Part 23 (2/2)

1. The hospital train, This says ”Hospital which reached Potsdam on train” (singular). I August 4, and was there described hospital trains unloaded, brought wounded (plural). It may be true men from various troop that one train did not divisions. There were no contain any Prussian Guards.

Prussian Guards among them. I did not happen to see that train. All the trains that I saw unloaded Prussian Guard Reserves.

2. No wounded man is I have never said that kept concealed in Germany. any wounded man was All are consigned to kept concealed in Germany.

public hospitals or I have pointed out lazarets, where they may that the whole system of at any time be visited the German placing of the by their relatives and wounded is to hide from friends. the German population, and especially in Social Democrat districts, the extent of their wounded.

3. Hospital trains travel This is absolutely untrue.

by day as well as by night, The number of wounded arriving and, in accordance with at the depots in Germany is instructions, are unloaded now so great that the trains only in the daytime. In are obliged to be unloaded case they reach their whenever they arrive, by day destination during the or by night. I have witnessed night, the regulations both.

provide that they are to wait until the following morning before unloading.

4. In order that the loading The whole of this paragraph or unloading of the vehicles is a transparent distortion which transport the wounded of fact. What happens at to the lazarets may proceed Potsdam and what happens as rapidly as possible, it everywhere else is that a is necessary to keep the cordon of police surrounds surroundings of the train the scene and, drives the clear. The wounded must public by force in the usual also be spared all annoyance Prussian way, if necessary, and curiosity on the part from the scene. I described of the public. the method by which I witnessed what was going on at the railway station from the railway station refreshment room itself.

5. Dead men have never been I saw the dead men removed.

unloaded from the lazaret trains at Potsdam--therefore there could have been none on August 4, 1916. The principle of transporting the wounded is based upon the ability of the wounded to bear transportation.

All those who suffer during the journey are removed to a hospital at the frontier.

6. The furniture vans A transparent untruth used for transporting on the face of it. If only wounded to the hospitals one train came into Potsdam at Potsdam and other why use furniture vans at cities have proved a great all? The furniture vans success. These vans, are used for purposes of moreover, all bear the sign concealment, and because of the Red Cross, and may the very large ambulance easily be recognised as supply always on duty at hospital vehicles. the great military hospitals at Potsdam was unequal to the task. I saw no Red Cross indications.

7. That men who are My statement is that all seriously wounded should the German wounded at give one an impression of the present stage of the weariness goes without war, lightly or otherwise, saying. Lightly wounded compare badly with the men who travel from the English and French Somme to Boulogne may wounded, whom I have make a better appearance seen. They are utterly than the seriously wounded war weary and suffering who have made the long not so much from sh.e.l.l journey from the West shock as from surprise front to Potsdam. shock, the revelation of the creation of a British Army that had never occurred to the German soldiers.

8. As to the great ”Hus.h.!.+ I have made inquiries hus.h.!.+ machinery”--what is of British officials, and one to call the attempt they tell me that it is to keep the truth from absolutely untrue that the neutrals by closing channel is closed to English harbours near the neutral s.h.i.+pping when the Channel to neutral s.h.i.+pping English hospital transports for whole days at a proceed to England.

time--during which the This untruth is on a par English s.h.i.+p-transports of with the others.

wounded proceed to England?

9. The figures published An interesting revelation by the Ministry of War as to German casualty lists.

concerning the numbers of It is stated by this head men dismissed from lazarets medical officer of Potsdam (hospitals) are based upon that these lists are drawn up unquestionable statistics. from the men _dismissed_ from These statistics remain as lazarets (hospitals), that is given--despite all the to say, this doctor admits aspersions of our enemies. that the custom is now to keep back the casualty lists until the man is _discharged_, whereas your British lists, I am informed on authority, are published as speedily as possible after the soldier is _wounded_. The whole of the German wounded now in hospitals have not yet, therefore, been included in casualty lists--the casualties which are forcing the Germans to employ every kind of labour they can enslave or enroll from Belgium, Poland, France, and now from their own people from sixteen up to sixty years of age of both s.e.xes.

10. It would prove interesting For obvious reasons I to learn the name of the decline to subject my ”patriotic German Statesman,” friend to the certain who is said to cherish the punishment that would follow same opinions as this writer disclosure of his name.

in the _Daily Mail_.

I regret to burden readers with a chapter so personal to myself, but I think that anyone who studies these German denials with the preceding chapter on the Contalmaison wounded will learn at least as much about the German mind as he would by studying the famous British White paper of August, 1914.

CHAPTER XXIV

GERMANY'S HUMAN RESOURCES

Three factors are of chief importance in estimating German man-power. First, the number of men of military age; second, the number of these that are indispensable in civil life; third, the number of casualties. Concerning the last two there are great differences of opinion among military critics in Allied and neutral countries. As regards the first there need be little difference, although I confess surprise at the number of people I have met who believe the grotesque myth that Germany has systematically concealed her increase in population, and that instead of being a nation of less than seventy millions she has really more than one hundred millions.

It is safe to say that at the outbreak of war Germany was a nation of 68,000,000, of whom 33,500,000 were males. Of these nearly 14,000,000 were between 18 and 45; 350,000 men over 45 are also with the Colours. The boys who were then 16 and 17 can now be added, giving us a grand total of some 15,000,000.

Normally Germany employed men of between 18 and 45 as follows:--Mines, 600,000; metals, 800,000; transport, 650,000; agriculture, 3,000,000; clothing, food preparation, 1,000,000, making a total of 6,050,000.

Up to this point there can be little difference of opinion. From this point on, however, I must, like others who deal with the subject, make estimates upon data obtained. During my last visit to Germany I systematically employed a rough check on the figures derived through the usual channels. Concentrated effort to obtain first-hand information in city, village, and countryside, north, east, south, and west, with eyes and ears open, and vocal organs constantly used for purposes of interrogation, naturally yielded considerable data when carried over a period of ten months. The changes from my last visit and from peace time were also duly observed as were the differences between Germany and the other nations I had visited during the war. Walking, of which I did a colossal amount, was most instructive, because it afforded me an opportunity to study conditions in the villages. Discreet questioning gave me accurate statistics in hundreds of these that I visited, and of many more hundreds that I asked about from people whom I met on my travels. For example, in Oberammergau, which had at the beginning of the war 1,900 inhabitants, about 350 had been called to the Colours when I was there, and of these thirty-nine had been killed.

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