90Berchtold to Szapary, July 30, 1914; Berchtold to Szogyeni, July 31, 1914, in Oe-U VIII, Nrs. 11092, 11155.
91Albertini, Origins III, 24 ff., remains the best analysis of the still-controversial issue of exactly when the German leaders first learned of Russia’s mobilization.
92First Lieutenant Hermann Hoth, who was to become one of the Wehrmacht’s most distinguished panzer commanders, was the duty officer in Berlin that morning. His account is in Gempp, “Nachrichtendienst” III, 2, 34 ff. For the phone call to XX Corps see F. von Notz, General von Scholtz: Ein deutsches Soldatenleben in Grosser Zeit (Berlin, 1937), 37.
93Nicolai observed that the advantages of Jewish agents were their “unscrupulous greed, slyness, and persistence.” Disadvantages were insolence, cowardice, vengefulness, and excessive imagination. He graciously commented, however, that the better elements among Russia’s oppressed Jews repaid decent treatment with gratitude and loyalty. Gempp, “Nachrichtendienst,” I, 149.
94Gert Buchheit, Der deutsche Geheimdienst (Munich, 1966), 22.
95Bethmann to Pourtalès, 3:30 p.m., July 31, 1914, DD III, Nr. 490.
4. THE VIRGIN SOLDIERS
1For military life in Germany’s eastern provinces, regimental histories are a mine of direct and indirect information. I found particularly useful Erich Balla’s history of the 1st Jäger, Im Yorkschen Geist: Der Deutsche Frontsoldat und seine Seele (Berlin, 1926), 1 ff.; Kurt Hennig, Das Infanterie-Regiment (8.Ostpreussisches) Nr. 45 (Oldenburg, Berlin, 1928), 15 ff.; Alfred Dieterich, Geschichte des Grenadierregiments König Friedrich der Grosse (3.Ostpreussischen) Nr. 4 (Berlin, 1928), 590 ff. (hereafter cited as 4 .Grenadiere); and Konrad Marschall, “Die 5.Grenadiere in Danzig,” Zeitschrift für Heeresführung und Truppenkunde XXXII (1968), 64–75. Economic conditions are best summarized in Frank B. Tipton, Jr., Regional Variations in the Economic Development of Germany during the Nineteenth Century (Middletown, Conn., 1976), 112 ff.; and Heinz Rogmann, Die Bevölkerungsen-twicktung im preussischen Osten in den letzten hundert Jahren (Berlin, 1937).
2Geoff Eley, “German Politics and Polish Nationality: The Dialectic of Nation-Forming in the East of Prussia,” East European Quarterly XVIII (1984), 335–364, is at once an excellent analysis of the question and a perceptive survey of the relevant literature. Eric A. Johnson, “The Roots of Crime in Imperial Germany,” Central European History XV (1982), 351–376, presents the relationship between ethnic makeup and criminal activity in the Kreise mentioned. For the emergence of ethnic politics in the east see Stanley Suval, Electoral Politics in Wilhelmine Germany (Chapel Hill, N.C., 1985), 180 ff.
3Quoted in Daniel Hughes, “The Social Composition of the Prussian Generalcy, 1871–1914” (Ph.D. Dissertation, University of North Carolina, 1979), 215.
4Martin Kitchen, The German Officer Corps, 1890–1914 (Oxford, 1968), especially 99 ff., 115 ff., is a familiar summary of the case against the officers. For the Bilse scandal, the 1904 translation of Aus einer kleinen Garnison, published by John Lane, incorporates a summary of the court-martial. Cf. also Ernst Arnold, Aus allerlei Garnisonen… Zugleich Lehren und Forderungen des Falles Bilse (Leipzig, 1904), passim.
5The anecdotes are from Bundesarchiv-Militärarchiv, Nachlass Below, N87/44, 572, 626. The problems of balancing professional and social requirements are presented in such contemporary works as Rudolf Krafft, Glänzendes Elend (Stuttgart, 1895); Das moderne Landsknechtsthum. Streiflichter über die sociale Stellung der Officiercorps (Leipzig, 1898); and Eduard Preuss, Die höheren Aufgaben desjungen Offiziers für Armee und Volk (Munich, 1906).
