Agent of Peace

by Jennifer Hobhouse Balme

  Later we passed to speak of my interview with von Jagow. He refused to believe that Alsace-Lorraine had been offered to the French. I told him I knew it not from von Jagow’s lips but from two high authorities but I told him what von J had conveyed to me, his general attitude of moderation and reason … I spoke of the right hand of fellowship held out by Germany if we would take it. I went further and told him, and him only, of that which I had promised von Jagow. He said that the fact I had put the seal on his lips, nullified its importance; no step could be advanced.

  Said a thing told Confidentially was of no use unless told to the person responsible. I said that the knowledge would, I hoped, have strengthened any effort he could make. He said, ‘No; it would not’. Rather urged me to reconsider if I could conscientiously relax my promise in any degree. Said the letters I left behind were of great importance. [In Switzerland perhaps, – there is no indication as to what these letters were unless they were the correspondence with von Jagow.] Spoke at length on this point and repeated himself a good deal. Wished me to be clear that nothing advanced without my permission to unseal his lips.

  As Emily came away from the meeting she realised she had to get a message to Jagow to ask him to release her from her promise. Her promise was not to divulge that he was willing to talk peace (on the grounds that Britain could take it as a sign of weakness). She will have considered her options, and, although nothing is written, I believe decided that the best approach would be through the German section at the American Embassy. To go through her contacts in Switzerland or the Netherlands would take too long.

  By a letter2 we know she went to the German section of the Embassy and was well received. We can only surmise that she was able to arrange for a message to be sent either to the German Minister in Switzerland, Baron von Romberg, or to Jagow himself.

  What neither she nor the Embassy knew was that as all cables passed through British hands messages could be intercepted, and the name Miss Hobhouse would have raised a red flag. That this happened could explain Cecil’s unexpected statements in the House of Commons both on the exchange of internees and the acceptable procedure for starting peace talks. The thought of her Embassy visit could also account for his virulent attacks on Emily herself in October. The Foreign Office did not appreciate interference from anyone.

  While Emily was at the Embassy the suggestion was probably made that she write to the US Ambassador, Dr Walter Hines Page, with a request that the President intervene in the process of getting the internees repatriated. She wrote a good and sincere letter but we know that this move may not have been entirely necessary at that time, so it could have been partly as a ‘cover’ for her visit. If news of this letter got back to the Foreign Office they would not have cared for that either.

  She wrote: 3

  August 5th 1916

  Yr Excellency,

  Will you allow me, on the broad basis of humanity, to write to you quite privately and unofficially and even without introduction?

  It has been suggested to me in the course of my work for the release of Civilian Prisoners in the camps of England and Germany, and even urged by various prominent persons, that the President of the United States is the one Personage who could take the matter up with success and by appealing simultaneously to the two Governments bring them into agreement by a promise to himself.

  As the President is beyond our reach. I was counselled to ask your Excellency if you would in private capacity or not as seems to you best, bring this request before him …

  [She proceeded to outline what she hoped could happen.]

  Indeed the moment seems ripe for such action – Salvation in lieu of Destruction, a refreshing thought and the whole question would thus be lifted to a higher plane and like the Red Cross removed from the Spirit of War. About 35,000 men are concerned; and this seems but a small number in contrast with the vast figures of the Military, but their fate affects also thousands of women and children – their wives and families …

  Should apology be needed for this appeal I hope and believe you will grant it when I tell you that I solemnly promised the men at Ruhleben and the German Government to leave no stone unturned to obtain the release of both sets of prisoners.

  The United States was not yet at war with Germany. Like many peace activists Emily had great faith in the abilities of the Americans to take a dispassionate view and help in the international field.

  On 9 August 1916 she wrote to the Archbishop of Canterbury the confidential draft of which read:4

  Your Grace,

  I have thought long and seriously but cannot feel I should do right to relax my promise on the point we discussed. At any rate not at present. Opportunity is offering itself by which to ask if the prohibition can be removed.

  I pray it may be, for words fail to express how strongly I feel that we are all wrong to continue this slaughter, and as in the end Negotiation must be resorted to. How desirable – nay how urgent to begin at once.

  All that your Grace pointed out to me was exceedingly helpful and I am very grateful for it; nevertheless I cannot abandon my belief that the knowledge of a fact bearing written [in] it such a disposition of goodwill and readiness on the other side cannot fail to be an inward strength to anyone placed in a position to plead with the Government and to lead the Nation in the highest paths. It may lack legal importance apart from full disclosure but does it not contain spiritual value of greater import?

  Your Grace – I have mixed these two years with the peoples of Holland, Italy, Switzerland, Germany, France and Belgium – besides our own country, and everywhere the same ‘darkness covers the earth and thick darkness the people.’

  All alike grope for the Light to arise and shine and there is but one Light to illumine Humanity – the Love Eternal which comprehends and embraces all nations alike.

  I am jealous for our Country that she should be the exponent of this Love that she should initiate a great moral and spiritual act such as would make her ‘blessed amongst nations’. Without this it seems to me that our righteousness is as rags.

