Belgian refugees in the Netherlands during the First World War Belgian refugees in the Netherlands during the First World War During the First World War between 1914 and 1918, approximately one million Belgians fled across the border to the Netherlands. These refugees were both civilians who were afraid of the war and the alleged atrocities of the Germans, and soldiers who either deserted or were cut off from their army unit. Officially Belgium, like the Netherlands, was a neutral country during the war. By 1904 the news had already leaked out that the Germans had a plan to march through Belgium to reach France. Precautionary measures were taken against this,
The Country of the Blind The Country of the Blind "The Country of the Blind" is a short story written by H. G. Wells. It was first published in the April 1904 issue of "The Strand Magazine" and included in a 1911 collection of Wells's short stories, "The Country of the Blind and Other Stories". It is one of Wells's best known short stories, and features prominently in literature dealing with blindness. Wells later revised the story, with the expanded version first published by an English private printer, Golden Cockerel Press, in 1939. While attempting to climb the unconquered crest of Parascotopetl (a fictitious mountain