In the canteen at Karlsruhe one was still able to buy a bottle of very light Rhenish wine, but food was dear and scarce. A small tin of sardines cost 3/6; for one fortnight about the end of June or the beginning of July, sugar sold at 1½d. a lump. My wounds had careful attention every day and I was the only one in hospital who still got gauze or cotton bandages. All the others were paper—‘substitute.’ Lint was very scarce and before I left it was almost impossible to get cotton. That great silent power, the British Navy, was doing its work in the North Sea. Little was said or written of it, but the Germans knew it and their hate was in proportion. They knew and felt it in every operation of everyday life, knew that while the seamen of England maintained this grim, strangling grip upon them their own navy—apart from the submarine—was powerless to resent it.
There was one old corporal of the Red Cross in Karlsruhe whom we called ‘Dad’ and who referred to us in turn as ‘his boys’. He always hung about us at meal times and pleaded for anything that was left over. Although engaged in the camps most of the attendants were fed at home. ‘Dad’ used to bring his lunch in a handkerchief and pack it furtively away. The lunch was always the same—a hunk of black bread, a raw turnip and a pinch of salt over it. He had two sons, one of whom he told me was permanently injured in a bombing raid on Karlsruhe.
The aviators came over one night when there was a circus just outside the town and, seeing the tents, bombed it in a mistake for a military camp, killing or wounding about three hundred people, of whom over a hundred were children. Immediately afterwards the Germans placed a prison camp on the circus site. ‘Dad’s’ second boy was a Sergeant Major on the Western Front, and he had a conviction that this one would be taken prisoner. He asked one of our chaps to write a note for him saying that he had always looked after prisoners properly, and he believed that if he could get such a letter to his son, with instructions to keep it about him always, it would lead to his being treated kindly in turn. We were able to assure him that Britons in no circumstances, except when surrender was a cloak to treachery, ill-treated prisoners. Strangely enough, before leaving Karlsruhe, I heard that this man had been taken prisoner somewhere around Ypres, and ‘Dad’ was rather pleased about it. ‘We know,’ he confided to me, ‘that the British always treat prisoners well, though the French do not.’ He also told me that his brother, long resident in England and a naturalised British subject, had two sons fighting with the English.
One of the attendants, the student who had not completed his course when war broke out, sometimes spoke to me in confidence. ‘Our Kaiser is mad,’ he explained. ‘We know very well that Prussia forced on this war because her object had been conquest, and she was confident about the strength of her armies. We can’t hope to win now,’ he added. ‘England has spoiled all our ambitions and our people are starving. It takes all I can get to keep me alive. Curse the Kaiser!’
On another occasion he offered the opinion that for Bavaria, at any rate, a German victory would be the worst event. ‘Defeat would be our future salvation. No more uniforms, no more clicking of heels and saluting for these damned Prussians. I shall stick my fingers on my nose to them.’
He was no mere grumbler either, but a very fine type of fellow, a superior man in many ways, very friendly and very kind. Indeed nothing that he could do for the prisoners was ever a trouble. He had too a sense of decent dignity, for while ‘Dad’ hung about, as I have explained, at meal time, the student always made a point of getting out of the way. His views were influenced by no thought of favour. ‘Freddy’, as he was known to us, dropped a hint one day that we should not trust ‘Dad’ too far, as he had the reputation of carrying tales to headquarters. ‘Striker’, another attendant, was the red-headed humorist whom nothing seemed to depress.
There was a Bavarian who had been with the Uhlans, and one day I mentioned atrocities. ‘Oh yes, that’s the way,’ he remarked. ‘We did have our fun with the girls,’ and he seemed to be rather proud of it. He told me that he was married, talked dolefully about his wife and children who were trying to live upon what would have been sufficient food for one. He was always pleading for scraps to take home to them. He showed us a portrait just taken of his wife and family, and it was horrible. They looked like ghouls. They were, without a doubt, starving.
