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Show GERARD PROFFERS I HELP OF THE U. S. TO PREVENT WAR The emperor walked with a martial stride and glanced toward the gallery where the diplomats were assembled. i Russian Ambassador Mobbed and Beaten; French Envoy Forced to Pay in Gold for Government's Special Train. By JAMES W. GERARD, American Ambassador to the German Imperial pourt, July 28, 1913, to February Feb-ruary 4, 1917. Copyright,, 1917, by the Public Ledger Company. AFTER my return from Kiel to Berlin a period of calm ensued. No one seemed to think that the murders at Sarajevo would have any effect upon theworld. The emperor had gone north on his yacht, but, as I believe, not until a certain line cf action had been agreed upon. Most of the diplomats started on their - acations. Sir Edward Goschen, British ambassador, as well as the Russian Rus-sian ambassador, left Berlin. This shows? of course, how little war was expected in diplomatic circles. I went ou two visits to German country coun-try houses in Silesia, where the richest estates are situated. One of these visits waa to the country house of a count, one of the wealthiest men in Germany, possessed of a fortune of about twenty to thirty million dollars. He has a great estate in Silesia, farmed, as I explained, not by tenant farmers, but by his own superintendents. In the center is a beautiful country house or castle. Wo were thirty-two guests in the house party. This count and his charming wife had traveled much and evidently desired to niodel ...their coun-. try life on that of England. Our amusements were tennis, swimming and clay-pigeon shooting, with dancing and music at nitrht. Life such as this, and, especially, the lavish entertainment of so many guests, is very exceptional in Prussian country life and quite a seven months' wonder for the countryside. country-side. Ultimatum to Serbia. Some days after my return to Berlin Ber-lin the ultimatum of Austria was sent to Serbia. Even then there was very little excitement, and, when the Serbian Ser-bian answer was published, it waa believed be-lieved that this would end the incident, inci-dent, and that matters would be adjusted ad-justed by dilatory diplomats in the usual way. On the twenty-sixth of July matters : began to boil. The emperor returned on this day and fiom the morning of (Continued on Pase Two.) "My Four Years in Germany" (Continued from Page One.) : the twenty-seventh took charge. On the t-venty seventh, a!?o, Sir Edward Goschen returned to Berlin. I kept in touch, as far as possible, with the other diplomats, at the Gorman officials were excee.lhiLil uncommunicative, although I called on Von Jagow every day and tried to get something o;it of him. On the night of the twenty-ninth the chancellor chan-cellor and Sir Edward had their memorable memor-able conversation in which the chancellor, chancel-lor, while making no promises about the French colonies, agreed, if Great Britain remained neutral, to make ' no terri-torial terri-torial aggressions at the expense of Fr:j ee ' The chancellor further stated to Sir Edward that "Ever since he had been chancellor the object of his policy had bfen to bring about an understanding with. England and that he had in mind a general neutral agreement between Germany and England.'7 On the thirtieth Sir Sdward Grey refused re-fused the bargain proposed, namely, that "Great Britain should engage to stand by while the French colonies were taken and France beaten, so long as French territ6ry was not taken." Si Edward Grey said that ' the . so-called bargain at the expense of France would constitute a disgrace from which the good name of Great Britain would never recover. He also refused to bargain bar-gain with reference to the neutrality of Belgium. Peace talk continued, however,, on both the thirtieth and thirty-first and many diplomats were still optimistic. On the thirty-first I was lunching at the Hotel Bristol with Mrs. Gerard and Thomas H. Birch, our minister to Portugal, Portu-gal, and his wife. I left the table and went over and talked to Mouktar Pasha, Pa-sha, the Turkish ambassador, who assured as-sured me that there was no danger whatever of war. But in spite of his help. Right and loft men and women were weepng, and the whole atmosphere icemed that of despair. , . j )n the da v the Russian ambassador left I sent him my automobile to take him to the station. The chauffeur and footman reported to me that the police protection was inedaquate, that the automobile au-tomobile was nearly overturned by the crowd, and that men jumped on the running1 board ami struck the ambassador ambassa-dor and the ladies with him in the face with sticks. 11 is-train was due to leave at 1:15 p. m. At about ten minutes of 1, whilo I was standing in my room in the embassy surrounded by a crowd of Americans, Mrs. James, wife of the senator front Kentucky, and Mrs. Post Wheeler, wife of our secretary to the embassy in Japan, came to me and said that they were anxious to get through to Japan via Siberia, and did not know what to do. I immediately scribbled a note to the Russian ambassador, asking ask-ing him to take them nn the train with him. This and the ladies I confided to "it y-.,... "g. ir. i. . in. . : ' Seutfijfaitte lef.te.lM m BuSfoaiL- - ' Xp l'":' "' irt,v,; uv"( f.'i'!'irr.v. v.v.Imi.vv.v" JilM fAaHtlLta. fOi Br WTt. " Y'li "I,. ,1 ,... - ! (' ihiKii. 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I .