Insel pp180-211 Douglas (part 1)

It was pitch black when we had to get up, there was no breakfast, except that Herr von Beyerheim was so kind as to send me a cup of hot tea by means of Kosel. We shook hands with Klein and others who were awake, then there was roll call in the big hut. On leaving the barbed-wire quadrangle, we were bodily searched for letters. From the one hundred men that we were, fifty-seven [p. 180] were Jews, for whom Lord Rothschild had set up a separate camp in Douglas. An officer and fifty soldiers stuck to us like glue, as they took us on the one-hour's walk to the railway station in St. John. Although we were wading through dripping mud and rain, we none the less liked to be pilgrims making their way through outdoor nature. Only the Jews, who were dragging with them thick straw mattresses, heavy suitcases and many other traps and sticks, got tired every ten minutes, and put their things down in the filth of road, but time and time again these groaning men were made to get up by the Tommies. We marched through valleys, past mills and shepherds' huts, in the gardens of which palms and araucarias were passing the winter, kept warm because this island lies in the flow of the Gulf Stream. The dark type of woman, the ragged children, the arched bridges and the decayed terrace walls, the deforested hills, everything reminds one vividly of Sicily — but not the constant rainfall. Dr. H., who has some fastidiously effeminate characteristics, said that it seemed to him as if he were Potiphar's wife in her flight,^ⁱ and every now and again took out a mirror from his pocket to put his hair in order. The effect was bizarre. The Jews were trudging themselves almost to death; all in all it was a curious, mixed procession.

When we arrived in St. John, anyone requiring to relieve themselves was assigned two Tommies. Myself and Dr. H., who had both taken chocolate from a vending machine, had it confiscated from us by the officer. Then we were taken away on the little railway, which went cacadÃ¹, cacadÃ¹, cacadÃ¹ and took us past beautiful country houses, set in splendid parks. In them we saw cactus hedges, agaves, palms, buriti and cocquito shrubs, just as in the south. The finest estate, made famous by its giant cedar of Lebanon, belonged to Hall Caine,^ⁱⁱ the most famous writer of novellas^ⁱⁱⁱ in England. Dr. H. was conversing with a passenger who looked like the embodiment of John Bull, but it turned out that [p. 181] he was a Hungarian, who had come to England when he was five years old, and now, in his fiftieth year, had been interned. — A few stations further on, we all got out, and, strange to say, it began to snow heavily. The march ascended steeply for half an hour, a limping soldier told me on the way that he had been shot in the leg in the Battle of Mons. Then at the top of the hill, the gates were opened that led into Douglas Camp. In the entrance hall the English doctor was already waiting, looking into everybody's mouth, as if all the world's illnesses were to be found there. In my case he examined my hair as well, and ordered me to have it cut. A 'local' then took us into the lower camp, while the Ghetto Jews moved off through an underground passageway into a separate camp. The houses and rooms we came through made a very pleasant impression after our last miserable dump, the reason being that before the War they had been used as a holiday home for English students, but after the outbreak of the War had been taken on lease by the English authorities for internment purposes. From the terrace on a clear day you can see across the Irish Sea as far as Blackpool in England and as far as the summit of Snowden in Wales, the highest mountain in that country.

Tents and little asbestos huts stood ready to serve as our accommodation. Herr von Beyerheim, Hörns and I obtained one of these huts, which we thought would be warmer in the winter than the tents. Three steps took us into the three-by-three, or more, metre square small room. The window had not yet been fitted, and a light and a stove were also absent. Then we went to have food in the brightly lit dining hall, where there are places for six prisoners at each of eighty tables. In the corner there is what they call a 'coffee-bar', where cocoa and cake, too, is not served, but sold. Men who had been waiters served at table, in exchange for a monthly wage. There was soup, then [p. 182] Australian frozen meat with potatoes and tinned vegetables. Hörns greeted an earlier camp comrade, Schnell, who had studied in Oxford, and the two of us were invited to his 'den'. There we saw just how cosily a small room like that can be set up. Another thing was that every tent and every hut has its steward, who carries out the coarser work for remuneration. The stewards live in six-man groups in special tents. At eight o'clock, there is roll call in the hall, and then the evening meal. I invited Herr von Beyerheim and Hörns to a bottle of Moselle wine, since today is my mother's birthday.^{^iv} The whistle blows at ten o'clock, and everybody has to go to bed. In our hut, without light, window and stove, things were was still very uncomfortable. How was it that I longed to be back in Knockaloe? Does habit make a law of lethargy? But that was exactly the case. At half-past ten, soldiers came and made sure that all light had been extinguished.

Weeks have passed, and my second Christmas in captivity is at the door! The routine of daily life takes place without a hitch. We are settled in again here. At eight o'clock comes the first roll call, before breakfast in the hall. Men coming in late pay a penalty of sixpence. On the way there, we mostly see the sun just rising blood-red from the Irish Sea. There's hut parade at ten o'clock. All prisoners must line up in front of their tents and huts, which have the names of the men living there on them, and the Commandant, Lieutenant-Colonel Madoc, who has the appearance of a worse-for-wear Kitchener and clears his throat and spits in the manner of his model, [p. 183] strides through the alleyways, asking everyone mechanically: "Everything in order? No complaints?" The prompt answer has to be: "No, Sir." If it is anything else, he says to his adjutant: "Take that man's name, the air in Knockaloe will suit him better." And it looks absurd, the way that civilians have to give a military greeting.

While the stewards are cleaning things up, we five hundred men walk round in a circle on the small square in front of the terrace. No matter what direction you look in, there is high wire-netting with wooden watch-towers, in which guards with loaded rifles stand on duty. Twice a week, the camp band plays in accompaniment.

The climate on this island is the weirdest in the world. The isotherms of summer and winter, for example, are identical. In summer, with plus-five degrees to plus-fifteen^{^v} on average, the Isle of Man has the same temperature as Northern Siberia; in winter it corresponds to that of North Africa. The Gulf Stream causes this, and so it happens that one day it is as warm as in Egypt, but on the next day it is snowing, and on the third day the temperature is moderate. But the damp sea-climate spoils everything, and causes almost everybody to suffer from rheumatism, including me.

