German Barbarism: A Neutral's Indictment — John Shaqi
German Barbarism: A Neutral's IndictmentMaccas, Léon
History
German Barbarism: A Neutral's Indictment
Maccas, Léon
World War, 1914-1918 -- Atrocities
Among savage races, or even nearer home, before certain agreements had
been made between nations, poisoned or barbed arrows, small shot, pounded
glass, and soft-nosed bullets were used to aggravate the condition
of wounded enemies to the worst possible extent. To-day all these
contrivances are prohibited, with the consent of Germany, who signed
the conventions which embodied this prohibition. German jurists like
Bluntschli approved this concurrence of opinion, and the German General
Hartmann declared that for a long time these kinds of projectiles have
gone into the lumber-rooms of arsenals.
This fact, however, did not prevent Germany from resorting in this war to
the use of weapons of the same kind, or even the still more formidable
dum-dum bullets. Moreover, dum-dum bullets are expressly specified among
the list of prohibitions laid down by the Hague Conference, 29th July,
1899, prohibitions signed by Germany and her ally Austria. These declare
that “the contracting parties forbid the use of bullets which expand or
easily get flattened in the human body, such as bullets with a hard outer
case which does not completely cover the core or is notched at the end.”
THE USE OF DUM-DUM BULLETS IN BELGIUM
The report of the military governor of Ghent, Lieutenant-general L.
Clooten, and the results of experiments made by M. V. Rousseaux, armoury
expert at Antwerp, prove indisputably that these bullets were in use
among the Germans. The following is the report—
“_Headquarters at Ghent, 26th September, 1914._
“SIR,
“I have the honour to send herewith some cartridges with
bullets of the kind called ‘dum-dum,’ seized on the Hanoverian
Lieutenant von Halden, who was taken prisoner at Ninove, by my
troops, on the 29th inst.
“This officer’s pistol, which he threw away shortly before his
capture, could not be found again.
“LIEUTENANT-GENERAL L. CLOOTEN,
“Military Governor.”
The following is the result of the experiment made by M. V. Rousseaux—
“The box with green label which you send me (20 cartridges
for Mauser self-loading pistols of calibre 7·63) must have
contained full cartridges. It contains three rows of expanding
dum-dum bullets, taken from the special boxes with yellow
labels. These bullets were made to expand by the process of
manufacture, and it is impossible to make them so by hand.
“V. ROUSSEAUX,
“Armoury Expert.
“_Antwerp, 28th September, 1914._”
THE USE OF DUM-DUM BULLETS ON FRENCH SOIL
The first instance of the use of dum-dum bullets on French soil goes back
to the early days of the war. It was denounced by the French Government
in the protest which they addressed (21st August, 1914) to the signatory
powers of the Hague Convention.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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