BRITISH HONOR AT STAKE.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LI, Issue 16870, 27 October 1925, Page 7

BRITISH HONOR AT STAKE.

THE CHARTERIS’ INTERVIEW. WAS CORPSE STORY TRUE OR FALSE? (Australian anil N.Z. CnhWt Association) LONDON, October 25. Mr. Baldwin is intervening in the Charteris’ controversy, but nothing is to be done until General Charteris’ return. The official viewpoint is that no Government could do other than disavow responsibility for the invention. It is pointed out that the report that the Germans were utilising human corpses arose from statements in Germany’s own newspapers. The Lokal An/.vigor Is war correspondent on October 4, .1917, referred to the groat, corpse conversion establishment' at Evergnicourt. The word used was ‘ ‘ kadaververwertmigsanstalt. ’ ’ Similar statements appeared in other Gorman newspapers. The British captured a photographically reproduced order to the sixth German army dated December 21, 19.16, reading that it was necessary to again draw attention to the fact that when corpses .are delivered to corpse utilisation establishments details are to accompany them showing which troops and units they are from, the date of death and illness, also information regarding opi ionics. A search of the war museum failed to reveal the forged diary to which General Charteris’ speech referred. .In Hie newspaper Despatch, Sir Sydney Low, an ex-member of Northeliffe’s propaganda committee, states: “Our main guiding rule was to toll the truth, not • the /whole truth, which was impossible during wartime. We did not invent or knowingly circulate falsehoods. Accordingly, I am utterly confounded fit Charteris’ stunning declaration that he, when one of the heads of the Intelligence Department, deliberately forged one of the most terrible indictments of Germany’s brutality and callousness. When the Germans explained that the corpse factory disposed of animals, not human beings, I accepted the denial. The question was never settled because the Germans refused to allow neutrals to examino the vat; for the corpses. If General Charteris’ version is correct, wo owe Germany an apology, which should be fully and frankly given. A Tank Corps officer, in a letter to the Dispatch, recalls during the battle of St. Quentin in 19.18 that he found an underground tunnel near Hie St. Quentin canal containing Inigo vats, one of which contained three naked German corpses bound with wire. Another was three-quar-ters full of nil unspeakably horrid liiquad wherein was a body stripped to the waist. He says he firmly believes it was a corpse conversion factory, although the Germans stated a was a kitchen which a shell nun. destroyed.

The Dailv News’ New York correspondent rebuts Charteris’ assertion that he was incorrectly reported. Ho asserts that he telephoned Charteris, who admitted its accuracy, stating that, the story was an isolated instance of a deliberate invention in the cause of British propaganda. Mr. Lloyd George, interviewed, said: “We knew the story could not be true. Therefore it was never officially issued. I did not believe it ami will not now.” Mr. 0. L. Mnstorman, then head of the Propaganda Department, said that lie examined the story and found the word “kndnver” did not apply to human beings. Tt was applicable only to horses. _ , General Campbell says that he visited St. Quentin tunnel and saw the vats. He was convinced the bodies wore being refined down.