Some citizens, including a
canon of the cathedral, with his aged mother, were ordered to go to the
station and afterward to take the road to Tirlemont. Among the number
were about twenty priests from Louvain. They were insulted and
threatened, but ultimately allowed to go free and make their way as best
they could, women and sick persons among them, to Tirlemont. Other
groups of prisoners from Louvain were on the same day taken by other
routes, some early in the morning, through various villages in the
direction of Malines, with hands tightly bound by a long cord. More
prisoners were afterward added, and all made to stay the night in the
church at Campenhout. Next day, the 28th, this group, then consisting of
about 1,000 men, women and children, was taken back to Louvain. The
houses along the road were burning and many dead bodies of civilians,
men and women, were seen on the way. Some of the principal streets in
Louvain had by that time been burned out. The prisoners were placed in a
large building on the cavalry exercise ground--"One woman went mad, some
children died, others were born." On the 29th the prisoners were marched
along the Malines road, and at Herent the women and children and men
over 40 were allowed to go; the others were taken to Boort Meerbeek, 15
kilometers from Malines, and told to march straight to Malines or be
shot.
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