A TRAITOR DEGRADED

Waipukurau Press, Issue 300, 25 August 1908, Page 7

A TRAITOR DEGRADED

« “Ullmo, Benjamin Charles, you are unworthy to wear the uniform of the Republic, and by law we hereby degrade you.” Captain Duthiel, whose duty it was to perform the dramatic ceremony of degrading Lieutenans Ullmo, the opium eater who tried to ■sell the secrets of his country to Germany, stood facing the prisoner. Behind him stood 150 army and navy officers of all ranks. Around the prisoner was a guard of eight sailors carrying -their rifles with bayonets fixed,and by the Governor’s side a quartermaster who, as Captain Duthiel finished reading the sentence, stepped up and laid his hand on Ullmo’s shoulder. The degradation took place in the morning (writes a correspondent of the “Daily Express”) in the Place St Roch at Toulon—a dusty square surrounded by palm trees. Ullmo spent the previous night in silent tears, and when day dawned he began to show signs of impatience. He said nothing, however. He had spoken to nobody for two days. At six o’clock in the morning he put on his uniform and waited. A tremendous crowd had gathered on the Place St Roch. The palm trees bent with their human freight, and all round the square were ladders covered with people. An angry crowd, weary with long waiting, began to shout and yell and scream for Ullmo’s blood at four o’clock that morning. So for five hours Ullmo, sitting in his prison cell, heard what his countrymen desired of him.

“ Death to the traitor 1 Give up the traitor’s blood! A bas Ullmo ! A mort !” Just before eight o’clock the troops arrived. They marched on to the wide square, and did their best to form the seething crowd into something like order. It was not easy. Men were knocked down and trampled under foot, children were hurt and women were taken off to the hospital, protesting as they were carried away that they were well enough, and begged to be allowed to remain.

At last the soldiers formed their square, but even then the crowd broke through it several times,'and for some moments it was felt by the authorities that a postponement of the degradation would be wise. But orders were given to proceed with it, and at twenty minutes to nine the prison door was opened, and Ullmo, with his guard of eight men, stepped out. There was one wild howl from the crowd, and then silence. Ullmo marched stiffly on, his eyes fixed on the heels of the men in front of him. Then came the beat of drums, and Captain Duthiel, whose voice shook, read the sentence. The quartermaster laid his left hand on Ullmo’s shoulder, and the officer who had tried to betray his country shivered. But not a word was spoken. In perfect silence the quartermaster tore the braid from Ullmo’s cap, then the two epaulettes from his shoulders, and the buttons from his coat.

One by one the signs of his officer’s rank were torn off the prisoner’s uniform and thrown upon the ground, and one could hear them fall ou the dusty ground, for not a sound came from the crowd. With a quick movement the quartermaster unbuckled the traitor’s belt and drew the sword from its sheath. As he did so, and the bright blade glittered in the sunlight, the crowd cried, “ A mort 1” and was still again. In that short silence was heard the short, sharp click of the sword as the quartermaster broke it across his knee and threw the pieces at Ullmo’s feet, and then pandemonium broke out again. The officers grew nervous. A quick order was given. Ullmo marched round the square before the troops almost at a double, and hurried back into the prison. He was crying bitterly, and as the prison door closed on him his escort brought him to a chair, on to which he sank a broken man. He will be taken to the He de Re, where he will await the boat that is to take him out to Devil’s Island, for Ullmo has been sentenced to perpetual confinement

foi having tried to sell his country’s secrets to a foreign Power. In the little island off the coast of French Guiana where Major Dreyfus suffered his five years of martyrdom, perhaps in the same cell, Ullmo will drag out what is left of his wrecked life. There is not likely to be much of it. He looked like a dying man. There had been no degradation of a naval officer at Toulon for 117 years.