RAEMAEKERS'
CARTOON
HISTORY OF THE WAR

Table of Contents

RAEMAEKERS'
CARTOON
HISTORY OF THE WAR

compiled by
J. MURRAY ALLISON

Editor of Raemaekers' Cartoons, Kultur in Cartoons, The
Century Edition de Luxe Raemaekers' Cartoons, etc.

VOLUME TWO

THE SECOND TWELVE MONTHS OF WAR

NEW YORK
THE CENTURY CO.
1919

Copyright, 1919, by
The Century Co.

FOREWORD

The second year of the war opened in the West with the enemy, although superior in man power and munitionment, pinned down to a defensive line from Belfort to the sea. The new armies of the British Empire were still being raised and trained, and neither England nor France had reached their zenith in the production of guns and munitions. The western front was to remain for a time comparatively inactive.

In the East the great Teutonic drive through Poland was still in progress, although the Russian armies had everywhere escaped envelopment, and their retreat was nearly at an end. Warsaw was occupied by the Germans early in August. It was a moment chosen by Germany to make an offer of separate peace to Russia. The enemy sought to gain by bribery what his armies had failed to accomplish in the field. The offer was rejected by Russia.

By October Germany's greatest military effort so far had failed and the Russian armies stood intact from the Bukovina to Riga.

The next great development in the history of the war was the entry of Bulgaria in October on the side of the Central Powers. Whilst great German and Austro-Hungarian forces crossed the Danube in the north the Bulgarians attacked Serbia on the flank. In a few weeks Serbia and Montenegro suffered the fate of Belgium and Luxemburg, the British and French troops not having arrived in time to render material aid to the Serbians. Greece, failing to live up to her treaty with Serbia, contributed to the defeat of that country and was for many months to form a menace to the allied troops who were making the port of Salonika their base in the Balkans.

In the meantime the western allies had taken the offensive in September, the French attacking in Champagne and the British in Flanders. The attack was not driven home and no further offensive upon a large scale was to take place until July in the following year.

January saw Gallipoli evacuated by the Allies, releasing Turkish troops for service in Mesopotamia which was doubtless to have its effect in the fall of Kut and the capture of the garrison later on.

Late in February the great German offensive began at Verdun, an offensive which was to prove the most costly defeat of the German arms during the war. The Battle of Verdun continued for months and may be said to have been definitely lost by the Germans by the 1st of July.

Meanwhile the Russian armies in the Caucasus and Armenia had beaten the Turks in many engagements, taking amongst other towns the fortress of Erzerum with great numbers of prisoners and military stores. The other Russian armies in the north, reorganized and thoroughly equipped with munitionment, began in June their magnificent advance all along their line from Riga to the Carpathians.

The last month of the second year of the war witnessed the beginning of the "big push" in the west, the Russian advance in the east, the retreat of the Austrians in the Trentino, and the beginning of the Italians' successful thrust upon the Isonzo.

It is with these major military operations of the year with which Raemaekers' cartoons on the following pages deal.

He did not neglect to record, however, many of the minor happenings. The various and devious peace moves of the enemy did not escape his comment nor did the cold blooded murders of Nurse Cavell and Captain Fryatt. He has recorded also many examples of German Zeppelin Ruthlessness and German Piracy on the sea. Notable amongst the latter is the Sussex crime and its subsequent diplomatic developments, which were to play such an important part in America's entry into the war.

J. M. A.

VOLUME TWO

THE ANNIVERSARY, AUGUST, 1915

Bernhardi: "Have we not surpassed your most sanguine expectations?"

Total losses amongst all belligerents during first year of war:

Killed Wounded Missing and Prisoners Total
3,026,713 5,768,994 2,673,188 11,528,895

Nineteenth Century and After.

KING ALBERT'S ANSWER TO THE POPE

"With him who broke his word, devastated my country, burned my villages, destroyed my towns, desecrated my churches, and murdered my people, I will not make peace before he is expelled from my country and punished for his crimes."

Today, on the sad anniversary of the terrible conflict, our heart gives forth the wish that the war will soon end. We raise again our voice to utter a fatherly cry for peace. May this cry, dominating the frightful noise of arms, reach the warring peoples and their chiefs and induce kindly and more serene intentions.

From the Papal Peace Appeal,
August 1, 1916.

