Public-domain ebook
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In: World War I·History - British·History - European
Public-domain ebook sourced from Project Gutenberg #24810.
Harold W. Picton’s The Better Germany in War Time is a wartime nonfiction work that seeks to balance the usual grim reportage of World War I with accounts of humane treatment and unexpected kindness shown to British and Allied prisoners by their German captors. The book opens with a quoted pledge from a British officer refusing to hate Germans, followed by a foreword in which Picton explains his intention to “describe the other German” and to collect testimonies that reveal the good deeds of the enemy. From there it proceeds through a structured series of chapters, military prisoners, civilian prisoners, historical precedents, reprisals, and a speculative look at what Germany might become, interspersed with letters, official reports, and newspaper excerpts that illustrate moments of generosity, shared meals, and even personal assistance offered to wounded captives.
Written in a measured, essay‑like style typical of the late‑1910s, the text combines documentary excerpts with Picton’s reflective commentary, giving it a tone that is both scholarly and earnest. Readers interested in primary‑source perspectives on the human side of the Great War, especially those studying prisoner‑of‑war conditions, wartime propaganda, or early attempts at reconciliation, will find the book’s blend of factual detail and moral argument compelling. It also appeals to general history enthusiasts who appreciate a nuanced look at how compassion could surface amid the conflict’s brutality.
The opening · free to read
Being some Facts towards Fellowship.
BY HAROLD PICTON.
THE NATIONAL LABOUR PRESS, LIMITED, MANCHESTER AND LONDON.
TO THE BRITISH AND THE GERMAN PEOPLES AND IN MEMORY OF MY MOTHER WHO KNEW AND LOVED THEM BOTH.
"Forsooth, brothers, fellowship is heaven, and lack of fellowship is Hell."--_A Dream of John Ball._
"Either we are all citizens of the same city and war between us, a civil war, a monstrous iniquity to be forgotten, as soon as it may bring in peace; or else there is no city and no home for man in the universe, but only an everlasting conflict between creatures that have nothing in common and no place where they can together be at rest."--_Times Literary Supplement_, Nov. 11, 1915.
"He had to be extremely careful, said Lord Newton at Knutsford last Saturday, because if he made any statement which did not accuse the Germans of brutality he was denounced by many people as pro-German."--_Common Sense_, April 20, 1918.
"Des faits de ce genre méritent dêtre mis en evidence. Il faudrait, dans ce déchaînement d'horreurs et de haines, insister sur les quelques traits capables d'adoucir les âmes."--_La Guerre vue d'une Ambulance_ par L'Abbé FÉLIX KLEIN.
"Hate as a policy is either inadequate to deal with the crimes (real and invented) of our enemies, or, if adequate, so recoils on the hater that he himself becomes ruined as a moral agent."--G. JARVIS SMITH, M.C. (late Chaplain at the Western Front). Nation, Nov. 2, 1918.
"The belief at home that the individual enemy is an incurable barbarian is simply wrong...."--Second-Lieut. A. R. WILLIAMS, killed in action August, 1917.
"I will go on fighting as long as it is necessary to get a decision in this war.... But I will not hate Germans to the order of any bloody politician; and the first thing I shall do after I am free will be to go to Germany and create all the ties I can with German life."--J. H. KEELING (B.E.F., December, 1915).
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