But while the British permitted our Embassy in Paris to inspect the prisoners of war at Havre, the Germans for months refused to allow me permission to send anyone to inspect those British prisoners at Libau.
Cases came to my attention where individual corps commanders on their own initiative directed punitive measures against the prisoners of war in their districts, on account of the rumours of the bad treatment of German citizens in England. Thus the commander in the district where the camp of Doeberitz was situated issued an order directing reprisals against prisoners under his command on account of what he claimed to be the bad treatment of German women in England. It required constant vigilance to seek out instances of this kind and cause them to be remedied.
I did not find the Germans at all efficient in the handling of prisoners of war. The authority was so divided that it was hard to find who was responsible for any given bad conditions. For instance, for a long period of time I contended with the German authorities for better living conditions at the civilian camp of Ruhleben. I was promised time and again by Colonel Friedrich, by the camp commander and by the Foreign
Office that these conditions would be remedied. In that camp men of education, men in delicate health, were compelled to sleep and live six in a box stall or so closely that the beds touched each other in hay-lofts, the outside walls of which were only four feet high.
I finally almost in despair wrote identical personal letters, after having exhausted all ordinary diplomatic steps, to General von Kessel, Commander of the Mark of Brandenburg, to the commander of the corps district in which the Ruhleben camp was situated, and to the Minister of War: and the only result was that each of the officers addressed claimed that he had been personally insulted by me because I had presumed to call his attention to the inhuman conditions under which the prisoners were compelled to live in the Ruhleben camp.
The commander of this civilian camp of Ruhleben was a very handsome old gentleman, named Count Schwerin. His second in command for a long time was a Baron Taube. Both of these officers had been long retired from the army and were given these prison commands at the commencement of the war. Both of them were naturally kind-hearted but curiously sensitive and not always of even temper. 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, assisted 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 Embassy 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 Embassy 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 Association 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 glasses 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 ships, 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 ships’ boys. They lived in a barrack by themselves and under the supervision of a ship’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 ships, 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 pass 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 quantity 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 amusements, 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 passed 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 grass, 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.
[Illustration: IN RUHLEBEN CAMP. A SPECIMEN BOTH OF THE PRISONER-ARTIST’S WORK AND OF THE TYPES ABOUT HIM.]
At Ruhleben there was a hospital which in spite of many representations was never in proper shape. In addition, there was in the camp a special barrack established by the prisoners themselves for the care of those who were so ill or so weak as to require special attention but who were not ill enough to be sent to the hospital. This barrack was for a long time in charge of a devoted gentleman, a prisoner, whose name I have unfortunately forgotten, but whose self-sacrifice deserves special mention.
I arranged with the camp authorities and the German authorities for permission to enter into a contract with Dr. Weiler. Under this contract Dr. Weiler, who had a sanatorium in the West of Berlin, received patients from Ruhleben. Those who were able paid for themselves, the poorer ones being paid for by the British Government. This sanatorium, occupied several villas. I had many disputes with Dr. Weiler, but finally managed to get this sanatorium in such condition that the prisoners who resided there were fairly well taken care of.
An arrangement was made between Great Britain and Germany by which civilians unfit for military service were sent to their respective countries, and just before I left I effected an arrangement by which all civilians over forty-five years old, with the exception of twenty who might be held by each country for military reasons, were to be released. I do not know whether this arrangement was actually carried out in full. With the lapse of time the mental condition of the older prisoners in Ruhleben had become quite alarming. Soldier prisoners, when they enter the army, are always in good physical condition and enter with the expectation of either being killed or wounded or taken prisoner, and have made their arrangements accordingly. But these unfortunate civilian prisoners were often men in delicate health, and all were in a constant state of great mental anxiety as to the fate of their business and their enterprises and their families. In 1916, not only Mr. Grafton Minot, who for some time had devoted himself exclusively to the Ruhleben prisoners, but also Mr. Ellis Dresel, a distinguished lawyer of Boston, who had joined the Embassy as a volunteer, took up the work. Mr. Dresel visited Ruhleben almost daily and by listening to the stories and complaints of the prisoners materially helped their mental condition.
The Germans collected all the soldier prisoners of Irish nationality in one camp at Limburg not far from Frankfurt a. M. These efforts were made to induce them to join the German army. The men were well treated and were often visited by Sir Roger Casement who, working with the German authorities, tried to get these Irishmen to desert their flag and join the Germans. A few weaklings were persuaded by Sir Roger who finally discontinued his visits, after obtaining about thirty recruits, because the remaining Irishmen chased him out of the camp.
I received information of the shooting of one prisoner, and although the camp authorities had told Dr. McCarthy that the investigation had been closed and the guard who did the shooting exonerated, nevertheless, when I visited the camp in order to investigate, I was told that I could not do so because the matter of the shooting was still under investigation. Nor was I allowed to speak to those prisoners who had been witnesses at the time of the shooting. I afterwards learned that another Irishman had been shot by a guard on the day before my visit, and the same obstacles to my investigation were drawn about this case.
The Irishmen did not bear confinement well, and at the time of my visit among them many of them were suffering from tuberculosis in the camp hospital. They seemed also peculiarly subject to mental breakdowns. Two devoted Catholic priests, Father Crotty and a Brother Warren from a religious house in Belgium, were doing wonderful work among these prisoners.
The sending out of the prisoners of war to work throughout Germany has had one very evil effect. It has made it to the financial advantage of certain farmers and manufacturers to have the war continued. The Prussian land owners or Junkers obtain four or five times as much for their agricultural products as they did before the war and have the work on their farms performed by prisoners of war to whom they are required to pay only six cents a day. When the _Tageblatt_ called attention to this it was suppressed for several days.
At many of these so-called working camps our inspectors were refused admission on the ground that they might learn trade or war secrets. They succeeded, however, in having the men sent outside in order that they might inspect them and hear their complaints. There were in Germany about one hundred central camps and perhaps ten thousand or more so-called working camps, in summer time, throughout the country. Some of the British prisoners were put to work on the sewage farm of Berlin but we succeeded in getting them sent back to their parent camp.
The prisoners of war were often accused of various breaches of discipline and crimes. Members of the Embassy would attend these trials, and we endeavoured to see that the prisoners were properly represented. But the Germans often refused us an opportunity to see the prisoners before their trial, or even before their execution. The case of Captain Fryatt is in point.
Captain Fryatt who commanded a British merchant ship was captured and taken to the civilian camp at Ruhleben. In searching him the Germans claimed that he wore a watch presented to him for an attempt to ram a German submarine. They, therefore, took Fryatt from the Ruhleben camp and sent him to Bruges for trial. When I heard of this I immediately sent two formal notes to the German Foreign Office demanding the right to see Fryatt and hire counsel to represent him, inquiring what sort of counsel would be permitted to attend the trial and asking for postponement of the trial until these matters could be arranged. The German Foreign Office had informed me that they had backed up these requests and I believe them, but the answer of the German admiralty to my notes was to cause the trial to proceed the morning after the day on which my notes were delivered and to shoot Fryatt before noon of the same day.
As to the evidence regarding the watch, the British Foreign Office learned that, when captured, Captain Fryatt had neither a watch nor any letter to indicate that he had tried to ram a submarine!
This cruel and high-handed outrage caused great indignation in England, and even in certain circles in Germany; and the manner in which my request was treated was certainly a direct insult to the country which I represented. In conversation with me, Zimmermann and the Chancellor and von Jagow all expressed the greatest regret over this incident, which shows how little control the civilian branch of the government has over the military in time of war. Later on, when similar charges were made against another British sea captain, the Foreign Office, I think through the influence of the Emperor, was able to prevent a recurrence of the Fryatt outrage.
As I have said, many of the camp commanders in Germany were men, excellent and efficient and kind hearted, who did what they could for the prisoners. It is a pity that these men should bear the odium which attaches to Germany because of the general bad treatment of prisoners of war in the first days of the war, and because certain commanders of prison camps were not fitted for their positions.
The commander at the camp at Wittenberg was replaced, but the Germans have never acknowledged that bad conditions had existed in that camp. Shortly before we left Germany the war department seemed to gain more control of the prisoners of war situation, and on our representations at least one camp commander was permanently relieved. If examples had been made early in the war of the camp commanders who were not fit for their places and of those who had in any way mishandled prisoners of war, the German people as a whole would not have had to bear the burden of this odium. The many prisoners will return to their homes with a deep and bitter hatred of all things German.
The British Government took a great interest in the British prisoners in Germany. Nothing was omitted and every suggestion made by me was immediately acted on; while many most valuable hints were given me from London as to prisoners’ affairs. Their Majesties, the King and Queen, showed a deep personal concern in the welfare of the unfortunate British in German hands; and this concern never flagged during the period of my stay in Berlin. Lord Robert Cecil and Lord Newton were continually working for the benefit of British prisoners.