A STABLE PEACE

The Kaiser: "And remember, if they do not accept it, I deny it altogether"

That the Dardanelles and Galicia had been offered by Berlin to Petrograd; that Egypt was asked for Turkey, and that the mediation of the Pope was desired on the basis of the restitution of Belgium, were some of the reports which gained currency between Aug. 5, the date of the fall of Warsaw, and Aug. 12, when the Novoe Vremya of Petrograd confirmed the rumors of German overtures for a separate peace with Russia.

Almost simultaneously from Petrograd and from Milan announcements that, after the capture of Warsaw, Germany was seriously engaged in preliminary negotiations for the establishment of a peace were published.

Besides Galicia and the Dardanelles, the Novoe Vremya said, Germany would guarantee the integrity of the Russian frontiers, at the same time stipulating for Egypt on the pretext of ceding that country to Turkey, and for a free hand to deal with Russia's allies. The report declared that these offers were rejected by the Czar's Government.

"Current History",
New York.

THROWN TO THE SWINE

On August 5, 1915, Miss Cavell, an English woman, directress of a large nursing home at Brussels, was quietly arrested by the German authorities and confined in the prison of St. Gilles on the charge that she had aided stragglers from the Allied Armies to escape across the frontier from Belgium to Holland, furnishing them with money, clothing and information concerning the route to be followed.

We reminded him (Baron Von der Lancken) of the burning of Louvain and the sinking of the Lusitania, and told him that this murder would stir all civilized countries with horror and disgust. Count Harrach broke in at this with the rather irrelevant remark that he would rather see Miss Cavell shot than have harm come to one of the humblest German soldiers, and his only regret was that they had not "three or four English old women to shoot."

The day brought forth another loathsome fact in connection with the case. It seems the sentence of Miss Cavell was not pronounced in open court. Her executioners, apparently in hope of concealing their intentions from us, went into her cell and there behind locked doors pronounced sentence upon her. It is all a piece with the other things they have done.

Hugh Gibson,
First Secretary of the American
Legation at Brussels.

THE MARTYRED NURSE

William: "Now you can bring me the American protest"

Even when I was ready to abandon all hope, Leval was unable to believe that the German authorities would persist in their decision, and appealed most touchingly and feelingly to the sense of pity for which we looked in vain.

Hugh Gibson,
First Secretary American
Legation at Brussels.

To condemn any human being, even if he were the vilest criminal, at 5 o'clock in the afternoon and execute him at 2 A. M. was an act of barbarism for which no possible condemnation is adequate.

Under these circumstances, it would be incredible, if the facts were not beyond dispute, that the request of the United States for a little delay was not only brutally refused, but that our Legation was deliberately misled and deceived until the death sentence had been inflicted.

James M. Beck
In "New York Times".

THE YELLOW BOOK

"Unmasked"

The publication of the French Government Yellow Book in August dealing with the diplomatic events which led up to the war proved that whilst Germany was assuring the nations of her peaceful intentions she was secretly preparing for war.

U'S

His Majesty: "Well, Tirpitz, you've sunk a great many?"

Tirpitz: "Yes, sire, here is another U coming down."

On August 26, 1915, Squadron-Commander A. W. Bigsworth destroyed single-handed, a German submarine by bombs from his aeroplane off Ostend on the coast of Belgium.

The British Admiralty said in reference to this episode:

"It is not the practice of the Admiralty to publish statements regarding the losses of German submarines, important though they have been, in cases where the enemy have no other sources of information as to the time and place at which these losses have occurred. In the case referred to above, however, the brilliant feat of Squadron-Commander Bigsworth was performed in the immediate neighbourhood of the coast in occupation of the enemy, and the position of the sunken submarine has been located by a German destroyer."

Pallas Athene: "Has it come to this?"

When, on Sept. 21, after the Bulgarian mobilization had begun, M. Venizelos, who was then Prime Minister of Greece, asked France and ourselves for 150,000 men, it was on the express understanding that Greece would mobilize also. Greece did, in fact, mobilize under his direction on Sept. 24, but it was not until Oct. 2 that M. Venizelos found himself able to agree to the landing of British and French troops under the formal protest, a merely formal protest, which he had already made to the French Government. On Oct. 4—I wish these dates to be borne in mind—M. Venizelos announced what had happened to the Greek Chamber, and at the same time declared that Greece must abide by her treaty with Serbia. The next day the King repudiated the declaration and then M. Venizelos resigned. The new Government which succeeded declined to recognize that a casus foederis had arisen between Greece and Serbia, in spite of our constant insistence that Greece should make common cause with Serbia, and the new Greek Government, while declaring their desire to remain on friendly terms with the Allies, declined to depart from their attitude of neutrality.

