Description
There is little in the peaceful scene before us to recall the terrible tragedy enacted on this very spot in August, 1914. Here, in that fateful month, 116 citizens of Dinant were pitilessly massacred by German soldiers acting under the command of their officers. With the butt ends of muskets, men were separated from the women as the terrified citizens huddled together in the street, stood up against this wall, and shot. On Friday, August 21st, the sack of the town began, and its fate was more terrible than it was when Charles the Bold captured the city five hundred years before. The citizens were all indoors, the "guarde civile" had given up their arms, when the enemy burst into the streets, fired into the windows, smashed in the doors, dragged people into the street to be shot and stabbed. Then began the pillage, and when the invaders had glutted themselves with spoil, grenades were thrown and houses set on fire. Of 1,400 houses not 200 were left standing. One of these we see ; on the wall a plaster plaque to the memory of the slain, before it a memorial wreath. Dinant is a Belgian town on the banks of the Meuse. In the fifteenth century it was a flourishing city of 60,000 people, but its commercial importance has declined. It is now principally a summer resort,—or was, before the war—a charming town with quiet streets, quaint architecture and lovely vistas. All this the war has leveled to a heap of ruins, to piles of unsightly stone and mortar.
