Part 9 (2/2)

On the whole I think that they sympathised with the prisoners and did their best to obtain a bettering of the conditions of their confinement. The prisoners organised themselves in their various barracks, each barrack having a captain of the barrack, the captains electing one of their number as a camp captain or _Obmann_.

The man who finally appeared as head man of the camp was an ex-cinematograph proprietor, named Powell. In my mind he, a.s.sisted by Beaumont and other captains, conducted the affairs of the camp as well as possible, given the difficulty of dealing with the prisoners on one hand and the prison authorities on the other hand. Naturally he was always subject to opposition from many prisoners, among whom those of aristocratic tendencies objected to being under the control of one not of the highest caste in Great Britain; and there were others who either envied him his authority or desired his place. The camp authorities allowed Powell to visit the Emba.s.sy at least once a week and in that way I was enabled, to keep in direct touch with the camp. At two periods during my stay in Berlin I spent enough days at the camp to enable every prisoner who had a complaint of any kind to present it personally to me.

The organisation of this camp was quite extraordinary. I found it impossible to get British prisoners to perform the ordinary work of cleaning up the camp, and so forth, always expected of prisoners themselves; and so, with the funds furnished me from the British Government, the camp captain was compelled to pay a number of the poorer prisoners to perform this work. Secretaries Ruddock and Kirk of our Emba.s.sy undertook the uninteresting and arduous work of superintending these payments as well as of our other financial affairs. This work was most trying and they deserve great credit for their self-denial. By arrangement with the British Government, I was also enabled to pay the poorer prisoners an allowance of five marks a week, thus permitting them to buy little luxuries and necessities and extra food at the camp canteen which was early established in the camp. I also furnished the capital to the camp canteen, enabling it to make its purchases and carry on its business. In this establishment everything could be purchased which was purchasable in Germany, and for months after the commencement of the war articles of luxury were sold at a profit and articles of food sold at a loss for the benefit of those who required an addition to the camp diet. There was a street in the camp of little barracks or booths which the prisoners christened Bond Street, and where many stores were in operation such as a tailor shop, shoe-maker's, watch-maker's, etc. Acting with Powell, I succeeded in getting the German authorities to turn over the kitchens to the prisoners. Four of the prisoners who did most excellent self-denying work in these kitchens deserve to be specially mentioned. They were Ernest L. Pyke, Herbert.

Kasmer, Richard H. Carrad and George Fergusson.

The men in this camp subsisted to a great extent upon the packages of food sent to them from England. Credit must be given to the German authorities for the fairly prompt and efficient delivery of the packages of food sent from England, Denmark and Switzerland to prisoners of war in all camps.

In Ruhleben the educated prisoners volunteered to teach the ignorant: two hundred and ninety-seven different educational courses were offered to those who desired to improve their minds. A splendid orchestra was organised, a dramatic society which gave plays in French and one which gave plays in English and another one which gave operas. On New Year's day, 1916, I attended at Ruhleben do really wonderful performance of the pantomime of ”Cinderella”; and, in January, 1917, a performance of ”The Mikado” in a theatre under one of the grand stands. In these productions, of course, the female parts were taken by young men and the scenery, costumes and accessories were all made by the prisoners. There was a camp library of over five thousand volumes sent over by the British Government and a reading and meeting hall, erected by the American Y. M. C. A. There was even a system of postal service with special stamps so that a prisoner in one barrack could write to a friend in another and have a letter delivered by the camp postal authorities.

The German authorities had not hired the entire race track from the Race Track a.s.sociation so that I made a special contract with the race track owners and hired from them the in-field and other portions not taken over by German authorities. Here the prisoners had tennis courts and played hockey, foot-ball and cricket and held athletic games. Expert dentists in the camp took care of the poorer prisoners as did an oculist hired by me with British funds, and gla.s.ses were given them from the same funds.

