Fighting in Flanders | Page 7

day or so and then went away again without
once getting beyond the city gates. Even if one succeeded in obtaining
the necessary laisser-passer from the military Government, there was
no way of reaching the front, as all the automobiles and all except the
most decrepit horses had been requisitioned for the use of the army.
There was, you understand, no such thing as hiring an automobile, or
even buying one. Even the few people who had influence enough to
retain their cars found them useless, as one of the very first acts of the
military authorities was to commandeer the entire supply of petrol. The
bulk of the cars were used in the ambulance service or for purposes of
transport, the army train consisting entirely of motor vehicles. Staff
officers, certain Government officials, and members of the diplomatic
and consular corps were provided by the Government with automobiles
and military drivers. Every one else walked or used the trams. Thus it
frequently happened that a young staff officer, who had never before
known the joys of motoring, would tear madly down the street in a
luxurious limousine, his spurred boots resting on the broadcloth
cushions, while the ci-devant owner of the car, who might be a banker
or a merchant prince, would jump for the side-walk to escape being run
down. With the declaration of war and the taking over of all
automobiles by the military, all speed laws were flung to the winds.
No matter how unimportant his business, every one tore through the

city streets as though the devil (or the Germans) were behind him. The
staid citizens of Antwerp quickly developed a remarkably agility in
getting out of the way of furiously driven cars. They had to. Otherwise
they would have been killed.
Because, from the middle of August to the middle of October, Antwerp
was the capital of Belgium and the seat of the King, Cabinet, and
diplomatic corps; because from it any point on the battle-front could
easily be reached by motor-car; and because, above all else, it was at
the end of the cable and the one place in Belgium where there was any
certainty of dispatches getting through to England, I made it my
headquarters during the operations in Flanders, going out to the front in
the morning and returning to the Hotel St. Antoine at night. I doubt if
war correspondence has ever been carried on under such comfortable,
even luxurious, conditions. "Going out to the front" became as
commonplace a proceeding as for a business man to take the morning
train to the city. For one whose previous campaigning had been done in
Persia, Mexico and North Africa and the Balkans, it was a novel
experience to leave a large and fashionable hotel after breakfast, take a
run of twenty or thirty miles over stone-paved roads in a powerful and
comfortable car, witness a battle--provided, of course, that there
happened to be a battle on that day's list of events--and get back to the
hotel in time to dress for dinner. Imagine it, if you please! Imagine
leaving a line of battle, where shells were shrieking overhead and
musketry was crackling along the trenches, and moaning,
blood-smeared figures were being placed in ambulances, and other
blood-smeared figures who no longer moaned were sprawled in strange
attitudes upon the ground --imagine leaving such a scene, I say, and in
an hour, or even less, finding oneself in a hotel where men and women
in evening dress were dining by the light of pink-shaded candles, or in
the marble- paved palm court were sipping coffee and liqueurs to the
sound of water splashing gently in a fountain.
II. The City Of Gloom
In order to grasp the true significance of the events which preceded and
led up to the fall of Antwerp, it is necessary to understand the

extraordinary conditions which existed in and around that city when I
reached there in the middle of August. At that time all that was left to
the Belgians of Belgium were the provinces of Limbourg, Antwerp,
and East and West Flanders. Everything else was in the possession of
the Germans. Suppose, for the sake of, having things quite clear, that
you unfold the map of Belgium. Now, with your pencil, draw a line
across the country from east to west, starting at the Dutch city of
Maastricht and passing through Hasselt, Diest, Aerschot, Malines,
Alost, and Courtrai to the French frontier. This line was, roughly
speaking, "the front," and for upwards of two months fighting of a
more or less serious character took place along its entire length. During
August and the early part of September this fighting consisted, for the
most part, of attempts by the Belgian field army to harass the enemy
and to