1The subject of the book by Annette Becker is on the forgotten of the Great War [1], as military prisoners came late in the remembrance of the conflict; furthermore, soldiers from the colonies appear to be poorly represented in the official centenary commemorations [2]. What then of the prisoners of war from the colonial empires? Are they forgotten on two counts [3]?

2As a specific category, Muslim prisoners found themselves at the heart of geopolitical issues that were above their heads. From the beginning of the conflict, the Germans, allies of the Ottoman Empire, used propaganda, both on the front and in captivity, based on Islam with the aim of rallying to their cause Muslim soldiers in the French, British and Russian Empires. Since the Ottoman caliph had declared a Jihad, every good Muslim should change sides and fight for his religion against the “infidels”. In this context, Muslim prisoners were amassed in camps around Berlin where they were subjected to intense propaganda and a widely publicised “favoured” status to convince them to go to Constantinople and join the ranks of the Ottoman army. This strategy of changing sides was linked in particular to images. What were they? Do they differ from the images of prisoners in general?

3At a time when oral traditions have dried up [4], is it possible to find the voice of these prisoners deep in the German and French archives; trace the men behind the propaganda and reconstruct some fragments of individual destinies?

Captivity in war: key motifs, dominant perspectives

4Period paintings, photographs, postcards and films: what should we make of those visual documents representing prisoners of war? What do they tell us and what do they keep from us? And what impact do these sources have on the way we now look at what happened?

5However the prisoners of war joined the European imagery of the First World War, two key motifs clearly emerge. The first shows long lines of defeated soldiers heading to the assembly camps, disarmed, with a blanket over their shoulder. Their eyes sometimes show fear, sometimes relief but always fatigue. The guards, rifle at the ready, point out the route. Sometimes, civilians are watching the scene. The war is reflected in ruins, rutted roads and sometimes temporary signs.

6The second motif widely reproduced by European reporters of the Great War consists of a few prisoners amassed outside a hut or in front of their camp fence. They are quite still and all are facing directly towards the camera. No interaction, no unexpected actions disturb the scene. Often, this living tableau is captioned “sample of types”.

7The possession of others takes various forms. It involves both the civilian population of occupied cities and regions and military personnel. According to recent research, between eight to nine million soldiers were captured between 1914 and 1918 – almost 15 per cent of all men mobilised – and held in camps around the world. Every day the International Prisoners of War Agency, a service of the International Committee of the Red Cross based in Geneva, responded to between 15,000 and 18,000 enquiries about missing or captured soldiers. At the end of 1918, according to the statistics of the time, some 328,000 soldiers had been taken prisoner by Britain, 350,000 by France, 916,000 by the Austro-Hungarian Empire, 2.25 million by Russia and 2.4 million by Germany. It was not until four years later that the last Russian prisoners were released from the German camps and the last representatives of the German and Austro-Hungarian armies left Russia to return to their countries [5].

The representation of “masses”: prisoners of war heading to a transit camp, April 1917.

Living tableau of “types”: prisoners of war held at Wünsdorf-Zossen camp near Berlin, 1916.

8Both motifs reveal the two main angles under which, in the early 20^th century, captivity in war was perceived by European societies. Widely disseminated by agencies such as the German agency Paul Hoffmann & Co., they require a very specific reading: the magnitude of the number of prisoners and opposition between armed guards on one side and disarmed prisoners on the other, indicate the huge gap between victors and vanquished. The same applies to the representation of male prisoners, numbered and objectified in the camps. Prisoners of war appeared either as “masses” or were represented as “types”. Neither description gives them any status as an individual. While it impacts images of prisoners of war in general, this denial of the individual applies in particular to prisoners from the colonial empires [6]. For the Muslims, there were additional religious motifs (mosque, slaughter of sheep) and images suggesting an almost pleasant captivity. Historical research struggles to distance itself from these perspectives. There are few biographical notes, personal viewpoints or first-person accounts [7] and their stories and emotions generally elude us.

Finding the men behind the image

9In this context, we feel it is important to start looking for the experience of these men and try to find out more about them than the images we have of them. Here we will look in particular at North African soldiers (called “Arabs” in the contemporary sources [8]), since for the moment the only firsthand accounts we have are from them [9].

10After recommending that Muslim prisoners be amassed not far from Berlin (North Africans were concentrated in Zossen), the Germans’ strategy for persuading them to enlist on the Ottoman side emphasised the following points: they should be built a mosque, a space for them to do their ablutions before prayers, they should have facilities for slaughtering sheep and lambs according to Islamic rituals and also the opportunity to write to their families for propaganda purposes in order to disseminate a positive image of Germany in the colonies. It was also pointed out that account should be taken of the fact that these men came from regions with a milder climate. Apart from respect for their food or the practice of their religion, a wide range of external players was engaged with the task of convincing the prisoners to join the Ottomans. Each week, imams and speakers from the Ottoman Empire or Tunisia, deserters from the French army now working for the Germans, would come to the camp to make speeches which all were obliged to attend [10].

11The images confirm this strategy: photos and postcards of the mosque, communal prayers, a film of the slaughter of sheep or a speaker haranguing prisoners sitting in a circle around him [11]. In line with this iconography, the statements of escaped or repatriated prisoners report the content of these speeches: “The propagandists said (…) that the allies, especially France, were trying to destroy Islam. (…) You act as shock troops, while the French follow behind you and rejoice at your success (…), (you are) cannon fodder (…). They criticised the Muslim representatives for failing to stand up to our civilisers but they always concluded with the forthcoming victory of the central states that would lead the liberation and expansion of Islam under the protection of Wilhelm II” [12]. This propaganda was also conducted on a more personal level: “On our arrival at the camp (they) took us aside one after another asking us for information on French injustices and inquiring whether we were prepared to fight for the holy war. Following these interviews, marks were given. Those with the highest marks were those who best met their expectations” [13]. They were then used to relay propaganda in the camp.

