Edith Cavell

by Diana Souhami

  Sadi Kirschen later wrote that Edith Cavell’s French was fluent, though her English accent was strong. She spoke in a low voice and appeared proud, calm and unafraid. Stoeber put it to her that from November 1914 to July 1915 she harbored French and English soldiers, including a colonel, all in civilian clothes. That she helped give Belgian, French and English of military age the means to get to the front by taking them into her Clinic and by giving them money.

  “Yes,” Edith Cavell replied.

  “With whom did you collaborate in doing this?”

  “With M. Capiau, Mlle. Thuliez, M. Derveau and M. Libiez.”

  “Who was the head of this organisation?”

  “There was no head.”

  “Was it not the Prince de Croÿ?”

  “No. The Prince only sent men to us and gave some of them a little money.”

  “Why have you committed the acts of which you are accused?”

  “At the start I was confronted by two English soldiers whose lives were in danger. One was wounded.”

  Stoeber told her martial law did not carry the death penalty in the event of them being captured. Edith Cavell replied that it was her belief and theirs that if she did not help them they would be shot.

  “Once they were across the frontier did you get news of these men?”

  “Only of four or five of them.”

  “Baucq and Fromage: are they the same person?”

  “Yes.”

  “What was Baucq’s role?”

  “I know little about him. I met him only once. I did not ask what he did.”

  “Do you stand by all you have said at your interrogations concerning the people with whom you have worked, in trying to obtain recruits? That is, with Prince Reginald de Croÿ, Baucq, Séverin, Capiau, Libiez, Derveau, Mlle. Thuliez and Mme. Ada Bodart?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you realise that by recruiting men it has been to the disadvantage of Germany and to the advantage of the enemy?”

  “My aim was not to help your enemy but to help those men who asked for my help to reach the frontier. Once across the frontier they were free.”

  “How many men have you helped get to the frontier?”

  “About two hundred.”

  She was asked if some of the men she helped were French and Belgian. She said they were. “That made a serious difference,” one of the judges said. Another judge asked her if she had been foolish to help English soldiers because the English were so ungrateful.

  “The English are not ungrateful.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because a few of them have written from England to thank me.”

  That was all. No more than ten minutes of questioning, for there were thirty-four other men and women to dispose of in the day.

  Stoeber and the others were keen to incriminate Edith Cavell as the head of a structured recruiting organization for the Allied armies. Her key statement, which her prosecutors chose to ignore, was that she was working not to recruit soldiers but to help trapped men get out of a war zone. Any defense lawyer, given proper process, would not have allowed their elision. Nor would a charge of treason hold against someone who was neither a German national, nor living in Germany.

  She remained in the Senate room after her questioning. One by one the others were called in. She saw the charade unfold. Louise Thuliez was next. Unlike Edith Cavell she faced material evidence against her: the receipt in her bag for lodging six men, the book of coded addresses, a faked identity certificate, copies of Petits Mots du Soldat. She told Stoeber she had helped “about 126” men reach the frontier. He asked her if she had received any subsequent news from them. She said she had not.

  Stoeber then asked her about the structure of the “organisation.” Who was the chief? Who gave the orders? She said it was not like that. They were not divided into chiefs and subalterns. She told him each of them did the best they could and that they were all motivated by the desire to save lives.

  Baucq was questioned next. In reply to the questions was he Belgian and Catholic he said “Oui, et bon patriote.” This angered Stoeber who repeated it time after time, with scathing theatricality, as he asked his accusatory questions. Baucq admitted distributing La Libre Belgique and working with Reginald de Croÿ, Louise Thuliez, Ada Bodart and Edith Cavell to get men to the frontier, but he denied the rest, said he had never guided the men himself and did not know who did what.