Outside there was often wonder why Germany had not risen in revolt, but I realised there was little hope of that. The spirit of revolt might exist, but there was nobody behind it. Almost all the men who were fit to fight had reached such a stage of exhaustion that they had no alternative but to submit and suffer. ‘Forbidden’ had come to be a word full of stern meaning: behind the sentiment of ‘Fatherland’ was an iron discipline. Both in Northern and Southern Germany the law of the survival of the fittest in its crude barbaric form was being enforced. The weak must fall, so that the strong might stand unencumbered by any sentiment which, in the higher civilisation, means chivalry or practical humanity. How often we heard that the aged and infants were dying in great numbers, that the German cupboard was empty. In many ways they were suffering. Cotton was so badly needed for explosives that its use otherwise was almost denied. Much of the clothing was being made from inferior fibre, most of it obtained, I was told, from a tough kind of mettle. Meat was taboo; the sausage remained, but was more than ever a mystery. The famine in fats was so severely felt, no soap, no candles. About the rumour that they were boiling down their own dead the Germans were always resentful, and explained that it was due to a wrong translation of one of their orders. They always burned their dead, who were wired together in bundles of five, and English officers who saw these trainloads of bundled dead stacked in open trucks say it was a horrible sight.
Under all these circumstances the prisoners of Karlsruhe Lager were fairly comfortable. There was no lack of musical talent in camp, and they had managed to hire a piano, so that concerts were frequently held, a German official being always present as censor to see that nothing offensive to German sentiment appeared on the program. On the French national day we were permitted to sing our anthem, but were asked not to ‘acclaim’ because people outside said that prisoners were having too many concessions, enjoying themselves too much, though we saw little sign of any strong civil feeling upon that point. As compared with Northern Germany I noted repeatedly a change in the sentiment. In Prussia they at least made pretence of admiring Frenchmen who, they said, could do nothing less but fight in defence of their country. For a time at any rate a better understanding with the French prisoners was being very sedulously cultivated. In Baden the great majority were better disposed towards the British and rather hated the French. This was due, without much doubt, to the fact that the flying squadrons which crossed the border to bomb their towns were almost nearly always French.
One day the Commandant read out a list of names amongst which mine was included, and said, ‘You are to be repatriated soon.’ We exchanged warning glances not to make a demonstration then, but when he had left we became almost hysterical in our congratulations. A few days later ‘Dad’ explained that we were to leave on July 18th, that we would be send to a port in Holland and a British hospital ship would meet us there. July 18th found us in a fever of excitement. Then came the chilling information that there was a hitch and delay. England, they said, was to blame. There was some dispute as to the ports of exchange, but we might get away at the end of the month. One day after another was mentioned for departure, but as time passed we lost all faith in such rumours. About the middle of September hope revived, but the end of it was the intimation that some were to be transferred to another camp. The intention to repatriate had been genuine enough, for we were examined by medical boards and the papers of exchange prepared. Those eligible for repatriation were men who had lost a leg or an eye, if the doctors agreed in such a case that the sight of the other eye was badly affected or failing. Paralysed and tubercular patients were also included.
From June on for some time the weather in Baden was hot, and about that time the doctors said that they wished in my case to try the sun care. I was carried out every day and laid in the sunshine with the wound exposed. Improvement was very soon noticeable, the wound commenced to heal and a film of skin to form over the gap. The sun cure seems to be very widely practised in Germany. It is not wholly for thrift’s sake that children are encouraged to walk to school bare-foot, carrying their books with them. Boys and girls not constitutionally strong are taken in summer to the pine woods of the Black Forest, where, almost nude, they spend as much of their time as possible in the open air. The Australian must have lived for a time in the worst weather conditions of Northern Europe to realise himself as he is—a Sun worshipper—to appreciate the extent to which both his constitution and character have been fashioned and favoured by sunlight.
Whenever food parcels were delayed, ‘Freddy’ would point to our empty tables and remark, ‘England finished—no more food.’ But he always got back his laugh and the retort, ‘Verdient. Deutschland finished; no food.’
They were apparently not much worst off in that respect than they had been a year before, although living largely from one potato season to another. Agriculture, like everything else in Germany, had been organised for war. Root crops were their mainstay. Here in Baden fields of red beet, carrots, turnips and potatoes spread far and wide. There was little fallow, every patch was being cultivated, not as a private enterprise, but always ‘For the Government’. The two great crops were cabbages and potatoes. I had the impression that, by comparison with beans and peas, the diet specialists declared both these foods to be greatly over-valued. If German opinion is to be judged by its practices, they think otherwise.
