WITTENBERG CAMP.

Press, Volume LII, Issue 15605, 1 June 1916, Page 3

WITTENBERG CAMP.

j INHUMAN GERMAN CRUELTY. I MOST TERRIBLE STORY OF THE WAR. CntOM OCR OW.V CORRESPONDENT.) LONDON, April 21. Wittenberg Camp was devastated oy a typhus epidemic during the first mx months of 1010. Russians, French, and English to the number of about 1.,°00 were herded together in a space of under eleven acres. One Russian,' rcnchman, and Englishman were directed to sleep on one mattress, with tho result that the typhus germs brought originally by the Russian prisoners ot war, were carried bv lice to the other prisoners. In an incredibly si.oit space oI time-the camn was a stricken plague snot. The"German medical men ran away, and the German guards refused to enter the camp, while medical supplies in sufficient ! quantities were refused by the German ! ant horities. Six British doctors fought j gallantly against, the epidemic, and j threo of them gave up their lives. . »hen thev asl.'od for medical rcquij Sites tho Germans only replied with I mutterings of "pigs ot Englishmen," j and the Kaiser showed iiis appreciation | by conferring the Iron Cross on the leading German medical officer in charge of the f.aL-;i, The horrors of * Wittenberg Camp deserve never tn bo iorgotton so long as the English tongue is spoken. Tne terrible and inhuman cruelly of the Germans proves that they have made no progress' in the path of civilisation since tiie hideous atrocities practised in the 1 hirty Years War. The report is signed by Mr Justicc i ounger, and is based on information collected from prisoners of war repatriated from Wittenberg, and especially on information given by Major. I riestlev. Captain Vidal, and Captain Lauder, of the R.A.M.C. Overcrowd- I ing at Witte.nburg was serious right from the start. The British prisoners numbered between 700 and 800. There ! was a much larger number of French and' Belgians, but the Russians always ; greatly preponderated over all the i others. It is believed that before and ! during the progress of the typhus j there were at least 15,000 prisoners in ! the camp, and there may have been as many as 16,000 or 17,000 —an enormous population for so restricted an area as 10} acres. Tho men passed a terrible winter. There was very little coal, they had no coats, and the food was bad and insufficient.

And the sjiread of typhus, when it [ fame, was much facilitated by a camp regulation, not. confined to Wittenborg._ which enjoined that the prisoners of ail nationalities should bo mixed together. Normally, there was only one mat-tress for every three prisoners, and every British prisoner was compelled to hare on© French and ono Russian prisoner to share his mattress with him. Now typhus, as was fully recognised by the Russian doctors themselves, was, unfortunately to some extent—but through no fault of their own—latent among somo of the Russian troops, and it is a well-known medical fact that lice are the great carriers of that disease, while it is, of course, notorious that the men of all armies in the field, including the British. ai'o plagued with lice. As a protection asainst typhus, therefore, tho separation of the-infected area's is an elementary precaution. But at "W'ittenbers no adequate measures were taken even to free the prisoners, on their arrival at the camo, from the lice. The only provision for - personal-clean-liness tliere made for the men was ono cupful of soft soap issued at intervals of many weeks to a r.oom containing at least 120. GERMAN STAFF DEPART. The epidemic broke out in December, lf'll. Thereupon Dr. Aachenbach and his assistants precipitately left the camp, and thencforth nntil tho month of August. 1915, with the exceptions detailed later, no communication was held between tho prisoners and their guards, except by means of directions shouted from tho guards or officers remaining outside the wire entanglements of the camp. All. supplies for the men were nushed into tho camp over chutes. The food for the hospital and medical officers was passed in on a trolly over about 20 yards of rail,; worked ,by winches at cither end so as to avoid all contact between the prisoners and the outside world. No medical attention during the wholo timo was provided by the German staff.

Oil February 10th, 1913, six British Ti.A.M.C. officers were sent to Wittenberg. They were also .prisoners of ■war, and had been detained in spite of the Geneva. Convention. Their names were:—Major Fry, Major J'riestlev, Captain Sutcliffe. Captain Field, C'ajxtnin Vidal, and Captain (then Lieut.)' Lauder. No reason was given for the order that they should <;o to Wittenberg, and it, Mas from the

