Anyone who has worked in hospitals
will realize how important it is for the health of
the staff, nurses and doctors, that they should get
out into the fresh air for at least some part of every
day. It is still more necessary in a war hospital,
for not only is the work more exacting, but the cases
themselves involve certain risks which can only be
safely taken in perfect health. Practically every
one is septic, and to anyone in the least run down
the danger of infection is considerable; and infection
with some of the organisms with which one meets in
war is a very serious thing indeed. We had four
large motors in Antwerp belonging to the members of
our hospital, and always at its service, and every
afternoon parties were made up to drive out into the
country. As a rule calls were made at various
Croix Rouge posts on the way, and in that way we kept
in contact with the medical service of the army in
the field, and gave them what help we could. We
were always provided with the password, and the whole
country was open to us a privilege we very
greatly appreciated; for after a hard morning’s
work in the wards there are few things more delightful
than a motor drive. And it gave us an opportunity
of seeing war as very few but staff officers ever
can see it. We learnt more about the condition
of the country and of the results of German methods
in one afternoon than all the literature in the world
could ever teach. If only it were possible to
bring home to the people of Britain one-hundredth part
of what we saw with our own eyes, stringent laws would
have to be passed to stop men and women from enlisting.
No man who deserved the name of man, and no woman
who deserved to be the mother of a child, would rest
day or night till the earth had been freed from the
fiends who have ravaged Belgium and made the name of
German vile.
One afternoon towards the end of September
we visited Termonde. We heard that the Germans,
having burnt the town, had retired, leaving it in
the hands of the Belgian troops. It was a rare
opportunity to see the handiwork of the enemy at close
quarters, and we did not wish to miss it. Termonde
is about twenty-two miles from Antwerp, and a powerful
car made short work of the distance. Starting
directly southwards through Boom, we reached Willebroeck
and the road which runs east and west from Malines
through Termonde to Ghent, and along it we turned
to the right. We were now running parallel to
the German lines, which at some points were only a
couple of miles away on the other side of the Termonde-Malines
railway. We passed numerous Belgian outposts
along the road, and for a few miles between Lippeloo
and Baesrode they begged us to travel as fast as possible,
as at this point we came within a mile of the railway.
We did travel, and it would have taken a smart marksman
to hit us at fifty miles an hour; but we felt much
happier when we passed under the railway bridge of
a loop line at Briel and placed it between ourselves
and the enemy. The entrance to Termonde was blocked
by a rough barricade of bricks and branches guarded
by a squad of soldiers. They told us that no
one was allowed to pass, and we were about to return
disappointed, when one of us happened to mention the
password. As without it we could not possibly
have got so far, it had never occurred to us that
they might think we had not got it; and as we had
no possible business in the town, we had no arguments
to oppose to their refusal to let us in. However,
all was now open to us, and the cheery fellows ran
forward to remove the barrier they had put up.
Termonde is, or rather was, a well-to-do
town of 10,000 inhabitants lying on the Scheldt at
the point where the Dendre, coming up from the south,
runs into it. A river in Belgium means a route
for traffic, and the town must have derived some advantage
from its position as a trade junction. But it
possesses an even greater one in the bridge which
here crosses the Scheldt, the first road bridge above
the mouth of the river, for there is none at Antwerp.
At least six main roads converge upon this bridge,
and they must have brought a great deal of traffic
through the town. When we mention that a corresponding
number of railways meet at the same spot, it will be
seen Termonde was an important centre, and that it
must have been a wealthy town. The Dendre runs
right through the centre of the town to the point
where it joins the Scheldt, and on each side runs a
long stone quay planted with trees, with old-fashioned
houses facing the river. With the little wooden
bridges and the barges on the river it must have been
a very pretty picture. Now it was little better
than a heap of ruins.
The destruction of the town was extraordinarily
complete, and evidently carefully organized.
The whole thing had been arranged beforehand at headquarters,
and these particular troops supplied with special
incendiary apparatus. There is strong evidence
to show that the destruction of Louvain, Termonde,
and of several smaller towns, was all part of a definite
plan of “frightfulness,” the real object
being to terrorize Holland and Denmark, and to prevent
any possibility of their joining with the Allies.
