HUN BRUTALITIES

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 284, 20 August 1918, Page 5

HUN BRUTALITIES

AMERICAN PRISONERS SAVAGELY TREATED ANOTHER CHAPTER OF HORROR (Rec. Angus; 39, 5.5 p.m.) New York, August 18. Tlio "World's" correspondent at Oldenzaal, on tlio Dutch-German frontier, interviewed Sergeant Sehwarts Leigh, who deserted the 74th Pomeranian Regiment iiftdi- serving na a guard at the prison camps. Ho says; 'Tho Germans, acting on Headquarters' authority, are outdoing their own record of cruelly towards American prisoners. Tlicy have adopted the policy of 'tho fewer 'Americans who return home tho befaer for us,' applying 11,141 so-called 'sharp regime' and 'preventive punishment,' whereby Americans aro punished before committing offencea and sont to tho Kuestrin reprisal camp, where tjiey are compelled "to work from 18 to 20 hours daily. The guawls are instructed to shoot if the prisoners sit down, and crush their skulls, with their bayonets if they collapse. The food consists nf dirty thin soup aiid bread, and the latter is missing three I'unes a week. Those making complaints are punished, standing motionless in the sun for three days. Tho Americans are compelled to fill tlio fish ponds, using only a water glass, with one month's solitary confinement on thoir failure to fill -.lie pond. "Americans are conveyed in chains to Russia, and exhibited while a lecturer explained the German victories. Oil one occasion an American broke his handcuffs and assaulted the lecturer. Tho prisoner was shot. Negroes aro especially cruelly treated, and flogged mercilessly for the 'slightest otEctice. GernianAmericnn prisoners are treated kindly, for the purpose of trying to organise a Ijrigado to fight for Germany, but the German-Americans refuse to eat the extra bread rations when ot'iar American prisoners are not supplied. At the railway stations the polico invite tho populace to insult and spit n\ tho Americans. saying, 'The war prolongers aro here!"'—Aus.-N.Z. Cable Assn.