Our hut has acquired a homely appearance, Herr von Beyerheim has had a carpet, two upholstered wicker chairs, a paraffin lamp, a wire bed and a folding screen, sent from his home in Chichester, together with a dinner service. However, instead of a coffee percolator they had packed only a coffee grinder. The thin asbestos walls have been panelled by a carpenter from Vienna with a green-painted layer of wood with dado. On my suggestion, the mock-up of a small fire-place was let in to one wall, with a mirror above it and an opening for the oil-lamp below. The window has been fitted with two seats and a folding table, at which we work. Herr von Beyerheim copies paintings, I study artists' monographs [p. 184] from the camp library. Hanging on the wall is the painting which Herr von Ramenz did of me, as well as a genuine Lenbach, representing Lady Blenner-Hassert.^{^vi} In addition I have acquired one of those little Isle-of-Man cats, which have no tails and may be exported from the island only on a high customs tariff.

Rodenhaus has written that he's not coming to Douglas; but Martin Költsch, midshipman on S.M.S^{^vii} Mainz, whom Herr von Beyerheim knows from Donington Hall, has written to him, saying that he has applied to come here.

New countenances, new faces, new fizzogs have appeared. A new broom sweeps clean, and everybody puts his best face on at first. At my table, besides Hörns and von Beyerheim, sits a Mr. Selton from Alexandria, who speaks only French, is taking German lessons and after the War intends to settle in Hamburg. Then a Baron von Gampen entertains us with his exploits; he was in the Battle of Tannenberg,^{^viii} then became adjutant to the Prince of Albania and was given the order to stir up the Arab tribes in North Africa against the Italians. Then he was caught by the English, during a crossing. Dr. Pemmler, a fat Bavarian, keeps himself busy with applications for his release. In point of fact, the poor chap was on his honeymoon, at the end of July 1914 (!), when he was taken away in handcuffs from the seaside promenade in Margate. Now the Commandant has threatened him with dispatch to Knockaloe if he ever finds another application on his writing desk. Pemmler's hope was rekindled when last week the old Hamburg ship-owner, Herr Seezen, and the terminally ill Professor Altmann were celebrating their departure, being allowed to go home. We all envied them, and would have liked to be terminally ill ourselves. However, Pemmler got a letter from them yesterday, from the soap-factory in Stratford, saying that they had to stay there. What a disappointment and what a poor exchange! — Now Herr von Beyerheim [p. 185] wants to go with me to the upper camp, where the wood-carving school is putting on an exhibition for Christmas purchases.

Christmas has passed, thank goodness, and took 1915 with it, a year which stands unique in the history of mankind for achievements of superhuman character, just as it does for those beneath all human dignity. For the sun to follow its path peacefully over such evil, shatters the faith of many. "Never to have been born, never to see the sun's scorching ray, would be the best thing", a Greek sage opined as long as two thousand years ago — and yet everyone likes to celebrate their birthday. Hörns delighted me with a packet of Abdulla cigarettes, Herr von Beyerheim with a box crafted in the wood-carving school. In the evening the three of us sat in the hut next to the paraffin stove and drank blended French wine, which the enterprising English sell as expensive Burgundy. Three days later it was Christmas Eve. Many thousands of marks have been collected in the camp for Christmas presents to needy prisoners. This fine amount had to be surrendered to the commandant, since he attended to the purchases. The value in exchange shrank very seriously. Unfortunately, no remittance had arrived from the League of German Princesses, I had inquired on this matter of Princess Eliese,^{^ix} I had not of course been permitted to describe the situation here to her, and looking between the lines, the old lady is probably no longer able to read. Just before Christmas, the connection by post to Liverpool was disrupted again, with the result that the Christmas packages we all so very much longed for did not arrive on time. On Christmas Eve, the great fir tree in the middle of the [p. 186] Hall was ablaze with lights, and Baldur, the Camp Capt'n, gave an emotional speech, which brought tears to the eyes a many a family man. Mr. Cunningham, his name translated into German is Schlauschinken [Sly-ham],^{^x} the owner of this holiday camp, which the Government had leased from him, donated roast goose. He could afford it, since each month he turns in about two hundred pounds Sterling from our presence here. On many of the eighty tables, small trees stood lit with burning candles. The choir sang Christmas songs, and Hopke's brass-band music blared out through the Hall, so as to blow away the desolate atmosphere which was felt by everyone. After the official part of the celebration, Hörns, Herr von Beyerheim and I went into our hut, where some paper lanterns were supposed to feign "Happy Christmas". On the paraffin stove, wine was bubbling away, which had the delightful smell of cloves and cinnamon. Everybody was lost in his own thoughts (I was staying in Berlin, visited Alberta, who had already become a silhouette, and Rodenhaus, who prefers to celebrate in Knockaloe, in amongst his missionaries).

Here, where it's always a special day or always the same day, I find the official special days particularly unsettling. It doesn't surprise me that people here turn to drink, and that because of this, Mr. Sly-ham's wine bar does particularly well. On New Year's Eve, we had gymnastics displays on the stage in the dining hall, which the commandant watched from a lodge seat. At a suitable interval, Baldur, the German Camp Capt'n, took over the throne, a weathercock, now pointing to England. I had the misfortune while taking off my overcoat of knocking over a glass of beer, which the waiter had just brought for Herr Baldur; slosh! it went, and emptied its contents as far as to where the commandant was sitting, whose Airedale started to bark, loudly. For one minute I was the focus of all attention, as if I had just carried out an assassination. I went early to bed, Herr von Beyerheim was already asleep. It was spring tide, and the sea thundered against the rocks. At twelve [p. 187] o'clock trumpets sounded out; when will they sound out for peace? 1916 has begun!

Herr von Beyerheim has a lot to do. The English doctor, Dr. Marshall,^{^xi} brought him paintings to restore, naturally for next-to-nothing. There is one painting amongst them that he bought for six shillings, and which he thinks is a genuine Lawrence^{^xii}; if that is so, it would be worth twenty thousand marks. It was precisely in this portrait that our steward gouged a big hole. Furthermore we had to dismiss him, because he's brazen-faced and steals like a raven. Naturally, we have not told Herr Baldur anything of this. The new steward is called Edmund, and used to be a valet in a big house. Incidentally, a tremendously great deal of stealing has been going off in parcel delivery. But practically nothing can be proved. It's because when we get the parcels, they have been opened and searched through. The English censor cuts up cakes, sausages, and other things, all in a heap, while looking for secret communications. Herr von Beyerheim had had three hundred Austrian Virginia cigarettes stolen from his parcel, something he only found out because the consignment list was still in there. A few days later, men from the upper camp sold him the Virginias at twice the price.