The prisoners who needed a little better nourishment than that afforded by the camp diet and their parcels from England, could obtain cards giving them the right to eat in the Casino or camp official restaurant where they were allowed a certain indicated amount of wine or beer with their meals, and finally arrangements were arrived at by which the German guards left the camp, simply guarding it from the outside; and the policing was taken over by the camp police department, under the charge of the prison camp commander and committee. The worst features, of course, were the food and housing. Human nature seems always to be the same. Establishment of clubs seems inherent to the Anglo-Saxon nature. Ten or more persons would combine together and erect a sort of wooden shed against the brick walls of a barrack, hire some poorer person to put on a white jacket and be addressed as ”steward,” put in the shed a few deck chairs and a table and enjoy the sensation of exclusiveness and club life thereby given.

Owing to the failure of Germany and Great Britain to come to an agreement for a long time as to the release of captured crews of s.h.i.+ps, there were in Ruhleben men as old as seventy-five years and boys as young as fifteen. There were in all between fifty and sixty of these s.h.i.+ps' boys. They lived in a barrack by themselves and under the supervision of a s.h.i.+p's officer who volunteered to look after them as sort of a monitor. They were taught navigation by the older prisoners and I imagine were rather benefited by their stay in the camp. I finally made arrangements by which these boys were released from England and Germany. With the exception of the officers and crews of the s.h.i.+ps, prisoners were not interned who were over fifty-five.

The British Government was generous in the allowance of money for Ruhleben prisoners. The amount allowed by the German Government to the camp commanders for feeding the prisoners was extremely small, only sixty pfennigs a day. At first many of the camp commanders made contracts with caterers for the feeding of the prisoners and as the caterers' profit had to come out of this very small sum the amount of food which the remainder purchased for the prisoners was small indeed. As the war went on the prisoners'

department of the war office tried to induce the camp commanders to abandon the contractors' system and purchase supplies themselves.

A sort of convention of camp commanders was held in Berlin which I attended. Lectures were there given on food and its purchase, and methods of disinfecting prisoners, on providing against typhus, and on housing and other subjects. A daily lunch was served, supposed to be composed of the exact rations given at the prison camps.

The schedules of food, etc., made out by the camp commanders and furnished to foreign correspondents were often not followed in practice. I know on one occasion when I was at the camp at Doeberitz, the camp commander gave me his schedule of food for the week. This provided that soup with pieces of meat was to be given on the day of my visit, but on visiting the camp kitchen I found that the contractor was serving fish instead of meat. Some of the camp commanders not only treated their prisoners kindly but introduced manufactures of furniture, etc., to help the prisoners to pa.s.s their time. The camps of Krossen and Gottingen deserve special mention. At Giessen, the camp commander had permitted the erection of a barrack in which certain prisoners who were electrical experts gave lessons in electrical fitting, etc., to their fellow prisoners. There was also a studio in this camp where prisoners with artistic talent were furnished with paints and allowed to work. As more and more people were called to the front in Germany, greater use was made of the prisoners, and in the summer of 1916 practically all the prisoners were compelled to work outside of the camps. They were paid a small extra sum for this, a few cents a day, and as a rule were benefited by the change of scene and occupation. The Russians especially became very useful to the Germans as agricultural laborers.

Professor Alonzo E. Taylor of the University of Pennsylvania, a food expert, and Dr. D. J. McCarthy, also of Philadelphia, joined my staff in 1916 and proved most efficient and fearless inspectors of prison camps. Dr. Taylor could use the terms calories, proteins, etc., as readily as German experts and at a greater rate of speed. His report showing that the official diet of the prisoners in Ruhleben was a starvation diet incensed the German authorities to such fury that they forbade him to revisit Ruhleben.

Professor Buckhaus, the German expert, agreed with him in some of his findings. I do not know what will happen to the Professor, who seemed willing to do his best for the prisoners. He wrote a booklet on the prison camps which he asked permission to dedicate to me, but the War Office, which published the book, refused to allow him to make this dedication. It was a real pleasure to see the way in which Dr. Taylor carried on his work of food inspection; and his work, as well as that of the other doctors sent from America to join my staff, Drs. Furbush, McCarthy, Roler, Harns, Webster and Luginbuhl, did much to better camp conditions.