12At first glance, despite intensive propaganda, the camp therefore seems to have preferential living conditions: halal meat, prayers, leaving the camp accompanied by a band, dances, games, etc., but the statements of former prisoners reveal less positive aspects of life in the Zossen camp. Letters to families are a primary source of information on this experience [14]. Invariably, they mentioned hunger and the cold and the need for parcels. One prisoner complained to his parents that he was the only one receiving nothing while the others were sent “oil, fat, honey, dates, soap and tobacco” and he has dire need of them [15]. The interviews of escaped prisoners confirm and clarify that the food was insufficient and “very bad. They were given 1.5 kg of bread for 5 days. This was black bread, made with potatoes and peelings.” [16] They worried about the meat, repeatedly claiming that “(…) in the soup, they found (…) dog meat” and “German sergeants (…) were there, especially at meal times to stop them fighting, because (they were) hungry and what they were given was not enough” [17]. This hunger got worse over time and depended on the restrictions also applicable to the German population.

13The cold was also a source of suffering. The photos also often showed soldiers who had covered their heads with a blanket. The nights were freezing cold and the prisoners were barely covered: “So in the morning to get up, we had to we cling to the boards, as we were so stiff with cold” [18].

View on the Halbmondlager in Zossen and on his mosque, 1916-1917.

14They were also forced to work hard for fear of reprisals. They received “whippings and blows with rifle butts. For the slightest mistake, (they are) tied to the post, and (form) the punishment squad, loaded with French knapsacks filled with sand“ and say that “many died of starvation and ill-treatment” [19].

15As for propaganda to induce prisoners to change sides, if after gentle treatment they refused, the tough method seems to have been imposed. “Those who are steadfast in their loyalty are punished in the cruelest manner, all privileges granted at the beginning are withdrawn, and the discipline is very strict” [20]. The guards “mistreat those who (refuse) to work or side with Turkey and make them do exercises in the snow” [21].

16The harshness of camp life therefore depended on the attitude of the prisoner. Yet the most common reaction seems to be a refusal to betray.

Loyalty or betrayal?

17In defiance of international conventions, the prisoners were pressed to join the enemy. The propaganda was intense and treatment became quite brutal when the soldiers resisted. Did many refuse? Can we measure the success or failure of the German strategy? During interviews, many declared their loyalty to France. Talking about the arguments of a soldier who joined the enemy and became a propaganda agent, one escaped prisoner asserts that “not one (of them) was taken in by it”, that they “cursed Boucabouya because he was the first dog, the first traitor” [22]. Faced with a Tunisian propagandist, refusal seems to have been even more direct: “This El Hadj Salah Ben Cherif expounded the same theories as the Turkish pasha; he had gone over to the Turks and tried to convince us too. So we all insulted him to his face and out loud, so he had to give up his theories” [23].

18Categorical refusal, rebellion; are these statements reliable? The interviews by the French military authorities aimed precisely to determine how loyal these soldiers were, bearing in mind that it was essential for them to demonstrate an unwavering loyalty to France. However, German sources tend to confirm the limited success of the propaganda. They say that the speech of one of the propagandists was received in total silence and report that the prisoners expressed a wish to return home but in no circumstances did they want to fight on the front against the French army for fear that their wives and children might be executed by the French [24]. The “turncoats” were even bullied by the other prisoners. One German report recommends the transfer of two Algerian prisoners to Turkey since, as deserters from the French army, they were harassed every day, complaining that their detention conditions were too harsh since they suffered attacks and contempt from the other prisoners and appealed desperately to be able to join the Ottoman army [25].

19So it was a minority that signed up through conviction. The others were resigned to go to Constantinople, driven by hunger [26], fear of reprisals or the hope of escaping once in the Ottoman Empire [27]. By Hauptmann Naldony’s own admission [28], in his memoirs dating from 1955, the dissemination of the idea of a holy war was a failure. “The Muslim peoples paid little attention to it even though it had been declared by the Turkish Sultan” [29]. They thus remained loyal to their colonial power.

20Prisoners behind the camp fence, prisoners of the eyes watching them, these prisoners from the colonies are hard to understand as individuals. How can we discover the men behind the soldiers; the brothers, husbands and sons behind the prisoners? How can we learn about their inner suffering, the role of faith in the horror of war? Rare extracts reveal family feelings and ties: those of a father to his son [30], saying he was pleased to know that he was alive though a captive; those of a son to his father, a soldier tormented by not being able to find the sun to direct his prayers; those of a soldier to a friend in a poem expressing the pain of separation. All these elements bring them out of anonymity, give them a name, a profession, a family, bringing us closer and giving us some hope of gradually making them the subject of their own history.

21“The dove cries over our separation but the birds are singing on the branches of the trees. Cruel fate disunites us; Oh how painful is this separation! Oh moon, shining your light on the world, why do you leave the house of my friends plunged into darkness? I now cry alone, because I have no friends to cry with me. But oh my soul! Pluck up courage and be patient, because our Holy Prophet watches at the bedside of every man who is alone!” (El Hadj Salah Ben Yacouba) [31]