Shaving costs five pfennigs, and for two suits in homespun I was charged only one hundred and forty marks. When I needed money for this, and reminded Herr Bohltsmann of the four pounds I had lent him in Knockaloe, he grew hot under the collar. I believe everyone and everywhere has this experience, whether in war or in peace.

The crocus are already in bloom in the little front gardens, and once more the rumour has gone around that we would be back home in three months, because Mr. Cunningham has received orders not to have anything else built and to get in no more [p. 188] food. It has also had an encouraging effect that a City-meeting has accused Sir Edward Grey of treachery; encouraging, too, have been the weekly (false of course) reports of losses in the English merchant fleet incurred in the U-boat war. Lists are compared, and calculations done, as to when the world tonnage will be sunk completely. Intense debates the whole day between pessimist and optimists. "England is blocking off all central Europe on all sides like a fortress, it blares out every day, but the counter-blockade is making itself silently effective", said Professor B., our economist. "England, like imperial Rome in the days of the Decline and Fall, is dependent on its imports, and these run up annually to about ten thousand million^{^xiii} marks; in Germany it's only half that. England itself produces only one quarter of its own needs in eggs, butter and sugar, and, even in iron, it has to import one half of its needs." Similar favourable conclusions will be made from the first secret sitting of Parliament which will take place soon. And so the spring of 1916 draws on.

Von Ramenz, the painter, who looks like a wild barricade man and has senses as keen as those of a young girl, had waylaid us into holding spiritualist séances. In the dead of night, when everyone is asleep, the necromancers gather together in our hut. Before this, the window is completely darkened off, and all chinks in the door are carefully blocked up. Only the paraffin stove spreads soft warmth and brightness. When the rolling of the sea can be heard or rain murmurs down on the tin roof, it is especially private, but set to reveal all. Dr. Pemmler, the unfortunate honeymooner, Hörns, Herr von Ramenz, von Beyerheim and I place our ten hands on the table, to make up a magic [p. 189] circle; while this is happening, we calmly carry on speaking. Herr von Ramenz, who seems to be the medium, whispered: "The soul of every man is enclosed as if in the urn which bears the seal of Salomon and was sunk in the sea, from which the soul cannot escape until faith finds it and opens it." "That will probably be the old fairy tale of the ghost in the bottle, won't it?" asked Dr. Pemmler, who is a pharmacist and a wine connoisseur. "If the chain of causation be pre-empted by spiritualist revelations, what would then be the logical conclusion? A world grounded in itself, no longer blind and incomprehensible, but an initial alignment of all things", Ramenz continued. "But in the Bible it does say", I objected, "'You must not seek answers from a piece of wood,'"^{^xiv} and was told: "That holds good for the lay persons, and the Egyptian priests for that reason similarly kept their wisdom to themselves, just as the interpretation still even today is the prerogative of the ordained." But our table was already moving itself and rose gradually with all four legs into the air, making us all stand up as well. Herr von Beyerheim placed a lit candle on the floor, and the table leg put it out so gently that not even a trace of wax remained stuck to it. Then there was a hollow knocking within the table, which had calmed down; then there was a tapping at the lamp cylinder above us that came as rhythmically as a Morse telegraph, and Herr von Ramenz translated it into the alphabet. If it tapped three times, the letter C was indicated, six times it was F, and so on. Whether the answers constructed themselves out of the depths of the subconscious, or whether animism or some distant effect was at play here, who could ascertain that? At any rate, in this way, General von Emmich, who died recently in Hannover,^{^xv} and whom I myself have often seen, unexpectedly came forward and, tapping on the glass cylinder, prophesied that a stupendous battle lay before us on the Western Front.^{^xvi} To the question of who would lead the French, it was not the [p.190] name of Joffres that came up, but one we had never heard of up till that point. We spelt out F, O, C, H. On another occasion Nelson announced himself in the same way, and tapped out "England is in danger"; but nothing more. We thought a sea battle is on its way. Then there was a chimney sweep from Dresden, name of Meier, to whose wife we were to send money, and then we deciphered once more the name Cagliostros, who told us of a buried treasure still lying beneath the statue of Diana in the park at Fontainebleau.^{^xvii}

We huddled together in thus way for many nights, and there was always something to entertain us. Sometimes a goblin came up, probably an old native Celt, who then either kicked the table upside down, or else thrust it into the corner, so that we were very badly shaken up; or he made the washbowls and glasses rattle, threw pictures down from the wainscoting, and breathed icy gusts in our faces. Since we were all sober, and nobody was out to put one over on anyone else, these to say the least were strange phenomena, which for a little time removed us from banal reality.

Easter 1916 has already arrived,^{^xviii} but there are no prospects of peace. Our close neighbour Ireland is in complete turmoil and the gargantuan struggle at Verdun makes us all hold our breath, it is the most fearsome and bloodiest battle of human kind in the entire history of the world! Desperate heroes confront each other. How will the dice fall? What are our sufferings, compared with these sufferings? Farmer L. from Africa was seized with madness at the dinner table, and died on the same evening from a stroke. In the upper camp, a violent brawl took place; the English recruits, still green, fired in amongst them, and three seriously wounded men were taken off to hospital. [p. 191] But the recruits themselves, most of them only just eighteen years old, were thoroughly shaken up. Next week they go up to the Front, and five of them already have taken their own lives while on night duty. A new arrival from Knockaloe brought with him a long letter from Rodenhaus for me, in which Rodenhaus wrote that he had been doing some deep thinking, and would probably never see his homeland again. He also told me also of a grim occurrence which had come about in the last few days. A prisoner from his compound had, he said, let it be known to the English censor that 'Scotty' was taking uncensored letters out of the camp. The poor chap himself was hauled off to the stone quarry; the betrayer, however, was beaten up by his fellow countrymen. When he yelled out to the guards for help, these had shot blindly through the barbed wire and directly into the tangle of men, and some bullets had come flying through the walls into the huts. We can even read about this in the Times, under the heading: "Unruly Germans in Knockaloe." At exactly the same time as this, the following statement from the English consul in St. Gallen was released: "When German and English officer prisoners-of-war arrived in Switzerland, no difference of any kind at all was found in way that both groups had been treated. The German officers stated that that they only hoped things were going just as well for British officers in Germany; both in camp and in hospital matters had gone without a hitch, and no one had ever made them feel that they were prisoners. England, they said, had treated them all as officers and soldiers. No insults, no hardships or unnecessary restrictions had come their way." But is that a correct way to go about things? Brutalise poor, unjustly interned civilian prisoners, but pamper prisoners of war, particularly officers, so that this is dinned loudly out to the world at large, and things for wealthy English officer prisoners of war are made all the better? [p. 192] What other reason has the whole process of locking up civilian prisoners than to enable the seizure of their property all over the world, as well as to bring pressure to bear on the enemy? But this intended pressure has not yet pressed down with any great force on the German government, as for years now we all have had the opportunity to find out.

