Warsaw,
June 8.

Ever since my return from the southern armies last week I have spent practically my entire time in the study and investigation of the newest phase of frightfulness as practised by the German authorities. Ten months of war and an earlier experience in Manchuria of what misery it represents even when conducted in the most humane way have not tended to make me over-sensitive to the sights and sufferings which are the inevitable accompaniment of the conflict between modern armies; but what I have seen in the last week has impressed me more deeply than the sum total of all the other horrors which I have seen in this and other campaigns combined. The effects of the new war methods involve hideous suffering and are of no military value whatsoever (if results on this front are typical); while they reduce war to a barbarity and cruelty which could not be justified from any point of view, even were the results obtained for the cause of the user a thousandfold greater than they have proved to be.

I found on my return from the south the whole of Warsaw in a fever of riotous indignation against the Germans and the German people as the result of the arrival of the first block of gas victims brought in from the Bzura front. I have already described the attack made on the Russian position, its absolute failure, and the result it had of increasing the morale of the Russian troops. I must now try to convey to the reader an idea of the effects which I have personally witnessed and ascertained by first hand investigation of the whole subject. The investigation has taken me from the Warsaw hospitals, down through the various army, corps, division and regimental head-quarters, to the advance trenches on which the attack was actually made. I have talked with every one possible, from generals to privates, and from surgeons to the nurses, and to the victims themselves, and feel, therefore, that I can write with a fair degree of authority.

The gas itself, I was told at the front, was almost pure chloral fumes; but in the hospitals here they informed me that there were indications of the presence of a small trace of bromine, though it has proved somewhat difficult to make an exact analysis. The effect of the gas when inhaled is to cause an immediate and extremely painful irritation of the lungs and the bronchial tubes, which causes instantly acute suffering. The gas, on reaching the lungs, and coming in contact with the blood, at once causes congestion, and clots begin to form not only in the lungs themselves but in the blood-vessels and larger arteries, while the blood itself becomes so thick that it is with great difficulty that the heart is able to force it through the veins. The first effects, then, are those of strangulation, pains throughout the body where clots are forming, and the additional misery of the irritation which the acid gases cause to all the mucous membranes to which it is exposed. Some of the fatal cases were examined by the surgeons on the post-mortem table, and it was found that the lungs were so choked with coagulated blood that, as one doctor at the front told me, they resembled huge slabs of raw liver rather than lungs at all. The heart was badly strained from the endeavour to exert its functions against such obstacles, and death had resulted from strangulation.

Though the unfortunates who succumbed suffered hideously, their lot was an easy one compared to the lot of the miserable wretches who lingered on and died later. One might almost say that even those that are recovering have suffered so excruciatingly as to make life dear at the price. Those who could be treated promptly have for the most part struggled back to life. Time only will show whether they recover entirely, but from evidence obtained, I am inclined to believe many of them will be restored to a moderate condition of good health after their lungs are healed. The first treatment employed by the Russians when their patients come to the hospitals, is to strip them of all clothing, give them a hot bath and put them into clean garments. This is done for the protection of the nurses as well as of the victims, for it was found that many of the helpers were overcome by the residue of the fumes left in the clothing, so deadly was the nature of the chemical compound used.

Even after these cases were brought to Warsaw and put into clean linen pyjamas and immaculate beds, the gas still given out from their lungs as they exhaled so poisoned the air in the hospital that some of the women nurses were affected with severe headaches and with nausea. From this it may be gathered that the potency of the chloral compound is extremely deadly. The incredible part is, that out of the thousands affected, hardly a thousand died in the trenches, and of the 1,300 to 1,500 brought to Warsaw, only 2 per cent. have died to date. It is probably true that the Russian moujik soldier is the hardiest individual in Europe; add to this the consideration that for ten months none of them have been touching alcohol, which is probably one reason for their astonishing vitality in fighting this deadly poison and struggling back to life.

After the victims are washed, every effort is made to relieve the congestion. Mustard plasters are applied to the feet, while camphor injections are given hypodermically, and caffeine or, in desperate cases, digitalis is given to help the heart keep up its task against the heavy odds. Next blood is drawn from the patient and quantities of salt and water injected in the veins to take its place and to dilute what remains. In the severer cases I am told that the blood even from the arteries barely flows, and comes out a deep purple and almost as viscous as molasses. In the far-gone cases it refuses to flow at all.

