The New York Times Current History, A Monthly Magazine: The European War, March 1915Various
History
The New York Times Current History, A Monthly Magazine: The European War, March 1915
Various
World War, 1914-1918
At Bonvillers, on the 21st, 23d, and 25th of August, twenty-six houses
were set on fire by the Germans, who made use of squibs and candles.
At Einville, on the 22d of August, the day the Germans arrived, they
shot a Town Councilor, M. Pierson, whom they wrongfully accused of
having fired on them. They also executed, without reason, MM. Bouvier
and Barbelin, whom they had taken away a short distance from the
village. They also massacred a poacher called Pierrat, whom they had
found carrying a sack containing a small net and a gun in pieces. The
wretched man was terribly tortured by them. Having dragged him beyond
the village, they brought him back in front of Mme. Famose's house.
This lady saw him pass by in the midst of the Germans. His nose was
nearly cut off. His eyes were haggard and, to quote the witness's
remark, he seemed to have aged ten years in a quarter of an hour. At
this moment an officer gave an order and eight soldiers went off with
the prisoner. When they returned ten minutes later without him one of
them said in French, "He was already dead."
On the 12th of September M. Dieudonne, Mayor of Einville, was taken
off as a hostage with his assistant and another of his townsmen by the
enemy at the time of their retreat. He and his companions were taken
to Alsace, then into Germany, where they were kept until the 24th of
October. Before his arrest, and during a fight which took place around
his commune, M. Dieudonne had been forced, notwithstanding his
protests, to commandeer several of his townsmen in order to bury the
dead. Three of the inhabitants of Einville thus forcible employed on
this duty were wounded by bullets; another, M. Noel, was killed by a
fragment of a shell.
The farm of Remonville, situated within the boundaries of the same
village, was burned down. The women were able to escape. Four men who
were working on this estate must have been all killed. The bodies of
two of them, Victor Chaudre and Thomas Prosper, were discovered two
months later buried together near the buildings which had been burned.
Both had been decapitated, and Thomas's head was smashed to pieces.
At Sommerviller the enemy's course on the 23d of August was marked by
the sack of the cafes and grocers' shops and of several private
houses, and by the murder of M. Robert, aged 70, and M. Harau, aged
65, who were killed by rifle shots. The latter at the moment when he
received his death wound was quietly eating a piece of bread.
At Rehainviller, on the 26th of August, the Germans seized the cure,
Barbot, and M. Noircler in the street. The bodies of these two men
were found a long time afterward buried in the fields a few hundred
meters from the village. Their bodies were in an advanced state of
decomposition, and it was therefore impossible to ascertain the wounds
which the cure had received; as for Noircler, his head was found in
the grave by the side of the rest of his body, in a line with his hip.
[Illustration: AVIATOR-COMMANDANT MARCONNAY
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