Hörns, my stalwart companion since arrival on the Man-Island, has moved into a hut designed for four, because it's cheaper. Herr von Beyerheim and von Ramenz have had a studio of their own built. The reason why Mr. Cunningham, the owner of the Douglas camp, is paying half of the building costs comes only from the fact that von Beyerheim is restoring the Cunninghams' picture gallery for no money, and is building up Cunningham's art collection with good purchases from Christie's in London, through an agent. Besides that, he still retains ownership of the building. That is why I am almost always sitting alone at the table by the window in our hut, and am able to study without being disturbed; in this way, I intend to work at Scherr's history of German literature.^{^xix} I have no contact with anyone except 'persons passing by'; that means with people one meets in the course of everyday activities. The turnover is quick; one hears this and that, without oneself coming into gossip and leaving me obliged to anyone. You get to know so many types of men, only no women; but Dr. Hinze said: "If you know one of them, you know them all; they are all evil without exception." My Manx cat has disappeared, its box now serves me as a waste paper basket. The Camp Calendar,^{^xx} which comes out every week, has just been brought in for me. And there is still The Twilight.^{^xxi} In that you can find adverts as in any other newspaper: "A. Hauff, teacher of languages, written correspondence in all languages, inquiries at the [p. 193] Café-Bar". I wonder if the language-expert can really translate a letter to the Dali Lama into Tibetan. "Typing School does requests to the Home-Office, on correct paper, and also does correspondence and translations." Then there comes: "Cutter of top-class ladies' wardrobe array, provides instruction, H. Reussenberger — table next to the Café-Bar." "S. Weiss, goldsmith, on the gallery in the big Hall." The camp canteens advertise: "Very large selection of foodstuffs and consumer goods. You can ask for everything, even what you cannot see in the window display." "Corn operations and nail care with Karl Schulze, hair dresser at the Tower." "Get ready, it's high time for you to have your suitcases and leather bags renovated. O. Bruckner, on the dining-hall gallery."

Now, what's going off this week? Tuesday: Dancing Class in the Hall, Wednesday: Football Match: Krüger's Mariners' Band will be playing (at football?), Thursday: Practice Evening for the Swimming Club, Friday: Jewish religious service in the Entertainments Hut (of all places), Saturday: Bible Class, Address by Pastor Farbig of London. Cinema: The merry Dog. Sunday: Little Theatre: Georgette's Dilemma (all women's roles played by men!) You have to admire German hustle and bustle, their achievements, their organisations, their staying power, their courage and especially their wide-ranging talent, which the Germans have shown and show in every condition of life, even if relevant errors smooth away these characteristics. Thus they are for ever inclined to show more bitterness towards each other than against the real enemy. They are not the most unpolitical people of the earth; instead they are, like the ancient Greeks, the most politically engaged; each individual one of them thinks he is a politician, and that therefore his point of view effaces itself in favour of the common good. [p. 194] "The German people do not perish; how can they? They are individuals." A hundred years ago, Goethe still maintained: "Germany is nothing, but every German is a great deal, yet to themselves they imagine precisely the opposite."^{^xxii} On this topic it occurred to me, if one wished to compare the civilised nations of the present day — and over the last hundred years, their culture has probably sufficiently lignified to be able to do that — with the insects, those exemplary products of civilisation in the animal kingdom, one could compare America to a termite mound, England to an ant colony, France and Italy to beehives, while in Germany the case is the same as it is with spiders, where up till now each one has been spinning his own intricate web. If, however, one would seek to typify the nations by means of their works of art, then I would depict Germany as an intricate mosaic picture in the resplendence of refracted colours, England as a relief of gilded bronze, France in the lightly-pastelled portrait of a woman, Italy as a bust of alabaster, Spain in the realistic shape of a painted wooden statue, and America as a cast-iron colossus. I came to thinking about this through the pronouncements on the subject of the Germans by their prominent enemies in the Daily Graphic. The Englishman came to the conclusion that the Germans were imitators with no originality, exploiters of foreign intellects, all their geniuses were not Germans at all, but descendants of Celts who had remained behind during the migrations of the Germanic Peoples. The Frenchman stated that nothing original remained in Goethe, once one had abstracted what he had borrowed from Shakespeare, Rousseau and Voltaire, and that Kant^{^xxiii} had moved the plumb line of his books on to a world which, after the Gospels, Plato and Descartes, no longer required these works. He prophesied: the Germans will continue to imitate and falsify in the same way as they have done up till now with everything beautiful, which Western [p. 195] invention had placed before their eyes in lavish abundance. But did Voltaire not call Shakespeare's plays: The works of a drunken buffoon? And did Verdi call the French a nation of intellect, but one that had no heart, hard, but uncivilised, whose laughter had some value, but not their seriousness? And did not Goethe on the other hand say of the French that while they do have intellect and wit, they do not have sufficient substructure and reverence to allow them to overcome French pride, because this pride is tied to vanity, but they are well able to overcome English haughtiness, because this is based on commerce and dependent on the intrinsic value of money?!

Can the mental confusion, which the thunder and lightning of this War has triggered, be pushed on any further? We can probably answer this by saying that the manner of how a nation or a person judges his neighbour is an indicator of the level of his own culture, character and development of intelligence. Not only an alliance of weaponry, but also an alliance of art is now to be created against Germany. In a book only recently published, Art of the Allies,^{^xxiv} all artists, Tungusic peoples^{^xxv} and Hawaiian Islanders included, show their masterpieces; and the introduction issues a call also to defend the realm of the muses from the barbaric attack of the Germans. Thus everything comes as a consequence of business-diseased war psychosis! In conversation with Herr Lö…, the multifully-informed London publisher, on the subject of why the Germans abroad seemed to have so many enemies, he remarked that the tremendous rise, over the last fifty years, of Germany as a centralised state had disrupted the old political machinery of equilibrium and arithmetic equality. Added to that came the fact that because of the constant zeal and the enormous industriousness of the Germans, to the point of becoming a dumping-ground, all nations who so-to-speak had thought themselves already to have their sheep in the fold, and were living off their pensions, and therefore doing homage to a comfortable attitude to life, felt themselves severely threatened and forced to make retaliatory efforts, [p. 196] which at their age they felt too much of a strain to make.^{^xxvi} A new schoolboy who excels in a class and gives a glowing example of hard work and fulfilment of duty — perhaps because his parents are poor, and later he will have to earn his money for himself — will probably be secretly admired and tolerated, until an opportunity arises to avenge one's own inferiority. Perhaps that is the psychological force behind the hatred, so incomprehensibly general, of the Germans, whose diligence is, at the same time, in itself so admirable.

