by Henry Landau
The venerable Abbé was surprised at our visit. He anxiously inquired after our families; and then, adjusting his spectacles, he gave us a look as much as to say, ‘Well, what’s it all about?’ Glad of the opening, we immediately plunged into our plans. Instead of showing us the door, which he might well have done for broaching such a compromising subject, to our relief, he immediately understood the situation, and the importance of our mission. He regretted that owing to his duties he could not play an active role himself, but Monsieur Dommelier, the editor of the local newspaper, certainly would – he had often expressed a desire for just such an opportunity. He would go and fetch Monsieur Dommelier.
Monsieur Dommelier was all that he had been described. His only regret was that we had not got in touch with him sooner. He thought that we should call into consultation Monsieur Grafetiaux and his wife, proprietors of a large pharmacy; they were patriots, intimate friends of his, and he knew they would wish to participate.
Thanking the Abbé for having started us off on the right road, we adjourned to the pharmacy, and there in the back sitting-room, after Madame Grafetiaux had kindly provided us with a change of clothing, we held a council of war. After spending several hours discussing plans, and going over instructions for the train-watchers, and the itinerant agents, we finally settled on the following organisation: Monsieur Dommelier was to be the chief of the Charleville Platoon, and Madame Grafetiaux was to be his assistant. Between them they were to find the necessary agents to mount four train-watching posts at Charleville to control all troop movements passing through in the directions of Sedan, Rethel, Hirson, and Givet. In addition, they were to enrol itinerant agents to report on all German divisions moving in and out of the region. For courier from Charleville to Gedinne, it was decided that a certain Paul Martin was the man indicated for the job – to their knowledge he had guided several refugees across the frontier, and was a man with the necessary determination and courage. It was arranged that Martin, or whomever they could find as courier, should carry the first batch of reports through to Lucien Voltèche, our forester at Gedinne; and that he would indicate some hiding place in the woods between Gedinne and Monthermé, where thereafter the reports could be deposited and picked up. On our return, we would arrange for a courier from Gedinne to Conneux.
By this time it was already six o’clock. Madame Grafetiaux prepared a good dinner to fortify us for the road; and at eight o’clock we met Georges outside the Abbé’s house. Our newfound friends accompanied us to the outskirts of the town, and there, after many fervent handshakes, and mutual wishes of ‘Good Luck!’ we took leave of them. Once again we were en route. We were tired, but we had the satisfaction of knowing that our mission had been entirely successful.
The first part of the return journey, as far as Breaux, was over a different route; to avoid the woods outside of Charleville, through which Georges was afraid he would not find his way in the dark, they followed the course of the Meuse instead, and passed through Nouzon. Georges brought his two young charges back in safety, though not without several exciting moments (one when they waded into the Meuse to escape the notice of a detachment of troops; another, when Georges failed to locate immediately the place where he had hidden the boat). The 60-odd miles from Gedinne to Charleville and back was accomplished in forty-seven hours – an incredible feat for two young girls travelling on foot across country, and through thick woods.
It was some time before the first reports came through. The recruiting of agents took longer than Dommelier and Madame Grafetiaux had expected. But eventually we received them in Holland. There could have been no better proof of their value than the telegram of congratulations which came back immediately from British GHQ.
The reports came through regularly for a month, and then the same old trouble, the courier service broke down. Lucien Voltèche had gone twice to the cache in the woods, and had found no reports. This was all the ‘White Lady’ knew. Clémie and Marie-Antoinette immediately volunteered to make a second expedition to Charleville, and once again they set out for Gedinne to secure the services of Georges.
Chance modified their plans. On arrival at the family estate, they found an aviation unit installed there. Ever anxious to obtain military information, they made friends with one of the non-commissioned officers. Details of the latest German fighting plane was their objective, but their thoughts were quickly diverted when they discovered that he was leaving for Charleville the next day to bring back supplies with one of his unit’s covered motor lorries. The opportunity was too good to lose, and so with all the guile they could summon up, and using the pretext that they wished to visit a relative, they begged him to hide them in the truck.
Thinking that it was merely a youthful escapade, and, no doubt, not insensible to their charms, the good fellow – as Clémie herself described him – willingly took the risk. It was rash of the non-commissioned officer, if he had been caught it would have meant a court martial; but he knew, as well as did our valiant young friends, that the interior of a military vehicle was the very last place the Secret Police would search for them. He dropped them off at a secluded spot outside of Charleville, and it was there that they met him again the next day.
The journey was safely accomplished and so was their mission. Monsieur Crépel, the Mayor of Nouzon, was a friend of the Grafetiauxs, and as he had to come to Charleville frequently on business for his commune, he was persuaded to act as courier from Charleville to Nouzon. The courier service from Nouzon to Gedinne was undertaken by Lucien Voltèche, and so communications were once again established. They remained intact from then until the Armistice.
