HOW GERMANS USE THEIR DEAD.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVIII, Issue 137, 9 June 1917, Page 15

HOW GERMANS USE THEIR DEAD.

DISTILLED FOR SOAP AXD PIG FOOD. Further gruesome details of the industrial uses which the Germans make of their dead are published In the "Times," which quotes the foJtewing from "La Belglque." of Leyden:-^ We have known for long that the Germans stripped their dead behind the firing line, fastened them into bundles of three or four bodies with Iron wire, and then dispatched these grisly bundles to the rear. Until recently the trains laden with the dead were sent to Seralng, near Liege, anil a point north of Brussels, where were refuse consumers. Much surprise was caused by the fact that of late this trntlic has proceeded ln the direction of ('ernlsteln, and it was noted that on each wagon was written "D.A.V.G.." German science is responsible for the ghoulish idea of the formation of the German Offal Utilisation Company, Ltd. ("D.A.V.G." or "Deutsche Abfall-Verwer-tungs Gessellschafr"), a dividend-earning company, with a capital of £250,000, the chief factory of which has been constructed 1000 yards from the railway connecting St. Vith, near tbe Belgian frontier, with Oerolstein, In the lonely, little-frequented Eifel district, south-west of Goblentz. FACTORY GUARDED BY LIVE YVIRKS. This factory deals specially with the dead from the West front. If the results are as good as the company hopes another will be established to deal with the corpses on the East front.

The factory ls invisible from the railway. It is placed deep in forest country, with a specially thick growth of trees about itI.lye wires surround it A special double track leads to It. The works are about 700 ft long and 110 ft. broad, and the railway runs completely round them. In the north-west corner of the works the discharge of the trains takes place. The trains arrive full of bare bodies, which are unloaded by the workers, who live at the works. Tbe men wear oilskin overalls and masks with mica eyepieces. They are equipped with long, hooked poles, and push the bundles of bodies to an endless chain, which picks them up with big hooks, attached to Intervals of 2ft. The bodies are transported on this endless chain Into a long, narrow compart meDt, where they pass through a bath which disinfects them. They then go through a drying chamber. and finally are automatically carried Into a digester, or great cauldron. In which they are dropped by an apparatus which detaches them from the chain. In the digester they remain from six to eight hours, aud are treated by steam, which breaks them up while they are slowly stirred by machinery.

From this treatment result several products. The fat. are broken up Into stearine, a form of tallow, and oils, which require to be redistilled before they can be used. OIL FOR SOAP. The process of distillation Is carried out by boiling the oil with carbonate of soda, and some of the by-products resulting from this is used by German soapmakers. The oil distillery and refinery He In the south-eastern corner of the works. The refined oil is sent out In small casks like those used for petroleum, and is of a yellowish brown colour. The fumes are exhausted from the buildings by electric fans, and are sucked through a great pipe to the north-eastern corner, where they are condensed, and the refuse resulting ls discharged Into a icwcr. There is no high chimney, ns the boiler furnaces are supplied with air by electric fans. There ls a laboratory, and In charge of the works is a chief chemist, with two assists nts and seventy-eight men. All the employes are soldiers, and are attached to the Sth Army Corps. There Is a sanatorium by the works, and under no pretext ls any man permitted to leave them. They are guarded as prisoners at their appalling work.