A WAR BOOK

Hokitika Guardian, 27 December 1929, Page 5

A WAR BOOK

SERIOUS CHARGES AGAINST WAR HAPPENINGS. [United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph.—Copyright.] ' (Received this day at 9.40 a.in.) LONDON, December 25. Were Australians guilty of atrocities against their prisoners in the great war, is a question brought to the lront owing to statements by the Irish-Ger-man poet, Robert Graves in a brilliantly written autograph “Goodbye to all that”, dealing generally with war in which he fought most gallantly on the British side and was so badly wounded that he was reported dead. This book published last month was immediately criticised by the “Daily Mail” as painful, and provocative. Graves wtords suggest that France and Britain plotted and prepared for the war, dftd he add| there was neither patriotism nor religion in the trenches.. '■ V'

He declares ilf the chaplains had shown one tenth of the courage and endurance of the < doctors, the British expeditionary force might have started a religious rivival over the States. Many of the officers having two years service in the trenches became dipsom- . aniacsi Some even worked up two bottles of whisky daily. He commentson the numerous suicides and adds that executions were ■frequent including two privates who , confessed that they shot a company Sergt, Major instead of a platoon Sergt whom they hated. French military at Bethune at which plnce they were executed, delivered a ’speech, eulogising how gloriously the British could die, The book also contains many instances of amazing British gallantry, but as foil to these, instances are quoted of alleged atrocities by Australian, and Canadian soldiers, who Graves asserts, had the worst reputations for violence against prisoners. Jonathan Cape, the publisher, now denies reports from Australia that the book has been recalled owing the paragraph alleging Australian atrocities. The publishers say they had no complaints from Australia. The book is selling freely in England. It is now added that Graves’s paragraph refeiring to the “worst reputation,” added “the only thing to be said was they were only two generations removed from the days of Ralph Rashleigh and Marcus Clarke,” both of whom wrote of convict time. He could not decide how far this reputation was due to the overseas habit of bragging and leg pulling. „ /

Graves related a first hand account ■ of an accident at Mdreancourt where

Australians captured a dozen Germans t in a cellar, made them turn out their pockets and return to /the cellar, and then threw half, a dozen mills bombs amongj them. * 'Authors reflection on 'Scottish troops - have aroused violent protest and writing in the “Daily Mail” about the alleged retreat of Scottish battalions from High Wood. Graves says he merely recorded what he had been told. He now finds it untrue nnd apologises for reporting a libel.

ASPERSIONS RIDICULED. /• v _ MELBOURNE, Dee. 27. Interviewed regarding Graves’s aspersions on Australian troo'is, cabled from London, Sir John Monash characterised the statements as ridiculous and impossibly. ' The writer evidently had no idea what he was talking About. German prisoners captured by Australians were handed over immediately to the military police who •■snorted them to the corps cages whe,re they were handed over, to the intelligence officer. Brigadier-General Lloyd described the story as absolute rot. , The Australians treated their prisoners too leniently. “1 have seen Germans scrambling past men of other divisions to be taken prisoner by Australians.” Brigadiers McKay and Heane ridiculed Graves’s allegations.