Hostage

“ Bigot came down the steps, smiling detestably, and passed me with no more than a quick look. I made my way cautiously through the streets towards the cathedral, for I owed a duty to the poor soldier who had died in my arms, through whose death I had been able to enter the town.
Disarray and ruin met my sight at every hand. Shot and shell had made wicked havoc. Houses where, as a hostage, I had dined, were battered and broken; public buildings were shapeless masses, and dogs and thieves prowled among the ruins. Drunken soldiers staggered past me ”

“ And ye maidens sit ye there, and move not till we have made way on our ship, unless ye would feel the point of the arrow. For ye are within bowshot of the ship, and we have shot weapons aboard.’
“So the Hostage departed with them, and she unweeping, but we wept sorely. And we saw the small boat come up to the side of the round-ship, and the Hostage going over the gunwale along with those evil men, and we heard the hale and how of the mariners as they drew up the anchor and sheeted home; and then the sweeps came out and the ship began to move over the sea. ”

“ Attacked by second Privateer — Out houses fired — Breach in the wall — Wounded — Surrender — Carried away as a prisoner — Expostulate with Captain — Ransomed — Peter left as a hostage — His deportment.
With a constant apprehension of attack before us we lived on the “qui vive,” from the 1st. ”

“ Our men will mix with the crowd, and at a given signal--when the Duke's cortège crosses the bridge--they will rush the bodyguard, scatter confusion among the escort, and in the mêlée seize the person of Alva. During the inevitable tumult that will ensue among the soldiers and the populace, our valuable hostage shall be conveyed in absolute secrecy to Het Spanjaard's Kasteel, where of course we can easily keep him a close prisoner whilst we negotiate with the King. ”

“ HOSTAGE, in the art of war, a person given up to an enemy, as a security for the performance of the articles of a treaty. When two enemies enter into a treaty or capitulation, it is common for them mutually to give hostages as a security for their reciprocally performing the engagement they have entered into. An hostage becomes either an accessary, or principal according to the state of things. Thus, for example, he is accessary when a prince promises fidelity to another prince, and gives either his son or some great lord, as a security for his performance, without any further capitulation ”

“ I felt fully convinced that by securing possession of a dozen of the most important citizens as hostages, we should effectually protect ourselves from all possibility of attack; but it is clear that there is somebody ashore there who cares not what happens to the hostages, if he can only find a chance to strike at us a treacherous blow. Now, then, to deal with this rascal,” indicating the approaching plate ship. ”

“ Iran took dozens of Americans hostage in Tehran, murdered hundreds of American soldiers, Marines, in Beirut, and was responsible for killing and maiming thousands of American service men and women in Iraq and Afghanistan. ”

“ W. Set us a-firing, thou meanest; that they might indeed; but set us on fire they shall not; they may try, at their peril, and we shall make mad work with your hundred thousand men, if they come within reach of our guns, I assure thee.
D. But what if the king gives you hostages for your safety?
W. Whom can he give but mere slaves and servants like thyself, whose lives he no more values than we an English hound?
D. Whom do you demand for hostages? ”

“ It is full of life and adventure. The interest of the story is sustained without a break from first to last."—Standard.
Hussein the Hostage: or, A Boy's Adventures in Persia. By G. Norway. With 6 page Illustrations by John Schönberg. 3s.
"Hussein the Hostage is full of originality and vigour. The characters are lifelike, there is plenty of stirring incident, the interest is sustained throughout, and every boy will enjoy following the fortunes of the hero."—Journal of Education. ”

“ This farmer, fearing that the English might be driven out of the country and that he would lose his possessions, because he is a great worker for the enemy, did find a young girl, who was related to one of the leaders of your holy cause, and he lured her into his house and holds her as a hostage. ”

“ But if it happen that for need any of them will have traffic with us, or we with them, with cattle and with goods, that is to be allowed on this wise: that hostages be furnished as security for peace and as evidence whereby one may know that the man has a clean back. ”

“ These tribes refused to submit to the British, and instead sent messengers to the Ameer of Afghanistan, asking him to help them.
They have spread a report among the hill tribes that the Ameer has asked hostages from them, and will help them if the hostages are given.
A hostage is a person given and held under the laws of war, as a pledge. ”

“ KILLING OF HOSTAGES Throughout the territories occupied by the German Armed Forces in the course of waging aggressive wars, the defendants adopted and put into effect on a wide scale the practice of taking, and of killing, hostages from the civilian population. ”

“ Make yourself at home. We hope to enjoy the pleasure of your company for a good long while. We shall hold you in a sort of honorable captivity, as a hostage for the safety of some of our poor fellows now pining in the clock-peddlers’ prisons. Sit down, sir. Pray sit down. But let us find a chair first. Here! you! Hoskins! bring a chair this way for the gentleman. I hope we shall spend a pleasant season together, Colonel Rosenthal.”
One of the men brought forward a rude wooden chair, probably of camp manufacture, and Justin threw himself into it.
Monck squared himself for a talk. ”

“ However, that we might be very secure, I told him he should go back again and choose out five of them, and tell them they might see that he did not want men, that he would take out those five to be his assistants, and that the governor would keep the other two and the three that were sent prisoners to the castle, my cave, as hostages for the fidelity of those five; and that if they proved unfaithful in the execution, the five hostages should be hanged in chains alive upon the shore. ”

“ By incredible efforts, and by encroachment on the military chest, this sum was sent with certain messengers, who, by a previously concerted scheme, were waylaid and robbed of it by men sent by Ackbar Khan, who, seizing the thirty Europeans, added them to the other hostages whose lives or liberties were to pay for the surrender of Jellalabad!
The poor soldiers had given all they possessed in the world, save their kits and ammunition, to save their comrades from perilous bondage, and had given it in vain. ”