The victims that die quickly are spared the worst effects, but those that linger on and finally succumb suffer a torture which the days of the Inquisition can hardly parallel. Many of them have in their efforts to breathe swallowed quantities of the gas, and in these cases, which seem to be common, post-mortems disclose the fact that great patches in their stomachs and in their intestines have been eaten almost raw by the action of the acid in the gas. These men then die not only of strangulation, which, in itself, is a slow torture, but in their last moments their internal organs are slowly being eaten away by the acids which they have taken into their stomachs. Several of the doctors have told me that in these instances the men go violently mad from sheer agony, and that many of them must be held in their beds by force to prevent them from leaping out of the windows or running amok in the hospitals. It is hard to still them with sufficient morphine to deaden the pain without giving an overdose, with the result that many of the poor fellows probably suffer until their last gasp.

This then is the physical effect which is produced on the victims of Germany’s latest device to win the war. I have been in many of the hospitals, and I have never in my life been more deeply moved than by the pathetic spectacle of these magnificent specimens of manhood lying on their beds writhing in pain or gasping for breath, each struggle being a torture. The Russians endure suffering with a stoicism that is heartbreaking to observe, and I think it would surely touch even the most cynical German chemist were he to see his victims, purple in the face, lips frothed with red from bleeding lungs, with head thrown back and teeth clenched to keep back the groans of anguish, as they struggle against the subtle poison that has been taken into their system. One poor fellow said to the nurse as she sat by his bed and held his hand, “Oh, if the German Kaiser could but suffer the pain that I do he would never inflict this torture upon us. Surely there must be a horrible place prepared for him in the hereafter.”

The effect upon the troops at the front who have seen the sufferings of their fellows or who have had a touch of it themselves, has been quite extraordinary. Some of the more cynical say that the German idea involved this suffering as a part of their campaign of frightfulness, their belief being that it would strike panic to the hearts of all the soldiers that beheld it and result in the utter demoralization of the Russian Army. If this be true the German psychologists never made a more stupid blunder, for in this single night’s work they have built up for themselves in the heart of every Russian moujik a personal hatred and detestation that has spread like wildfire in all parts of the army and has made the Russian troops infinitely fiercer both in attack and in defence than at any other period in the war. Not a soldier or officer with whom I have talked has shown the smallest sign of fear for the future, and all are praying for an opportunity to exact a vengeance.

Unfortunately in the next attacks in which this just fury will be in evidence, it will be the unfortunate German soldier who must pay the price at the point of the bayonet, while the cold-blooded wretches who worked it all out will go scot free from the retribution which the Russians intend to administer with cold steel and the butt end of their muskets. In the meantime the Russians have taken steps which will in all probability render future attacks practically innocuous. Every soldier is receiving a respirator, a small mask soaked in some chemical preparation and done up in an air-tight packet ready for use. The preparation, it is believed, will keep out the fumes for at least an hour. It is highly improbable that any such period will elapse before the gases are dissipated by the wind; but in any event extra quantities of the solution will be kept in the trenches to enable the soldiers to freshen their masks if the gases are not cleared up within an hour.

In addition to this, open ditches will be dug in the trenches and filled with water, which will promptly suck up the gas that would otherwise linger on indefinitely. It is also proposed to strew straw in front of the positions and to sprinkle it with water before an attack with the gases in order to take up as much of the poison as possible before it reaches the trenches at all. When one remembers that though the first attack came without any preparations being made to meet it, and was an absolutely new experience to the Russians, it yet failed overwhelmingly, I think one need feel no anxiety as to the results which will follow the next attack when every preparation has been made by the Russians to receive it.

I have dwelt at some length on the subject of the poisoned gases, but as there is available evidence to indicate that the Germans are planning to make this an important feature of their campaign, it seems worth while to bring before the attention of the outside world all of the consequences which the use of this practice involve. I hear now from excellent sources that the Germans are equipping a large plant at Plonsk for the express purpose of making poison gases on a large scale. In what I have written before I have only mentioned the bearing of the gas on strictly military operations, but there is another consideration to be noticed in this new practice, and that is the effect which it has, and will have increasingly, upon the unfortunate peasant and civil population whose miserable fate it is to live behind the lines.