H. H. Asquith, House of Commons,
November 2, 1915.

THE NEXT TO BE KICKED OUT

Dumba's Master

By reason of the admitted purpose and intent of Mr. Dumba to conspire to cripple legitimate industries of the people of the United States and to interrupt their legitimate trade and by reason of the flagrant violation of diplomatic propriety in employing an American citizen protected by an American passport as a secret bearer of official dispatches through the lines of the enemy of Austria-Hungary, the President directs me to inform your Excellency that Mr. Dumba is no longer acceptable to the Government of the United States as the Ambassador of his Imperial Majesty at Washington.

Official American Note Requesting the Recall of
Mr. Dumba, the Austro-Hungarian Ambassador.
September, 1916.

SEPTEMBER, 1914, AND SEPTEMBER, 1915

The Crown Prince, 1914: "Now the war begins as we like it."
The Crown Prince, 1915: "But this is not as I wished it to continue."

Towards the end of September, 1916, the British and French Armies began an attack upon the German forces at Loos and in the Champagne. During five days' fighting, over 25,000 prisoners and 125 guns were captured by the Allies.

IDYLLIC NEUTRALITY

A daily smuggling scene on the Dutch frontier

Neutral countries whose frontiers march with those of Germany have rendered enormous aid to the Central Powers by the supply of materials and food. The general practice of evasion has been to smuggle home produce of all sorts for which high prices were forthcoming and use for local consumption similar products imported from other countries over seas. The imports of many lines of merchandise into Holland alone are known to have increased from fifty to one hundred per cent. compared with pre-war figures.

WHAT SHOULD WE DO WITHOUT MICHAEL?

Michael: "For my 100 Marks I obtained a receipt. I gave this for second 100 Marks and I received a second receipt. For the third loan I gave the second receipt. Have I invested 300 Marks and has the Government got 300, or have both of us got nothing?"

If we desire the possibility of shaping a peace in accordance with our needs and our vital requirements, we must not forget the question of cost. We must see to it that the whole future livelihood of our people shall, so far as is in any way possible, be relieved of the burden. The leaden weight of thousands of millions is due to the people who got up this war. They, not we, shall drag it along with them. Of course, we know that this is a matter of peculiar difficulty, but everything that can be done in this direction shall be done.

We are paying the money almost exclusively to ourselves, whilst the enemy is paying its loans abroad, a guarantee that in the future we shall maintain the advantage.

Dr. Helfferich,
Reichstag, September, 1915.

WE DON'T UNDERSTAND THIS LOAN GAME

(In Germany there is a game by which children passing a coin from one to another are supposed to, but do not, get richer.)

German statesmen and editors make a boast of the fact that so far they have not raised any war funds by taxation. That is true, but they are pursuing the far less commendable course of raising the money by loans and by "hanky-panky" manipulations of currency paper. Dr. Helfferich, the Imperial Minister of Finance, recently admitted that he dared not impose further taxation, and it is a fair inference that he knew any such proposals would be futile—that the burdens of the German taxpayers are already as heavy as they can bear.

The Nineteenth Century and After.

THE GERMAN LOAN

"Don't breathe on the bubble or the whole will collapse"

The German war loans have been subscribed mainly by the great companies of Germany; by the Savings Banks, the Banks, the Life and Fire Insurance and Accident Insurance Companies, etc.

Furthermore, these loans have been pyramided; that is to say, a man who subscribed and paid for one hundred thousand marks of loan number one could, when loan number two was called for, take the bonds he had bought of loan number one to his bank and on his agreement to spend the proceeds in subscribing to loan number two, borrow from the bank eighty thousand marks on the security of his first loan bonds, and so on.

James W. Gerard in
"My Four Years in Germany."

"Wounded First"

The Allan Liner Hesperian was torpedoed by a German submarine in the English Channel on the 4th September, 1915; on board were a number of invalided Canadian troops. British admiralty patrol boats were quickly on the spot and succeeded in saving all the passengers and crew with the exception of eight souls.

