This week Sabine’s battlefield guide Saturday
Messines or Mesen , everyone always seem to focus on the June 1917 action but let’s go to what happened in 1914 seen through the eyes of the locals
the arrival of the Germans in Messines through the eyes of Josephine Scheerlinck
It was the 7th of October 1914, we knew that the Germans were in the vicinity: for on Sunday, the 4th of October, we had seen many of them marching towards Neuve Eglise( Nieuwkerke), on the 7th we saw a large number of them on the road from Messines to Warneton. Just at noon, a German captain entered the institute, revolver in hand, saying: I need the priest! and he went through our cloisters straight to the church.
Madame Van Baeckerghem, who had followed him there, goes to the village, to look for the priest. When the priest has arrived, the captain orders him to open the door which leads to the tower and to remove the flag which was still flying from the bell tower. Impatient, he climbs up there himself with two soldiers and tears down the flag. On descending from the tower, he allows the parish priest to return to his house, and asks me for a lunch for his officers and himself. It was easy, our table was all served. But he told me to take the lunch to the cavalry officers who were stationed in the street fifty metres from the institute. I went with Mrs. Goosens, but as we had not been able to take care of the wine, these gentlemen shouted at us from a distance in a terrible voice: Wein! Wein!” and we had to return quickly to get them some Bordeaux. This was the first sample of German politeness for us.
At one o’clock they left the village and we thought we were safe. Unfortunately, at about five o’clock in the evening, I was told that the large entrance courtyard was full of German cavalrymen and that the officer was asking for rooms to house them. Where is this officer? In the courtyard of the farm, I am told. I run there and I see Captain Frisch busy getting cows, horses and bulls out of the stables so that the German horses can be put there. I went up to him and told him that we never housed men inside the institute, that we needed the rooms for ourselves. I don’t care! It doesn’t count! This is war! The best beds and rooms are for the soldiers, if you don’t have beds for yourselves, you have to sleep on the couches! A new sample of German politeness.
What to do! I feel I must give in! I look him straight in the face and say to him: So, give me your word of honour, your word as an officer, that there will be no danger to our children? He looked at me coldly, thought for a moment, then said:” I give it to you. If there was any danger to your children, we would laugh.” He was thinking of a night attack by the French, I was afraid of a much more terrible danger.
Finally I had his word. However, as I could not bring myself to give them our rooms, I took him to Madame Beel’s sewing school, a beautiful room which was entirely empty at the time, and told him that we could put beds there and all the desired comforts. He was furious! “How dare you present this large room for German officers! I will put two thousand horses in your institute, in your salons, your classes everywhere. Do you want us to leave and I will send you the infantry? The infantry was certainly not the finest of the German army, “ his sarcastic tone revealed a terrible threat.
I could have replied: “Sir, on the 27th of September we had the great honour of accommodating Lord Grovenor, the English aviator, in this very appropriate room, and he found it very comfortable. But to speak to him of an English airman was not a good idea, so I kept my mouth shut and took him to our rooms and put them at his disposal. This time he was happy. At the top of the royal staircase we met the Colonel, I told him that I thought the Captain’s word was good for the safety of our children: “And you still have the word of a German Colonel,” he said. If anyone moves, come and find me.
Finally I ask Captain Frisch to decide himself on the menu for their dinner, hoping that the prospect of a good meal would make him give up the two thousand horses he had threatened us with. And indeed he forgot them. We had twelve officers at our table: we measured out the wine to them, fearing too much that they would be envious of each other. suddenly the colonel asked what kind of institute we had. I replied that it was an institute founded by Maria Theresa of Austria for the children of her soldiers. They were delighted! Maria Theresa of Austria, the great Empress of our allies… A little more and they would have felt at home… “And now?” said the captain. Now we take care of orphans. I couldn’t say to them: “Now, gentlemen, we have children of Belgian soldiers here.
Finally everything went well. We had at least four hundred Germans in the institute, but they respected the house. We were still very afraid. The pupils went to bed fully dressed and ready to flee at the first alarm. All night the ladies walked around the dormitories in mortal anxiety, the girls were all gathered in the big infirmary: I stayed there with them, from there I could observe the Germans in the courtyards. Thank God the night passed without any unpleasant incident for us. But towards midnight the Germans brought into the institute all the weapons which they had seized at the town hall, where the people of Messines had to deposit them. These weapons, whose crime was that they belonged to the Belgians, went immediately to the council of war. The luxury weapons (beautiful hunting rifles and expensive revolvers) were sentenced to deportation to …. Germany and so meticulously packed and placed in vans, the faith of the ordinary weapons : they were broken and burned on the square.
In the village they looted almost all the shops and set fire to three workers’ houses. Here they only stole the fresh butter from the farm and a lot of oats. The next morning to our great relief they left Messines and headed for Ypres. On Saturday the 10thof October we saw them coming back towards Ploegsteert and Warneton. A stream of carts, carriages, cars from Antwerp, Liege, Louvain, Aarschot, even a tram bus from Brussels Midi. It was endless. The soldiers were singing, yet they looked miserable, and the horses, most of them without a rider.
This is an eyewitness account so it is written from Josephine’s experiences
Source :oorlogsdagboeken uit de streek tussen ijzer en Leie by Luc Devlieger 1972