subjects mentioned will be accorded under certain reasonable necessary conditions. British Government hope therefore British subjects will be released and permitted to leave the country if they so desire. You may communicate the above without comment. File No. 763.72115/396 BRYAN The Ambassador in Turkey (Morgenthau) to the Secretary of State1 273. Your 240. [Telegram] AMERICAN EMBASSY, Constantinople, January 9, 1915, 5 p. m. [Received January 10, 9 a. m.] Contents communicated to Minister of the Interior who says that statement of British Foreign Office in your No. 227 being construed by him as a promise not to bombard' unfortified places the Ottoman Government gives assurances that all British subjects throughout the empire will be properly treated and receive full protection. He says belligerent subjects were sent from the seacoast to the interior as a military measure and in order to prevent all possibility of their giving information to the AngloFrench fleet. If conditions for the release of Omar Tousson and others mentioned prove acceptable he states the whole matter can be promptly arranged. AMERICAN AMBASSADOR METHODS OF WARFARE: CHARGES OF ILLEGAL AND INHUMANE CONDUCT ON THE PART OF BELLIGERENT FORCES-ATTITUDE OF THE UNITED STATES [No attempt is here made to include all the charges and evidence submitted to the Department relative to alleged violations of the Hague regulations of war on land and other agreements designed to reduce the inhumanity and destructiveness of war, nor the demands for protests addressed to it by American citizens. The following selection of documents is designed primarily to set forth the attitude taken by the American Government toward the subject.] File No. 763.72116/1 The Chargé d'Affaires in Sweden (Caffery) to the Secretary of 1 State From German Minister here: AMERICAN LEGATION, Stockholm, August 18, 1914. [Received August 19, 12.15 p. m.] Please make by wire following communication to French Government : Reports from the German troops show that contrary to international law a war in which the whole population is involved is being organized Repeated to the Ambassador in Great Britain January 12. 2 "Not printed. in France in numerous cases, members of the population wearing ordinary clothes have treacherously shot on German soldiers. Germany protests against such warfare incompatible with the rules of international law. The German army has been instructed to suppress in the most energetical manner any hostile attempt on the part of the population. Every person not belonging to the recognized armed forces who bears arms, who disturbs the communication in the rear of the German armies, who cuts telegraph wires, who handles explosives or who in any way takes part in the war without being entitled to do so will be immediately shot under martial law. If through these measures the war assumes a brutal character Germany declines all responsibility. France alone is responsible for the streams of blood which the war will cause. Please communicate to the Belgian Government the following text: The Royal Government of Belgium has refused Germany's sincere offers which would have spared the country the terrors of war. Belgium wanted to have war as she opposed an armed resistance to the German forces who were forced to enter her territory because of the measures taken by Germany's enemies. Although the Belgian Government has informed Germany in the note of the 8th instant according to the rules of war they will only allow troops in uniform to participate in the hostilities numerous civilians in ordinary clothes have taken part [in] the engagements around Liége. They have not only fired on German troops but they have even murdered the wounded in the most cruel manner and they have killed medical officers in the exercise of their functions. At the same time the mob in Antwerp has destroyed German property and has brutally assassinated women and children before the whole civilized world. Germany asks Belgium to account for the blood of these innocent persons and for her way of making war which defies all the rules of civilization if the entirely Belgians fault in view of protecting the German army against the fanaticism of the population every person not wearing a uniform who does not bear some clearly visible sign entitling him to participate in the war will be treated as having forfeited the privileges given by international law if he takes part in the hostilities disturbs the communications in the rear of the German armies cuts telegraph wires handles explosives or unlawfully commits any other hostile act he will be treated as a franc tireur and consequence he will immediately be shot under martial law [sic]. Please wire via American Legation, Stockholm, date when above communication has reached French and Belgian Governments. IMPERIAL GERMAN FOREIGN [OFFICE], ZIMMERMANN CAFFERY The Secretary of State to the Chargé d'Affaires in Sweden (Caffery) [Telegram] DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, August 26, 1914. Your August 18. Communication to French Government was read orally to Counselor of French Embassy to-day for his information. Communication to Belgian Government was read to Belgian Minister on the 22d instant. Copies were not delivered to either the French Embassy or the Belgian Legation, inasmuch as the Department prefers not to become the official medium of communications of such nature between belligerents. BRYAN File No. 763.72/635 The Consul General at Antwerp (Diederich) to the Secretary of State [Telegram] AMERICAN CONSULATE GENERAL, Antwerp, undated. [Received August 26, 1914, 7.20 p. m.] Your cables 22, 23, 25 August, welfare.1 All communications Belgium save Ghent, Bruges, and seacoast cut off. Gibson, after two days' sojourn here, has started back to Brussels this noon. Hope he will get safely through firing lines. Antwerp very calm though almost completely isolated. At outbreak of war excitement was at fever heat and though many German women and children were made to endure cruel hardships by the perhaps too precipitate execution of the expulsion order no bodily