The charges of poisoned wells around cantonments was another canard. Rumors came out that horses, and men also, had been killed by the poisoned water. The entire investigating force of the United States has found one case of poisoned water in a horse trough in West Virginia—and no horse drank of it. The charges about poisoned court-plaster were proved to be equally groundless—indeed, they would seem to be of small reason in any case, because, if Germany was putting out the court-plaster, why should she speak of it; and why should America put it out at all? The psychology of it is this: anything which makes the people feel uneasy or anxious is good propaganda for the enemy.
Stories were spread very widely at one time that Canada and England were not practicing food conservation—that we were shipping our food to England and she was eating it without reservation, whereas we were denying ourselves sugar and butter. Perhaps you had best talk with someone who lived in England during the war as to the truth of that. It was one of the many German lies. There was the charge that the price of gasoline was due to the fact that the Standard Oil Company was dumping and wasting large quantities of gasoline. There was nothing in that, of course.
The report of Polish pograms, general Jew killing expeditions by the Poles, were magnified and distorted, all with the purpose of making both the Poles and Jews dissatisfied with the conduct of the war. Continually these anti-Ally stories got out, and always they were hard to trace.
This form of propaganda, spread by word of mouth, was the most insidious and most widely spread of all forms. It was of course, made the more easy by the excited state of mind of the people during war times. You will remember that you yourself bought more newspapers than you ever did in your life—you looked for new headlines, new sensations, all the time. At home, your wife also was eager for sensations, for the news, for the gossip. It was ready for her and every member of her family, and her neighbors and neighbors' families. The spread of a rumor is not governed by the laws of evidence; and hearsay testimony rarely is given twice the same—it always grows.
Into this form of German propaganda came spite work against German-Americans who themselves were loyal. A