At a time when the British prisoners were without proper clothing, the British Government sent me uniforms, overcoats, etc., and I hired a warehouse in Berlin as a distributing point; but, after some months, the German authorities refused to allow me to continue this method of distribution on the ground that it was the duty of Germany to provide the prisoners with clothes. But Germany was not performing this duty and the British prisoners had to suffer because of this German official woodenheadedness.
In the spring of 1916, quite characteristically, the Germans broke their “treaty” concerning visits to prisoners, and refused to permit us to speak to prisoners out of hearing. Von Jagow told me that this was because of the trouble made among Russian prisoners by the visits of Madam Sazonoff, but this had nothing to do with the arrangement between Great Britain and Germany.
I think that the Germans suspected that I had learned from fellow prisoners of the cruel and unnecessary shooting of two Irish prisoners at Limburg. It was not from prisoners, however, that I obtained this information. but from Germans who wrote to me.
In addition to the English and Japanese, I had the protection of the Serbian and Roumanian subjects and the protection of the interests of a very small country, the Republic of San Marino. Soon after the Serbians and Roumanians appeared in the prison camps of Germany we made reports on the condition and treatment of these prisoners, as well as reports concerning the British.
I was able to converse with some Serbians, in the first days of the war, in their native tongue, which, curiously enough, was Spanish. Immediately after the persecution of the Jews in Spain by Ferdinand and Isabella and other monarchs, a number of Spanish Jews emigrated to Serbia where they have remained ever since, keeping their old customs and speaking the old Spanish of the time of Cervantes.
The German authorities, in the most petty manner, often concealed from me the presence of British prisoners, especially civilians, in prison camps. For a long time I was not informed of the presence of British civilians in Sennelager and it was only by paying a surprise visit by motor to the camp at Brandenburg that I discovered a few British, the crew of a trawler, there. It was on information contained in an anonymous letter, evidently from the wife of some German officer, that I visited Brandenburg where the crew of this trawler, deprived of money, were without any of the little comforts or packages that mitigate life in a German prison camp.
CHAPTER XI
FIRST DAYS OF THE WAR: POLITICAL AND DIPLOMATIC
At the commencement of the war for some days I was cut off from communication with the United States; but we soon established a chain of communication, at first through Italy and later by way of Denmark. At all times cables from Washington to Berlin, or _vice_versa_, took, on the average, two days in transmission.
After the fall of Liege, von Jagow sent for me and asked me if I would transmit through the American Legation a proposition offering Belgium peace and indemnity if no further opposition were made to the passage of German troops through Belgium. As the proposition was a proposition for peace, I took the responsibility of forwarding it and sent the note of the German Government to our Minister at the Hague for transmission to our Minister in Belgium.
Dr. Van Dyke, our Minister at the Hague, refused to have anything to do with the transmission of this proposition and turned the German note over to the Holland Minister for Foreign Affairs, and through this channel the proposition reached the Belgian Government.
The State Department cabled me a message from the President to the Emperor which stated that the United States stood ready at any time to mediate between the warring powers, and directed me to present this proposition direct to the Emperor.
I, therefore, asked for an audience with the Emperor and received word from the chief Court Marshal that the Emperor would receive me at the palace in Berlin on the morning of August tenth. I drove in a motor into the courtyard of the palace and was there escorted to the door which opened on a flight of steps leading to a little garden about fifty yards square, directly on the embankment of the River Spree, which flows past the Royal Palace. As I went down the steps, the Empress and her only daughter, the Duchess of Brunswick, came up. Both stopped and shook hands with me, speaking a few words. I found the Emperor seated at a green iron table under a large canvas garden umbrella. Telegraph forms were scattered on the table in front of him and basking in the gravel were two small dachshunds. I explained to the Emperor the object of my visit and we had a general conversation about the war and the state of affairs. The Emperor took some of the large telegraph blanks and wrote out in pencil his reply to the President’s offer, This reply, of course, I cabled immediately to the State Department.
_For_the_President_of_the_
_United_States_personally:_
10/VIII 14.
1. H. R. H. Prince Henry was received by his Majesty King George V in London, who empowered him to transmit to me verbally, that England would remain neutral if war broke out on the Continent involving Germany and France, Austria and Russia. This message was telegraphed to me by my brother from London after his conversation with H. M. the King, and repeated verbally on the twenty-ninth of July.
2. My Ambassador in London transmitted a message from Sir E. Grey to Berlin saying that only in case France was likely to be crushed England would interfere.
3. On the thirtieth my Ambassador in London reported that Sir Edward Grey in course of a “private” conversation told him that if the conflict remained localized between _Russia_–not Serbia–and _Austria_, England would not move, but if we “mixed” in the fray she would take quick decisions and grave measures; i. e., if I left my ally Austria in the lurch to fight alone England would not touch me.
4. This communication being directly counter to the King’s message to me, I telegraphed to H. M. on the twenty-ninth or thirtieth, thanking him for kind messages through my brother and begging him to use all his power to keep France and Russia–his Allies–from making any war-like preparations calculated to disturb my work of mediation, stating that I was in constant communication with H. M. the Czar. In the evening the King kindly answered that he had ordered his Government to use every possible influence with his Allies to refrain from taking any provocative military measures. At the same time H. M. asked me if I would transmit to Vienna the British proposal that Austria was to take Belgrade and a few other Serbian towns and a strip of country as a “main-mise” to make sure that the Serbian promises on paper should be fulfilled in reality. This proposal was in the same moment telegraphed to me from Vienna for London, quite in conjunction with the British proposal; besides, I had telegraphed to H. M. the Czar the same as an idea of mine, before I received the two communications from Vienna and London, as both were of the same opinion.
5. I immediately transmitted the telegrams _vice_versa_ to Vienna and London. I felt that I was able to tide the question over and was happy at the peaceful outlook.
6. While I was preparing a note to H. M. the Czar the next morning, to inform him that Vienna, London and Berlin were agreed about the treatment of affairs, I received the telephones from H. E. the Chancellor that in the night before the Czar had given the order to mobilize the whole of the Russian army, which was, of course, also meant against Germany; whereas up till then the southern armies had been mobilized against Austria.
7. In a telegram from London my Ambassador informed me he understood the British Government would guarantee neutrality of France and wished to know whether Germany would refrain from attack. I telegraphed to H. M. the King personally that mobilization being already carried out could not be stopped, but if H. M. could guarantee with his armed forces the neutrality of France I would refrain _from_attacking_her_, _leave_her_alone_ and employ my troops elsewhere. H. M. answered that he thought my offer was based on a misunderstanding; and, as far as I can make out, Sir E. Grey never took my offer into serious consideration. He never answered it. Instead, he declared England had to defend Belgian neutrality, which had to be violated by Germany on strategical grounds, news having been received that France was already preparing to enter Belgium, and the King of Belgians having refused my petition for a free passage under guarantee of his country’s freedom. I am most grateful for the President’s message.
WILLIAM, H. R.
When the German Emperor in my presence indited his letter to President Wilson of August tenth, 1914, he asked that I cable it immediately to the State Department and that I simultaneously give it to the press. As I have already stated, I cabled the document immediately to the State Department at Washington, but I withheld it from publication.
My interview with the Emperor was in the morning. That afternoon a man holding a high position in Germany sent for me. I do not give his name because I do not wish to involve him in any way with the Emperor, so I shall not even indicate whether he is a royalty or an official. He said:
“You had an interview today with the Emperor. What happened?”
I told of the message given me for the President which was intended for publication by the Emperor. He said:
“I think you ought to show that message to me; you know the Emperor is a constitutional Emperor and there was once a great row about such a message.”
I showed him the message, and when he had read it he said: “I think it would be inadvisable for us to have this message published, and in the interest of good feeling between Germany and America. If you cable it ask that publication be withheld.”
I complied with his request and it is characteristic of the President’s desire to preserve good relations that publication was withheld. Now, when the two countries are at war; when the whole world, and especially our own country, has an interest in knowing how this great calamity of universal war came to the earth, the time has come when this message should be given out and I have published it by permission.
This most interesting document in the first place clears up one issue never really obscure in the eyes of the world–the deliberate violation of the neutrality of Belgium, whose territory “had to be violated by Germany on strategical grounds.” The very weak excuse is added that “news had been received that France was already preparing to enter Belgium,”–not even a pretense that there had ever been any actual violation of Belgium’s frontier by the French prior to the German invasion of that unfortunate country. Of course the second excuse that the King of the Belgians had refused entrance to the Emperor’s troops under guarantee of his country’s freedom is even weaker than the first. It would indeed inaugurate a new era in the intercourse of nations if a small nation could only preserve its freedom by at all times, on request, granting free passage to the troops of a powerful neighbour on the march to attack an adjoining country.