  Ada Bodart, who was Irish, admitted sheltering French and English soldiers until Louise Thuliez or another guide came to fetch them. She admitted too that she received a card from one of these men saying he had arrived safely in Holland. She said she did not know the Prince of Croÿ and did not know who organized the guides. She said she took one English soldier to St. Mary’s church in Schaerbeek and handed him over to Baucq.

  So it went on throughout the morning. Little was added to the confessions obtained by Bergan and Pinkhoff. Libiez admitted telling fugitive soldiers, stranded at Wihéries, that they would get help from Edith Cavell at the rue de la Culture. He confessed to making a stamp, with the name of a fictitious commune, to forge identity cards. Capiau said he only wanted to get Allied soldiers out of his district because local people feared German reprisal. He admitted faking passports but denied there was any structured resistance organization with leaders and plans.

  The day was Stoeber’s marathon. He intended to get through all thirty-five cross-examinations by its end. Séverin the chemist stood before him with the same story as the others. He had given refuge to Allied soldiers. He spoke of a day when Edith Cavell brought two wounded English soldiers to him.

  I took them in. But after a while I went to her and asked her to find alternative accommodation for them. She said she did not know where to house all the men who came to her for help. I thought of my old employee Louis Gille. I thought he would make a good guide and get these men to the frontier. He agreed to do it for a payment of 20 or 30 francs per man. I suggested to Miss Cavell that she use him. I loaned her 400 francs.

  Was this to pay for the men’s transport, Stoeber asked.

  “No, it was just a loan. I knew thirteen Frenchmen had asked for her help to get to the border and that she was short of money.”

  Did he hear from them after they had crossed the border, Stoeber asked. Yes, sometimes, Séverin said. Some of them signed their letters with women’s names.

  The Princess de Croÿ, in court, was allowed a chair in front of the judges. Briefed by Braun, knowing her brother had safely escaped, she put the blame on him. In her memoir she wrote she had hoped all the accused might have exculpated themselves by accusing him—but it was hard to see how they could have managed that.

  I am asked if it is true that I am the sister of the Prince of Croÿ. I answer that I am the sister of two Princes of Croÿ, one a Belgian officer at the Front the other of whose whereabouts I am unaware. I am asked if it is true I have housed French and English soldiers who had been hiding in the countryside. Knowing this can be proved I answered Yes.

  Do I own to having photographed these men when they were with me? Yes. Why? Here I had to be careful because to Bergan and Pinkhoff I had denied all knowledge of false papers. I answered that the men required photos to obtain their identity cards to travel to Brussels.

  Did I not know that it was to enable them to leave the occupied territory as I had said in my deposition to the police? I answered “Ainsi qu’on m’a fait dire.” (“As I was made to say.”) This angered Bergan and Pinkhoff for it showed, what was a fact, that they had turned our words and changed their significance in their interpretation. I said my aim in helping these men was to get them out of the Étapes, their lives were in danger, we were continually hearing of men being taken and shot, like at Hiron where eleven soldiers as well as the miller who was hiding them had been shot together.

  Where did these soldiers go?

  To Brussels.

  Who took care of them?

  I don’t know.

  Who
escorted them there?

  My brother and mademoiselle Thuliez.

  Why did you do this?

  Because my brother asked it of me.

  Did you know what danger you ran by acting so?

  One must do one’s duty without thinking of the consequences.

  The session was suspended for lunch at noon. The judges, lawyers and police officers went out to eat. The prisoners stayed under guard in the Senate room. Some had bits of food in their pockets. Libiez offered pieces of chocolate and bread and butter to Edith Cavell and Louise Thuliez. The two women whispered to each other about the progress of the trial. Edith Cavell said, “I think Baucq, Capiau, you and I have a bad chance. But that’s all right as long as we don’t get shot.”

  A tureen of soup was brought for the soldiers. What they left in their bowls they offered to the prisoners. “Most of us refused,” Libiez said. Hot weak coffee was brought in but there was nothing to drink it out of. One of the women offered the heel of her shoe, which caused laughter. The interpreter Herr Brueck returned and shouted at them to be silent. He then shouted at them to stand as the judges entered. Stoeber declared the session reopened.

