These troops—they were Bavarians—completed the work of destruction by burning the quarter of the town nearest to the German frontier, some thirty houses in all, besides pillaging many others. They also shot twelve of the inhabitants, including a woman and the child she was holding in her arms, and an old man of seventy-eight, who was sitting peacefully by his window.
These were the chief events of the first occupation, which took place early in August. The second—there have been three in all—began on August 23rd. At eight in the morning the French hurriedly evacuated Badonviller and took up a position at Pexonnes, about two miles to the rear, and the Germans, after a desultory bombardment, which went on all day, marched in at six in the evening. For the next few hours there was furious fighting in and around the town between the Chasseurs Alpins and the Chasseurs d’Afrique on the one side and the Landwehr, the 162nd Regiment of Strassburg, and the regiment of Lieutenant von Forstner (since reported killed), the 99th of Saverne, on the other. During the night a stronger German force approached the town, and as soon as they entered it, began ordering the terrified inhabitants to come out of the cellars in which they had taken refuge, when suddenly they were interrupted by a furious counter-attack of the Chasseurs, and driven out of the town at the point of the bayonet. Once more the natives shut themselves up in the cellars and listened panic-stricken to the noise and confusion of the struggle overhead. One comfort they had in their alarm. All the time, above the din of the fighting, they heard the stirring notes of the French bugles sounding the charge, and all the time the voices of the French soldiers singing, as they charged, the famous Sidi-’Brahim bugle-march:—
“Pan! Pan! L’Arbi! Les chacals sont par ici! Mais plus haut c’est les Turcos!”
Little by little the Germans retreated, and the sounds died away in the distance, and then suddenly they began again, as the Chasseurs, still chanting the Sidi-’Brahim, marched back through the town and retired to their position at Pexonnes. Then once more the Germans, and at last the silence of the night.
St. Benoit, near Raon l’Etape, is another of these murdered towns. It has been destroyed, that is to say, burnt by the Germans, about as effectually as Gerbéviller. The church has only its four walls left. The Germans, during their occupation, placed mitrailleuses in the tower, which stands high up and commands the main road. A body of French troops passing along this road, which skirts the village to the north, came under the fire of the mitrailleuses and suffered severely, without being able to see where the attack came from. A second detachment was more fortunate in finding out the position of the machine guns. A battery of 75’s was trained on the church. Shortly afterwards the French retired on Rambervillers, and when the Germans reached St. Benoit they set fire to the village to avenge the death of their comrades who belonged to the same corps. They did not, however, the Mayor told us, kill any of the inhabitants, of whom only 12 out of about 250 were missing.