And aside from the violation of Belgian neutrality, what would have become of England and of the world if the Prussian autocracy had been left free to defeat–one by one–the nations of the earth? First, the defeat of Russia and Serbia by Austria and Germany, the incorporation of a large part of Russia in the German Empire, German influence predominant in Russia and all the vast resources of that great Empire at the command of Germany. All the fleets in the world could uselessly blockade the German coasts if Germany possessed the limitless riches of the Empire of the Romanoffs.
[Illustration: ALLEGED DUM-DUM BULLETS, WHICH THE GERMANS DECLARED HAD BEEN FOUND IN LONGWY.]
The German army drawing for reserves on the teeming populations of Russia and Siberia would never know defeat. And this is not idle conjecture, mere dreaming in the realm of possibilities, because the Russian revolution has shown us how weak and tottering in reality was the dreaded power of the Czar.
Russia, beaten and half digested, France would have been an easy prey, and England, even if then joining France in war, would have a far different problem to face if the V-boats were now sailing from Cherbourg and Calais and Brest and Bordeaux on the mission of piracy and murder, and then would come our turn and that of Latin America. The first attack would come not on us, but on South or Central America–at some point to which it would be as difficult for us to send troops to help our neighbor as it would be for Germany to attack.
Remember that in Southern Brazil nearly four hundred thousand Germans are sustained, as I found out, in their devotion to the Fatherland by annual grants of money for educational purposes from the Imperial treasury in Berlin.
It was not without reason that at this interview, when the Kaiser wrote this message to the President, he said that the coming in of England had changed the whole situation and would make the war a long one. The Kaiser talked rather despondently about the war. I tried to cheer him up by saying the German troops would soon enter Paris, but he answered, “The English change the whole situation–an obstinate nation–they will keep up the war. It cannot end soon.”
It was the entry of England into the war, in defence of the rights of small nations, in defence of the guaranteed neutrality of Belgium, which saved the world from the harsh dominion of the conquest-hungry Prussians and therefore saved as well the two Americas and their protecting doctrine of President Monroe.
The document, which is dated August tenth, 1914, supersedes the statement made by the German Chancellor von Bethmann-Hollweg in his speech before the Reichstag on August fourth, 1914, in which he gave the then official account of the entrance into the war of the Central Empires. It will be noted that von Bethmann-Hollweg insisted that France began the war in the sentence reading: “There were bomb-throwing fliers, cavalry patrols, invading companies in the Reichsland (Alsace-Lorraine). Thereby France, although the condition of war had not yet been declared, had attacked our territory.” But the Emperor makes no mention of this fact, of supreme importance if true, in his writing to President Wilson six days later.
Quite curiously, at this time there was a belief on the part of the Germans that Japan would declare war on the Allies and range herself on the side of the Central Powers. In fact on one night there was a friendly demonstration in front of the Japanese Embassy, but these hopes were soon dispelled by the ultimatum of Japan sent on the sixteenth of August, and, finally, by the declaration of war on August twenty-third.
During the first days of the war the warring powers indulged in mutual recriminations as to the use of dumdum bullets and I was given several packages of cartridges containing bullets bored out at the top which the Germans said had been found in the French fortress of Longwy, with a request that I send an account of them to President Wilson and ask for his intervention in the matter. Very wisely President Wilson refused to do anything of the kind, as otherwise he would have been deluged with constant complaints from both sides as to the violations of the rules of war.
The cartridges given to me were in packages marked on the outside “_Cartouches_de_Stand_” and from this I took it that possibly these cartridges had been used on some shooting range near the fort and the bullets bored out in order that they might not go too far, if carelessly fired over the targets.
On August fifth, with our Naval Attache, Commander Walter Gherardi, I called upon von Tirpitz, to learn from him which ports be considered safest for the ships to be sent from America with gold for stranded Americans. He recommended Rotterdam.
I also had a conversation on this day with Geheimrat Letze of the Foreign Office with reference to the proposition that English and German ships respectively should have a delay of until the fourteenth of August in which to leave the English or German ports in which they chanced to be.
The second week in August, my wife’s sister and her husband, Count Sigray, arrived in Berlin. Count Sigray is a reserve officer of the Hungarian Hussars and was in Montana when the first rumours of war came. He and his wife immediately started for New York and sailed on the fourth of August. They landed in England, and as England had not yet declared war on Austria, they were able to proceed on their journey. With them were Count George Festetics and Count Cziraki, the former from the Austrian Embassy in London and the latter from that in Washington. They were all naturally very much excited about war and the events of their trip. The Hungarians as a people are quite like Americans. They have agreeable manners and are able to laugh in a natural way, something which seems to be a lost art in Prussia. Nearly all the members of Hungarian noble families speak English perfectly and model their clothes, sports and country life, as far as possible, after the English.
The thirteenth saw the departure of our first special train containing Americans bound for Holland. I saw the Americans off at the Charlottenburg station. They all departed in great spirits and very glad of an opportunity to leave Germany.
I had some negotiations about the purchase by America or Americans of the ships of the North German Lloyd, but nothing came of these negotiations. Trainloads of Americans continued to leave, but there seemed to be no end to the Americans coming into Berlin from all directions.
On August twenty-ninth, Count Szoegyeny, the Austrian Ambassador, left Berlin. He had been Ambassador there for twenty-two years and I suppose because of his advancing years the Austrian Government thought that he had outlived his usefulness. Quite a crowd of Germans and diplomats were at the station to witness the rather sad farewell. His successor was Prince Hohenlohe, married to a daughter of Archduke Frederick. She expressly waived her right to precedence as a royal highness, and agreed to take only the precedence given to her as the wife of the Ambassador, in order not to cause feeling in Berlin. Prince Hohenlohe, a rather easy-going man, who had been most popular in Russia and Austria, immediately made a favourable impression in Berlin and successfully occupied the difficult position of mediator between the governments of Berlin and Vienna.
On September fourth the Chancellor gave me a statement to give to the reporters in which he attacked England, claiming that England did not desire the friendship of Germany but was moved by commercial jealousy and a desire to crush her; that the efforts made for peace had failed because Russia, under all circumstances, was resolved upon war; and that Germany had entered Belgium in order to forestall the planned French advance. He also claimed that England, regardless of consequences to the white race, had excited Japan to a pillaging expedition, and claimed that Belgian girls and women had gouged out the eyes of the wounded; that officers had been invited to dinner and shot across the table; and Belgian women had cut the throats of soldiers quartered in their houses while they were asleep. The Chancellor concluded by saying, in this statement, that everyone knows that the German people is not capable of unnecessary cruelty or of any brutality.
We were fully occupied with taking care of the English prisoners and interests, the Americans, and negotiations relating to commercial questions, and to getting goods required in the United States out of Germany, when, on October seventh, a most unpleasant incident, and one which for some time caused the members of our Embassy to feel rather bitterly toward the German Foreign Office, took place.
A great number of British civilians, men and women, were stranded in Berlin. To many of these were paid sums of money in the form of small allowances on behalf of the British Government. In order to facilitate this work, we placed the clerks employed in this distribution in the building formerly occupied by the British Consul in Berlin. Of course, the great crowds of Americans resorting to our Embassy, when combined with the crowds of British, made it almost impossible even to enter the Embassy, and establishment of this outlying relief station materially helped this situation. I occupied it, and employed English men and English women in this relief work by the express permission of the Imperial Foreign Office, which I thought it wise to obtain in view of the fact that the Germans seemed daily to become more irritable and suspicious, especially after the Battle of the Marne.
On the night of October second, our Second Secretary, Harvey, went to this relief headquarters at about twelve o’clock at night, and was witness to a raid made by the Berlin police on this establishment of ours. The men and women working were arrested, and all books and papers which the police could get at were seized by them. The next morning I went around to the place and on talking with the criminal detectives in charge, was told by them that they had made the raid by the orders of the Foreign Office. When I spoke to the Foreign Office about this, they denied that they had given directions for the raid and made a sort of half apology. The raid was all the more unjustified because only the day before I had had a conversation with the Adjutant of the Berlin Kommandantur and told him that, although I had permission from the Foreign Office, I thought it would be better to dismiss the English employed and employ only Americans or Germans; and I sent round to my friend, Herr von Gwinner, head of the Deutsche Bank, and asked him to recommend some German accountants to me.
The Kommandantur is the direct office of military control. When the Adjutant heard of the raid he was almost as indignant as I was, and on the tenth of October informed me that he had learned that the raid had been made on the joint orders of the Foreign Office and von Tirpitz’s department.
The books and papers of an Embassy, including those relating to the affairs of foreign nations temporarily in the Embassy’s care, are universally recognised in international law as not, subject to seizure, nor did the fact that I was carrying on this work outside the actual Embassy building have any bearing on this point so long as the building was directly under my control and, especially, as the only work carried on was work properly in my hands in my official capacity. The Foreign Office saw that they had made a mistake, but at Zimmermann’s earnest request I agreed, as it were, to forget the incident. Later on, this precedent might have been used by our government had they desired to press the matter of the seizure of von Igel’s papers. Von Igel, it will be remembered, was carrying on business of a private nature in a private office hired by him. Nevertheless, as he had been employed in some capacity in the German Embassy at Washington, Count von Bernstorff claimed immunity from seizure for the papers found in that office.