CHAPTER 14
SIEGBURG — PRISON FOR WOMEN
THE PERCENTAGE OF women condemned to death was not as great as that of the men. Close to 300 men were shot as spies in the occupied territories. But in the prison sentences, no discrimination was shown. For the women life imprisonment with hard labour was the order of the day.
Prior to their trial, all prisoners were confined in the local prisons in Belgium and occupied France. I have already described the prison regime, and have also told in detail about the stool-pigeons and the third-degree methods employed. Once they had been sentenced, they were transferred, almost without exception, to some prison in Germany; and in the case of the women, it was to Siegburg that they were almost invariably sent (some were also confined in the prisons at Delizch and at Sagan).
The town of Siegburg, situated in the valley of the Rhine, about two hours from Bonn, is a typical Rhineland town, dominated by a ridge of hills whose fertile slopes are covered with vineyards. In the lower end of the town, we find the prison, composed of two T-shaped buildings, one for men, the other for women, surrounded and separated from each other by high prison walls.
The director of both the male and female sections of the prison was one whom I shall call von G., a retired Prussian officer. Having been wounded during the early stages of the war, he seemed to have a grudge against the political prisoners. He was a martinet, and did not have enough generosity to understand that though they had harmed the Germans, they had committed no moral offence against Society. He insisted on an iron discipline, and for the least offence punished the political prisoners with the utmost severity.
On the walls of the cells the following warning was posted: ‘You are now a prisoner. Your window is barred, your door is locked, the colour of your clothing indicates that you have lost your liberty. God has not wished that you continue to abuse it for the purpose of sinning against His laws and those of man. He has brought you here to expiate your crimes. Therefore, bow down under the all-powerful hand of God, bow down under the iron regulations of this prison. If you do not obey willingly, your spirit will be broken. But if you accept humbly the punishment which has been inflicted upon you, the fruit of your submission will be a humbled heart, and a tranquil conscience. God wishes this to be so.’
That was his creed and he carried it into effect. He was universally hated by everyone, e
ven by the German personnel, who felt that they, too, were being watched as von G. went round on his daily tour of inspection. He was arrested by the British when the army of occupation reached the Rhine, but, fortunately for him, he managed to escape.
Frau R., the directress of the female section of the prison, had secured her appointment through influence in higher quarters. The widow of a former army officer, and a woman of some refinement, she seemed at times to have some compassion for the tragic lot of the women under her charge; but any generous impulse by which she might have been moved was never put into effect, for she was completely under the domination of von G., of whom she was in mortal fear.
The prisoner on arrival was taken to the office for an examination of her commitment papers and the establishing of her identity. After this she was taken to the bath house where, in the presence of the ‘Housemother’, she was forced to undress and take a bath. Her clothing was then removed, and she was given her prison outfit.
The prison dress was brown for those sentenced to hard labour, and grey for the others. It consisted of a blouse, and a skirt reaching down to the ankles, both of which were made of a rough woollen material. To this was added a blue and white cotton neckerchief, a white apron, blue and white cotton stockings and sandals. Underclothing was of cotton. This prison uniform remained obligatory until 1917 when, on account of the shortage of clothing, the prisoners were allowed to wear the clothes with which they had entered the prison. If, however, they used this privilege, they were forced to pay for their laundry.
The cells, arranged in three tiers on both sides of a large gallery from which all the doors could be seen at a glance, were 12 ft long, 8 ft wide and 9 ft high. Each contained a small table and an iron bed on which a straw mattress in three sections was placed. Opposite the door was a small barred window, one section of which could be opened with an iron key in possession of the wardress. The windows were only opened for a stated period during the day; however, the prisoners soon learned to open them clandestinely at night with a wooden key of their own manufacture. The heavy cell door contained a peephole, but had to be opened completely to pass food to the prisoners.
An oil lamp, attached to the whitewashed wall, was allowed to be lit for an hour during the winter; but on Sundays and holidays, even this privilege was withdrawn. Lights were extinguished before the evening meal, and it was only by touch that the bowl of thin gruel could be reached. These long hours of darkness, which during the winter often lasted fifteen hours, had a most depressing effect on the prisoners.
At seven o’clock a bell announced that it was the hour to rise. The doors were opened by the wardresses, and the prisoners put out their water jugs and their sanitary buckets. Fifteen minutes later, these were ready to be taken in again. At eight o’clock, 100 grams of black bread and a cup of hot black unsweetened liquid, which passed for coffee, were handed in. Except for two promenade periods in the courtyard, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, each of forty-five minutes’ duration, the prisoners were kept busy in their cells from the morning until the evening meal. Those who were expert with the needle were allowed to make garments; the others were provided with machines with which they stamped out men’s trouser buttons. Sunday was a day of rest. Mass was celebrated at nine o’clock, vespers at one-thirty.