Sara Bernhard, ages old, who with her wooden leg is still 'portraying' the twenty-year-old son of Napoleon, and who before the War wished to play in Germany only after Alsace-Lorraine had been returned to France, has gone by aeroplane to London, where she has appeared in a patriotic play, Strasbourg Cathedral. People in London are said to have asked who was the older, the Cathedral or the old Jewess.^{^xxvii}

Hörns gave me a booklet, 'Speak German' by Eduard Engel,^{^xxviii} which made an attack directed by war psychosis on all foreign words in German, which were to be driven out by flame-thrower. Quite apart from the fact that Herr Engels' name is in itself of Greek and Latin origin, he goes decidedly too far in his demands. He is certainly correct [p. 197] in conducting propaganda to show the exit door to all-too insulting and unpleasant foreign words, which force their way like courtesans into better society. Personally, I find that foreign words appear so especially alien in the German language, because they stress their foreign origins so much, i.e. they do not adapt themselves to the rhythm of the laws of German pronunciation, and therefore have the effect of laying as erratic boulders in a level landscape. They claim the greatest attention in the German complex sentence, tyrannise the majority, and play a similar role to what foreigners have always played, i.e. they are allowed an unjustifiably privileged rank. It's as though there are no cockatoos any longer sitting on German linden trees, just nightingales.^{^xxix} It was quite different with the ranking of the foreign word in Romance languages, where only the English language has been undergoing increasing romancisation since the War.^{^xxx} In the romance languages, foreign expressions have to fit in very closely to what is acceptable to the generality, i.e. the Chinese ambassador must turn up in the European frock-coat, so as not intentionally to upset the harmonious overall image of the society into which he has been admitted, by allowing it to be beset with idiosyncrasies from his homeland! In this way, the Englishman coats the vast (now close to being enormous) number of Romance and Greek words with the amorphous throat scrapings which go to characterise Anglo-Saxon pronunciation, and thus to give all of them the imprint of being English. It is also untrue that the German language takes in a particularly large number of foreign words, and legalises them; no, the only reason why they strike people as being so objectionable is because they remain as foreign bodies, and don't get assimilated. If, for example, one speaks Latin with an English accent, one thinks one hears an English dialect. So it is also with the Romance languages. I am, therefore, for people speaking German with [p. 198] as few as possible foreign words, since these only distort the harmony, and they don't get really to the point of being disturbing until someone tries to give them German character by applying German orthography to them.^{^xxxi} To do that is a completely inorganic, misconceived experiment. Another thing: foreign words, used by an uneducated man, give the listener the impression that he does not know what he is talking about, like a cook wwith real pearls around her neck. Academically educated people may of course use the foreign words, especially in writing, since scholarship is international. But brutal transformations, such as Venus into Lustinne ['lust-mistress'], nature into Zeugmutter ['creation-mother'] and cloister into Jungfernzwinger ['damsel-enclosure'], only sound ridiculous. We can also reflect on the following: the European languages have one original root (Aryan); from this over the course of thousands of years, various branches, strong, well-formed, gnarled and minor, have developed. Even a hundred years ago, when there were still no technical means to bring the nations of the earth as closely together as they are today, Germany was so strongly marked with particularism that the individual characteristics in language of these branches, even though they stood in closest relationship to each other on the European family tree, were stressed as being the solely correct and definitive forms of the language. Today we have come so much closer to the final goal in the history of European nations, i.e., the tops of all the boughs that sprang from that original root must unite in a great leaf canopy of European language and culture. Today amongst the continents, Europe is what Germany was amongst its neighbours a hundred years ago. Germany, which in those days had decayed into a hundred various individual states, has today through mighty efforts and struggles fused itself together in one higher entity. Will the European [p. 199] nations do a similar thing after this fratricidal war? Seen from this standpoint, of a single kindred development towards a common goal and destiny — and because the twigs of the various boughs still remain attached to only one root — there are no longer any foreign words.

But we've not reached that stage yet. — The German verb strafen has been officially listed as an English verb in Murray's Oxford Dictionary,^{^xxxii} with the meanings: 'to attack violently', 'to heap curses on someone', as well also as a noun the strafe — 'a violent attack': which was taken over from the German greeting "God strafe England",^{^xxxiii} and modified by the inferences the English soldiers at the Front made of it, and what they had come to understand by it.

I was already lying in bed, but the languages topic let me have no rest. Herr von Beyerheim is already asleep, I have put on his dressing gown and set up a shaded candle. Before I forget, I shall make the following entries. The growth of a language may be compared to that of a carpet. First of all, long and short threads form up, they lie next to each other almost randomly and loosely, as for example today perhaps still in Brazil, where there are over twenty entirely different languages, as Dr. Wartemberger has told me. Gradually, however, there, where intellectual endowment forces its way most clearly to the fore (I'm thinking of Greek and Latin), those threads of words tie up into simple sentences, still loosely, then more firmly, then into a really coarse-woven fabric. Another development (or in this case 'linkage') takes place, and the texture assumes richer forms, i.e. patterns appear through artistic-linkage; it turns into exemplary language; rhetoric and poetry weave vibrant threads throughout. At last the language carpet is complete; a wonderful, organic cloth full of colourful splendour and fresh strength, and serving generations. Then [p. 200] comes the dissolution, i.e. the people take possession, unlearnedly, of the language; the carpet becomes run down, the colours fade, the threads tear here and there, and there in the end we have the stage where the fabric has become shabby, everybody does whatever he wants to do with it. (Just as ancient buildings were made to serves as sources for building-materials.) The grand old carpet comes into the hands of strangers; rough hands, but with reverence towards things ancient; these people attempt to restore the carpet, to maintain it. Since they are ignorant of the strange fabric, they work in at their own discretion threads they themselves have spun or borrowed, the carpet looks as though it's been put together out of rags and tatters. Now it's cut up, everybody takes a piece. The once poor, rough-handed purchasers have in the meantime become rich, powerful and educated; they use the old structure and weave into it new and splendid patterns; some holes (i.e. grammatical misunderstandings) are repeated symmetrically in other positions, the heavy carpet gradually becomes a delicate creation; not unlike spun lace.