On August sixteenth the Kaiser left Berlin for the front. I wrote to his master of the household, saying that I should like an opportunity to be at the railway station to say good-bye to the Emperor, but was put off on various excuses. Thereafter the Emperor practically abandoned Berlin and lived either in Silesia, at Pless, or at some place near the Western front.
At first, following the precedent of the war of 1870, the more important members of the government followed the Kaiser to the front, even the Chancellor and the Minister of Foreign Affairs abandoning their offices in Berlin. Not long afterwards, when it was apparent that the war must be carried on on several fronts and that it was not going to be the matter of a few weeks which the Germans had first supposed, these officials returned to their offices in Berlin. In the meantime, however, much confusion had been caused by this rather ridiculous effort to follow the customs of the war of 1870.
When von Jagow, Minister of Foreign Affairs, was absent at the Great General Headquarters, the diplomats remaining behind conducted their negotiations with Zimmermann, who in turn had to transmit everything to the great general headquarters.
In August, there were apparently rumours afloat in countries outside of Germany that prominent Socialists at the outbreak of the war had been shot. The State Department cabled me to find out whether there was any truth in these rumours, with particular reference to Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg.
Liebknecht is a lawyer practicing in Berlin and so I telephoned him, asking him to come and see me. He did so, and of course, by his presence verified the fact that he had not been executed. He told me that the rumours as to the treatment of the Socialists were entirely unfounded and said that he had no objection to my cabling a statement that the Socialists were opposed to Czarismus and that he personally had confidence in the German army and the cause of the German people.
Many people confuse Liebknecht with his father, now dead. Liebknecht, the son, is a man of perhaps forty-three years, with dark bushy hair and moustache and wearing eye-glasses, a man of medium height and not at all of strong build. In the numerous interruptions made by him during the debates in the Reichstag, during the first year of the war, his voice sounded high and shrill. Of course, anyone who defies the heavy hand of autocracy must suffer from nervousness. We all knew that sooner or later autocracy would “get” Liebknecht, and its opportunity came when he appeared in citizen’s clothes at an attempted mass-meeting at the Potsdamerplatz. For the offence of appearing out of uniform after being called and mobilized, and for alleged incitement of the people, he was condemned for a long term of imprisonment. One can but admire his courage. I believe that he earns his living by the practice of law before one of the minor courts. It is hard to say just what _role_ he will play in the future. It is probable that when the Socialists settle down after the war and think things over, they will consider that the leadership of Scheidemann has been too conservative; that he submitted too readily to the powers of autocracy and too easily abandoned the program of the Socialists. In this case, Liebknecht perhaps will be made leader of the Socialists, and it is within the bounds of probability that Scheidemann and certain of his party may become Liberals rather than Socialists.
CHAPTER XII
DIPLOMATIC NEGOTIATIONS
In the autumn of 1914, the rush of getting the Americans out of Germany was over. The care of the British civilians was on a business basis and there were comparatively few camps of prisoners of war. Absolutely tired by working every day and until twelve at night, I went to Munich for a two weeks’ rest.
On February fourth, 1915, Germany announced that on February eighteenth the blockade of England through submarines would commence.
Some very peculiar and mysterious negotiations thereafter ensued. About February eighth, an American who was very intimate with the members of the General Staff came to me with a statement that Germany desired peace and was ready to open negotiations to that end. It was, however, to be made a condition of these peace negotiations that this particular American should go to Paris and to Petrograd and inform the governments there of the overwhelming strength of the German armies and of their positions, which knowledge, it was said, he had obtained by personally visiting both the fronts. it was further intimated that von Tirpitz himself was anxious that peace should be concluded, possibly because of his fear that the proposed blockade would not be successful.
Of course, I informed the State Department of these mysterious manoeuvres.
I was taken by back stairways to a mysterious meeting with von Tirpitz at night in his rooms in the Navy Department. When I was alone with him, however, he had nothing definite to say or to offer; if there was any opportunity at that time to make peace nothing came of it. It looked somewhat to me as if the whole idea had been to get this American to go to Paris and Petrograd, certify from his personal observation to the strength of the German armies and position, and thereby to assist in enticing one or both of these countries to desert the allied cause. All of this took place about ten days before the eighteenth of February, the time named for the announcement of the blockade of England.
Medals were struck having the head of von Tirpitz on one side and on the other the words “Gott strafe England,” and a picture of a sort of Neptune assisted by a submarine rising from the sea to blockade the distant English coast.
The Ambassador is supposed to have the right to demand an audience with the Kaiser at any time, and as there were matters connected with the treatment of prisoners as well as this coming submarine warfare which I wished to take up with him, I had on various occasions asked for an audience with him; on each occasion my request had been refused on some excuse or other, and I was not even permitted to go to the railway station to bid him good-bye on one occasion when he left for the front.
When our Military Attache, Major Langhorne, left in March, 1915, he had a farewell audience with the Kaiser and I then asked him to say to the Kaiser that I had not seen him for so long a time that I had forgotten what he looked like. Langhorne reported to me that he had given his message to the Kaiser and that the Kaiser said, “I have nothing against Mr. Gerard personally, but I will not see the Ambassador of a country which furnishes arms and ammunition to the enemies of Germany.”
Before the departure of Langhorne, I had succeeded in getting Germany to agree that six American army officers might visit Germany as military observers. When they arrived, I presented them at the Foreign Office, etc., and they were taken on trips to the East and West fronts.
They were not allowed to see much, and their request to be attached to a particular unit was refused. Nearly everywhere they were subject to insulting remarks or treatment because of the shipment of munitions of war to the Allies from America; and finally after they had been subjected to deliberate insults at the hands of several German generals, Mackensen particularly distinguishing himself, the United States Government withdrew them from Germany.
Colonel (now General) Kuhn, however, who was of these observers, was appointed Military Attache in place of Major Langhorne. Speaking German fluently and acting with great tact, he managed for a long time to keep sufficiently in the good graces of the Germans to be allowed to see something of the operations of the various fronts. There came a period in 1916 when he was no longer invited to go on the various excursions made by the foreign military attaches and finally Major Nicolai, the general intelligence officer of the Great General Headquarters, sent for him early in the autumn of 1916, and informed him that he could no longer go to any of the fronts. Colonel Kuhn answered that he was aware of this already. Major Nicolai said that he gave him this information by direct order of General Ludendorf, that General Ludendorf had stated that he did not believe America could do more damage to Germany than she had done if the two countries were actually at war, and that he considered that, practically, America and Germany were engaged in hostilities. On this being reported to Washington, Colonel Kuhn was quite naturally recalled.
I cannot praise too highly the patience and tact shown by Colonel Kuhn in dealing with the Germans. Although accused in the German newspapers of being a spy, and otherwise attacked, he kept his temper and observed all that he could for the benefit of his own country. As he had had an opportunity to observe the Russian-Japanese war, his experiences at that time, coupled with his experiences in Germany, make him, perhaps, our greatest American expert on modern war.
It was with the greatest pleasure that I heard from Secretary Baker that he had determined to promote Colonel Kuhn to the rank of General and make him head of our War College, where his teachings will prove of the greatest value to the armies of the United States.
Colonel House and his wife arrived to pay us a visit on March 19, 1915, and remained until the twenty-eighth. During this period the Colonel met all the principal members of the German Government and many men of influence and prominence in the world of affairs, such as Herr von Gwinner, head of the Deutsche Bank, and Dr. Walter Rathenau, who succeeded his father as head of the Allgemeine Elektricitats Gesellschaft and hundreds of other corporations. The Colonel dined at the house of Dr. Solf, the Colonial Minister, and lunched with von Gwinner.
In April, negotiations were continued about the sinking of the _William_P._Fry_, an American boat loaded with food and destined for Ireland. The American Government on behalf of the owners of the _William_P._Fry_ claimed damages for the boat. Nothing was said about the cargo, but in the German answer it was stated that the cargo of the _William_P._Fry_ consisting of foodstuffs destined for an armed port of the enemy and, therefore, presumed to be destined for the armed forces of the enemy was, because of this, contraband. I spoke to von Jagow about this and told him that I thought that possibly this would seem to amount to a German justification of the British blockade of Germany. He said that this note had been drawn by Director Kriege who was their expert on international law, and that he would not interfere with Kriege’s work. Of course, as a matter of fact, all foodstuffs shipped to Germany would have to be landed at some armed port, and, therefore, according to the contentions of Germany, these would be supposed to be destined to the armed forces of the enemy and become contraband of war.