guard on the train that they first .heard of typhus there. A SCENE OF HORROR. On arrival at Wittenberg they were marched to the camp. They Visited the different compounds. They were received in apathetic silence. The rooms were nniighted, the men were aimlessly marching up and down; some wore lying on the floor probably sickcning tor typhus. When they got. into the open air again Major' Fry broke down; The horror of it all was more than he could for_ the moment bear. Later :n the evening Major Priestley and Captain Vidal were directed to go to two temporary hospitals outside the camp, Major Priestley to the Kronprinz Hospital and Captain Vidal ito tin- Elbariin Hospital, at which places they wore kept until March. 7th, 191-J. j Of the four officers left behind, Cap- . tain Lauder alone survives, and the Venditions as lie describes them during ' thp period between February 11th and : Marr-h 7th are full of horror. The : wonder is that any prisoner escaped • infection. j Tiie camp conditions were too much ! for each of the four medical officers, who were left there; three of them, Major Fry, Captain Suteliffe, and Captain Field, were attacked by the. dis- ; ease and died. There is no doubt in : the minds of the committee that the conditions to which the camp authori- | ties had reduced the camn and the : prisoners they bad abandoned, was j directly responsible for the deaths of I these devoted men. Lieutenant Lnti- ! der was finally stricken with the disease on March 7th. after having for ! three days, with a temperature due to typhus, stuck to his work, there being no one then to take his v>!ace. :He alone of the officers attacked finnl'v recovered. When convalescent, ho brave'v rrcmied his duty. On Mnr°h 7th, Major PWest'ey and CapI tain Vidal were d< .-ctcd to return to the main wove met there Iby Cant ain Field. Maicr Fry and Captain SntrliTo were t'-en dying. Lieutenant Lauder, as above explained, was in the early stnsres of tyobus. Two Russian medical .ironornk were in command in the hospital. was then I about a thousand cases of typhus in | the camp, and frc«h enses were eom- ; ing in at the rate ef about fifty, and sometimes more, a dav. There were at that time some 150 British cases. A MOVING ARMY OF VERMIN. The British sick were lying scattered among the French and the Russians, lying sometimes dressed in French, Belgian, or Russian uniforms, i which made them difficult to recognise. Major Priestley saw delirious men wav- ! ing arms brown to the elbow with ! faecal matter. _ The patients were, alive | with vermin; in the half light he at- ' tempted to brush what he took to he ;an accumulation of dust from the folds of a patient's clothes, and ho discovered it to be a moving mass of vermin. In one room in Compound No. .3' tho patients lay so close to one another on the floor that he had to stand straddle-legged across to examine them. Tho doctor could not obtain a sufficient supply of . drugs or dressings, and | the terrible state of affairs continued for some time. Major Priestley, Captain Vidal, and Captain Lauder worked hard and devotedly, and a gradual improvement act in. THE KAISER'S DECORATION. On one occasion only during tho whole course of the epidemic did Dr. Aschenbach enter the hospital or even .tho camp. His visit_ took place about four weeks after Major Priestley's arrival, and after some kind of order had been evolved. He came attired in a'complete suit of protective cloth- j ing, including a mask and rubber gloves. His inspection was brief and I rapid. For his services 'n combating the epidemic Dr. Aschenbach, thp committee understand, has been awarded the Iron Cross.

The dead were buried in a cemetery formed out of a part of the camp. The Germans sent in a certain number of coffins every day into which the bodies of tho dead were put, and carried outby their comrades through a gate in the barbed wire. Thero was not sufficient room for burial of so many, and the coffins were piled one upon another, but the eommittco do not think there was any special danger in the arrangement. What the prisoners found hardest to bear in this matter were the icers with which the coffins were frequently greeted by the inhabitants, of Wittenberg, who stood outside'the wire, and were permitted to insult their dead. During the first two months the typhus was hsemorrhagic typhus; it was of a milder type later'on: There were between 250 and 300 English cases, and there were sixty deaths among them. In the earlier days it was often necessary to discharge the patients from hospital before they were fit to be removed. In many cases these men had to go back to their barrack room and lio on the bare floor, as no fresh beds or mattresses. were provided for a long time. Captain Vidal srT-s that the conditions were thoroughly realised by tho German . authorities _ without, anv effort being made to bring about an improvement. "PIGS OF ENGLISH." Incredible as it may seem, the action qf the officers and guards in precipitately deserting the camp and thenceforth controlling its caged inmates with loaded rifles from the outside was only in keeping with the methods and conduct of these men throughout. The

cruelty of the administration at Wittenberg Camp from the very beginning has become notorious. Savage dogs were habitually employed to terrorise the prisoners; flogging with a rubber whip was frequent: men were struck with little or no provocation, and were tied to posts with their arms above their heads for hours. And the callousness during the outbreak even of so prominent an officer as Dr. Aschenbacn is illustrated by an incident related by Captain Lauder. Shortly after 'their arrival at the camp, Major Fry, with Captain Lauder, was begging Dr. .AscTjenuach, standing outr- : side the entanglements., for some medical requisite urgently reauired. One of his staff with Dr. Asclienbach was apparently favourably inclined towards the request, but it was curtly refused by Dr. Aschenbach, who turned away with the words, "Schwcine Enrjlaendcr." Mr Justice Younger is forced to the conclusion that the terrible sufferings and privations of the afflicted prisoners during the period under review were directly chargenble to the deliberate cruelty and neglect of the German officials whose elementary duty it was. in the words of the Geneva Convention, to respect and take care of these men, wounded and sick as they were, without distinction of nationality, but who acted as if neither that Convention j nor even the ordinary instincts of humanity had any place in their scheme of things. The commandant during the whole time was General von Das-sel. The committee believe that lie has now been removed from a position which he always was unfitted to occupy. | In conclusion. Major Priestley. Cap- ; tain Vidal, and Captain Lauder are specially thanked for their work in fightinsj the epidemic, and the report concludes: —"And all these officers concur in pra'sing the splendid bearing of the orderlies. They each of them volunteered for the work. tended prisoners of all nationalities. They all of them with full understanding, for they were all warned, risked their lives without a thought, and many of them died at their post. The committee hone to bo able in due course to supp'y his Majesty's Government with a full list, of thcfe heroic souls. Tho committee feel that every one of these officers and men as truly offered his life for the sake of others as any soldier on the battlefield, and they venture to liopo that the devoted service of sunn of them as survive will be. duly remembered at the proper time."