English Swine! …’ As for those articles necessary for some semblance of
civilized life, provision was equally mean. Each man was given a coarse towel
which resembled a dish cloth, a tin bowl to hold his food and nothing else.
No knives, spoons, forks, plates, cup, nor cake of soap. There was a canteen
where these could be purchased but many had no money at all and had to
wash without soap, eat with their fingers and drink from the tap. Added to all
this there were no mirrors, so shaving was ‘hit or miss’ and prisoners had to
guess whether their hair was parted straight.
29 The 6.30 a.m. parade must
have been quite a sight.
The order that exempted the sick from internment too was more honoured
by its breach than by its observance. There were suffers of tuberculosis,
bronchitis, cancer, rheumatism, infectious skin diseases and all these—together with the crippled and the ‘half witted’—were mixed indiscriminately
with the able bodied. Even when it came to cleaning out their fouled boxes
and scrubbing the floors to make them habitable for themselves, the sick were
made to work, but very few were given tools such as shovels or brooms to ease
their labours. Exercise for the able bodied too was a problem. At first the
racecourse, 1200 m in circumference, was strictly out of bounds; men had to
exercise themselves in the stable yards all of which were unpaved. The soil was
sandy and loose and as there was no provision for drainage it quickly transformed itself into mud when it rained—and there was much rain in the
autumn of 1914. Puddle merged into puddle until they became more like
little lakes and through this cold quagmire all the men had to wade up to
three times a day, for a distance of almost a quarter of a mile, to fetch food
from the kitchens under the grandstand. Each barrack in turn formed up for
this ‘privilege’, often waiting for up to half an hour in the mud to get served.
The food consisted of sugarless black coffee or tea in the mornings or
sometimes a wretched concoction called ‘cocoa’. For dinner there was ‘soup’
which tasted like cabbage water one day, turnip water another day and rice
water on yet another. Sometimes a ‘lump’ of sausage was thrown in, and a loaf
of the infamous
30 standard German military issue ‘black bread’ (Kommissbrot)
—made largely with rye, wheat and potatoes—was added every two days.
28,31
The same muddy journey had to be undertaken to reach the latrines which
had been dug for them; latrines that the American Ambassador
32 described as
‘a danger not only to the camp but to Berlin!’ for no disinfectant was ever
provided by the authorities. And add to all this the pitiless, piercing winds
from Poland and the Pinsk marshes that cut the across the camp each winter.
But out of all the chaos there soon came some order. On 08 November
1914 the prisoners were paraded and told that each barrack had to appoint an
interpreter, fluent in both languages, to represent them in any dealings with
14 Robert’s War 1914–1918
283
civilized life, provision was equally mean. Each man was given a coarse towel
which resembled a dish cloth, a tin bowl to hold his food and nothing else.
No knives, spoons, forks, plates, cup, nor cake of soap. There was a canteen
where these could be purchased but many had no money at all and had to
wash without soap, eat with their fingers and drink from the tap. Added to all
this there were no mirrors, so shaving was ‘hit or miss’ and prisoners had to
guess whether their hair was parted straight.
29 The 6.30 a.m. parade must
have been quite a sight.
The order that exempted the sick from internment too was more honoured
by its breach than by its observance. There were suffers of tuberculosis,
bronchitis, cancer, rheumatism, infectious skin diseases and all these—together with the crippled and the ‘half witted’—were mixed indiscriminately
with the able bodied. Even when it came to cleaning out their fouled boxes
and scrubbing the floors to make them habitable for themselves, the sick were
made to work, but very few were given tools such as shovels or brooms to ease
their labours. Exercise for the able bodied too was a problem. At first the
racecourse, 1200 m in circumference, was strictly out of bounds; men had to
exercise themselves in the stable yards all of which were unpaved. The soil was
sandy and loose and as there was no provision for drainage it quickly transformed itself into mud when it rained—and there was much rain in the
autumn of 1914. Puddle merged into puddle until they became more like
little lakes and through this cold quagmire all the men had to wade up to
three times a day, for a distance of almost a quarter of a mile, to fetch food
from the kitchens under the grandstand. Each barrack in turn formed up for
this ‘privilege’, often waiting for up to half an hour in the mud to get served.
The food consisted of sugarless black coffee or tea in the mornings or
sometimes a wretched concoction called ‘cocoa’. For dinner there was ‘soup’
which tasted like cabbage water one day, turnip water another day and rice
water on yet another. Sometimes a ‘lump’ of sausage was thrown in, and a loaf
of the infamous
30 standard German military issue ‘black bread’ (Kommissbrot)
—made largely with rye, wheat and potatoes—was added every two days.
28,31
The same muddy journey had to be undertaken to reach the latrines which
had been dug for them; latrines that the American Ambassador
32 described as
‘a danger not only to the camp but to Berlin!’ for no disinfectant was ever
provided by the authorities. And add to all this the pitiless, piercing winds
from Poland and the Pinsk marshes that cut the across the camp each winter.
But out of all the chaos there soon came some order. On 08 November
1914 the prisoners were paraded and told that each barrack had to appoint an
interpreter, fluent in both languages, to represent them in any dealings with
14 Robert’s War 1914–1918
283