  The afternoon passed. Prisoner after prisoner was brought in and questioned. A story unfurled: the man who for no money let two Englishmen stay in his garden shed for a few weeks before Louise Thuliez guided them to Brussels. The lawyer who hid a fugitive English soldier for a night. The student, Constant Cayron, who confessed he had given Father Piersoul the address of fifty Belgians of military age who wanted to join the Allied armies, including his own brother who was now fighting in France.

  For most of the prisoners their main consideration was not to recruit for the army they hoped would defeat these German invaders, but to give aid to the traumatized men who came as beggars to their door. Many of the prisoners called, undefended, before the prosecutor that Thursday afternoon, lived in what once was the tranquility of the countryside. They spoke the patois of the Borinage, the coal mining area around Mons. Only in one or two cases was their motivation financial gain. More often they had risked their lives out of simple humanity. That was the common theme. They had no chiefs of staff, no generals or foot soldiers. None of them carried arms, planted bombs, destroyed property, attacked German soldiers. They were citizens conditioned to peacetime who found themselves surrounded by carnage, injustice and wrongdoing on an unprecedented scale.

  Toward the day’s end Lieutenant Bergan was called as a witness. Under oath he swore that his interrogation of the prisoners had been conducted with scrupulous fairness in the presence of two witnesses, Pinkhoff and Neuhaus; that the prisoners’ statements had been read back to them phrase by phrase; that no confession had been obtained under pressure as some of the accused sought to imply. He was convinced, he said, that this was a highly organized ring. All the accused knowingly assisted in sending soldiers and men of military age to join the Allied armies, particularly for Joffre’s recent offensive.19

  Bergan said there were two groups organizing this recruitment drive: one in northern France under the Prince and Princess de Croÿ, Capiau, Derveau, de Belleville and Thuliez, the other in the Mons district headed by Libiez. “The Cavell woman managed the headquarters of the whole thing in Brussels.”

  The only civilian witness, Philippe Bodart, was then called. He was fourteen with black curly hair. His mother Ada was sitting among the prisoners. He was warned if he made a false statement he would get ten years’ hard labor. He was asked if Baucq had taken packages of La Libre Belgique to his mother’s house. Yes, he replied. He was asked if he had heard Baucq say he had mapped a route for escaping soldiers to take to reach the frontier. Yes, the boy said again. Baucq called out that he had said he intended mapping a route, not that he had actually done so. The boy was too young to understand, he called, French was not his usual language, he spoke English at home. Baucq was told to be quiet. The Princess de Croÿ said he put his head in his hands. “His shaking shoulders betrayed his emotion. It was terrible, helplessly to look on at the despair of this brave father of a family, young and with a bright future before him and to realise his life was in jeopardy.” But despair was the currency of this war that destroyed brave fathers and bright futures. Stoeber told the boy to say goodbye to his mother Ada Bodart who faced imprisonment. The boy kissed her. Some of the prisoners cried.

  At 7:00 in the evening the court adjourned. It was to convene again in the morning. Braun conversed with his other titled client, the Countess Jeanne de Belleville. The other lawyers had no words with the prisoners who went out to the waiting black vans and back to their cells at St. Gilles. Hostelet was pleased to find a new gas lamp in his, so that he could see to write to his family. Louise Thuliez ate her evening ration then slept, worn out with fatigue. Baucq wrote in his diary of the Bodart boy, “He has certainly brought me the coup de grâce.”

  And Edith Cavell? She went back to the cell in which she had been for two months alone. She was far now from any consolation of home, the comforting presence of Jack, the attentive respect of her nurses. “The terrible dogs of war,” as she had called them, had bayed her into a trap. She knew she would lose her freedom. She did not know she would lose her life. As ever she prayed: Grant me patience O Lord even now in this emergency. Help me my God and then I will not fear how grievously so ever I be afflicted.

