THE GERMAN CORPSE FACTORY.

Taranaki Daily News, 1 June 1917, Page 3

THE GERMAN CORPSE FACTORY.

A COMPANY RUN' FOR PROFIT.

HOW THE HUNS EXPLOIT THEIR

DEAD.

_ Hie recent statement made by Herr Karl Rosner, special correspondent of the Berlin Local 'Advertiser (Lokal Auzcigcr) with the German armies in the u est, that north of Rheims a German. factory exists for "converting corpses" 1 into oil, fertiliser, and pig-fodder, corroborates a very remarkable account of this new anil horrible Herman industry which appeared in the "Independance Beige" for April 10 as extracted from "La Belgique" of Leydon (in Holland), the statement (reference to which was ivas recently cabled), omitting some of Uie most repulsive details, is as follows: "We have known for long that the Hermans stripped their dead behind the firing line, fastened them ipto bundles Df three or foilr bodies with iron wire, and then dispatched these grisly bundles to the rear. Until recently the trains laden with the dead were sent to Selling, near 1" le, and a point north of Brussels where were refuse consumers. Much surprise has been caused by the fact that of late this traffic lias proceeded ir. the direction of Gerolstein, and it was noted that on each wagon was written 'D.A.V.G.'

'•'German science is responsible for the ghoulish idea of the formation of the German Oft'al-Conversion Company, Ltd. ('D.A.V.G.,' or 'Deutsche Abfaly-Vcrwer-tung Gcssellischaft') a dividend-earning company, with a capital of £230,000, the factory of which has been constructed 1000 yards from the lumvay connecting St. Vitli, near the Belgian frontier, with Gerolstein, in the lonely, little-frequent-ed Eifel district, south-west of Coblentz. This factory deals specially with the dead from the West front. If the results are as good as the company hopes, another will be established to deal with torpses on the East front.

"The factory is invisible from the railway. It is placed deep in forest country, with a specially tliiclc growth of trees about it. Live wires surround it. A special double trade leads to it. The works are about TOCfb longhand 100 ft broad, and the railway runs completely round them. In the north-west corner of the works the discharge of the trains takes place. AN ENDLESS CHAIN. "The trains arrive full of bare bodies, which are unloaded by the workers, who live at the works. The men wear oilskin overalls and niaSKs with mica eyepieces. They arc equipped with long hooked poles and push the bundles of bodies to an endless chain which picks them up with bit;, hooks, attached at intervals of 2ft. The bodies are transported on this endless chain into a limp, narrow compartment where thev pass through a scalding bath which disinfects them. They then fro through a drying chamber, and finally are automatically carried into a digester or great cnuldron, in wli'ch they are dropped by an apparatus which detaches them from the chain. Tn the digester tli'ev remain from six to eight hours, and are treated by steam, which breaks them up, while they are slowly stirred by machinery. The bones sink to the bottom, leaving a thick, dark-colored

■'From this treatment result several products: The fats are broken up into stearir.e. a form of talloiv, and oils, which require to he re-distilled before they call be used. The process of distillation is carried out by boiling the oil with carbonate of soda, and some paart of the by-products resulting from this is used by German soap-makers. The oil distillery and refinery lies in the southeastern corner of the works. The refined oil is sent out in small casks like those, used for petroleum, and is of a yellowish-brown colcr.

"The fumes are exhausted from the buildings by electric fans, and are sucked through a great pipe to the north-east-em eonier, where they are condensed and the muse resulting is dissharged into a sewer. There is no high chimney, ns 'the boiler furnaces are supplied with tlir bv electric fans.

'•There is a laboratory, and in charge of the works is a chief chemist with tv;o assistants and 78 men. All the employees live soldiers and are attached to the Sth Army Corps. There is a> sanatorium by tlio works, and under no pretext is any man permitted to leave them. They are guarded as prisoners at their appalling work.

"One of the American Consuls, on leaving Germany in February, stated in Switzerland that the Germans were distilling glycerine for nitro-glyeerine from the bodies of their dead, and thus were obtaining some part of their explosives. The 'Local-Advertiser' special correspondent announced that three products were obtained from corpses by this horrible industry:

1. Lubricating oil.

2. Feeding material for pigs. 3. Fertilisers from the refuse and 'bones, which were ground down together."