Our Part in the Great War

"No, no."

I looked to see if he gave the order to any of his soldiers. I didn't see that, but I noticed one of our sisters who was drawing a wheelbarrow with an old man in it, who weighed at least seventy-five kilos and who was paralyzed.

"Where are you going?" I asked her.

"Over there; the soldiers tell me that they are coming to set fire to the hospital," she replied. "One of our old men cried out to me, 'My sister, do not make us stay here. Let us go and die in peace, since they are killing everybody here. We would rather leave and die of hunger in the fields.' So I said, 'Come along, then.'"

For the moment I am all alone in this room with my thirteen wounded men. I said to myself, "My God, what will become of me all alone in the midst of fire and blood."

I stood a few seconds in the doorway and then went in to see our little soldiers.

"My poor children, I ask your forgiveness for bringing in such a visitation, but I assure you that I thought my last quarter hour had come. I thought they were going to kill us all."

"My sister, stay with us," they said; "stay with us."

"I will bear the impossible, my children, to save your life."

I remained there a few minutes, and then two German soldiers presented themselves with fixed bayonets. I stepped down the two stairs; see what an escort was there for me!

"Why is this house shut up? There are French in it, lying hidden with their arms."

"The owner has been mobilized, and so has gone away. His wife and children have gone away."

They kept on insisting: "The French. Hidden. In there."

They indicated the place with a gesture.

I thought to myself, What is happening? What will they do? Here are the men who will set fire to the house.

"Why will you set fire to this house?" I asked. "Your chiefs don't wish it. They have promised me that they won't burn here. You want to set fire here out of excitement (par contagion). Will you put out the fire?"

I said again to them:

"It is wicked to set fire here, because we shall nurse your wounded."

While this was going on, our sisters upstairs were not able to subdue the poor father Prévost. He is an old man of eighty-eight years, partly paralyzed in leg and arm. I was at the doorway. I heard him call out:

"They shoved me into the fire. They have gone away and left me. I am going to fall out of the window."

I climbed to the fourth floor of the house where he was, to try to attract him away, but he did not wish to come. He was foolish. I knew that he was fond of white sugar. I went up to him and showed him the sugar. I took his jacket and put his snowboots on him, so that he could get away more quickly. You know those boots which fasten by means of two or three buckles, very primitive, and which are so speedily put on. At last I led him to the edge of the doorway here.

The Germans saw him and said: "It is a lunatic asylum, don't you see?" so they said to each other. "They want to kill the sisters. There is no need of going into that house. It is a lunatic asylum."

That is the reason, I believe, why they didn't come into the house during the night. They entered the chapel of the hospital.

While I was with the Germans, some of their like had come to our Infirmary to say:

"You must leave here because we are going to set fire."

They then said to the old people:

"We have orders to burn the Infirmary."

Among the number we had the poor mother André, Monsieur Porté, who walked hobbling like this; Monsieur Georget, who is hung on only one wire, and Monsieur Leroy, who isn't hung on any (qui ne tenait qu'à un fil, Monsieur Leroy qui ne tenait plus non plus).

[Sister Julie limped across the room. She bent her back double. She went feeble. In swift pantomime she revealed each infirmity of the aged people. She created the picture of a flock of sick and crippled sheep driven before wolves.]

At four o'clock they were led away to Maréville. Those of whom I tell you died in the course of the year. Death came likewise to seven others who would not have died but for that.

The next morning we had German wounded. No one to care for them. What to do? I said to a wounded Lieutenant-Colonel:

"You have given us many wounded to tend. Where are your majors?"

See what he answered me. "They have abandoned us."

That evening this Lieutenant-Colonel said to me in a rough voice:

"Some bread, my sister."

"You haven't any bread?" I said. "You have burned our bakery and killed our baker in it. You have burned our butcher shop with our butcher in it. And now you have no bread and no meat. Eat potatoes as we have to."

He was hit in the calf of the leg, but the leg bone was not touched, nor the femur; it was not a severe wound. He unrolled his bandage and showed me his treatment, assuming an air of pain.

"Aie! Aie!" he cried.

Ah! "They" are more soft (douillets) than our poor little French. I began to dress his leg.

"It is terrible, my sister, this war. Terrible for you and for us also. If the French were the least bit intelligent, they would ask for peace at once. Belgium is ours. In three days we shall be at Paris."

The bandage tightened on his wound. "Ah," he said.

I replied to him: "It is your Kaiser who is the cause of all this."

"Oh, no. Not the Kaiser. The Kaiser. Oh, the Kaiser." As he pronounced the word "Kaiser," he seemed to be letting something very good come out of his mouth, as if he were savoring it.

The bandage went round once more. "Ah," he said.

"It is then his son, the Crown Prince, who is responsible?" I continued.

"Not at all. Not at all; it is France."

"France is peace-loving," I replied.

"It is Serbia, because the Austrian Archduke was killed by a Serbian."

The 29th or 30th of the month shells fell occasionally over our roof. My famous wounded German was frightened.

"My sister, I must be carried to the cellar at once."