It is strictly scientific warfare, it produces a strictly
scientific hell upon this world, and I think that
one may have every reasonable hope that it leads to
a strictly scientific hell in the next. After
a town has been shelled, its occupants driven out,
and its buildings to a large extent broken down, the
soldiers enter, each provided with a number of incendiary
bombs, filled with a very inflammable compound.
They set light to these and throw them into the houses,
and in a very few minutes each house is blazing.
In half an hour the town is a roaring furnace, and
by the next day nothing is left but the bare walls.
And that is almost all that there was left of Termonde.
We walked along the quay beside a row of charred and
blackened ruins, a twisted iron bedstead or a battered
lamp being all there was to tell of the homes which
these had been. A few houses were still standing
untouched, and on the door of each of these was scrawled
in chalk the inscription:
“Güte Leute,
nicht Anzünden,
Breitfuss, Lt.”
One wondered at what cost the approval
of Lieutenant Breitfuss had been obtained. His
request to the soldiers not to set fire to the houses
of these “good people” had been respected,
but I think that if the Belgians ever return to Termonde
those houses are likely to be empty. There are
things worse than having your house burnt down, and
one would be to win the approval of Lieutenant Breitfuss.
We crossed the Dendre and wandered
up the town towards the Square. For a few moments
I stood alone in a long curving street with not a
soul in sight, and the utter desolation of the whole
thing made me shiver. Houses, shops, banks, churches,
all gutted by the flames and destroyed. The smell
of burning from the smouldering ruins was sickening.
Every now and then the silence was broken by the fall
of bricks or plaster. Except a very few houses
with that ominous inscription on their doors, there
was nothing left; everything was destroyed. A
little farther on I went into the remains of a large
factory equipped with elaborate machinery, but so
complete was the destruction that I could not discover
what had been made there. There was a large gas
engine and extensive shafting, all hanging in dismal
chaos, and I recognized the remains of machines for
making tin boxes, in which the products of the factory
had, I suppose, been packed. A large pile of
glass stoppers in one corner was fused up into a solid
mass, and I chipped a bit off as a memento.
In the Square in front of the church
of Notre Dame the German soldiers had evidently celebrated
their achievement by a revel. In the centre were
the remains of a bonfire, and all around were broken
bottles and packs of cheap cards in confusion.
Think of the scene. A blazing town around them,
and every now and then the crash of falling buildings;
behind them Notre Dame in flames towering up to heaven;
the ancient Town Hall and the Guard House burning across
the Square; and in the centre a crowd of drunken soldiers
round a bonfire, playing cards. And miles away
across the fields ten thousand homeless wanderers
watching the destruction of all for which they had
spent their lives in toil.
Of the ancient church of Notre Dame
only the walls remained. The roof had fallen,
all the woodwork had perished in the flames, and the
stonework was calcined by the heat. Above the
arch of a door was a little row of angels’ heads
carved in stone, but when we touched them they fell
to powder. The heat inside must have been terrific,
for all the features of the church had disappeared,
and we were surrounded by merely a mass of debris.
In the apse a few fragments of old gold brocade buried
beneath masses of brick and mortar were all that remained
to show where the altar had been.
The Town Hall was once a beautiful
gabled building with a tall square tower ending in
four little turrets. I have a drawing of it, and
it must have formed quite a pleasing picture, the
entrance reached by the double flight of steps of
which Belgium is so fond, and from which public proclamations
were read. It had been only recently restored,
and it was now to all intents and purposes a heap of
smoking bricks. The upper part of the tower had
fallen into the roof, and the whole place was burnt
out.
But no words can ever convey any idea
of the utter destruction of the whole town, or of
the awful loneliness by which one was surrounded.
One felt that one was in the presence of wickedness
such as the world has rarely seen, that the powers
of darkness were very near, and that behind those
blackened walls there lurked evil forms. Twilight
was coming on as we turned back to our car, and a cold
mist was slowly rising from the river. I am not
superstitious, and in broad daylight I will scoff
at ghosts with anyone, but I should not care to spend
a night alone in Termonde. One could almost hear
the Devil laughing at the handiwork of his children.