THE MORNING PAPER:—"GREAT NEWS"

The Press Bureau of the War Office announces that a fleet of hostile airships visited the eastern counties and a portion of the London area last night and dropped bombs.

The following military casualties, in addition to the one announced last night, have been reported: Fourteen killed and thirteen wounded.

The Home Office announces the following casualties other than the military casualties reported above: Killed—Men, 27; women, 9; children, 5; total, 41. Injured—Men, 64; women, 30; children, 7; total, 101.

Of these casualties 32 killed and 95 injured were in the London area, and these figures include those announced last night.

London, October, 1915.

VAN TROMP AND DE REUTER

"So long as you permit Zeppelins to cross our land you surely should cease to boast of our deeds.

(Whenever a Dutchman wishes to speak of the great past of his country he calls to mind the names of these heroes.)

Many of the Zeppelins that raided English towns and villages crossed over Holland leaving and returning to their bases in Germany. This was held to be a violation of the neutrality of Holland and "pro-Ally" Dutchmen endeavored to make the question an international one.

THE MARSHES OF PINSK

The Kaiser: "When the leaves fall you'll have peace."—They have.

The last of the great Austro-German strokes had failed, and before the beginning of October, 1915, the line of the enemy in the east was established precisely where it was to be found unchanged until the great offensive delivered upon its southern part by the Russians in the beginning of June, 1916. Lord Kitchener put the matter simply and in words the accuracy of which could be gauged by the exasperation they caused at Berlin, when he said that the enemy had now in the East "shot his bolt." It was a phrase exactly true. The expense in men, the difficulty of bringing up munitionment; the entry into territories with worse roads and less opportunities of supply; the fact that the line now reached was cut by the great belt of marshes in the centre—all these things between them brought the great adventure to a stand.

Hilaire Belloc.
in Land and Water.

"Cheer up, Austria, you have Germans and Bulgarians to help you this time"

Until October, 1915, the Austro-Hungarian forces entrusted with the invasion and subjection of Serbia had failed in their objectives.

After an initial success the armies of the Dual Empire met with several defeats and were finally driven across the Danube. At the beginning of the year the Serbian campaign was abandoned and Field Marshal Pottionek in command of the Austrian Armies was removed from his post.

FERDINAND, THE CHAMELEON

"I was a Catholic, but needing Russian help, I became a Greek Orthodox. Now I need the Austrians I again become Catholic. Should things turn out badly I can again revert to Greek Orthodoxy."

Bulgaria must fight at the victor's side. The Germans and Austro-Hungarians are victorious on all fronts. Russia soon will have collapsed entirely. Then will come the turn of France, Italy, and Serbia. Bulgaria would commit suicide if she did not fight on the side of the central powers, which offer the only possibility of realizing her desire for union of all Bulgarian peoples.

In the beginning none could foresee how events would develop and which side would be victorious. If the Government had resolved to participate in the great war it might have committed the fault of joining the side that would have been beaten, and thus jeopardize the existence of the present Bulgarian Empire.

From Bulgarian Manifesto.
October, 1915.

SERBIA. AUTUMN, 1915

"Now we can make an end of him"

The Balkan campaign is the easiest task ever intrusted to an army leader. If the present plan is carried out it will be impossible for the Allies to escape capture or disaster, and the only real military task is to accomplish all this with the smallest possible loss to ourselves.

Even with the greatest force the Anglo-French Governments can muster the Germanic armies will outnumber them two to one, while the Austro-German artillery is in the proportion of five to one.

The Azest, Budapest,
October, 1915.

OCTOBER IN SERBIA

(October in Holland is called the "butcher's month," as the flocks are then killed preparatory to the winter.)

On October 7th, 1915, an army of 400,000 Austrians, Hungarians and Germans forced the Danube and commenced the great drive on Serbia; by the 10th the invaders had captured Belgrade. At the same moment the Bulgarians in great force attacked the Serbians on their right flank and by the 28th joined forces with the Teutonic troops.

