TREATMENT OF PRISONERS

Evening Post, Volume XC, Issue 146, 17 December 1915, Page 7

TREATMENT OF PRISONERS

GERMANY'S REPLY TO CHARGES.

(Received December 17, 9.30 a.m.)

LONDON, 16th December. The Foreign Office, in a White Paper, states that the German authorities say that Major Vandeleur, who escaped from a German camp, was made to travel in a cattle truck owing to his illbred behaviour in refusing to speak to German officers. The British soldiers of the standing army were fit for no particular employment except the care of horses and farm work. Theyi were frequently lazy, obstinate, and arrogant; and there were many nghts between the English and other prisoners, who mutually avoided each other. The authorities deny that the soup was dreadfully unappetising. The Germans say it wa's possibly less palatable than England's extravagant fare.

I [A White Paper published in London on 11th April last, on the treatment of British prisoners in Germany showed that Britain had constantly received proof of German inhumanity, and protested to America. The American Ambassador and Consuls in Germany frequently reported ill-treatment and insufficient clothing and food, harsh restrictions, cruelty to the sick and wounded, and the savagery of the guards. A Russian doctor reported in December that British officers were treated worse than others, and were openly insulted. A French priest saw the Germans kick the British in the stomach and break guns over their backs. They were forced to sleep in marshy places, and many became consumptive. The British were almost starved, and thirty were so tortured that they 'asked to be shot. Major Vandeleur escaped from Crefeld. He reported' that fiftyseven officers and men were packed without food in an unventilatcd horse-wagon, in which there was three inches of manure. They were unable to sit, and remained there for thirty hours. German officers and men brutally assaulted and insulted them on the 'journey to Cologne, which lasted for three days' and nights, when they were again without food. Throughout, the officers were treated fairly well at Crefeld. but the soldiers were treated barbarously. They slept in sodden straw, which was not changed for months, and they were forced to do' all the menial and filthy work for other prisoners. Mr. Gerard, the American Ambassador, reported that the British wounded at Doeberitz were in need of medical attention and extra food. They received daily merely two cups of coffee*, soup, and one-third of a loaf. They got only one blanket, and the German Government refused Mr. Gerard's' request for more clothing. Other instances were given of brutality. Six civilians at Ruhleben were sleeping in a space of lOgft, while twenty-three officers near Magdeburg were herded together, and were gradually starving to death. The prisoners at Ulm are prematurely aged. The above story, the White Paper stated contrasted with the report of Mr. Jackson, of the American Embassy at Berlin, who visited nine detention prisons and ships in Britain, where the food was the same as that given to British soldiers The Germans' chief complaint was that they get too much beef, and too little pork, and white bread instead of black bread, as well as insufficient fresh vegetables. They were in good health, and they were supplied with books and papers. The officers purchased hot break- j fasts and three-course- dinners. They I .«l6o.£Brcha»ed;.winea *md .delicaciesJ * j