The principal meal of the day was a vegetable soup, served at 11.30 a.m. This was nourishing, but the vegetables were so badly washed that insects often floated on the liquid; hence the name ‘bug soup’ by which it came to be known. Before 1917, a few pieces of meat were occasionally discovered in this soup; but after this period, meat was never seen again. At four o’clock, the prisoners received another cup of black coffee, together with 75 grams of black bread. The final meal, consisting of a bowl of thin gruel, was passed in at six o’clock. The cell doors were then locked, and under no circumstances were they opened again until seven o’clock the next morning.
The food was entirely insufficient to sustain the prisoners, and as food became scarce in Germany, what was offered the prisoners became worse and worse. In the bread, potato meal was used; and in the soup, beetroot became the exclusive vegetable. During March 1917 packets of food started reaching the prisoners from France. It was a godsend. They were allowed to receive 4 lbs of biscuits a week. It was time, for many of the younger prisoners, some of whom were only fifteen years of age, were suffering terribly from hunger. The most pitiful cases, however, were the unfortunate mothers who had given birth to children in the prison, and were not getting enough nourishment to nurse them.
If births occurred at night, they often took place without any assistance. Mothers were permitted to keep their babies for nine months. After this, the infants were either put in a home in Siegburg, or were given out to some German nurse. On one Sunday a month, the mother was allowed to have the child brought to her; the leave-taking was heart-rending, and it was especially sad for the mother to perceive that her baby was gradually forgetting her.
Bad as the food was, it was the lack of medical care, and the insanitary conditions in the prison, which caused the greatest suffering. I have already mentioned the bucket. Those who became ill were required to report sick to the prison doctor. In a long file, outside his office, they could be viewed each morning waiting to see him. The care they received, however, was almost nil. Doctor ‘Get Out’, for this is what the prisoners called him, either prescribed nothing, or gave the same pills for a dozen varied ailments. Some of the prisoners had such little faith in the prison doctor that they were discovered dead in their cells without having approached him. Dysentery, typhoid, and tuberculosis ravaged the prison. A large percentage of the 300 prisoners died within its walls. Prisoners were not even spared the sad task of having to carry the coffins out of the cells.
The number of victims would have been even greater had it not been for the devotion of some of the prisoners, such as Léonie Vanhutte, who were allowed to nurse their companions. Léonie Vanhutte herself contracted typhoid and nearly died.
The case of Louise de Bettignies was typical of the harsh treatment meted out to the prisoners. Having discovered that her companions were engaged in assembling shell fuses without knowing what they were intended for, she encouraged them to refuse the work. For this, she was thrown into a special cell for recalcitrant prisoners. These cells, smaller than the others, contained no furniture other than a narrow wooden plank, which served as a bed. The meagre food ration was also reduced. But von G. relied on the cold to break her spirit. Even though it was mid-winter and the cells were unheated, he removed her blankets and took away from her the woollen underwear which she had brought to the prison, substituting in their place the regulation cotton ones.
Shivering in her cell, Louise contracted pneumonia. For days she hovered between life and death. Eventually she recovered, but her health remained permanently shattered. Shortly afterward, a small tumour appeared in one of her breasts. As it grew at an alarming pace, she was forced to consult the doctor. He quickly diagnosed the malignant growth and urged an immediate operation. Having no faith in him, however, and knowing that the small prison infirmary was not equipped for a major operation of this kind, she asked for permission to be transferred to a clinic in Bonn.
Von G. was adamant. Louise was a prisoner and had no rights. For a time she held out against him; but, finally, realising that she had no alternative, she signed the paper giving the prison doctor the right to operate. The operation, as she had feared, was unsuccessful. It was only when she was dying that von G. eventually granted permission for her to be transferred to a hospital in Cologne. There she died 17 September 1918.
After the Armistice, with full military ceremonial her remains, draped with the French flag and placed on a gun-carriage, were escorted through the streets of Cologne to the railway station, en route to her last resting-place in Lille. General Degoutte and General Simon, representatives of the French and British armies of the Rhine, marched in the funeral procession. This was Louise de Bettignies
, the valiant patriot, whom von G. had treated as a criminal.
No one can adequately portray the tragic lives of these women prisoners. Even worse than the prison treatment was the mental agony they had to endure not knowing what was happening to those who were dear to them.
In spite of all their suffering, not one of these brave women, from the Princess de Croy down to the humblest peasant, regretted having served her country. Those who survived returned home at the Armistice, happy that their sacrifice had not been in vain.
CHAPTER 15
DESERTERS AND A DAME
FROM TIME TO time, German deserters were crossing the frontier into Holland. Our frontier agents reported this; the Dutch papers also occasionally made reference to it.
I was so busy, however, organising our services in Belgium that at first I could not give much attention to it. Besides, how was I to get hold of them? I certainly wasn’t going to compromise our frontier agents by having them lead deserters in uniform to me.
One day, walking on the Blaak, I came face to face with two deserters. Their tattered uniforms and their drawn faces told me their story: they were down and out, wandering around like stray dogs, ready to be pounced upon by the Dutch authorities as vagrants, and sent off to the concentration camp at Alkmaar, which they hated almost as much as being in the German Army.