I am not aware of the nature and potency of the gas used in the West, but I read recently in the paper that it was so deadly that its effects were observable a full mile from the line of battle. Over here they were noticeable 25 miles from the line, and individuals were overcome as far away as 14 versts from the positions. The General commanding the — Siberian Corps told me that the sentry before his gate fell to the ground from inhaling the poisoned air, though his head-quarters is more than 10 miles away from the point where the Germans turned loose their fiendish invention. The General commanding the —th Division of this same Siberian Corps, against whom the attack was made, told me that the gases reached his head-quarters exactly 1½ hours after it passed the positions which he told me were between 5 and 6 versts from the house in which he lived. In the morning the fumes lay like a mist on the grass, and later in the day they were felt with sufficient potency to cause nausea and headaches at Grodisk, 30 versts from the trenches. Everywhere I was told of the suffering and panic among the peasants, who came staggering in from every direction to the Russian Red Cross stations and head-quarters. These, of course, were not as severely stricken as the troops in the front lines, and as far as I know none of them have died, but hundreds were being cared for by the Russian authorities, and among these I am told were many women and children.

In fact it is but logical to expect the greatest suffering in the future to be among children, for the gas hangs very low, and where a six foot man might keep his nose clear of the fumes, a child of two or three years old would be almost sure to perish. The live stock suffered more or less, but there seems to have been a great difference in the effects of the gases upon different kinds of animals. Horses were driven almost frantic, cows felt it much less, and pigs are said not to have been bothered appreciably. In its effects on plants and flowers one notices a great range of results among different varieties. Pansies were slightly wilted, snapdragons absolutely, while certain little blue flowers whose name I do not know were scarcely affected at all. Some of the tips of the grasses were coloured brown, while leaves on some trees were completely destitute of any colour at all. I cannot explain the varying effects. I have in my pocket a leaf two-thirds of which is as white as a piece of writing paper while the remaining third is as green as grass. On the same tree some leaves were killed and others not affected at all. The effects also vary greatly in different parts of the country. From what I could observe the gas had flowed to all the low places where it hung for hours. In the woods it is said to have drifted about with bad effects that lasted for several days.

What I have described above is the first effect on the country, but if the Germans are to continue this practice for the rest of the summer I think there must be effects which in the end will result in far more injury to the peasants who are not prepared, than to the soldiers who are taught how to combat the gases. In the first place it seems extremely probable that this gas flowing to the low places will almost invariably settle in the lakes, marshes and all bodies of still water within 20 to 30 versts of the line. I am not sufficiently well grounded in chemistry to speak authoritatively, but it seems not improbable that the effect of this will be gradually to transform every small body of water in this vicinity into a diluted solution of hydrochloric acid, a solution which will become more and more concentrated with every wave of gas that passes over the country-side. If this be the case Poland may perhaps see huge numbers of its horses, cows and other live stock slowly poisoned by chloral while the inhabitants may experience a similar fate. With wet weather and moist soil will come a period when the chloral will go into the earth in large quantities. I do not know what effect this will have on the future of the crops, but I imagine that it will not help the harvest this year, while its deleterious effects may extend over many to come. In other words it seems as though the Germans in order to inflict a possible military damage on the Russians are planning a campaign, the terrible effects of which will fall for the most part not on the soldiers at all but on the harmless non-combatants who live in the rear of the lines. This practice is as absolutely unjustifiable as that of setting floating mines loose at sea on the possible chance of sinking an enemy ship, the probability being ten to one that the victim will prove an innocent one.

We are now facing over here, and I suppose in the West as well, a campaign of poisoned air, the effect of which upon the military situation will be neutralized by reprisals; but at the same time this campaign is going to increase the suffering and misery of the soldiers a hundred per cent., and in its ultimate results bring more misery to the populations in the various regions near the lines than has ever been experienced in any previous war. It must be reasonably clear to the Germans by now that their scheme to terrorize has failed, and that their aim of inflicting vast damage has fallen to the ground. When reprisals come, as they must if Germany continues this inhuman policy, she will, without having gained anything whatsoever from her experiment, cause needlessly the deaths of thousands of her own soldiers, as well as suffering and devastation among the rural classes. It does seem as though, when the German policy is so clearly unfruitful, it should be possible through the medium of some neutral country to reach an agreement providing for the entire discontinuance on all fronts of this horrible practice. Certainly, when there are so many thousands of innocents who must suffer by its continuance, it would be well worth the while of the authorities in the different countries to consider the possibility mentioned before resorting to the use of this deadly weapon, which often proves as dangerous to the users as to the enemy against whom it is directed.

THE BZURA FRONT IN JUNE