More and more soldiers were converging North, ready to meet the enemy at the borders. If during war times news are often grim, the press spread quickly the word of Belgian resistance, one which the German army was not expecting. Germany’s plans even had to be changed, to the point of crossing Netherlands borders. Almost every newspapers praised Belgian heroism in their streets, sometimes with very doubtful sources concerning the numbers of killed etc…
However, France was still preparing the last details of its defensive and offensive power as well as transferring its first troops in Belgium to assist its armed forces. The German tanker Czar-Nicholas II is captured by the French Navy, full of petrol and brought back to the North Tunisian city of Bizerte, a French possession. Its crew is made prisoner.
In Alsace and Lorraine, fights and skirmishes between France and Germany had already wounded and killed many. The French press diffused news of German ” brutality ” and ” barbarism “. The 6th of August, people could read about a wounded French officer executed in cold blood by a German soldier or about two fifteen years old boys executed at Morfontaine.