“ Arms, powder, and dynamite must be given up at 4 o'clock. Penalty, being shot.
"Citizens who know of a store of the above must inform the burgomaster, under penalty of hard labor for life.
Von Bülow takes hostages in every street.
"3. Every street will be occupied by a German guard, who will take ten hostages from each street, whom they will keep under surveillance. If there is any rising in the street, the ten hostages will be shot. ”

“ I do not, therefore, think it prudent to suffer any of the men to remain, unless a competent number of hostages are given, at least five out of a hundred, on condition of being put to death if those that remain should take up arms, or in any wise assist the enemies of our country. ”

“ I'm not going to be captured by those smugglers. I'd be a valuable man for them to have as a hostage. They'd probably ask a million dollars ransom for me," and Mr. Period carefully straightened his brilliant red necktie. ”

“ When the terms are fulfilled, the hostages are exchanged; but if the terms be evaded, the opposite side holds the right to put to death, or otherwise punish, the hostages in its possession; of late years the practice is going out of use. ”

“ They are seen in the opposite view. When leaving the village the Germans took twenty hostages with them, all very old, among them being the vicar. Three succeeded in escaping, but, for the others, the retreat proved (as will be seen) a veritable torture. ”

“ We shall perish, but we have for our hostages these divine captives who shall follow and share our fate. And death in their company is something less bitter, less inglorious, perhaps even less certain. ”

“ But with the morning, the French mitrailleuses are heard. The soldiers disappear.
The poor old women are free; they are able to leave their prison.
But their husbands are gone—carried off as hostages by the Germans. There were nineteen hostages in all. Three of them were taken off in a north-westerly direction, and found some German officers quartered in a château, who, after a short interrogation, released them. Of the other sixteen, fifteen were old men, and the sixteenth a child. ”

“ My hostages were a forlorn-looking set of "crackers," far inferior to our soldiers in physique, and yet quite equal, the latter declared, to the average material of the Southern armies. None were in uniform, but this proved nothing as to their being soldiers. One of them, a mere boy, was captured at his own door, with gun in hand. ”

“ You have returned triumphant from this WAR, and though, alas! your numbers are fewer, your hearts are as stout and your spirits as intrepid as ever. The land which claims you as her sons has in proportion to her capabilities given more hostages to glory than any land beneath the sun, and well and nobly have you upheld that national renown. ”

“ Eight hostages sprang overboard and escaped. Of the sixteen white men and four hostages left, three were powerless from scurvy. This last blow on top of a winter's siege was too much for the Russians. Their enfeebled bodies were totally exhausted. Stretching sails round as a tent and stationing ten men at a time as sentinels, they slept the first unbroken sleep they had known in five months. The tired-out sentinels must have fallen asleep at their places; for just as day dawned came a hundred savages, stealthy and silent, seeking the ship that had slipped {103} out from Oonalaska. ”

“ By the fourteenth day, the French had made a considerable advance and were dropping shells into the town, so the Germans decided to take away their own wounded.
During all this time daily rations were served to the civilian survivors, on orders secured by Sister Julie at the German headquarters. The civilians were ill-treated, but they were fed. Sister Julie gave me concrete instances of outrage. Many were killed for no reason whatever; some were sent as hostages to Germany. During fourteen days they were herded in the field. ”

“ We shall examine in succession executions of hostages, police crimes, deportations, crimes involving prisoners of war, terroristic activities against the Resistance, and the massacre of civilian populations.
A. The execution of hostages constitutes in all countries the first act of terrorism on the part of German occupation troops. From 1940 on, the German command, notably in France, carried out numerous executions as reprisals for any crime against the German Army. ”

“ But prisons are not peculiar to Paris, and probably quite as many executions have been witnessed in front of Newgate, in London. But that which gives a peculiar and sadder interest to this spot, is that here took place one of the most 83 terrible tragedies even in French history—the massacre of the hostages in the days of the Commune. In that prison yard the venerable Archbishop of Paris was shot, with others who bore honored names. No greater atrocity was enacted even in the Reign of Terror. There fiends in human shape, with hearts as hard as the stones of the street, butchered old age. ”

“ After all, there is nothing that in any way comes up to home and wife and children, in spite of the penalty one has to pay for having given hostages to fortune. I know just exactly how you feel about the 'two hearts.' Having a wife and six children, of whom I am very fond, I have found it more and more difficult to get away; for the last eight years, indeed, my hunting trips have merely been short outings. ”

“ Men and women marched about in bands with petroleum, and aided the spread of the conflagration by firing the city in different places. Heedless of the flames, the Versailles troops pressed on, eager, if possible, to save the lives of the 200 hostages, but, alas, in vain. A passion for blood had seized on the Commune, and its last expiring effort was to murder in cold blood, not only a large number of the hostages, but also batches of fresh victims, seized indiscriminately about the streets by bands of men and women, and dragged off to instant death. ”

“ While there is life there is hope, and sooner or later you may be restored to your friends. Sooner than later, I should guess, for you may be sure that when the news of this massacre reaches the authorities they will lose no time in getting together a strong punitive expedition against the tribes, and as soon as they find that resistance is hopeless they will try to make terms on the strength of any hostages that they may have in their hands. ”

“ We are not such churls as to withhold what a man would seek in his need."
"No man ever withholds aught from us, if so be we have set our minds on it," said the chief, with a great laugh.
Then he turned to his men, who were all round us by this time, listening.
"Here, take these two down to the ships, and see that they escape not; they will be good hostages."
In a moment, before we had time so much as to spur our horses, much less to draw sword, we were seized and pinioned by the men in spite of the rearing of the frightened steeds. ”