At international law, it had always been recognised that private individuals and corporations have the right to sell arms and ammunitions of war to any belligerent and, in the Hague Convention held in 1907, this right was expressly ratified and confirmed. This same Director Kriege who represented Germany at this Hague Conference in 1907, in the debates on this point said: “The neutral boats which engage in such a trade, commit a violation of the duties of neutrality. However, according to a principle generally recognised, the State of which the boat flies the flag is not responsible for this violation. The neutral States are not called upon to forbid their subjects a commerce which, from the point of view of the belligerents, ought to be considered as unlawful.” (Conference International de la Paix, La Haye, 15 Juin-18 Octobre 1907. Vol. III, p. 859.)
During our trouble with General Huerta, arms and ammunition for Huerta’s forces from Germany were landed from German ships in Mexico. During the Boer war the Germans, who openly sympathised with the Boers, nevertheless furnished to England great quantities of arms and munitions, expressly destined to be used against the Boers; and this, although it was manifest that there was no possibility whatever that the Boers could obtain arms and munitions from German sources during the war. For instance, the firm of Eberhardt in Dusseldorf furnished one hundred and nine cannon, complete, with wagons, caissons and munitions, etc., to the English which were expressly designed for use against the Boers.
At one time the Imperial Foreign Office sent me a formal note making reference to a paragraph in former Ambassador Andrew D. White’s autobiography with reference to the alleged stoppage in a German port of a boat laden with arms and ammunition, for use against the Americans in Cuba during the Spanish War. Of course, former Ambassador White wrote without having the Embassy records at hand and those records show that the position he took at the time of this alleged stoppage was eminently correct.
The files show that he wrote the letter to the State Department in which he stated that knowledge came to him of the proposed sailing of this ship, but he did not protest because he had been advised by a Naval Attache that the United States did not have the right to interfere. The Department of State wrote to him commending his action in not filing any protest and otherwise interfering.
It seemed as if the German Government expressly desired to stir up hatred against America on this issue in order to force the American Government through fear of either the German Government, or the German-American propagandists at home, to put an immediate embargo on the export of these supplies.
In the autumn of 1914 Zimmermann showed me a long list sent him by Bernstorff showing quantities of saddles, automobiles, motor trucks, tires, explosives, foodstuffs and so on, exported from America to the Allies and intimated that this traffic had reached such proportions that it should be stopped.
In February, 1915, in the official _Communique_ of the day appeared the following statement: “Heavy artillery fire in certain sections of the West front, mostly with American ammunition;” and in April in the official _Communique_ something to this effect: “Captured French artillery officers say that they have great stores of American ammunition.” I obtained through the State Department in Washington a statement from the French Ambassador certifying that up to that time, the end of April, 1915, no shells whatever of the French artillery had been furnished from America.
Nothing, however, would satisfy the Germans. They seemed determined that the export of every article, whether of food or munitions which might prove of use to the Allies in the war, should be stopped. Newspapers were filled with bitter attacks upon America and upon President Wilson, and with caricatures referring to the sale of munitions.
It never seemed to occur to the Germans that we could not violate the Hague Convention in order to change the rules of the game because one party, after the commencement of hostilities, found that the rule worked to his disadvantage. Nor did the Germans consider that America could not vary its international law with the changing fortunes of war and make one ruling when the Germans lost control of the sea and another ruling if they regained it.
From early in 1915 until I left Germany, I do not think I ever had a conversation with a German without his alluding to this question. Shortly before leaving Germany, in January, 1917, and after I had learned of the probability of the resumption of ruthless submarine war, at an evening party at the house of Dr. Solf, the Colonial Minister, a large German who turned out to be one of the Grand Dukes of Mecklenburg-Schwerin, planted himself some distance away from me and addressed me in German saying, “You are the American Ambassador and I want to tell you that the conduct of America in furnishing arms and ammunition to the enemies of Germany is stamped deep on the German heart, that we will never forget it and will some day have our revenge.” He spoke in a voice so loud and slapped his chest so hard that everyone in the room stopped their conversation in order to hear. He wore on his breast the orders of the Black Eagle, the Red Eagle, the Elephant and the Seraphim, and when he struck all this menagerie the rattle alone was quite loud. I reminded him politely of the Hague Convention, of the fact that we could not change international law from time to time with the change in the situation of the war, and that Germany had furnished arms to England to use against the Boers. But he simply answered, “We care nothing for treaties,” and my answer, “That is what they all say,” was a retort too obvious to be omitted.
The German press continually published articles to the effect that the war would be finished if it were not for the shipment of supplies from America. All public opinion was with the German Government when the warning was issued on February fourth, 1915, stating that the blockade of England would commence on the eighteenth and warning neutral ships to keep out of the war zone. From then on we had constant cases and crises with reference to the sinking of American boats by the German submarine. There were the cases of the _Gulfflight_ and the _Cushing_ and the _Falaba_, an English boat sunk without warning on which Americans were killed. On May sixth, 1915, Director Kriege of the Foreign Office asked Mr. Jackson to call and see him, and told him that he would like to have the following three points brought to the attention of the American public:
“1. As the result of the English effort to stop all foreign commerce with Germany, Germany would do everything in her power to destroy English commerce and merchant shipping. There was, however, never at any time an intention to destroy or interfere with neutral commerce or to attack neutral shipping unless engaged in contraband trade. In view of the action of the British Government in arming merchant vessels and causing them to disguise their national character, the occasional destruction of a neutral ship was unavoidable. Naval officers in command of submarines had been instructed originally, and new and more stringent instructions had been issued repeatedly, to use the utmost care, consistent with their own safety, to avoid attacks on neutral vessels.
“2. In case a neutral ship should be destroyed by a submarine the German Government is prepared to make an immediate and formal expression of its regret and to pay an indemnity, without having recourse to a prize court.
“3. All reports with regard to the destruction of a neutral vessel by a German submarine are investigated at once by both the German Foreign Office and Admiralty and the result is communicated to the Government concerned, which is requested in return to communicate to the German Government the result of its own independent investigation. Where there is any material divergence in the two reports as to the presumed cause of destruction (torpedo or mine), the question is to be submitted to investigation by a commission composed of representatives of the two nations concerned, with a neutral arbiter whose decision will be final. This course has already been adopted in two cases, in which a Dutch and a Norwegian vessel, respectively, were concerned. The German Government reserves its right to refuse this international arbitration in exceptional cases where for military reasons the German Admiralty are opposed to its taking place.”
Director Kriege told Mr. Jackson that a written communication in which the substance of the foregoing would be contained, would soon to be made to the Embassy.
Mr. Jackson put this conversation down in the form above given and showed Director Kriege a copy of it. Later in the day Geheimrat Simon called on Mr. Jackson at the Embassy and said that Dr. Kriege would like to have point two read as follows:
“In case _through_any_unfortunate_mistake_a_neutral_ship_,” and continuing to the end; and that Dr. Kriege would like to change what was written on point three beginning with “Where there is” so that it should read, as follows:–“Where there is any material divergence in the two reports as to the presumed cause of destruction (torpedo or mine), the German Government has already in several instances declared its readiness to submit the question to the decision of an international commission in accordance with the Hague Convention for the friendly settlement of international disputes.”
This had been suggested by Director Kriege in case it should be decided to make a communication to the American Press. Mr. Jackson told Geheimrat Simon that he would report the subject of his conversation to me, but that it would depend upon me whether any communication should be made to the American Government or to the press upon the subject.
Of course, the news of the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_ on May seventh and of the great loss of American lives brought about a very critical situation, and naturally nothing was done with Kriege’s propositions.
It is unnecessary here for me to go into the notes which were exchanged between the two governments because all that is already public property.
Sometime after I had delivered our first _Lusitania_ Note of May 11th, 1915, Zimmermann was lunching with us. A good looking American woman, married to a German, was also of the party and after lunch although I was talking to some one else I overheard part of her conversation with Zimmermann. When Zimmermann left I asked her what it was that he had said about America, Germany, Mr. Bryan and the _Lusitania_. She then told me that she had said to Zimmermann that it was a great pity that we were to leave Berlin as it looked as if diplomatic relations between the two countries would be broken, and that Zimmermann told her not to worry about that because they had just received word from the Austrian Government that Dr. Dumba, the Austrian Ambassador in Washington, had cabled that the _Lusitania_ Note from America to Germany was only sent as a sop to public opinion in America and that the government did not really mean what was said in that note. I then called on Zimmermann at the Foreign Office and he showed me Dumba’s telegram which was substantially as stated above. Of course, I immediately cabled to the State Department and also got word to President Wilson. The rest of the incident is public property. I, of course, did not know what actually occurred between Mr. Bryan and Dr. Dumba, but I am sure that Dr. Dumba must have misunderstood friendly statements made by Mr. Bryan.
It was very lucky that I discovered the existence of this Dumba cablegram in this manner which savours almost of diplomacy as represented on the stage. If the Germans had gone on in the belief that the _Lusitania_ Note was not really meant, war would have inevitably resulted at that time between Germany and America, and it shows how great events may be shaped by heavy luncheons and a pretty woman.