  She laid out her clothes for the morning, then turned the table into her bed. The prison bell would ring at 5:30 for Stoeber and Bergan’s judgment day.

  40

  THE TRIAL: FRIDAY OCTOBER 8

  Next morning, Friday October 8, the court convened at 8:00. This second session was held in the equally ornate Chamber of Deputies. There was the same pomp and ceremony as on the previous day. The uniformed soldiers, the jaded prisoners. As before, the chief accused sat apart from the others, facing their judges, their backs to their so-called counsel.

  For two hours Stoeber gave a theatrical peroration in German. He congratulated the police for apprehending these recruiting agents. The prisoners, he said, had conveyed numberless soldiers and men of military age to Holland via Brussels to join the Allied armies. They had acted in a manner prejudicial to the military power of the German Empire. The soldiers they recruited were at this moment fighting in France against the Fatherland. Each time he alluded to the brave German soldiers who fell as a consequence of this plot, Stoeber turned to the judges to receive an approving nod.

  He said that all admissions by the accused of involvement and culpability had been drawn up by Lieutenant Bergan with meticulous accuracy, carefully translated by Sergeant Pinkhoff, and only signed in each case after being read and accepted. The depositions of the prisoners corresponded exactly with their own statements. There was no truth in the assertion that their words had been distorted. The intention to transmit men to the enemy was clear, though culpability and division of work varied. Most of the accused had disclosed the particular way they worked. Where this was not the case, other prisoners had done so. Stoeber then went through the prisoners’ crimes:

  EDITH CAVELL was among the chief organizers. Between November 1914 and July 1915 at the Nursing School at 147 rue de la Culture she received fugitive soldiers in civilian clothes, including an English colonel, and Belgian and French men of military age who wished to join the Allied army. She looked after them and gave them funds to facilitate their journey to the frontier and to the ranks of the Allies. She escorted the men brought to her in Brussels, to prearranged places, to hand them over to waiting guides who were known to her. She had confessed that she received news of the safe arrival in Holland of several of these men.

  LOUISE THULIEZ between March and July 1915 took to Brussels, or arranged to be taken by special guides, fugitive French and English soldiers and French and Belgian men of military age, from parts of northern France occupied by the Germans. She collaborated with the Prince du Croÿ to seek out such men. She had been seriously incriminated by Miss Cavell as one of the people with whom arrangements were ma
de to convey soldiers to the Allied army. She had further infringed decrees of the Governor General, dated November 4 and December 15, 1914, paragraph 9b, on the law on the state of siege, by circulating La Libre Belgique on a large scale and distributing contraband letters by means of Les Petits Mots du Soldat.

  PHILIPPE BAUCQ between June and August 1915 had assisted Cavell, Thuliez, Bodart and the Prince de Croÿ in conveying soldiers to the Allied armies. He set on their way soldiers of military age after nominating a leader among them. Miss Cavell had admitted that under the name of Fromage he procured guides for the journey to the frontier. He had revealed his strategies to a secret agent interned with him in his cell. Prisoner Bodart had named him as a member of the Comité pour l’Éloignement des Mobilizables. Mme. Bodart’s son had heard him telling his mother about routes to the frontier for soldiers setting out to rejoin the ranks.

  THE COUNTESS OF BELLEVILLE took English and French soldiers and Belgians of military age from Montigny sur Roc to Miss Cavell’s house for transport to the frontier. She was in close communication with the Prince de Croÿ who brought English soldiers to her. After she handed them over to Miss Cavell she told the Abbé de Longueville what had been done. The Abbé himself transported soldiers but had escaped. The Countess gave Miss Cavell’s address to Belgians and French of military age and told them to go to Brussels. She acted as a guide and obtained false papers for these men. She was one of the prisoners chiefly implicated in this business of conveying soldiers and recruits to the enemy ranks.