Cavell, Edith.—An English nurse shot by the Germans as a spy at Brussels in October, 1915, an episode of the war which supplied the English propagandists in the United States with one of the principal articles in their bill of charges of German atrocities. Colonel E.R. West, chief of the legislative section of the Judge Advocate General’s Department, before the American Bar Association’s Committee on Military Justice, declared that the execution was entirely legal. S.S. Gregory, chairman of the committee, and Judge William P.Bynum, of Greensboro, N.C., before the Bar Association, (Baltimore, August27, 1919), rendered a minority report of the same import. Col. West said:

“We have heard much of the case of ‘poor Edith Cavell.’ Yet I have become rather firmly convinced that she was subject to her fate by the usual laws of war. Certainly the French have executed women spies.”

Col. West agreed with the Chairman that it would be only consistent with the Anglo-Saxon attitude on the Cavell case to exempt women from the death penalty, but he added:

“I believe that a woman spy deserves the same fate as a man spy. Otherwise we would open the gates wide to the most resourceful class of spies that is known.”

In his report Mr.Gregory said: “A careful consideration of the case of Miss Edith Cavell, one of the most pathetic and appealing victims of the great war, whose unfortunate fate has aroused the sympathy and excited the indignation of two continents, has led me to the conclusion that she was executed in accordance with the laws and usages of what we are commonly pleased to refer to as civilized warfare. This being so, it has seemed to me quite inconsistent with our condemnation of those who thus took her life to retain in our own system of military justice those provisions of law which were relied upon by the German military authorities in ordering her execution. For us to take any other course, it seems to me, is to impeach our sincerity and good faith in criticising the German authorities in this regard, and to warrant the suggestion that such criticism is inspired rather by the fact that they, our enemies, were responsible for it, as well as sympathy for a good and worthy woman, than any well-considered judgment in the case.” The three majority members declared that “they could not concur in the suggestion of Mr.Gregory that there should be a provision prohibiting the death penalty in the case of women spies.”

It was proved that Miss Cavell was an English professional nurse employed only by people well able to pay for her services. She imposed upon the German officials for a long time in the character of a devout Christian who was taking a disinterested share in the relief work for the good of humanity until it was discovered that she was the head of a widespread organization which assisted hundreds of English and Belgians to escape from the country and enter the armies of Germany’s enemies. Her activities are described in the New York “Times” of May11, 1919, by her friend and co-agent, Louise Thuliez, who was condemned with Miss Cavell but pardoned. In court she admitted all charges and contemptuously shrugged her shoulders when the presiding judge asked her if she wished to make any statement that might influence the verdict. She was confined in prison about ten weeks before her execution. Her case gave rise to much comment in the press, endeavoring to show that it was a case of exceptional harshness. The Paris “Galois” admitted the shooting of 80women spies by the French. The Germans presented proof that two German women, Margaret Schmidt and Otillie Moss, had been shot by the French in March, 1915, on similar charges, and this was admitted later by the French authorities. Miss Schmidt was executed at Nancy and Miss Moss at Bourges. (Associated Press dispatch from Luneville dated March25.) Julia Van Wauterghem, wife of Eugene Hontang, was executed at Louvain, August18, 1914, for treason. Felice Pfaat was executed at Marseilles, August22, 1916, for espionage. Later the beautiful Mata Hari was executed by the French.

Miss Cavell’s case is very similar to that of Mrs.Mary Surratt, the American woman, found guilty in1865, by a military commission consisting of Generals Hunter, Elkin, Kautz, Foster, Horn, Lew Wallace, Harris, Col.Clendenin, Col.Tompkins, Col.Burnett, Gen.Holt and Judge-Advocate Bingham, of receiving, harboring, concealing and assisting rebels; she was sentenced to be hanged by the neck until dead, which sentence was approved by President Johnson.