Dr. Caldwell, the sanitary expert, known for his great work in Serbia, now I believe head of the hospital at Pittsburgh, reported in regard to the prison diet: ”While of good quality and perhaps sufficient in quant.i.ty by weight, it is lacking in the essential elements which contribute to the making of a well-balanced and satisfactory diet. It is lacking particularly in fat and protein content which is especially desirable during the colder months of the year. There is considerable doubt whether this diet alone without being supplemented by the articles of food received by the prisoners from their homes would in any way be sufficient to maintain the prisoners in health and strength.”

Dr. Caldwell also visited Wittenberg and found the commander by temperament, and so on, unfitted for such a position.

The Germans, as Dr. Taylor has pointed out, tried to feed prisoners on schedule like horses. There is, however, a nervous discrimination in eating so far as man is concerned; and a diet, scientifically fitted to keep him alive, may fail because of its mere monotony.

Think of living as the prisoners of war in Germany have for years, without ever having anything (except black bread) which cannot be eaten with a spoon.

Officer prisoners were, after matters had settled down and after several bitter contests which I had with the German authorities, fairly well treated. There was, as in the case of the camps for the privates, a great difference between camps, and a great difference between camp commanders. Mr. Jackson did most of the visiting of the officers' camps. In many camps the officers were allowed a tennis court and other amus.e.m.e.nts, as well as light wine or beer at meals, but the length of the war had a bad effect on the mental condition of many of the officers.

A great step forward was made when arrangements were entered into between Germany and Great Britain whereby wounded and sick officers and men, when pa.s.sed by the Swiss Commission which visited both countries, were sent to Switzerland; sent still as prisoners of war, subject to return to Germany or England respectively, but the opportunity afforded by change of food and scene, as well as reunion of families, saved many a life. By arrangements between the two countries, also, the severely wounded prisoners were set free. I believe that this exchange of the heavily wounded between the Germans and the Russians was the factor which prevented the entrance of Sweden into the war. These wounded men traversed the whole length of Sweden in the railway, and the spectacle afforded to the Swedish population of these poor stumps of humanity, victims of war, has quite effectually kept the Swedish population from an attack of unnecessary war fever.

Officers and men who tried to escape were not very severely punished in Germany unless they had broken or stolen something in their attempt. Officers were usually subjected to a jail confinement for a period and then often sent to a sort of punitive camp.

Such a camp was situated in one of the Ring forts surrounding the city of Kustrin which I visited in September, 1916. There the officers had no opportunity for exercise except in a very small courtyard or on the roof, which was covered with gra.s.s, of the building in which they were confined. I arranged, however, on my visit for the construction of a tennis court outside. The British officers in Germany practically subsisted on their parcels received from home, and during the end of my stay a much better tea could be had with the prison officers than with the camp commander. The prisoners had real tea and marmalade and white bread to offer, luxuries which had long since disappeared from all German tables. On the whole, the quarters given to the officers'

prisons in Germany were not satisfactory, and were not of the kind that should have been offered to officer prisoners of war.

At the time I left Germany there were nearly two million prisoners of war in the Empire, of whom about ten thousand were Russian officers, nine thousand French officers and about one thousand British officers.

As a rule our inspectors found the hospitals, where the prisoners of war were, in as good condition as could be expected.

I think this was largely due to the fact that so many doctors in Germany are Jews. The people who are of the Jewish race are people of gentle instincts. In these hospitals a better diet was given to the prisoners. There were, of course, in addition to the regular hospitals, hospitals where the severely wounded prisoners were sent. Almost uniformly these hospitals were clean and the prisoners were well taken care of.

[Ill.u.s.tration: IN RUHLEBEN CAMP. A SPECIMEN BOTH OF THE PRISONER-ARTIST'S WORK AND OF THE TYPES ABOUT HIM.]

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