The errors and irregularities which arose when the language-carpet fell into disrepair, now form the misunderstood model for new (grammatical) rules. Another, also in its way a splendid creation, lies before us: from the old carpet of the Romans, five^{^xxxiv} new carpets have now arisen, each in a different pattern, but related in structure. The same is true of the Germanic and the Slavonic language-families. But all of them are composed from the Aryan base material.^{^xxxv}

We had excellent entertainment yesterday, when the Camp Revue got off the ground. By way of introduction, I had another encounter with the military. On the way to get myself [p. 201] a ticket, a soldier shouted something after me. Then he came up behind me bayonet drawn, and yelled at me: "Can't you hear me, when I order you to do something?" I said: "I heard nothing." The soldier shouted to a sergeant, who wrote down my number. I, however, turned to the officer on duty, a little shy chap. But the soldiers gave neither me nor him the chance to speak, but instead bellowed amongst themselves and waved their hands in his face, until, quite nervously, he said: "Allright, we will see." Up till now nothing has come of it.

In the upper hall, where otherwise the Upper Camp has its meals and where the workshops of the craftsmen are, a stage had been set up. Everybody who could walk had come along, including the commandant and his dog. Schneider, the director and the main player, lolloped along in front of the stage on a tilting-horse, which was grinning like a Cheshire cat on its birthday, and sang a satire on life in the Camp, which had the refrain: "He who at night by a candle's light, even if it is only in fun, indulges in the Devil's Game, he must go full of cheer on and on, to Peel, Peel, Peel (Knockaloe!)". Then the choir sang the Prisoners' Chorus from Fidelio.^{^xxxvi} The Capt'ns from the Upper Camp, who do practically nothing for their men, but sit instead with us all day long in a reserved room, playing cards over beer and port wine, were served just as well as we, when Mr. and Mrs. Cunningham, both of them, dazzlingly impersonated, sang a duet, in which they glorified their services to us and especially their earnings through us: "We take it in, we take it in, how could we otherwise be Sly-hams?"

It was a great success, everybody applauded and called out: "Encore!"' In the second part of the Revue, the Peace had arrived, and eight girls (men dressed up [p. 202] of course) bounced on to the stage in blue and white gauze tutus, led by a comical old woman, which was supposed to represent the wife of the Top-Capt'n, of whom one had heard that she had run the canteen in Ruhleben. She said saucily that she had made so much profit there that she had sailed to us here on her pleasure yacht (i.e., Mr. Cunningham possesses one such) to rescue her old man and all the rest of us from imprisonment. The eight 'Camp Girls' then sang and danced, throwing out kisses from their hands as they did so: "Kiss, oh kiss, oh kiss on and on; no man, no man, can kiss like you". The Commandant had the most kisses thrown to him, it was bizarre and hilarious, and the Tommies posted round the walls grinned in delight. Then Ernst Pl., nephew of the founder of North German Lloyd, dressed up as Elsa von Brabant,^{^xxxvii} danced a cake walk^{^xxxviii} with Herr 'Fatty' Kadisch.

The sentimental love rigmarole also had to be included, and 'Frida', the indestructible female impersonator, danced the role of Columbine in a moonlight setting. The finale was the exit of the prisoners from the Camp, each one with a paper lantern, with Herr Hilkes in his red waistcoat at the front, all his pockets, high boots included, full of newspapers, since he's the news agency; the others followed with bags, rucksacks, even two parrots in a cage, to the tune of the marching song: "Hurrah, hurrah, now we're all off to home, we can scarcely fathom the joy." Jubilant applause rewarded the players; even the Commandant, to whom all texts had had to be submitted in English prior to performance, gave his thanks with the words: "It was a good performance, which we all enjoyed, but we must not forget the orchestra, which contributed so wonderfully!" Györi, the Hungarian, took a bow; he had written the music for it.

All through today we have been hearing the far-off rumbling thunder of the guns of English warships, which have battered Dublin, the capital city of Ireland which is now in rebellion.^{^xxxix} The weather was sultry, and a static electricity lay on the Irish Sea, making its normally wild surface free of rippling waves. The whole world is in turmoil, yet nature gives no reflection of this, which is very weird. You feel as though you are on the Island of Oblivion, the Island of the Forgotten Ones. When Krüger's Mariners' Band suddenly blew into their instruments, a shudder ran through my entire body. I read my Milton. I did know that this English Dante became blind, but I did not know that he was also intellectually blind. I mean, what is one supposed to think when he declares that it is God's custom to reveal the pronouncements of his will to the Englishmen? Is it therefore God's will that Dublin be battered with shot and shell, although God ordains that all small nations should be protected by the English!!

Herr Hilkes with the red waistcoat is the first one to spread the news that twenty-thousand Englishmen have been captured at Kut in Mesopotamia;^{^xl} their General Townshend, however, is said to have flown off in an air balloon; besides this, riots are reported as having happened in Liverpool. Our Commandant thinks he has been insulted in the Isle of Man newspaper, and is planning retaliation by not allowing any more sales of goods on the Island.

I discover that the anniversary of my imprisonment is coming up, and I must in all truth confess that my worst time was when I was living at Mrs. v. L.'s; but in saying that, I share my fate here with thousands, mostly whose health [p. 204] and wealth have suffered worse than mine, although many men have a sufficient degree of practical pachydermatousness to enable them to ignore the need to react so strongly to the unpleasant minor details of daily life; to which I, however, still unfortunately do. Nevertheless. Dr. Pemmler always advises me: "Only be surprised, never vexed!"; but he gets vexed all the time, and then is surprised. I personally shall never forget the day my freedom was taken away from me; and I intend to warn every man from Germany who is staying at a seaside resort abroad to do so in all innocence as a visitor, and advise him to do his honeymooning at home; because we are fully aware of what might happen to him otherwise!

In the evening, almost everybody had taken their chairs and tables out into the open air, and had set little lamps to burn on them. People were telling each other stories, smoking, letting their gaze wander over the quietly resting sea, which only lazily reached the shore. The west was ablaze with a dispersing glow, in which the canopy over Ireland was vanishing away as though in a fiery abyss. Then the moon rose slowly up behind the fortified towers of the castle of the dukes of Atholl, floating in flocks of clouds, which clung delicately together.