  My hope in telling you what I did was just this – that the knowledge that our opponent would support and forward such effort would give irresistible power – and multitudes at home and abroad would rise up and call you blessed.

  If I presume on pressing this point I beg your Grace to pardon me – realizing that it is the outcome of a passionate desire not merely to hasten Peace but still more – see it attained by the power of the Spirit rather than by the murderous Powers now at work.

  I have the honour to be

  Yrs obediently

  Emily Hobhouse

  In a PS she said she had heard from Lord Beauchamp (a former Cabinet Minister) to whom she had spoken to about the Civilian Camps that he would be glad to assist the Archbishop in any way over the question of internees.

  At the parliamentary session on 10 August, Commander Wedgewood commented to Cecil in the House of Commons that the British people wished ‘to get rid of’ the more than 20,000 Germans interned in Britain in exchange for the 4,000 British in Germany. Cecil answered that negotiations were stuck on the issue of numbers, as Britain wished to keep the exchange of men of military age equal. This stand was supported by Grey stressing military considerations.

  However, the previous day, 9 August, Lord Newton had written to Emily:5 ‘We are negotiating with the German Gov. for the exchange of civilians. If this should happily be effected or if they were interned in neutral countries, then camps here would naturally cease to exist.’

  Emily noted on the back of her press cutting: ‘The exchange question seems to be going along satisfactorily so I’d better not include that in the message.’ This would seem to refer to her reply to Lord Newton’s letter. She was not fooled by Cecil’s remarks, which may however have annoyed Newton, who was dealing with the sensitive negotiations.

  While at the American Embassy Emily would have talked about Belgium. A few days later she had a letter from Herbert Hoover, th
e future US President, who was running the Belgian food programme.6 Unlike the Foreign Office officials Hoover was anxious to see her, and as he passed her hotel each evening, offered to visit her there on any evening convenient to her. (Notes of that interview follow later, and the letter appears as Plate 6.)

  Emily’s first published article was on the Leader page of the Daily News, 8 August 1916. It was published anonymously and was entitled ‘Life in Germany – from a correspondent’. It was introduced as follows:

  The writer passed through Germany within the last few weeks. The record, which does not agree with the evidence generally received as to the internal condition of Germany, is offered only as a personal impression.

  The aspect of Germany is so different from the picture usually painted, that it was almost a shock to see the tranquil condition of the country and the calm confidence of the people. The wide plains were waving with corn, promising well up to that midsummer moment – the harvest upon which so much depends for the coming year. Everywhere haymaking was proceeding apace with what looked like a heavy crop. Down the Rhine Valley the cherries were ripening, and men and women (chiefly women) were climbing the trees and gathering the fruit. Later one saw the barrows in Berlin piled with these cherries, and heard that the stones of all fruit were to be saved and collected this year and the kernels crushed for oil. This economical form of natural housekeeping has great attractions for the frugal mind, and one wonders why one needs a war to prevent waste and inculcate economy.

  A beautiful sight it was in the long midsummer evenings to see a Zeppelin sailing aloft … Surely Zeppelins will shortly be vehicles possessed by all for sky trips, opening new worlds, a precious means of closer intercommunication safeguarded by Hague Rules from evil-practices.

  Share and Share Alike

  Germany is living very carefully in these days, the strain falling heaviest during these final weeks before the harvest is gathered; then the national larder will be better filled. The blockade policy has certainly caused privation, and privation spells suffering for many innocent people; but not of a nature or magnitude to influence the war. Indeed the Social Democrats assert that had the distribution of food been taken in hand earlier, and luxurious waste prohibited at first, there need have been no scarcity today. Their scheme of food distribution submitted to the Government over a year ago was at the time disregarded, now it is recognized as a necessity and point by point is being adopted. What a marvellous leveller this must prove, when in matters of food all must share and share alike. The rich it is true can obtain variety by the purchase of luxuries, but necessaries are now being strictly regulated for the good of all. A man may not have a pound of butter and his neighbour none, each must have four ounces (now further reduced to three ounces a week) and must make that serve for table and cooking. The housewife is learning, she says, to cook as the English do, namely to grill steaks and chops, and in all things to return to the simpler habits which satisfied the country before 1870.

  Every day, they say, they are learning some new method. Soon, too, when the hay is saved and the crops garnered, the cows can be turned into the fields to fatten and yield more milk. That at least is their hope. Meantime their war bread, the ‘K Bread’ which has been so much decried, is very excellent and wholesome and being less dry than much Continental bread it is easy to eat without butter. Fish is abundant. At the restaurants ordinary food was not dearer than in other countries, but luxuries were high. Portions were perhaps smaller but that was less noticeable in Berlin than in Cologne where they were extremely small. At a large working women’s restaurant under philanthropic management the food was very well prepared, excellent in quality and quantity, and provided for 3d per head.

  The Food Queues

  The habit of standing in queues outside the shops now almost universal, to get their share of meat or groceries is very trying for the women. They feel the waste of time and get restless and impatient, with the result that several miniature street riots have arisen; these are not, however, considered of any importance.

