coming too near home. Then from absence of a better inspiration, we commenced to roar "Home, Sweet Home," which I think struck just as responsive a chord, but the sentiment of which made a universal appeal.

But hymns were resolutely barred. Those boisterous and irrepressible Tapleys absolutely declined to profane their faith on such a night as this. It was either a comic song or nothing. To have sung hymns with the swinish brutal guards lounging around would have conveyed an erroneous impression. They would have chuckled at the thought that at last we had been thoroughly broken in and in our resignation had turned Latter Day Saints or Revivalists. These boys were neither Saints, Revivalists nor Sinners, but merely victims of Prussian brutality in its blackest form and grimly determined not to give in under any circumstances whatever.

When at last a suggestion was made that a move would be advantageous, one shouted "Come on, boys!" Linking arms so as to form a solid human wall, but in truth to hold one another up, we marched across the field, singing "Soldiers of the King," or some other appropriate martial song to keep our spirits at a high level, while we stamped some warmth into our jaded bodies, exercised our stiffening muscles, and demonstrated to our captors that we were by no means "knocked to the wide" as they fondly imagined. Now and again a frantic cheer would ring through the night, or a yell of wild glee burst out as one of the party went floundering through a huge pool to land prostrate in the mud. When it is remembered that some of us had not tasted a bite of food for forty-eight hours, and had drunk nothing but thin and watery acorn coffee, it is possible to gain some measure of the indomitable spirit which was shown upon this desperate occasion. The attitude and persiflage under such depressing conditions did not fail to impress our guards. They looked on with mouths open and scratched their heads in perplexity. Afterwards they admitted that nothing had impressed them so powerfully as the behaviour of the British prisoners that night and conceded that we were truly "wonderful," to which one of the boys retorted that it was not wonderful at all but "merely natural and could not be helped." Personally I think singing was the most effective medium for passing the time which we could have hit on. It drowned the volleys of oaths, curses, wails, groans, sobbings, and piteous appeals which rose to Heaven from all around us. If we had kept dumb our minds must have been depressingly affected if not unhinged by what we could see and hear.

Thus we spent the remaining hours of that terrible night until with the break of day the rain ceased. Then we took a walk round to inspect the wreckage of humanity brought about by Major Bach's atrocious action in turning us out upon an open field, void of shelter, and without food, upon a night when even the most brutal man would willingly have braved a storm to succour a stranded or lost dog. As the daylight increased our gorge rose. The ground was littered with still and exhausted forms, too weak to do aught but groan, and absolutely unable to extricate themselves from the pools, mud, and slush in which they were lying. Some were rocking themselves laboriously to and fro singing and whining, but thankful that day had broken. One man had gone clean mad and was stamping up and down, his long hair waving wildly, hatless and coatless, bringing down the most blood-freezing demoniacal curses upon the authorities and upbraiding the Almighty for having cast us adrift that night.

The sanitary arrangements upon this field were of the most barbarous character, comprising merely deep wide open ditches which had been excavated by ourselves. Those of us who had not been broken by the experience, although suffering from extreme weakness, pulled ourselves together to make an effort to save what human flotsam and jetsam we could. But we could not repress a fearful curse and a fierce outburst of swearing when we came to the latrine. Six poor fellows, absolutely worn out, had crawled to a narrow ledge under the brink of the bank to seek a little shelter from the pitiless storm. There they had lain, growing weaker and weaker, until unable to cling any longer to their precarious perch they had slipped into the trench to lie among the human excreta, urine and other filth. They knew where they were but were so far gone as to be unable to lift a finger on their own behalf. Their condition, when we fished them out, to place them upon as dry a spot as we could find, I can leave to the imagination. I may say this was the only occasion upon which I remember the British prisoners giving vent to such voluble swearing as they then used, and I consider it was justified.

In an adjacent field our heroes from Mons were camped and a small party of us made our way to the first tent. We were greeted by the R.A.M.C. Water had been playing around their beds, but they acknowledged that they had fared better because they were protected overhead. The soldiers, however, made light of their situation, although we learned that many of the Tommies, from lack of accommodation, had been compelled to spend the night in the open. Still, as they were somewhat more inured to exposure than ourselves, they had accepted the inevitable more stoically, although the ravages of the night and the absence of food among them were clearly revealed by their haggard and pinched faces.

The men in the tents confessed that they had been moved by the sounds which penetrated to their ears from the field in which the civilian prisoners had been turned adrift. They immediately enquired after the condition of our boys. Unfortunately we could not yield much information upon this point, as we were still partially in ignorance of the plight of our compatriots. But there was no mistaking the depth of the feeling of pity which went out for "the poor devils of civvies," while the curses and oaths which were rained down upon the head of Major Bach with true British military emphasis and meaning revealed the innermost feelings of our soldiers very convincingly.

Seeing that we were exhausted and shivering from emptiness the R.A.M.C. made a diligent search for food, but the quest was in vain. Their larder like ours was empty. In fact the Tommies themselves were as hard-pushed for food as we were.

I witnessed one incident with an English Tommy which provoked tremendous feeling when related to his comrades. He was walking the field soaked to the skin, perishing from cold produced by lack of food, continuously hitching in his belt to keep his "mess-tin" quiet, and on the brink of collapse. He happened to kick something soft. He picked the object up and to his extreme delight found it to be a piece of black bread, soaked with water, and thickly covered with mud. He made his way to the field kitchen where there happened to be a small fire under the cauldron in which the rations were prepared. He slipped the soddened bread beneath the grate to dry it. While he was so doing, the cook, an insignificant little bully, came along. Learning what the soldier was doing, he stooped down, raked out the fire, and buried the bread among the ashes. Then laughing at his achievement he went on his way.

The soldier, without a murmur, recovered his treasure with difficulty. He moved out into the open, succeeded in finding a few dry sticks, lit a small fire, and placed his bread on top of it. Again he was caught. His warder bustled up, saw the little fire, which he scattered with his feet, and then crunched the small hunk of bread to pieces in the mud and water with his iron heel.

The look that came over the soldier's face at this unprovoked demonstration of heartless cruelty was fearful, but he kept his head. "Lor' blime!" he commented to me when I came up and sympathised with him over his loss, "I could have knocked the god-damned head off the swine and I wonder I didn't."

I may say that during the night the guard announced an order which had been issued for the occasion—no one was to light a fire upon the Field. Even the striking of a match was sternly forbidden. The penalty was to be a bullet, the guards having been instructed to shoot upon the detection of an infraction of the order. One man was declared to have been killed for defying the order intentionally or from ignorance, but of this I cannot say anything definitely. Rumour was just as rife and startling among us on the field as among the millions of a humming city. But we understood that two or three men went raving mad, several were picked up unconscious, one Belgian committed suicide by hanging himself with his belt, while another Belgian was found dead, to which I refer elsewhere.

At 5.30 we were lined up. We were going to get something to eat we were told. But when the hungry, half-drowned souls reached the field kitchen after waiting and shivering in their wet clothes for two and a half hours, it was to receive nothing more than a small basin of the eternal lukewarm acorn coffee. We were not even given the usual piece of black bread.

The breakfast, though nauseating, was swallowed greedily. But it did not satisfy "little Mary" by any means. During my sojourn among German prisons I often felt hungry, but this term is capable of considerable qualification. Yet I think on this occasion it must have been the superlative stage of hunger. The night upon the Field had come upon my illness from which I had never recovered completely. It was a feeling such as I have never experienced before nor since, and I do not think it can ever be approached again.