THE KAISER COUNTS THE BAG

On October 13, 1915, about 9:30 at night, fire opened from the skies on the centre of London. That same evening parts of the Eastern Counties were attacked. In London alone 32 were killed and 95 injured, and the total casualties for the whole area of the raid that night were 56 killed and 113 wounded. A number of houses were damaged, and several fires started. Most of the victims were ordinary working folk, doing their ordinary work. Motor omnibus conductors died in the street, a messenger boy was killed when delivering a message, a potman died at his work, a caterer was killed while returning from a Masonic lodge, a carman's daughter was injured in the legs and lingered until the next morning, a waitress was done to death while returning from a Young Women's Guild, and so on.

Times History of the War.

"THE ENTRY INTO CONSTANTINOPLE"

The Kaiser: "Who is this man?"

The German Emperor will spend Christmas in Constantinople at the head of his victorious troops.

The Pesti-Napols, Budapest.
October, 1915.

GO TO YOUR HEREDITARY ENEMY, BULGARIA

It must not be forgotten that Greece is an independent nation that disposes of its fate in full sovereignty. The Austro-German attack on Serbia releases Greece at least from the obligation of armed intervention, and independent of that attack it is materially impossible for Serbia to give Greece the support of 150,000 men stipulated in the treaty in case of war with Bulgaria, the Entente powers have not furnished a contingent equivalent.

Grecian Note of October 26, 1915.

I deplored the fact that Serbia is being left to be crushed by Bulgaria, Greece's hereditary enemy, who will not scruple later to fall on Greece herself.

From speech of Venizelos
before dissolution of his Government.
November 3, 1915.

"THEY BOWED THE KNEE BEFORE HIM"

The extermination of Armenian Christians, Autumn of 1915

These atrocities had as their deliberate object the extermination of the Armenian race, and it is not difficult to assess the guilt. The guilt lay with the Young Turkish Government at Constantinople and with the local officials who acted in collusion with them. But there was a greater criminal even than the Young Turkish Government, for behind Turkey stood the country that was Turkey's ally and the dominant partner in the policy she pursued. There was a considerable variation in the conduct of individual Germans in Turkey. The German missionaries seem to have stood laudably by their principles, and the German Vice-Consul at Erzerum is said to have sent the exiles relief. But in the Aleppo province and Cilicia the German officials, both military and civil, threw themselves actively into the Young Turks' scheme; at Moush and Van German officers are believed to have participated directly in the slaughter, and at Erzerum they are reported to have taken their share of the Armenian girls.

Times History of the War.

DRIVEN FROM THE TEMPLE OF HUMANITY

If the Porte considers it necessary that Armenian insurrections can either go on or should be crushed so as to exclude all possibility of their repetition, then there is no murder and no atrocity, but simply measures of a justifiable and a necessary kind.

Count von Reventlow.

I was asked last night to define German militarism, and there is the definition (above) in the devilish spirit of such a judgment and excuse for the cowardly massacre of 800,000 human beings, not all men, but thousands of women and children.

T. P. O'Connor, M.P.
House of Commons,
London, November 16, 1915.

THE OLD SERB

"Fighting with the Bulgarians against the Turk I lost my brothers, my sons fell fighting with the Greeks against Bulgaria, but only when the Germans came were my wife and children killed."

In the three districts of Polzerie, Matchva, and Yadar, the various kinds of death and torture inflicted were apportioned as follows:

Males Females
Victims shot 345 64
Victims killed with knives 113 27
Victims hanged 7 6
Victims massacred and clubbed to death with sticks and butt-ends of rifles 48 26
Victims disemboweled 2 4
Victims burned alive 35 96
Victims pinioned and robbed 52 12
Victims whose arms were cut off, torn off, or broken 5 1
Victims whose legs were cut off or broken 3 0
Victims whose noses were cut off 28 6
Victims whose ears were cut off 31 7
Victims whose eyes were put out 30 38
Victims whose genital organs were mutilated 3 3
Victims whose skin was cut in strips, or portions of their face detached 15 3
Victims stoned 12 1
Victims whose breasts were cut off 0 2
Victims cut in pieces 17 16
Victims beheaded 1 0
Little girl thrown to the pigs 0 1
Victims killed without the manner of their deaths being specified 240 5

Serbian Government Report,
Professor R. A. Reiss,
University of Lausanne,
Switzerland.

NEW PEACE OFFERS

Von Bethmann-Hollweg: "The worst of it is, I must always deny having been there."