A young chap in the Upper Camp has failed in his remarkable attempt to escape. Disguised as a nun, he intended to flee to Catholic Ireland, which is quite close to us. On the steamer, however, he couldn't produce any identity papers, and on his way to the guard-post he ran off through the streets dressed in his nun's array. He found refuge, of all places, in a brothel, but the following day he was betrayed. Now they want to find out who his helpers were.

Indescribable joy reigns supreme! In a sea battle in waters off Jutland, the German Fleet has gained its Victory of Trafalgar.^{^xli} Five English battle cruisers, three cruisers, two flotillas, a torpedo boat and two destroyers, one hundred and sixty thousand tons, have been sunk. The newspapers did print the news, but gave it no commentary. The joy is so great that we are embarrassed to look at any Englishman; how will they ever get over this blow?

Today we got the answer. As if by command, every English newspaper is reporting: "Jellicoe's victory is greater than Nelson's at Trafalgar." — There's still more! Despite thick banks of mist and the prevailing icy cold, the sunshine of joy has broken though a second time in all its radiance: England's horrendous Minister of War, Lord Kitchener, has gone down with the warship and its entire crew which was to take him to Russia. No further details' have emerged, no 'where', no 'by what'. This loss is another bolt from the blue for England. We, however, thought we had every reason to strike up a triumphant 'Te Deum', because this man, who has perished so miserably and who will have no grave of honour in St. Paul's Cathedral, is the author of our shameful detention. He has added a new wartime atrocity to the ones which have been practised for thousands of years. It was he who ushered in this century by locking up twenty-thousand women and children in concentration camps during the Boer War, and allowing them partially to die in them by [p. 206] cutting off all their supplies of food, in order to do no more than break the will of the prisoners' fathers, brothers and sons, who were combatants in the war. But that has been forgotten; even Germany's official sympathy at the time did not last for long, and today Transvaal has become an English colony that willingly bleeds for its new fatherland, while its gold makes the English war chests inexhaustible.

The month of June on this island corresponds to November. The foghorns howl out day and night. Herr von Beyerheim and myself are invalids; he is suffering from catarrh of the sinuses, and sciatica. My stomach has been assailed by that unhealthy, unending, frozen meat. Wrapped up in our winter overcoats, with the paraffin stove placed under the table, we sit for hours on end, gazing at each other. Edmund, the silent steward, warms up tins of macaroni and tomatoes, which taste good, every time, although these Italian products are taboo amongst 'true patriots', such as Lieutenant C., of the Imperial Navy Reserve. This man, in point of fact, was put into the 'Clink',^{^xlii} by the sergeant for extreme drunkenness, and was sentenced by the Commandant to sweep the street in front of his and Cunningham's house for a week, from six o'clock to eight o'clock in the morning — and he did so.

Herr von Beyerheim recounted many of his rich stock of memories — such as when he, as a cavalry lieutenant in the Chevauxlegers, was sent to Monte Carlo to gamble up enough money to pay the bill which was owed by the Officers' Club. Out hunting in Austria, he told me he had shot a large bird, at which point the young prince asked what kind of bird it was. "An eagle." "How can that be? He's only got one head." "Now", Herr von Beyerheim [p. 207] answered, "then he's probably flown across to us from the Prussian Army."^{^xliii} In the USA, he saw the biggest Easter egg in the world, which a millionaire had given his daughter as a present; he said it was three metres high and two-and-a-half metres wide,^{^xliv} and filled with ten thousand marks' worth of sweets and bonbons. He described the splendid collections at Ambrass Castle^{^xlv}, which the now-murdered heir to the throne had shown him round; he told of his visit to Baroness Vaughan,^{^xlvi} who collected lace, and on whose possessions the blood of the poor negroes of the Congo was thought to lie; and told me how, at the outbreak of the War, he had been thrown in jail in handcuffs and with no boots on, in case he tried to escape. We then made out our joint plans for the future, since I, too, am now very interested in becoming an art dealer. He had made the extremely interesting and expert reports on paintings, and was well acquainted with all the art markets, dealers and connoisseurs in that field. Prince Lichtenstein,^{^xlvii} he told me, had shown him his painting by Franz Hals, for which his father in 1801 had paid only eighty-five marks, whereas today works by Franz Hals are worth a million. But how will the world have changed, and what will still remain? A bomb only a short time ago shattered the roof of the Church of St. Mary of Nazareth in Venice, the bronze horses in front of the Church of St. Mark have for that reason been taken to Rome. A foolhardy Lüneburg lieutenant once succeeded years ago in tearing apart the Parthenon in Athens, that wonderful building of antiquity, by means of a well-aimed cannon shot into the Turkish powder magazine (1689). War has always been a Herostrat.^{^xlviii}

Thus these are the most inspiring hours, spent with this intelligent man, and we have the very best understanding of each other. Sometimes we invite Hörns, too, back again, [p. 208] whose gift of sitting still and listening is admirable, or Herr Thieme, a constant devotee of nose drops, puts in an appearance. He feels obliged to entertain us, and always begins with extolling the virtues of Dr. Dralle's "Birchwater" hair-dressing oil, and the episode out of his army days in Hamburg, when they had to wait in wind and pouring rain in their best uniforms for the arrival of a general, who himself came in a coach. By contrast, really amusing is young von Br.; skinny as a skeleton, but with hands as big as garden plots, the reason being that he was snatched from home and sailed around the world as a seaman for four years. His grandfather, General von Lu….g, recently celebrated his hundredth birthday in Hannover (at the time of his birth, 1815, Hannover still belonged to England!) He tells seaman's stories, enough to bring the house down, but we've got to act as though we believe everything he says; even the sea serpents, which he says he really and truly saw. Perhaps that's enough for today. Herr von Beyerheim is lying groaning in bed, I'll have to make some covers for him. It's so misty outside that nobody can see anything, the lamps are on all day long, and it's supposed to be July.

Today the English camp doctor, Dr. Marshall, visited us again, to find out how far the restoration of his pictures had come along; he told us about a court sitting from which he had come, at which two prisoners were sentenced each to one year's penal servitude, one of them on account of unnatural sexual acts, which were attested by nine seamen, the other on account of a failed attempt at suicide. He went on to tell us of a dilapidated mill, which he had procured for himself in the north of the island and was now in the process of having transformed into a country house by ten prisoners under the guidance of Herr Kallenbach, who is an architect. (For the next-to-nothing that we all know so well!). Dr. Marshall is allowing Herr von Beyerheim and myself [p. 209] to go along with him there tomorrow; that's a pleasant diversion, finally once to get out for a day away from the barbed-wire fortress.

