Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 150, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 July 1917 — GERMANS DESERT ARMY IN DROVES [ARTICLE]

GERMANS DESERT ARMY IN DROVES

Story From Holland Says Uhlans Were Sent to Shoot Them Down. BEG FOOD AT DUTCH BORDER Weary of War and Depressed by Hunger They No Conger "Believe in German Victory, but Are Eager for Peace. By W. J. L. KtEHL. (Special Correapendence of the Chicago Daily News.) The Hague, Holland.—On the souths ern border of Holland desertions from the German army occur on a large scale nowadays. At first it was only a single soldier here and there, then they came by threes and fives, later in groups of ten and twenty, but now as many as seventy and eighty come a time. A few days ago a little army tried to desert —some 500 to 600 men, mostly fusileers, marines and landsturmers. The Dutch report says that they attempted to cross near Cadsand, but the German military authorities got wind of it, and 200 Uhlans with two machine guns were dispatched from Bruges to head them back. A formal battle raged between the two forces; it was viewed from Hollanjl. The machine guns got in their deadly work, and almost all the would-be deserters were either killed or captured; only eight wounded men succeeded in reaching Dutch soil and safety. Every fresh arrival, deserter or escaped prisoner, tells the same story of famine conditions In Belgium and Germany, and depression among the soldiers, who dread being to the front. They no longer believe in German victory, but are eager for peace. Only one escaped prisoner had a different storf to tell, and that man was a Russian general, who arrived in Maastricht accompanied by two German “flight lieutenants” who had escaped with him. This general believed the Germans

can never be reduced by hunger. “They will eat grass or the dust from the st ree t rather than surrender on the allies’ terms,” he said. He told how bad the treatment and the food was in the German prison camps; he had been in seven, so he could judge. After every attempt to escape he had been transferred to a different camp, but everywhere the prisoners were treated brutally, the officers as well as the men. How he had at last succeeded in getting away with his two companions he preferred not to say—because he feared that would make escape more difficult for his comrades still in captivity. He did, however, say that what made escape very difficult was that it caused great surprise to people in German towns and villages to see three able-bodied men walking about, and he and his companions had been obliged to invent all sorts of tales about having been wounded and being now on leave to account for their absence from “the front.”

German soldiers frankly beg for food on the Dutch border. The officers don't go quite as far as that. There is a sort of neutral zone along the frontier where Germans and Hollanders can meet. There the German officers often congregate and make overtures of comradeship to their colleagues on the other side. Friendly relations exist, and when the luncheon hour comes, and the Netherlanders see what poor provisions the Germans have, they invite the Germans to lunch. A picnic is held and the Germans consume incredible quantities of rolls, sausages or ham sandwiches, and loudly praise the coffee the orderlies of their Dutch comrades serve. They say they never get good coffee any more. Although the Duteh officer often meets his German colleagues, it must not be supposed he always agrees with their methods of discipline toward their own men. Both officers and soldiers in Holland, by far the greater number of them at least, strongly disapprove of the brutal and heartless way in which most German officers treat their men. The younger officers show this by chaffing the Germans about it. Merchant Ranks Over Noble. How the spirit of caste still rules in the German ranks is instanced by a little anecdote told me by a Dutch .officer. . He had come on friendly “coffee” terms with a German officer. Von S., the personification,, to, the very monocle, of those “schneidige lieutenants” often lampooned In Germany. One day Von S. came to lunch bubbling over with indignation, for a simple “bourgeois," a former Berlin merchant, had been given the post of captain in his regiment, and he himself was first lieutenant. “Denken sie slch, Heber Kamerad!” he exclaimed. I Von S. Un ter einem Kaufmann aus.Berlln I” He felt disgraced. But officers are beginning to get scarce in Germany, so the reserve officers who haveacquitted themselves creditably have to be promoted to positions they would never have at J tained in peace times. — —