Before this time much indignation had been caused in Germany by the fact that the _Lusitania_ on her eastward voyage from New York early in February, 1915, had raised the American flag when nearing British waters.
Shortly after this incident had become known, I was at the Wintergarten, a large concert hall in Berlin, with Grant Smith, First Secretary of the Embassy at Vienna and other members of my staff. We naturally spoke English among ourselves, a fact which aroused the ire of a German who had been drinking heavily and who was seated in the next box. He immediately began to call out that some one was speaking English and when told by one of the attendants that it was the American Ambassador, he immediately cried in a loud voice that Americans were even worse than English and that the _Lusitania_ had been flying the American flag as protection in British waters.
The audience, however, took sides against him and told him to shut up and as I left the house at the close of the performance, some Germans spoke to me and apologised for his conduct. The next day the manager of the Wintergarten called on me also to express his regret for the occurrence.
About a year afterwards I was at the races one day and saw this man and asked him what he meant by making such a noise at the Wintergarten. He immediately apologised and said that he had been drinking and hoped that I would forget the incident. This was the only incident of the kind which occurred to me during all the time that I was in Germany.
Both before and after the sinking of the _Lusitania_, the German Foreign Office put forward all kinds of proposals with reference to American ships in the war zone. On one afternoon, Zimmermann, who had a number of these proposals drafted in German, showed them to me and I wrote down the English translation for him to see how it would look in English. These proposals were about the sailing from America of what might be called certified ships, the ships to be painted and striped in a distinctive way, to come from certified ports at certain certified times, America to agree that these ships should carry no contraband whatever. All these proposals were sternly rejected by the President.
On February sixteenth, the German answer to our note of February tenth had announced that Germany declined all responsibility for what might happen to neutral ships and, in addition, announced that mines would be allowed in waters surrounding Great Britain and Ireland. This note also contained one of Zimmermann’s proposed solutions, namely, that American warships should convoy American merchantmen.
The German note of the sixteenth also spoke about the great traffic in munitions from the United States to the Allies, and contained a suggestion that the United States should induce the Allies to adopt the Declaration of London and omit the importation not only of food but also of all raw materials into Germany.
February twentieth was the date of the conciliatory note addressed by President Wilson to both Great Britain and Germany; and contained the suggestion that submarines should not be employed against merchant vessels of any nationality and that food should be allowed to go through for the civil population of Germany consigned to the agencies named by the United States in Germany, which were to see that the food was received and distributed to the civil population.
In the meantime the mines on the German coast had destroyed two American ships, both loaded with cotton for Germany; one called the _Carib_ and the other the _Evelyn_.
In America, Congress refused to pass a law to put it in the power of the President to place an embargo on the export of munitions of war.
In April, Count Bernstorff delivered his note concerning the alleged want of neutrality of the United States, referring to the numerous new industries in war materials being built up in the United States, stating, “In reality the United States is supplying only Germany’s enemies, a fact which is not in any way modified by the theoretical willingness to furnish Germany as well.”
To this note, Secretary Bryan in a note replied that it was impossible, in view of the indisputable doctrines of accepted international law, to make any change in our own laws of neutrality which meant unequally affecting, during the progress of the war, the relations of the United States with the various nations at war; and that the placing of embargoes on the trade in arms which constituted such a change would be a direct violation of the neutrality of the United States.
But all these negotiations, reproaches and recriminations were put an end to by the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_, with the killing of American women and civilians who were passengers on that vessel.
I believed myself that we would immediately break diplomatic relations, and prepared to leave Germany. On May eleventh, I delivered to von Jagow the _Lusitania_ Note, which after calling attention to the cases of the sinking of American boats, ending with the _Lusitania_, contained the statement, “The Imperial German Government will not expect the Government of the United States to omit any word or any act necessary to the sacred duty of maintaining the rights of the United States and its citizens and of safeguarding their free exercises and enjoyments.”
During this period I had constant conversations with von Jagow and Zimmermann, and it was during the conversations about this submarine warfare that Zimmermann on one occasion said to me: “The United States does not dare to do anything against Germany because we have five hundred thousand German reservists in America who will rise in arms against your government if your government should dare to take any action against Germany.” As he said this, he worked himself up to a passion and repeatedly struck the table with his fist. I told him that we had five hundred and one thousand lamp posts in America, and that was where the German reservists would find themselves if they tried any uprising; and I also called his attention to the fact that no German-Americans making use of the American passports which they could easily obtain, were sailing for Germany by way of Scandinavian countries in order to enlist in the German army. I told him that if he could show me one person with an American passport who had come to fight in the German army I might more readily believe what he said about the Germans in America rising in revolution.
As a matter of fact, during the whole course of the war, I knew of only one man with American citizenship who enlisted in the German army. This was an American student then in Germany who enlisted in a German regiment. His father, a business man in New York, cabled me asking me to have his son released from the German army; so I procured the discharge of the young man who immediately wrote to me and informed me that he was over twenty-one, and that he could not see what business his father had to interfere with his military ambitions. I thereupon withdrew my request with reference to him, but he had already been discharged from the army. When his regiment went to the West front he stowed away on the cars with it, was present at the attack on Ypres, and was shot through the body. He recovered in a German hospital, received the Iron Cross, was discharged and sailed for America. What has since become of him I do not know.
I do not intend to go in great detail into this exchange of notes and the public history of the submarine controversy, as all that properly belongs to the history of the war rather than to an account of my personal experiences; and besides, as Victor Hugo said, “History is not written with a microscope.” All will remember the answer of Germany to the American _Lusitania_ Note, which answer, delivered on May twenty-ninth, contained the charge that the _Lusitania_ was armed and carried munitions, and had been used in the transport of Canadian troops. In the meantime, however, the American ship, _Nebraskan_, had been torpedoed off the coast of Ireland on the twenty-sixth; and, on May twenty-eighth, Germany stated that the American steamer, _Gulfflight_, had been torpedoed by mistake, and apologised for this act.
Von Jagow gave me, about the same time, a Note requesting that American vessels should be more plainly marked and should illuminate their marking at night.
The second American _Lusitania_ Note was published on June eleventh, 1915; and its delivery was coincident with the resignation of Mr. Bryan as Secretary of State. In this last Note President Wilson (for, of course, it is an open secret that he was the author of these Notes) made the issue perfectly plain, referring to the torpedoing of enemy passenger ships. “Only her actual resistance to capture or refusal to stop when ordered to do so for the purpose of visit could have afforded the commander of the submarine any justification for so much as putting the lives of those on board the ship in jeopardy.” On July eighth the German answer to this American _Lusitania_ Note was delivered, and again stated that “we have been obliged to adopt a submarine war to meet the declared intentions of our enemies and the method of warfare adopted by them in contravention of international law”. Again referring to the alleged fact of the _Lusitania’s_ carrying munitions they said: “If the _Lusitania_ had been spared, thousands of cases of munitions would have been sent to Germany’s enemies and thereby thousands of German mothers and children robbed of breadwinners.” The note then contained some of Zimmermann’s favourite proposals, to the effect that German submarine commanders would be instructed to permit the passage of American steamers marked in a special way and of whose sailing they had been notified in advance, provided that the American Government guaranteed that these vessels did not carry contraband of war. It was also suggested that a number of neutral vessels should be added to those sailing under the American flag, to give greater opportunity for those Americans who were compelled to travel abroad, and the Note’s most important part continued: “In particular the Imperial Government is unable to admit that the American citizens can protect an enemy ship by mere fact of their presence on board.”
July twenty-first, the American Government rejected the proposals of Germany saying, “The lives of noncombatants may in no case be put in jeopardy unless the vessel resists or seeks to escape after being summoned to submit to examination,” and disposed of the claim that the acts of England gave Germany the right to retaliate, even though American citizens should be deprived of their lives in the course of retaliation by stating: “For a belligerent act of retaliation is _per_se_ an act beyond the law, and the defense, of an act as retaliatory, is an admission that it is illegal.” Continuing it said: “If a belligerent cannot retaliate against an enemy without injuring the lives of neutrals, as well as their property, humanity, as well as justice and a due regard for the dignity of neutral powers, should dictate that the practice be discontinued.”
It was also said: “The United States cannot believe that the Imperial Government will longer refrain from disavowing the wanton act of its naval commander in sinking the _Lusitania_ or from offering reparation for the American lives lost, so far as reparation can be made for the needless destruction of human life by an illegal act.” And the meat of the Note was contained in the following sentence: “Friendship itself prompts it (the United States) to say to the Imperial Government that repetition by the commanders of German naval vessels of acts in contravention of those rights must be regarded by the Government of the United States, when they affect American citizens, as being deliberately unfriendly.”
There the matter has remained so far as the Lusitania was concerned until now. In the meantime, the attack of the American ship, _Nebraskan_, was disavowed; the German Note stating that “the torpedo was not meant for the American flag and is to be considered an unfortunate accident.”
