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that there would be no further deportations.1 Nevertheless, the scale upon which it was resorted to during the succeeding years of the war was far less extensive.

§ 422. Treatment of the Belgian Déportés. The great majority of the déportés were sent to Germany, but a considerable number were taken to the occupied regions of France, where they were compelled to work at such tasks and under such conditions as the German authorities prescribed. The proclamations calling up the inhabitants usually stated that they would be "transferred" to Germany for forced labor, but generally no details as to the character of the labor or the wages to be paid were given. Many harrowing tales were told by the victims who were subsequently released of the cruel treatment they received at the hands of German authorities; of long journeys in overcrowded, filthy cattle trucks without food or drink; of how they were mocked and jeered at by the populace of German towns through which they passed; of how they were compelled to work at degrading tasks and in munitions factories and other establishments for the manufacture of war materials; of how they were overworked, starved, tortured, and denied the wages which had been promised them, and the like.2 In January,

1 Thus a despatch from Havre on May 23, 1917, stated that three thousand persons had been deported from Brussels since the first of the month. On May 14, it was announced that all men in the province of Luxemburg were being deported, and that a census of the female population was being taken with a view to replacing male farm laborers with women (New York Times, May 30, 1917). As late as February 14, 1918, a Havre despatch stated that the deportations were continuing, two thousand seven hundred persons from Lokeren having been carried off "within the last few weeks” and put to work at military tasks. See the Memorandum presented to Secretary Lansing by the Belgian minister and published in the New York Times of June 15, 1918. A Havre despatch of March 6, 1918, again stated that the deportations were continuing, and that in some cases children thirteen years of age were being carried away. In October, 1918, the Belgian government issued a statement that "from the coast to beyond Bruges the male population from fifteen to forty-five years of age is being torn from their homes and subjected to the most brutal treatment. These men are compelled to work at forced labor for the military needs of the enemy."

2 Cf. the report of Brand Whitlock, American minister to Belgium, made public at Washington on April 21, 1917. Cf. also a conversation between Mr. F. C. Walcott, an American citizen who was in the service of the Belgian relief commission, and governor general von Bissing, National Geographic Magazine, May, 1917; also an article by Vernon Kellogg, Atlantic Monthly, October, 1917. James W. Gerard, American ambassador to Germany, in his My Four Years in Germany (pp. 351-352), referring to the treatment of the Belgian déportés, says "Several of these Belgians who were put to work in Berlin managed to get away

1917, the German government consented to allow representatives of the American embassy to make an investigation of the conditions prevailing in the working camps of the déportés, but before the investigation was made, war broke out between the United States and Germany, and the American diplomatic staff was withdrawn.

§ 423. Allied Protests against the Deportation Measures. The German deportations evoked bitter protest not only in Belgium, Great Britain, and France, but in many neutral countries. In Belgium formal protests were addressed to the governor-general by ministers of State, senators and deputies, judges, municipal councils, labor organizations, scientific bodies, the bar, Cardinal Mercier, and others.1 All of them denied the German charge that the Belgian workingmen were voluntarily idle; all absolved Great Britain from responsibility for the paralyzed condition of Belgian industry, and all placed it upon the German authorities. They denounced the harsh and cruel manner in which the deportation measures were carried out and charged that in fact the German authorities made little or no distinction between the employed and the unemployed. Cardinal Mercier in three letters addressed to General von Bissing attacked his "physical and moral welfare" argument and denounced the deportations as a crime against civilization and one for which there was no excuse. The Belgian government addressed a protest to the neutral powers denouncing "to all civilized nations these unworthy proceedings which shamelessly ignore the laws of humanity as well as the rules and conventions of war." The Belgians complained that not only were the deportations contrary to the laws and usages of war, but they were also in violation of repeated pledges given by the German military authorities. Cardinal Mercier

and come to see me. They gave me a harrowing account of how they had been seized in Belgium and made to work in Germany at making munitions to be used probably against their own friends. I said to the Chancellor, 'There are Belgians employed in making shells contrary to all rules of war and the Hague convention. He said, 'I do not believe it.' I said, 'My automobile is at the door. I can take you in four minutes to where thirty Belgians are working on the manufacture of shells.' But he did not find time to go.'

1 The texts of many of these protests may be found in Passalecq, pp. 296 ff. The protest of the governments of Great Britain and France is printed in the New York Times of December 6, 1916.

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in his letters of October 19 and November 10, 1916, to Governorgeneral von Bissing reminded him of the assurances which had been given him by General von Huhne, military governor of Antwerp, after the fall of that city, that if the Belgians who had taken refuge in Holland and England would return to Belgium, they would not be carried away to Germany for forced labor or military service. This promise, he pointed out, had been renewed by General von der Goltz. The governor-general even issued an address to the people of Belgium confirming these assurances. Similar assurances had been made to the Dutch legation in Brussels and to the Dutch consul-general at Antwerp.1 Relying upon the good faith of the German promises, thousands of the exiles returned to Belgium. This pledge, said Cardinal Mercier in his letter of November 10 to von Bissing, "has been violated during the last fortnight thousands of times over every day."

The German government admitted that such assurances had been given, but claimed that they were made "under very different circumstances and under the expectation that the war would be a matter of only a few months." 2 Moreover, the promises referred to applied only to repatriés who had employment and not to those without employment.