Now this excursion, with clipped wings, from the prison cage, is over as well! At eight o'clock in the morning, in splendid sunshine, Herr von Beyerheim, myself and ten construction workers under the guidance of Herr Kallenbach, marched, escorted by only two soldiers armed with bayonets, to the railway station, up the middle of the road, because the pavements are prohibited to prisoners. The journey to Kirk Michael on the west end of the island lasted an hour-and-a-half. Kallenbach handed out chocolate to the small children waiting there, as he does every day, in thoughts of his own children. We ordered eggs from a farmer, so we could take them with us in the evening, a scarce item which the canteen is no longer allowed to sell.

The countryside, with its many palms, araucarias and hedges of blossoming fuchsias, reminded me of southern climes, especially now, in the splendour of the hot July sun.

Without coming across anybody, and singing 'Hiking is the Miller's Joy',^{^xlix} we came to a waterfall, which had earlier powered the mill-wheel. In the dilapidated house, we first made ourselves breakfast, then the men set about their work, and Herr von Beyerheim and myself walked down to the sea. On the pastures many sheep were grazing; they had their back legs tied together so that they could not escape; prisoners like us, it seems. When they saw us, they pushed themselves bleating into the hazel hedges. The waves swished up full of melancholy on the lonely beach, on which there were thousands of strangely shaped mussels. We lay down in the warm sand, and the wind swept away over our heads — we soon fell asleep. Kallenbach called us at midday. A wooden crate stood out in the open air with three [p. 210] chairs round it; on it was a great bowl of fruit salad, that being because as an architect Kallenbach had lived for ten years in the tropics as a strict vegetarian, and gave us of the most wonderful recipes. Lying next to me on the grass was a newspaper. I picked it up, but then threw it back, as far away as it had come from, once I had spotted — it was the Daily Chronicle — a witch-hunt article directed against the Huns, which in preposterous nonsense far outdid everything I had so far read, and that really is saying a lot! While Herr von Beyerheim was out taking a dip in the sea after his meal, I read the history of the Isle of Man, which, as small as it is, has not escaped its rich share of warlike events since Roman times. Unfortunately it had to be precisely today that the strong neurological pains came back to plague me, and because of this I held my head for a long time under the ice-cold water of the cascading millstream.

The bricklayers and carpenters, who had been working hard, for good wishes, but not for money, knocked off from work at seven o'clock, and we all marched, singing the song 'At the fountain before the gate, there stands a linden tree',^{^l} back to the station. On the way to it, a very old farmer's wife, who was a Celt and understood not a word of English, gave us three dozen freshly-laid eggs to take back with us.

In Douglas, in spite of it being high season, almost all the hotels and boarding-houses were shut. Full of curiosity we looked at the female entities on the street, who probably glanced back at us with a secret shudder.

I read it once that there are prisoners who long to be back in their cells, and that happened to me as well; the world outside the barbed wire had already become strange and too distant. Cervantes^{^li} wrote Don Quichotte while in his prison cell, and was just as much able as King Philip was from the Escorial^{^lii} to enjoy the sunset; thus the orbit of the earth can also be described splendidly in the most enclosed of circles — so long as providence has bestowed upon us the pair of compasses needed to do this.

x A rather heavy-handed word-for-word translation of Cunningham, where 'cunning' has been taken to mean 'sly, crafty, wily', (German schlau), to indicate the way the prisoners thought Cunningham pinched pennies from them, and 'ham' has been taken to mean 'ham, gammon' (German Schinken), not 'home' (German heim), as it really is.

xi See: 'New Manx Worthies' (2006), (www.isle-of-man.com/manxnotebook/people/neww.htm), pp. 296-98, article by Ulla Corkhill: 'Dr. Robert Marshall, though born at Stockport on 18 May 1868, had actually come to study Manx through having been on holiday on the Isle of Man at the age of six and meeting an old couple at Cregneash, who knew only Manx. He had been amazed that that he could not make himself understood to them. Then, as a teenager, he began to learn Manx, eventually becoming quite proficient in the language. He later served on the committee of the Manx Language Society, and was elected its president in 1934. He died at Douglas on 6 November 1943.'

xxvi Dunbar-Kalckreuth comments in German (pg.196, fn.1) that after the Boer War, when England was settling back, old and lazy, into some relaxation, Germany was young and hungry. Their spirit was the same as that of the English in the Age of Elizabeth, except for the fact that the cultivated and honest Germans behaved less boisterously and had less success.

xxix Dunbar-Kalckreuth (p. 197): "Auf deutschen Linden sitzen nun einmal keine Kakadus, sondern Nachtigallen." The implication is probably that the awful screeching of escaped pet cockatoos here and there from all different parts of the world has been replaced in the German national tree (the linden or lime, species Tilia) by the song of French nightingales.

xl The siege of Kut-al-Amara in Mesopotamia lasted one hundred and forty-seven days, until the eleven thousand eight hundred British and Indian troops inside the garrison-town finally surrendered on 19 April 1916. Their Commander, General Sir Charles Vere Ferres Townshend (1861-1924), was imprisoned at Prinkipo as a favoured guest, and released in October 1918. (wiki))

lii Escorial: Palace of Philip II of Spain.

Background

The transfer from Knockaloe to Douglas on the 15th November was along the Ballamoar road to St Johns then by train to the halt at Kk Braddan - both stations had sufficient space as the former was used for the crowds attending the annual Tynwald fair and the latter the popular sermon preached in the open air at the new Kk Braddan church. The Jews were transferring to obtain kosher food in the Jewish camp. The camp register noted 126 arrivals from Knockaloe with a further 5 arriving later from Stobs.

The visit to see the wood carvings was possibly St Nicholas day 6th December as Madoc notes display of sheaves and nuts.

....

The excursion to the "delapidated mill" being renovated/rebuilt on behalf of Dr Marshall, was to Glen Mooar mill. It appears that some in a later party pushed their luck somewhat, by going to the Mitre public house in Kirk Michael where they were apprehended and the camp informed; noted in Madoc's diary for 1st August 'to be investigated'. The following day Altmann, Wolffing and Strausky were charged with staying away from a working party; and remanded. On August 4th 'after careful consideration of all the points in connection with the Michael affair, & of the prisoners concerned in the affair. I have given them each 10 days, to work specially on clearing ground of buildings near the hen run'. It would seem that all three were Austrians




Any comments, errors or omissions gratefully received The Editor © G Newton , 2019

In the Douglas Camp 1915-1918.

Background