-L-Z'Vt.l i hA """(t ttn'Hrrll t,,,,,,,,,!',,!!,,,,!!, Kil r .4.. . hM irtin t. . . fiaJuTX'. ,7Trr "Z n4..,-fc"l'!,,"n -, ii;v., m, ..,,m,,. " J '1 Copy of the extra of the Berlin Lokal Anzeiger of Friday, July 31, 1914. assurances and judging by the situation and what I learned from other diplomats, diplo-mats, I had cabled to the state department depart-ment on the. morning of that day that a general European war was inevitable. European War Inevitable. On' the thirty-first ' Kreigsgefahrzuz-stand," Kreigsgefahrzuz-stand," or "condition of danger of war," was proclaimed at 7 p. m. and at 7 p. m. the demand was made by Germany that Russia should demobilize within twelve hours. v On the thirtieth I had a talk with Baron Beyens, minister of Belgium, and Jules Cambon, the French ambassador, in the garden of the French embassy in the afternoon. They both agreed that nothing could prevent war except th intervention of the United States. Both Ambassador Cambon and Minister Minis-ter Beyens were very sad and depressed. de-pressed. After leaving them I met Sir Fdward Goschen upon the street and had a short conversation with him. He also was very depressed. Acting on my own responsibility, I sent the following letter to the chancellor: chan-cellor: ' ' Your Excellency Ts there nothing that my country can do? Nothing that I can do toward stopping this dreadful war? "I am sure that the president would approve any act of mine looking toward to-ward peace. Yours ever, (Signed) "JAMES W. GERARD." To this letter I never had any reply. On the first of August at 5 p. m. the order for mobilization was given, and at 7:10 p. m. war was declared by Germany Ger-many on Russia, the kaiser proclaiminir from the balcony of the palace that "he knew no parties more." Germans Eager for War. Of course, during these days the population pop-ulation of Berlin was greatly excited. Every night great crowds of people paraded" pa-raded" the streets singing 'Deutsch-land 'Deutsch-land Ueber Alles" and demanding war. Extras, distributed free, were issued at frcqurnt intervals by . the newspapers, and there was a general feeling among the Germans that their years of preparation prepa-ration would now bear fruit, that Germany Ger-many would compier the world ami im-pusc im-pusc its ' ' I'ultur ' ' upon all nut ions. On the second of August 1 railed in the morning to say gnu'l-by to the Russian Rus-sian ambassador. His embassy was filled with unfortunate KmsBiimn who the care of a red-headed page boy of the embassy who spoke German. By some miracle he managed to get them to the railroad station before the ambassador 'R train left, the ambassador kindly agreeing to take them with him. His tVain, however, instead of going to Russia, was headed for Denmark; from there the two ladies crossed to Sweden, thence to England, and so home, it being perhaps as well for them that they did not have an opportunity- to attempt the Siberian journey during this period of mobilization. Russ Princess Frightened. The Russian ambassador reciprocated by confiding to my care a Russian prin-: prin-: cess, who had intended to go out with i him, but who, intimidated perhaps by i the scenes 'on the way to the station, j had lost her nerve at the railway sta-! sta-! tion and' refused to depart with the ! ambassador. She remained for a while in Berlin, and after some weeks recovered re-covered sufficient courage to make the trip to Denmark. ' t On the morning of the fourth of August, Au-gust, having received an invitation the day before, I attended at the palace in Berlin. In the room where the court balls had been held in peace times a certain number of the members of the reichstag were assembled.' The diplomats diplo-mats wore in a gallery on the west side of the room. Soon the emperor, dressed iu a field vjay uniform and attended by several members of his. staff and a number num-ber of ladies, filtered the room. He walked with martial stride and glanced toward the gallery where the diplomats were assembled, as if to see how mauv were there. Taking his place upon the throne and shin ding, he read an address to the members of the reichstag. reichs-tag. The members of the reichstag cheered him and then adjourned to the reichstag w here the chancel lor addressed them, making his famous declaration about Belgium, and stating that "necessity "ne-cessity knew no law, ' ' and that the German troops were perhaps at that moment crossing the Belgian frontier. Certain laws which had been prepared with reference to the government of the country, and which 1 will give in more detail in another place, as well as the war credit, were voted upon by the reichstag. The Socialists had not been present in the palace, but joined now in voting the necessary credits. Goschen Asks Passports. On the afternoon of the fourth of August 1 went to see Yon Jneow to try to pick up any news. The British am- , bassador sat in the waiting room of the foreign office. Sir Edward told me that he was there for the purpose of asking for hrs passports. He spoke in English, of course, and I am sure that he was overheard by a man sitting in the room who looked to me like a German newspaper man, so that I was not surprised when, late in the afternoon, after-noon, extra sheets appeared upon the ', street announcing that the British am- bassador had asked for his passports and tljat Great Britain had declared war. At this news the rage of the popula- j tion of Berlin was indescribable. The , foreign office had believed, and this belief had percolated through all classes in the capital, that the English were so occupied with the Ulster rebellion and ' unrest in Ireland that they would not declaro war. After dinner I went to the station to say good-by to the French 'ambassador, 'ambassa-dor, .tules Cambon. The route from the French embassy ,by the Branderburg Thor to the L-ehrter railway station was lined with troops and police, so that no accident whatever occurred. There was no one at the station except a very inferior in-ferior official from the German foreign ! office. Cambon was in excellent spirits land kept his nerve and composure admirably. ad-mirably. His family, luckily, were not in Berlin at the time of the outbreak of the war. Cambon, instead of being sent out by way of Switzerland, whence, of course, the road to France was easy, was sent north to Denmark. He was very badly treated on the train, and payment in gold for the special train was exacted from him by the German government. |