WITTENBERG REPEATED

Auckland Star, Volume XLVII, Issue 258, 28 October 1916, Page 5

WITTENBERG REPEATED

PRISONERS LEFT TO DIE. KULTCRED CRUELTY. APPALLING CALLOUSNESS. (Australian aud X.Z. Cable Association.) LONDON, October 27. The British official report on the typhus eyidemic irhich occurred in the spring and summer of 1915 in the prison camp at Gardelegen, in Saxony, reveals! horrifying mismanagement and callous! cruelty on the part of the Germans, equalling that which the Germans snowed to the British and Russian pri-1 soners at Wittenberg. The area of the camp was osoyds by aoOyds. The prisoners were not-allowed to leave it except when engaged in fatigue duties. There was only one bath- j house for 11,000 men, of whom 4,000 were Russians, 6,000 Brench, 700 Belgians, and 230 British. The overcrowding was most terrible. The huts -were devoid of tables and stools. The men sat on beds to eat their I meals. Here lay sick men, and even] dead. The atmosphere by day and night! was indescribably foetid. The food wasi of bad quality, and the prisoners con- , stantly suffered the pangs of hunger.: The Russians, who received few private; parcels, were seen on ttieir hands and : knees crowding round a pit where potato peelings -were thrown, struggling to find a bit of rind. REIGN OF TERROR. Few of the prisoners had boots or overcoate, and their suffering was intensified by the extreme cold and the absence of proper fires. The sanitary conditions were horrible. Twelve hundred men had to congregate at a single standpipe for their personal washing, and. the cleaning of eating utensils and clothes, all without soap. Some of the men were for three months without bathing. As a result, lice swarmed in every garment and blanket. The commandant and the guards established a reign of terror and brutality. The camp was soon in a state of utter misery and desolation. Everyone of them became anaemic and listless. Early in February the authorities, fearing an epidemic, cUose seven British, French, and Russian doctors, and brought them to Gardelegen. The doctors found very small quantities of drugs, including four ounces of Epsom salts, three ov four dozen tablets of quinine, some aspirin and calomel, and a few lint dressings. Cases of sickness numbered 50 daily. A commission of German doctors arrived, and spent an hour at the camp. Half-an-hour later, the -German guards packed up, and soon not a German remained inside the camp. The sick were left utterly unattended, and the kitchens were empty. FIGHT AGAINST DISEASE. Brunner, commandant of the camp, summoned the seven doctors to the edge of the barbed-wire, and told them that sentries would shoot anyone attempting to leave. He added he would return to the spot daily to receive their reports. The doctors were faced vrith an appalling situation. There were no beds for the sick men, and the state of the patients on the floors -was indescribable. No milk or eggs were procurable, co the sick were fed on black bread and raw herrings, like the rest of the prisoners. The doctors commenced to sort the cases, and to isolate the convalescents. The epidemic lasted four months, and totalled 2,000 cases, of whom 14 per cent died. Brunner and other camp authorities were actively hostile throughout. The doctors encouraged games of football, but Brunner ordered the games to be stopped on pain of severe punishment.