The diplomatic situation with regard to the use of the submarine and the attack on many merchant ships without notice and without putting the passengers in safety was still unsettled when on August nineteenth, 1915, the British ship _Arabic_, was torpedoed, without warning, not far from the place where the _Lusitania_ had gone down. Two Americans were among the passengers killed.
The German Government, after the usual quibbling, at length, in its Note of September seventh, claimed that the Captain of the German submarine, while engaged in preparing to sink the _Dunsley_, became convinced that the approaching _Arabic_ was trying to ram him and, therefore, fired his torpedo. The Imperial Government refused to admit any liability but offered to arbitrate.
There followed almost immediately the case of the _Ancona_, sunk by a submarine flying the Austrian flag. This case was naturally out of my jurisdiction, but formed a link in the chain, and then came the sinking of the _Persia_ in the Mediterranean. On this boat our consul to Aden lost his life.
In the Note of Count Bernstorff to Secretary Lansing, dated September first, 1915, Count Bernstorff said that liners would not be sunk by German submarines without warning, and without putting the passengers in safety, provided that the liners did not try to escape or offer resistance; and it was further stated that this policy was in effect before the sinking of the _Arabic_.
There were long negotiations during this period concerning the _Arabic_. At one time it looked as if diplomatic relations would be broken; but finally the Imperial Government consented to acknowledge that the submarine commander had been wrong in assuming that the _Arabic_ intended to ram his boat, offered to pay an indemnity and disavowed the act of the commander. It was stated that orders so precise had been given to the submarine commanders that a “recurrence of incidents similar to the _Arabic_ is considered out of the question.”
In the same way the Austrian Government gave way to the demands of America in the _Ancona_ case at the end of December, 1915. Ambassador Penfield, in Austria, won great praise by his admirable handling of this case.
The negotiations as to the still pending _Lusitania_ case were carried on in Washington by Count Bernstorff and Secretary Lansing, and finally Germany offered to pay an indemnity for the death of the Americans on the _Lusitania_ whose deaths Germany “greatly regretted,” but refused to disavow the act of the submarine commander in sinking the _Lusitania_ or to admit that such act was illegal.
About this time our State Department sent out a Note proposing in effect that submarines should conform to “cruiser” warfare, only sinking a vessel which defended itself or tried to escape, and that before sinking a vessel its passengers and crew should be placed in safety; and that, on the other hand, merchant vessels of belligerent nationality should be prohibited from carrying any armaments whatever. This suggestion was not followed up.
Zimmermann (not the one in the Foreign Office) wrote an article in the _Lokal_Anzeiger_ of which he is an editor, saying that the United States had something on their side in the question of the export of munitions. I heard that von Kessel, commander of the _Mark_of_Brandenburg_ said that he, Zimmermann, ought to be shot as a traitor. Zimmermann hearing of this made von Kessel apologise, but was shortly afterwards mobilised.
Colonel House had arrived in Germany at the end of January, 1916, and remained only three days. He was quite worried by the situation and by an interview he had had with Zimmermann in which Zimmermann expressed the readiness of Germany to go to war with the United States.
In February, 1916, the Junkers in the Prussian Lower House started a fight against the Chancellor and discussed submarine war, a matter out of their province. The Chancellor hit back at them hard and had the best of the exchange. At this period it was reported that the Emperor went to Wilhelmshafen to warn the submarine commanders to be careful.
About March first it was reported that a grand council of war was held at Charleville and that in spite of the support of von Tirpitz by Falkenhayn, the Chief of Staff, the Chancellor was supported by the Emperor, and once more beat the propositions to recommence ruthless submarine war.
In March too, the “illness” of von Tirpitz was announced, followed shortly by his resignation. On March nineteenth, his birthday, a demonstration was looked for and I saw many police near his dwelling, but nothing unusual occurred. I contemplated a trip to America, but both the Chancellor and von Jagow begged me not to go.
From the time of the _Lusitania_ sinking to that of the _Sussex_ all Germany was divided into two camps. The party of the Chancellor tried to keep peace with America and did not want to have Germany branded as an outlaw among nations. Von Tirpitz and his party of naval and military officers called for ruthless submarine war, and the Conservatives, angry with Bethmann-Hollweg because of his proposed concession as to the extension of the suffrage, joined the opposition. The reception of our last _Lusitania_ Note in July, 1915, was hostile and I was accused of being against Germany, although, of course, I had nothing to do with the preparation of this Note.
In August, 1915, the deputies representing the great industrials of Germany joined in the attack on the Chancellor. These men wished to keep Northern France and Belgium, because they hoped to get possession of the coal and iron deposits there and so obtain a monopoly of the iron and steel trade of the continent. Accelerators of public opinion, undoubtedly hired by the Krupp firm, were hard at work. These Annexationists were opposed by the more reasonable men who signed a petition against the annexation of Belgium. Among the signers of this reasonable men’s petition were Prince Hatzfeld (Duke of Trachenberg) head of the Red Cross, Dernburg, Prince Henkel Donnersmarck, Professor Delbruck, von Harnack and many others.
The rage of the Conservatives at the _Arabic_ settlement knew no bounds, and after a bitter article had appeared in the _Tageszeitung_ about the _Arabic_ affair, that newspaper was suppressed for some days,–a rather unexpected showing of backbone on the part of the Chancellor. Reventlow who wrote for this newspaper is one of the ablest editorial writers in Germany. An ex-naval officer, he is bitter in his hatred of America. It was said that he once lived in America and lost a small fortune in a Florida orange grove, but I never succeeded in having this verified.
In November, 1915, after the _Arabic_ settlement there followed a moment for us of comparative calm. Mrs. Gerard was given the Red Cross Orders of the first and third classes, and Jackson and Rives of the Embassy Staff the second and third class. The third class is always given because one cannot have the first and second unless one has the third or lowest.
There were rumours at this time of the formation of a new party; really the Socialists and Liberals, as the Socialists as such were too unfashionable, in too bad odour, to open a campaign against the military under their own name. This talk came to nothing.
The Chancellor always complained bitterly that he could not communicate in cipher _via_ wireless with von Bernstorff. On one occasion he said to me, “How can I arrange as I wish to in a friendly way the _Ancona_ and _Lusitania_ cases if I cannot communicate with my Ambassador? Why does the United States Government not allow me to communicate in cipher?” I said, “The Foreign Office tried to get me to procure a safe-conduct for the notorious von Rintelen on the pretense that he was going to do charitable work for Belgium in America; perhaps Washington thinks you want to communicate with people like that.” The Chancellor then changed the subject and said that there would be bad feeling in Germany against America after the war. I answered that that idea had been expressed by a great many Germans and German newspapers, and that I had had private letters from a great many Americans who wrote that if Germany intended to make war on America, after this war, perhaps we had better go in now. He then very amiably said that war with America would be ridiculous. He asked me why public opinion in America was against Germany, and I answered that matters like the Cavell case had made a bad impression in America and that I knew personally that even the Kaiser did not approve of the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_. The Chancellor said, “How about the _Baralong_?” I replied that I did not know the details and that there seemed much doubt and confusion about that affair, but that there was no doubt about the fact that Miss Cavell was shot and that she was a woman. I then took up in detail with him the treatment of British prisoners and said that this bad treatment could not go on. This was only one of the many times when I complained to the Chancellor about the condition of prisoners. I am sure that he did not approve of the manner in which prisoners of war in Germany were treated; but he always complained that he was powerless where the military were concerned, and always referred me to Bismarck’s memoirs.
During this winter of submarine controversy an interview with von Tirpitz, thinly veiled as an interview with a “high naval authority,” was published in that usually most conservative of newspapers, the _Frankfurter_Zeitung_. In this interview the “high naval authority” advocated ruthless submarine war with England, and promised to bring about thereby the speedy surrender of that country. After the surrender, which was to include the whole British fleet, the German fleet with the surrendered British fleet added to its force, was to sail for America, and exact from that country indemnities enough to pay the whole cost of the war.
After his fall, von Tirpitz, in a letter to some admirers who had sent him verses and a wreath, advocated holding the coast of Flanders as a necessity for the war against England and America.
The successor of von Tirpitz was Admiral von Holtzendorff, whose brother is Ballin’s right hand man in the management of the Hamburg American Line. Because of the more reasonable influence and surroundings of von Holtzendorff, I regarded his appointment as a help towards peaceful relations between Germany and America.
I have told in another chapter how the Emperor had refused to receive me as Ambassador of a country which was supplying munitions to the Allies.
From time to time since I learned of this in March, 1915, I kept insisting upon my right as Ambassador to be received by the Emperor; and finally early in October, 1915, wrote the following letter to the Chancellor:
“Your Excellency:
Some time ago I requested you to arrange an audience for me with his majesty.
Please take no further trouble about this matter.
Sincerely yours,
JAMES W. GERARD.”