$424. Neutral Protests. Various neutral governments likewise addressed representations to the German government remonstrating against the deportations and calling attention to the painful impression which the German policy had made on neutral public opinion. The fact is, the voice of almost the

1 The texts of the German pledges may be found in Passalecq, pp. 236 ff. Cf. also a statement of M. Vandervelde, New York Times, November 25, 1916; likewise Cammaerts, Through the Iron Bars, pp. 48-49, and Basdevant, op. cit., P. 34.

The action of the German authorities in disregarding the assurances thus given was the subject of much criticism in the Netherlands, whose government had on the strength of the German promises advised and encouraged the Belgian refugees to return to their country. The Dutch government protested, and in January, 1917, the German government agreed to repatriate Belgian refugees from Holland who had returned to Belgium and were subsequently deported to Germany. Text of Dutch protest in Grotius, Annuaire International pour l'Année, 1916, p. 113.

• Remonstrances are known to have been made by the governments of the United States, Holland, Switzerland, Brazil, and Spain. Text of the American protest in the New York Times, December 9, 1916. The Swiss Federal Council protested not only on the ground of the inhumanity of the German policy, but also because it was contrary to the Hague convention. Great mass meetings were

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entire neutral world was raised in protest against a policy which was regarded as differing but little from slavery, but strong and impressive as it was, it appears to have made little impression on the German government, and the policy of deportation was, as has been said, continued at intervals, although on a less extensive scale, throughout the remaining years of the war.1

§ 425. German Defence of the Policy of Deportation. The reasons given by the German authorities in justification of the Belgian deportations were somewhat different from those put forward in defence of the deportations from France. In the latter case the principal object avowed was to procure agricultural laborers to harvest the crops in the occupied country districts of France, and considerations of social and moral necessity were less emphasized. In the case of the Belgian deportations, however, the need of laborers in Germany, where most of the déportés were taken, was not put forward as the dominating consideration, but it was rather the German solicitude for the health, good order, morals, and social benefit to the working people of Belgium that moved Germany to "transfer" them to a country where they would not be exposed to the demoralizing influences under which they were living, and where in addition they would be assured of remunerative employment. These considerations were set forth in a letter of governorgeneral von Bissing on November 3, 1916, to the syndical

held in Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Chicago, and many other cities, at which the German policy of deportation was denounced as a system of slavery. Many protests were addressed to the President of the United States by various public associations and other bodies, urging the American government to use its influence to stop the deportations. The American press was practically unanimous in its condemnation. Even the Pope, who in his endeavor to be absolutely neutral had abstained from intervening by protests or remonstrances against the conduct of any of the belligerents, now broke his silence and made representations to the German government with a view to bringing about a discontinuance of the policy of deportation and the repatriation of those who had been carried away. New York Times, January 18, 1917, and Van den Heuvel, article cited, p. 294.

1 Protests in Germany, indeed, were not lacking, and on December 2, 1916, a number of socialist deputies in the Reichstag severely arraigned the government for its treatment of the Belgians and demanded that its policy should be stopped. In reply to this criticism Dr. Helfferich said: "The setting of the unemployed Belgians to work is thoroughly consistent with international law. They are not given work which, according to international law, they should not perform. We are only making use of our undoubted rights."

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commission of Brussels in reply to an appeal addressed on November 9, 1916, to the governor-general urging him to put a stop to the continued deportation of the Belgian population. Declining to comply with the request, the governor-general went on to say:

Clearsighted Belgians in the spring of 1915 drew my attention to the dangers of idleness and distaste for work. They showed that assistance, from whatever direction it came, constituted, finally, an economic burden upon Belgium and brought with it also idleness. The result was that the working people deteriorated physically and morally and that especially skilled laborers lost their capacity and could not be employed in time of peace in Belgian industry."

Then adverting to his decrees of August, 1915, and May, 1916, relating to compulsory labor of the unemployed, he stated that "these decrees were founded on considerations of health" and were necessary "to avoid public calamity."1 Again in a letter, dated November 23, 1916, to Cardinal Mercier who had addressed a protest to him against the deportations, the governorgeneral declined to modify his policy and reasserted that "the extensive unemployment which prevails in Belgium is a great social evil" that had been removed by the transportation of the idle to Germany.2

Again in an interview of November 11, 1916, with Cyril Brown, correspondent of the New York Times, he defended the policy of "transplantation" as a necessary measure against an intolerable social evil. It was not only, he said, no hardship for the unemployed or the population as a whole, but was "at bottom a blessing both for the workers and the nation." "Nothing," he added, "so demoralizes a man as idleness, and nothing tends more to weaken a nation than the fact that a large part of it is compelled for years to do nothing." In a

1 Text in Passalecq, pp. 346–348. The same defence was put forward in a letter of November 16 to M. Favereau, President of the Belgian senate. Passalecq, P. 301.

2 Text of his letter in the New York Times of January 14, 1917; also in Passalecq, pp. 335 ff.

This interview is published in the New York Times of November 12, 1916. "Our military security and the interests of the Belgian population demand the removal of the Belgian workingmen to Germany. No matter what impression the incident may make, our security comes first. It is the duty of the German administration to see that the people who have been confided to it do not relapse into a condition of enervation." Again: "We are responsible for the situation in