harm or injury was done them. I know whereof I speak. In times like these stories of horrible atrocities will crop out everywhere but let Americans keep cool and remember audiatur et altera pars. DIEDERICH File No. 763.72116/18 The Secretary of State to the Consul General at Antwerp (Diederich) [Telegram] DEPARTMENT OF STATE, Washington, September 4, 1914. Your September 2.1 Please confine yourself to statement of facts. Our neutrality does not permit an expression of opinion by our diplomatic or consular officers. BRYAN File No. 763.72116/24 The German Ambassador (Bernstorff) to the Secretary of State [Translation] GERMAN EMBASSY, Washington, September 3, 1914. I have the honor to communicate the following to your excellency: My Government has informed me that a Belgian delegation has left for America to lay before the President of the United States documentary evidence of alleged German atrocities. By direction of my Government I hereby protest against the contemplated representations which are groundless. Accept [etc.] 1 Not printed. J. BERNSTORFF File No. 763.72116/27 The Ambassador in Germany (Gerard) to the Secretary of State [Telegram] AMERICAN EMBASSY, Berlin, September 7, 1914. [Received September 8, 6.15 p. m.] 53. I am requested to forward the following telegram from the Emperor to the President: I feel it my duty, Mr. President, to inform you as the most prominent representative of principles of humanity, that after taking the French fortress of Longwy, my troops discovered there thousands of dumdum cartridges made by special government machinery. The same kind of ammunition was found on killed and wounded troops and prisoners, also on the British troops. You know what terrible wounds and suffering these bullets inflict and that their use is strictly forbidden by the established rules of international law. I therefore address a solemn protest to you against this kind of warfare which owing to the methods of our adversaries has become one of the most barbarous known in history. Not only have they employed these atrocious weapons but the Belgian Government has openly encouraged and since long carefully prepared the participation of the Belgian civil population in the fighting. The atrocities committed even by women and priests in this guerrilla warfare, also on wounded soldiers, medical staff and nurses (doctors killed), hospitals attacked by rifle fire, were such that my generals finally were compelled to take the most drastic measures in order to punish the guilty and to frighten the bloodthirsty population from continuing their work of vile murder and horror. Some villages and even the old town of Löwen, excepting the fine hôtel de ville, had to be destroyed in self-defense and for the protection of my troops. My heart bleeds when I see that such measures have become unavoidable and when I think of the numerous innocent people who lose their home and property as a consequence of the barbarous behaviour of those criminals. WILLIAM, EMPEROR AND KING GERARD File No. 763.72116/31 The President of France to the President of the United States [Telegram-Translation] Bordeaux, September 10, 1914. MR. PRESIDENT: I am informed that the German Government has tried to impose upon Your Excellency with a claim that dumdum bullets were made in a French Government shop and used by our soldiers. This calumny is but a bold attempt to reverse the charges. Since the beginning of the war Germany has been using dumdum bullets and committing daily infractions of international law. As early as August 18, and repeatedly thereafter, we have had occasion to denounce outrages to Your Excellency and to the powers signatory of the Hague convention. Germany, aware of our protests, is now trying to confuse the issue and to lay up mendacious pretexts for indulging in fresh atrocities. In the name of flouted right and outraged civilization I send to Your Excellency an indignant protest. RAYMOND POINCARÉ File No. 763.72/838 The Ambassador in Great Britain (Page) to the Secretary of State [Telegram] AMERICAN EMBASSY, London, September 11, 1914, 3 a. m. 644. Stories of horrors so naturally come with every war that for weeks I discredited the unspeakable tales that were brought from the Continent, and many are told which yet seem incredible. But American and other neutral witnesses of German atrocities in France and especially in Belgium now make doubt impossible about some of the most barbarous acts in human annals. Man after man and woman after woman tell of very young girls whom they have seen that were violated by German soldiers. They tell of Belgian boys the tendons in whose arms and legs were cut with swords. I am told by two persons who have seen him, of a physician whose hand was cut off while he was dressing a Belgian soldier's wounds. I am told by a trustworthy woman that there are wounded English soldiers. now in English hospitals whose noses were cut off while they lay wounded on the field. Hundreds of such stories are told by apparently credible persons. The violators of the Belgian treaty, the sowers of mines in the open sea, the droppers of bombs on Antwerp and Paris to kill anybody they may hit, have taken to heart Bernhardi's doctrine of the glorious enjoyment of war. It is impossible longer to doubt the wholly barbarous conduct of the Prussians. This conviction is helping to increase the number of English volunteers enormously and is producing a silent, grim determination to make an end forever of the military system that has produced such men. PAGE File No. 763.72/878 The Ambassador in Great Britain (Page) to the Secretary of State No. 675] [Telegram] AMERICAN EMBASSY, London, September 15, 1914, 7 p. m. 1 Would it not be a fruitful idea if the Carnegie Peace Foundation 1 should appoint a committee of inquiry of eminent Americans composed of men of international reputation to come to Europe immediately and investigate the alleged atrocities and the general conduct of the war upon a humanitarian point of view? Their report would become an historic document. 'Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. AMERICAN AMBASSADOR |