This seemed to have the desired effect. I was informed that I would be received by the Emperor in the new palace at Potsdam on October twenty-second. He was then to pay a flying visit to Berlin to receive the new Peruvian Minister and one or two others. We went down in the train to Potsdam, von Jagow accompanying us, in the morning; and it was arranged that we should return on the train leaving Potsdam a little after one o’clock. I think that the authorities of the palace expected that I would be with the Emperor for a few minutes only, as when I was shown into the room where he was, a large room opening from the famous shell hall of the palace, the Peruvian Minister and the others to be received were standing waiting in that hall.
The Emperor was alone in the room and no one was present at our interview. He was dressed in a Hussar uniform of the new field grey, the parade uniform of which the frogs and trimmings were of gold. A large table in the corner of the room was covered with maps, compasses, scales and rulers; and looked as if the Emperor there, in company with some of his aides, or possibly the chief of staff, had been working out the plan of campaign of the German armies.
The Emperor was standing; so, naturally, I stood also; and, according to his habit, which is quite Rooseveltian, he stood very close to me and talked very earnestly. I was fortunately able to clear up two distinct points which he had against America.
The Emperor said that he had read in a German paper that a number of submarines built in America for England had crossed the Atlantic to England, escorted by ships of the American Navy. I was, of course, able to deny this ridiculous story at the time and furnish definite proofs later. The Emperor complained because a loan to England and France had been floated in America. I said that the first loan to a belligerent floated in America was a loan to Germany. The Emperor sent for some of his staff and immediately inquired into the matter. The members of the staff confirmed my statement. The Emperor said that he would not have permitted the torpedoing of the _Lusitania_ if he had known, and that no gentleman would kill so many women and children. He showed, however, great bitterness against the United States and repeatedly said, “America had better look out after this war:” and “I shall stand no nonsense from America after the war.”
The interview lasted about an hour and a quarter, and when I finally emerged from the room the officers of the Emperor’s household were in such a state of agitation that I feel sure they must have thought that something fearful had occurred. As I walked rapidly towards the door of the palace in order to take the carriage which was to drive me to the train, one of them walked along beside me saying, “Is it all right? Is it all right?”
The unfortunate diplomats who were to have been received and who had been standing all this time outside the door waiting for an audience missed their train and their luncheon.
At this interview, the Emperor looked very careworn and seemed nervous. When I next saw him, however, which was not until the end of April, 1916, he was in much better condition.
I was so fearful in reporting the dangerous part of this interview, on account of the many spies not only in my own Embassy but also in the State Department, that I sent but a very few words in a roundabout way by courier direct to the President.
The year, 1916, opened with this great question still unsettled and, in effect, Germany gave notice that after March first, 1916, the German submarines would sink all armed merchantmen of the enemies of Germany without warning. It is not my place here to go into the agitation of this question in America or into the history of the votes in Congress, which in fact upheld the policy of the President. A proposal as to armed merchantmen was issued by our State Department and the position taken in this was apparently abandoned at the time of the settlement of the _Sussex_ case to which I now refer.
In the latter half of March, 1916, a number of boats having Americans on board were torpedoed without warning. These boats were the _Eaglejoint_, the _Englishman_, the _Manchester_Engineer_ and the _Sussex_. One American was killed or drowned on the _Englishman_, but the issue finally came to a head over the torpedoing of the channel passenger boat, _Sussex_ which carried passengers between Folkstone and Dieppe, France.
On March twenty-fourth the _Sussex_ was torpedoed near the coast of France. Four hundred and thirty-six persons, of whom seventy-five were Americans, were on board. The captain and a number of the passengers saw the torpedo and an endeavour was made to avoid it. After the boat was struck the many passengers took to the boats. Three Americans were injured and over forty persons lost their lives, although the boat was not sunk but was towed to Boulogne.
I was instructed to inquire from the German Government as to whether a German submarine had sunk the _Sussex_. The Foreign Office finally, at my repeated request, called on the Admiralty for a report of the torpedoing of the _Sussex_; and finally on the tenth of April the German Note was delivered to me. In the meantime, and before the delivery of this Note I had been assured again and again that the _Sussex_ had not been torpedoed by a German submarine. In this Note a rough sketch was enclosed, said to have been made by the officer commanding the submarine, of a vessel which he admitted he had torpedoed, in the same locality where the _Sussex_ had been attacked and at about the same time of day. It was said that this boat which was torpedoed was a mine layer of the recently built _Arabic_ class and that a great explosion which was observed to occur in the torpedoed ship warranted the certain conclusion that great amounts of munitions were on board. The Note concluded: “The German Government must therefore assume that injury to the _Sussex_ was attributable to another cause than attack by a German submarine.” The Note contained an offer to submit any difference of opinion that might develop to be investigated by a mixed commission in accordance with the Hague Convention of 1907. The _Englishman_ and the _Eaglepoint_, it was claimed, were attacked by German submarines only after they had attempted to escape, and an explanation was given as to the _Manchester_Engineer_. With reference to the _Sussex_, the note continued: “Should the American Government have at its disposal other material at the conclusion of the case of the _Sussex_, the German Government would ask that it be communicated, in order to subject this material also to investigation.”
In the meantime, American naval officers, etc., had been engaged in collecting facts as to the sinking of the _Sussex_, and this evidence, which seemed overwhelming and, in connection with the admissions in the German note, absolutely conclusive, was incorporated in the note sent to Germany in which Germany was notified: “Unless the Imperial Government should now immediately declare and effect abandonment of this present method of submarine warfare against passenger and freight carrying vessels, the Government of the United States can have no choice but to sever diplomatic relations with the German Empire altogether.”
The issue was now clearly defined.
I have already spoken of the fact that for a long time there had been growing up two parties in Germany. One party headed by von Tirpitz in favour of what the Germans called _rucksichtloser_, or ruthless submarine war, in which all enemy merchant ships were to be sunk without warning, and the party then headed by the Chancellor which desired to avoid a conflict with America on this issue.
As I have explained in a former chapter, the military have always claimed to take a hand in shaping the destinies and foreign policies of Germany. When the Germans began to turn their attention to the creation of a fleet, von Tirpitz was the man who, in a sense, became the leader of the movement and, therefore, the creator of the modern navy of Germany. A skilful politician, he for years dominated the Reichstag and on the question of submarine warfare was most efficiently seconded by the efforts of the Navy League, an organization having perhaps one million members throughout Germany. Although only one of the three heads of the navy (he was Secretary of the Navy), by the force of his personality, by the political position which he had created for himself, and by the backing of his friends in the Navy League he really dominated the other two departments of the navy, the Marine Staff and the Marine Cabinet.
Like most Germans of the ruling class, ambition is his only passion. These Spartans do not care either for money or for the luxury which it brings. Their life is on very simple lines, both in the Army and Navy, in order that the officers shall not vie with one another in expenditure, and in order that the poorer officers and their wives shall not be subject to the humiliation which would be caused if they had to live in constant contact with brother officers living on a more luxurious footing.
Von Tirpitz’ ambition undoubtedly led him to consider himself as a promising candidate for Bethmann-Hollweg’s shoes. The whole submarine issue, therefore, became not only a question of military expediency and a question for the Foreign Office to decide in connection with the relations of America to Germany, but also a question of internal politics, a means of forcing the Chancellor out of office. The advocates for the ruthless war were drawn from the Navy and from the Army, and those who believed in the use of any means of offence against their enemies and particularly in the use of any means that would stop the shipment of munitions of war to the Allies. The Army and the Navy were joined by the Conservatives and by all those who hoped for the fall of the Chancellor. The conservative newspapers, and even the Roman Catholic newspapers were violent in their call for ruthless submarine war as well as violent in their denunciations of the United States of America.
American passengers on merchant ships of the enemy were called _Schutzengel_ (guardian angels), and caricatures were published, such as one which showed the mate reporting to the Captain of an English boat that everything was in readiness for sailing and the Captain’s inquiry, “Are you sure that the American _Schutzengel_ is on board?” The numerous notes sent by America to Germany also formed a frequent subject of caricature and I remember particularly one quite clever one in the paper called _Brummer_, representing the celebrations in a German port on the arrival of the one hundredth note from America when the Mayor of the town and the military, flower girls and singing societies and _Turnverein_ were drawn up in welcoming array.
The liberal papers were inclined to support the Chancellor in his apparent intention to avoid an open break with America. But even the liberal papers were not very strong in their stand.
The military, of course, absolutely despised America and claimed that America could do no more harm by declaring war than it was doing then to Germany; and that possibly the war preparations of America might cut down the amount of the munitions available for export to the enemies of the Empire. As to anything that America could do in a military way, the Navy and the Army were unanimous in saying that as a military or naval factor the United States might be considered as less than nothing. This was the situation when the last _Sussex_ Note of America brought matters to a crisis, and even the crisis itself was considered a farce as it had been simmering for so long a period.