6The changed living conditions are described in Traugott Hoffmann and Ernst Hahn, Geschichte des Infanterie-Regiments Graf Dönhoff (7.Ostpreussischen) Nr. 44 1860–1918 (Berlin, 1930), 72 ff.; and Dieterich, 4.Grenadiere, 622. The anecdote of the major is from BA-MA, Nachlass Below, N87/45, 573.
7Balla, Yorkschen Geist, 2–3.
8For justifications and explanations of the negatives cf. Ann Taylor Allen, Satire and Society in Wilhelmine Germany. Kladderadatsch and Simplicissimus 1890–1914 (Lexington, Ky., 1984), 103 ff.; and Alex Hall, Scandal, Sensation, and Social Democracy; The SPD Press and Wilhelmine Germany, 1890–1914 (Cambridge, 1977), 116 ff.
9Jürgen Kocka, Facing Total War. German Society 1914–1918, tr. B. Weinberger (Cambridge, Mass., 1984), supports this interpretation against the intention of its author.
10Cf. particularly Manfred Messerschmidt, “Die Armee in Staat und Gesells-chaft,” Das kaiserliche Deutschland, ed. M. Stürmer (Düsseldorf, 1970), 89–118; and Wilhelm Deist, “Die Armee in Staat und Gesellschaft, 1890–1914,” ibid., 312–329.
11As in most recently Hartmut John, Das Reserveoffizierkorps im Deutschen Kaiserreich 1890–1914. Ein sozialgeschichtlicher Beitrag zur Untersuchung der gesellschaftlichen Militärisierung im Wilhelminischen Deutschland (Frankfurt, 1981).
12Günther Martin, Die bürgerlichen Exellenzen. Zur Sozialgeschichte der preussischen Generalität 1812–1918 (Düsseldorf, 1979). Hughes, “Prussian Generalcy,” challenges the concept of an open-access elite, but nevertheless stresses government service, as opposed to birth, as the primary social matrix of even general officers.
13Gerhard Hecker, Walther Rathenau und sein Verhältnis zu Militär und Krieg (Boppard, 1983), 32 passim.
14Hoffmann and Hahn, Infanterie-Regiment 44, 16–11.
15Paul Frh. v. Schoenaich, Mein Damaskus. Erlebnisse und Bekenntnisse (Berlin, 1926), 48–49.
16Nicolaus Sombart, “The Kaiser in His Epoch: Some Reflections on Wilhelmine Society, Sexuality, and Culture,” in Kaiser Wilhelm II. New Interpretations, ed. J. G. C. Röhl (Cambridge, 1982), 287–311.
17Hartmut Kaelble, Industrialization and Social Inequality in 19th-century Europe, tr. B. Little (New York, 1986) is a sound recent overview.
18Nachlass Below MA-BA, N87/44, 581–582.
19Dennis E. Showalter, “Army and Society in Imperial Germany: The Pains of Modernization,” Journal of Contemporary History XVIII (1983), 583–618.
20“Wie man als Reservist behandelt wird,” Dresdner Volkszeitung, Aug. 8, 1911, in Politisches Archiv des Auswärtigen Amtes, Deutschland 121/16 (hereafter cited as PAAA). The same file includes a number of clippings from other Socialist papers on the theme of mistreatment. Hans Rau, Der Sadismus in der Armee (Berlin, 1904), incorporates a cross-section of contemporary case studies in a psychological framework.
21Karl von Einem to the Lübeck prosecutor, Oct. 8, 1908, in PAAA, Deutschland 121/14. Representative public admonitions include “Soldatenmis-shandlungen und öffentüches Gerichtsverfahren,” Militär-Wochenblatt 1892, 6; von Kessling, “Massnahmen für Hintanhaltung von Misshandlungen sowie vor-schriftswidriger Behandlungen überhaupt,” Jahrbücher für die deutsche Armee und Marine 125 (1903), 623–630; Pelet-Narbonne, “Die Einfluss von Offizierinspekti-onen bzw. Offizierberichte auf die Misshandlungen,” ibid. 130 (1906), 188–191.