  Up to the present the general population does not seem to have been very seriously affected in health and the anticipated improvement in distribution and supply will relieve the severity of the pressure felt by the poor. Infants under 1 year and children aged from 10–14 have hitherto been the chief sufferers. A doctor of the municipal schools stated that he had weighed all the school children of Berlin last year and again this year finding no divergence from the normal but he admitted a general enfeeblement of children of the ages above named. Figures show that children of those ages living in the large towns have died to the number of 5,000 above the normal during the past twelve months of blockade but in the country districts no increase has been observed.

  A well-known clergyman who inhabited the poorer quarters of Berlin and who lives as the poor there live acknowledged very simply: ‘We are hungry, we are often very hungry; but we do not mind.’

  This article had to be submitted to the censor and was cut. Emily had said, in effect, that applying the blockade did not improve the feeling towards the British.

  The same day, 8 August, Dr Markel wrote to her from the Prisoners of War Relief Agency enclosing a cutting that said Emily had been to Ruhleben.7 ‘So,’ he said, ‘it seems your visit to Ruhleben is a secret no more.’ He also said that he was not allowed to visit the camps any more* and this only increased his work, ‘as also of course the large influx of fresh prisoners, especially wounded’. He hoped to see her very soon.

  Emily had at last managed to get to Bude, but was prepared to come up to London for meetings. In Bude there was a family gathering. Leonard, Nora and their girls were there; Leonard Courtney and his wife Kate; and Kate’s sister Maggie (Margaret), who was married to their cousin Henry.

  Maggie Hobhouse was much concerned about her eldest son, Stephen, the Quaker convert, who was absolutely opposed to conscription for the army which was now in force. He was determined not to do ambulance work or any other work to take the easy way out. He was prepared to go to prison, which he later did. He was not a strong man and his mother was at this point trying to do all she could to keep him out of jail. What with Emily’s efforts, Leonard told Oliver, who was with the army in Burma, they could expect a lot of notoriety.8

  Oliver’s reaction was interesting.9 While he was being ribbed about Emily and thought he would have to wear a placard saying: ‘Yes, my Aunt’, he said he had no patience at all with Stephen. He said: ‘We have buried our souls and are prepared to put our bodies on the line.’ He must have talked for many of his contemporaries. Religion had lost its hold. For a thousand years, at a time when people were expected, even compelled, to go to church, the message of peace had been proclaimed from the pulpit but it had not been acted on. The message had failed to go deep enough.

  On 15 August Emily received an obscure telegram from Gertrud Woker in Switzerland, via Leonard Courtney, that she should be at the St Ermin’s Hotel [Westminster, London] on the next day.10 She will have been overjoyed to hear of her friend, and possibly this provided her with the opportunity she needed to get a message through to German Foreign Minister von Jagow to ask if she could be released from her promise.

  She prepared a postcard on 16 August for Dr Kocher in Berne to give to the German Ambassador, Romberg.11 It read:

  Have you seen anything of Henry or has he also gone away for his holiday? If he would ask his Chief to release me from the promise I made I think something might be done pretty soon. Do try and see him and tell him so …

  Anyhow the door was not shut in my face rather postponement suggested and I am not entirely dissatisfied considering the moment was not opportune.

  It seems Emily had not receved a reply from von Jagow at the German Foreign Office.

  We now pass to a new venture. One of the leaders of the women’s movement in Denmark, Henni Forchhammer, was a fluent English speaker who later became the first woman to speak at the League of Nations. She was in England with a party of delegates
. They were interested in civilian detainees and in peace. Although Henni’s group did not have any success in seeing government members, she met Emily at the St Ermin’s Hotel and they struck up an immediate rapport. Henni told Emily:

  I am so happy that I’ve made your acquaintance and hope that the time may not be far away when we can meet under more peaceful conditions. Till then we must not lay down our weapons fighting for the best cause in the world. It has been such a help and inspiration for me to meet you …

  They again agreed on a code so a message could be got to von Jagow. This time he was Jack!12

  Here Emily kept a few pages of Notes.13 She was working hard and thriving on it:

  Aug 15: Came to London – saw Miss Forchhammer supped together – She told me all her mission.

  Aug 16: Went early to St Ermins to tell Miss Forchhammer she should try to see Archbishop – told her of my interview and correspondence with him and suggested that hers would endorse and verify what I had said. She agreed.

  Went to UDC and saw Mr Buxton. Spoke to him of Negotiation work – and how to arrange meetings and speakers. He alluded to lack of money.

  At 3 p.m. Dr. Markel called and we had a two hour talk. He spoke of our work for Civilian Camps. Of Dr. Taylor’s Confession of Error – of Donnington Hall, of tiresomeness of the American Embassy, of the need of Peace. Wished to forward the Negotiations Memorial and offered me money up to £100 or £200 to organize meetings. Great faith in Dunnico [Secretary of the Peace Negotiations Committee of which Emily was a member].

  After him came Mr Outhwaite to bring White Book and we chatted. Said that in this offensive (six weeks) 300,000 men and 10,000 officers were the casualities [still the Battle of the Somme].