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Three guarantees were left, which have been quoted again and again by the German Press and by Baron von Bissing in his various answers to Cardinal Mercier. It was first stated that the men seized would not be sent to Germany, then that only the unemployed were taken, and finally that these would not be used on military work. These last guarantees have been repeatedly broken.
This clumsy declaration is signed by Lieutenant-General Graf von Westcarp. And to think that, even now, Governor von Bissing perseveres in maintaining that no military work has ever been asked or will ever be asked from the Belgian workers! As the French proverb says: "On n'est jamais trahi que par les siens."
The German authorities took the matter in hand for investigation, but in the meantime General von Bissing fined the city of Brussels 500,000 marks and the suburb of Schaerbeek 50,000 marks on the plea that the murder had been committed with a revolver, the Germans having ordered that all arms should be surrendered at the town hall. But there was more in this affair than an ordinary crime.
After the concert had passed off with reasonable success, I had to fulfil another wish of the Prince's next day, by privately playing to him Beethoven's Symphony in C minor, when Frau von Bissing was also present. She had now been for some time a widow. She promised to come to Breslau, when I gave my concert there.
In 1910 General von Bissing, one of the Kaiser's closest friends, was sent to Brussels. For years he spent the summer months apparently at the watering places near The Hague in Holland and Ostend in Belgium, preparatory to the hour when Germany would seize Belgium and he assume his position as Governor-General, living in Brussels. Men nearing death tell the truth.
Besides Herwegh, who accompanied me, the party there consisted of Frau Wille and her sister, Frau von Bissing. I had often entertained these ladies with music in my own peculiar fashion during my pleasant visits to Mariafeld, about two hours' walk from Zurich.
Having affirmed, therefore, that the German Government lied at the beginning in claiming that they entered Belgium fighting a defensive warfare, General von Bissing cast about for some one behind whom he can hide as a screen and who can be used as an authority for lying. He finds his guide and leader in "The Prince," written by Machiavelli.
And further, the information that of the five condemned to death, Philip Bauck and Edith Cavell had already been executed. The monsters! Oh that von Bissing. How gladly she would die if she might first have the pleasure of killing him!
In January of 1917 von Bissing prepared a memorandum for the direction of Belgian affairs in His Majesty's name and according to his wish. This document contains the meditations of a dying man. The statements he makes, he says, contain the views that inspired his every act in Belgium during his administration.
Governor von Bissing reminds them that, according to De Raet's words, "Two heroic spirits dominate the world: The Mind and the Sword." They may possess the first but he holds the second. There is one idea which dominates the Belgian tragedy: "The body may be conquered, the soul remains free."
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