One of our interpreters at Karlsruhe was an elderly man, a very quiet, decent fellow, who had formerly been a prosperous schoolmaster. He would talk freely about Germany’s condition and prospects when there was no chance of his being overheard by anyone in authority. He too was wrathful with the Prussians and especially the Junkers, saying that it would be a good thing for the people if Germany were beaten. One might ‘Damn the Kaiser’ to his heart’s content almost anywhere in Baden, and be sure of finding the echo peculiar in being rather more virulent. Here, too, they were of opinion that the best they could expect from the war was a draw, with all the combatants reduced to the same dead level of exhaustion. One no longer heard the boast proudly made by a Sergeant Major at Bochum: ‘Germany can never be beaten by a nation of tea-drinkers.’
In many ways we realised that we were then occupying probably one of the best prison camps in Germany. True, we saw little outside the Lager, which was about two hundred yards square, but with a decent Commandant there was little inside it with which the fair-minded might find fault. In no circumstances would I have complained about the rations, for at that time they were unquestionably doing their best. There was very little punishment, mainly because there were no offences. One officer was sent to cells for referring to the Germans as ‘Bosche’, a term to which they much objected, and which the French used repeatedly for their annoyance. The attitude of the Commandant of a German prison regulates for good or evil the conduct of the whole staff.
Our food parcels from home were satisfactory, so much so that the camp authorities offered to pay us thirty pfennigs a day if we could relinquish our right to the German ration, so that it might be distributed outside. The sentimentalist may say that we were inhuman to refuse. But there was always this hard fact to consider. We were being asked to help Germany over difficulties which her own ambitions and cupidity had created. It was only when they began to suffer that they ceased to be arrogantly patriotic. To help them by foregoing anything that was our right would have been a sort of treason. It was well for the sake of peace in the future that all Germany should realise the suffering of the war which they had created, suffering which will be a black legend along the Rhine through many future generations. The frothing patriot who thinks that he covers the whole case with ‘Kill the Kaiser’ has neither thought nor fought. They were trying hard to cover up their needs for strategy’s sake. For having admitted at Bochum that they were only getting a small allowance of horseflesh twice a week, a two-inch wafer, in fact, one man was sent to cells for six days.
Once a week prisoners at Karlsruhe were allowed to have a bath, a cold shower outside, a hot bath in the infirmary.
There was an effort to prepare a tennis court in the Lager, but this could not be managed. The Commandant, however, brought a set of bowls, and they were able to play the game in a rough way upon hard ground. Another social success was a stage fitted up for a Pierrot show, and it was in absolute defiance of prison rules that the Commandant manages to get them seven suits of thin cotton pyjamas as the basis of costumes. We had the help of a skilled artist for the scenes, and much ingenuity was shown in cutting out little trifles from food tins for decoration. With the means available the stage and costume party were a remarkable success. The Adjutant, a bit of a bully, tried to baulk us at first, but a hint from higher up stopped him. Personally my only worry was still no word from home. The first letter overtook me at Freiburg ten months after I had been taken prisoner. I cannot help thinking that for some reason they were purposely kept back. Many letters which reached me in Switzerland, via Germany, had left Australia eight months before.
Two religious services, Catholic and Protestant, were held every Sunday. The young padre, another of the best German type, visited and conversed with us often. A Captain of the Mercantile Marine, who had been educated in Germany and knew the language perfectly, was also permitted to obtain certain specified German papers and read them to us, but on some days when we assumed that the news was not agreeable, no papers came. It was at Karlsruhe that we got first news of the great offensive against the Italians, and for some time afterwards those in Baden believed it to be the finishing stroke of the war. Of the two propaganda papers widely distributed through Germany, one was called the Continental edition of The Times, most of the articles in it being written by a notorious renegade. Another was the Continental edition of a French paper. The war news given in German papers seemed generally reliable, they were honest in mentioning failures as well as success. Occasionally we had new prisoners, flying men whose machines had been crippled and compelled to plane down on the wrong side of the line. Thus we got occasional scraps of news of our own operations in Ypres.