WOMEN'S GRIM WAR STORIES.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LVII, Issue 303, 1 June 1915, Page 6

WOMEN'S GRIM WAR STORIES.

MURDER OK YILLAGFKK. liVKN A WOUNDED GHUMAN WAS BUKIED ALIVE. Heart-moving tales are told by the twenty-one ladies released from internment in Brussels, wlio afterwards arrival in London. All of thoin had lived in the Belgian' capital before the war, some having been employed in Belgian families, while others were the wives of m")i who are now German prisoners. The party arrived at Tilbury ia the Batavief IV., after a passage across the North Sea that was devoid of interest. "We were looking nut for submarines all the way across." Miss Xorah Humphreys remarked in conversation, "hut we saw nothing in the shape of a German warship. We should not have been surprised had we been intercepted by one, because we were warned about the German blockade." • It seems that a tactful German officer when he was serving out passports a few days before sped the parting guests with the cheery suggestion that they ■ would probably be blown sky-high while crossing the North Sea. Another, who was oil the platform when the refugees left Brussels, indulged ill the more subtle jibe, "Au revoir, until wo meet you ■when we march through London." Miss Ortony, a young lady from Durban, who has been acting as a nurse since the outbreak of the war, was very outspoken about the conduct of the Ger- ! mans towards lier, and she told some 'gruesome stories about her experiences on the battlefields. " ABSOLUTE BEASTS." '•'They are absolute beasts," she said. "They are more like escaped convicts than men. One man was so rude to vno when 1 went for my passport that i threatened to box his ears. For this I was ordered to wait for three hours in the ollice as a punishment." She added that she was tending the German wounded at the hospital, when she saw the Germans burying their dead, after tying them together. One man -piteously cried out, "I am not dead,' 1 and a soldier doing the gruesome work replied that it was more than bis life was worth to release him. Asked as to the general treatment of the Belgians, Hiss Ortony said they wen terror-stricken. The Germans placarded the walls with the news of a fresh victory every day, and the number of English, French and Knssiivn prisoners taker amounted altogether to some millions, ii you added them up. Aliss K. Gnerin, a Tipperary lady, whe was governess at the chateau of tlx Baroness de Yort, near Liege, told : story of what was nothing less thai cold-blooded murder. " 1 was in the vil lage of Horse,'' said Miss Guerin, "wlccr the Germans came. The all'righte; people ran into their houses, The Ger mans shot over their heads to terrorisi them, and they took three men, tic< their hands over their heads, and the) shot one and stabbed the other two They then did the awful thing of ma. : ; ing an old man of over seventy, fathe of one of the victims, bury his own sol with the others. "When I went for my passport th olticer said, 'Von will be safer in Kng land, you know, for we are barbarians. 1 told him that was quite true, and fo this 1 was detained for some hours." SACK OF LOUYAIX. Miss Cordelia Xeedham, of Fence houses, Durham, was in Louvain durin; the bombardment. "We spent the night of August in the public gardens,? she said. "A three o'clock the next day we were take prisoners, and the Germans made us li down while they lircd over our licad> While we were lying there twenty Bel gians ran out of a side street. Tin'; were driven down the boulevard by th Germans, who put them in two line against a wall and then shot then Their bodies were buried in the publi gardens. "Afterwards the women and childre were allowed to go. I made my eseap to Uevele, and afterwards to Brusse'e Nearly the whole of Lonvain is dc stroyed." Mrs Atkinson had her three little elii' dren with her. Iter husband is now prisoner in Berlin. Mrs Atkinson sav they had some Germans billeted in the! house, but she makes no complaint a to their conduct. They told her tha it was not their fault they were i Belgium. Shampooing, Hairdressing, and Twisi ing. Electrolysis for the permanent rc moval of superfluous hair. Switches Toupees, etc. Ladies' combings made u to any design. Mrs. BEADLE," Egmon Toilet Parlors, Griffiths' Buildings, nezCarncgia Lilircri-