With the "Die-Hards" in Siberia Part 10

I was not quite an idle spectator, but the fact that at the critical moment I discovered I had no weapon except for my cane reduced me to helplessness so far as dealing with this gang of murderers was concerned. Directly the fight began every Russian, including the armed militiaman who was supposed to keep order at the station, bolted from the room, leaving the women and children to look after themselves.

Madame Frank went to the a.s.sistance of her husband and covered him as only a woman can, and as she grasped her husband's revolver the Serbs slunk back a pace, while I lifted his head and signed to the Serb officer who had fired at the colonel from behind to lift the dead Serb off the colonel's body. This he did and then proposed to the band surrounding us that they should kill us all three. Their knives glistened and a small automatic revolver was making a bee line for me, when a voice like the growl of a bear came from the direction of the door. The whole band instantly put up their weapons. I had stood up to receive my fate, and over the heads of our would-be murderers I saw a tall dark-bearded stage villain in a long black overcoat which reached to the floor, stalk across to the group. He looked at the body of the dead Serb and then at the prostrate Russian officer who at that instant began to show signs of returning consciousness. "Ah! Oh! Russky polkovnik," he roared, drawing his revolver. "Our dead brother demands blood."

I could not stand and see a wounded friend murdered before my eyes, not even in this land of blood. I stepped over both bodies and placed myself between this monster and his victim. I raised both hands and pushed him back, saying, "I am Anglisky polkovnik, and will not allow you to murder the wounded Russian officer." He answered that he was "Serbian polkovnik," and I said "Come into the other room," and by strategy got him away. His friends, however, told him something which sent him back quickly to finish his job, but as he re-entered the buffet he encountered about a dozen British and Czech soldiers with fixed bayonets, and it was not so difficult now to convince him that it was not quite good form to murder a wounded man.

We carried the Russian colonel to the British hospital, and as the leader of the Serbs had declared a blood feud, extra guards were placed on my wagon and the hospital. These ruffians were armed from our supplies under the direction of French officers. Directly the Russian military authorities began their investigations to bring this band to justice they, through the Czech commander, received orders from General Ganin, the French Allied commander, to move to Novo Nikoliosk out of Russian jurisdiction.

It is not very clear at present why the French gave their protection to these and similar disturbing elements in Siberia. Perhaps the reason will show itself later.

Krasnoyarsk is a huge railway depot with building and repairing shops employing about 3,000 workmen. To get at both shifts it was necessary to hold two meetings, one for the inside and the other for the outside staff. The first was a very silent, interested crowd, who listened to my address as though they understood its meaning and purport. The gallant "Russky" _polkovnika_ with bandaged head and hand translated the first part, Madame Frank the second. The impression created by this brave woman, who had herself commanded a company in the trenches before Kerensky destroyed the army, was very great. There was no mistaking the effect of her words as these oil-stained workmen raised their _papahas_ to the message from the English trade unionists which she delivered.

This town was the centre of international intrigue. There was an Italian battalion about 1,500 strong, the Czech 12th Regiment of about 200, and the British Middles.e.x Regiment, 220. To maintain their prestige the French were arming the Lett revolters as fast as the Russian General Affinasiaff could defeat and disarm them. The Italian soldiers were in very bad favour with the inhabitants and the local Russian civil and military authorities. Robberies and a.s.saults were of almost daily occurrence, and at last the authorities made definite official complaints to the Allied Headquarters and asked that the Italian soldiers should either be kept under proper discipline or removed from the country. The main complaint, however, of the Russian officials was based on the open hostility of the Allied officers led by the senior of them to everything Russian.

It is such an easy matter to make friends with the Russian people that this att.i.tude of her alleged helpers was very saddening. When I landed at "Vlady" my orders were to remember that we English had come as friends to help Russia on to her feet, and I always tried to keep that in mind. I often wondered what instructions could have been given to my Allied colleagues.

The next call was at Bogotol, where, under instructions from Consul Peac.o.c.k, I inquired into the imprisonment of an Australian subject named Savinoff. The authorities produced the _dossier_ of his case, which when translated proved him to be a Bolshevik leader and second in command of an armed band that had attempted to murder the local authorities. His trial took place shortly after, with that of t.i.toff, his chief, who was one of the Central Committee of the Baltic Fleet who ordered the murder of hundreds of the naval officers of the old regime.

The meeting maintained the usual standard of interest, and the chief of the works, whose face bore traces of the tortures inflicted upon him under Bolshevik rule, was delighted with the new hope we had brought to himself and his workmen.

Our next meeting was at Taiga, and it was quite a great event. A special platform had been erected in the big workshop, around which swarmed nearly two thousand workmen. The people looked upon the meeting as the new birth of Russian life. No meeting had been held for two years, except the underground gatherings of conspirators. I appealed to the men to discard disorder and take a hand in the orderly reconstruction of the new Russian State, in which they were now guaranteed a place. Madame Frank's translation made a profound impression upon these toil-worn men and women. It was clear that the people were tired of the horrors of revolution and yearned for peace and quiet.

I here interviewed General Knox, who was on his way to Omsk on important matters which had been brought to my notice.

We arrived at Novo Nikoliosk on the morning of the 23rd, and proceeded to make arrangements for the meeting to be held on the same day. I visited the various commands, as usual, and held long consultations with General Zoc.h.i.n.ko, from whom I gathered much information as to the situation in this important district. It was interesting to hear some news of our old friend, the _Voidavoda_ of the Serbian band. He and his gang had arrived from his excursion to Krasnoyarsk on the day that a banquet was held by the newly-formed Polish regiment. As chief of his band he was invited, and delivered an oration of a particularly patriotic character which had won all Polish hearts. He was in a great hurry to get away next morning, fearing that we were following behind.

He said nothing about our encounter, and the Russian officials became suspicious of his anxiety to get away. They brought a squad of soldiers to examine his trucks, and found an enormous amount of loot from Krasnoyarsk, as well as contraband goods upon which he had to pay duty to the amount of 130,000 roubles. Having squeezed this toll out of the "bounder," they gave him a free way to Ekaterinburg, where things are very scarce, and where he would be able to sell out at a good figure.

General Zoc.h.i.n.ko told us some funny stories about the French Staff's attempt to form a powerful counter force to Bolshevism from the German and Austrian war prisoners. In Novo Nikoliosk the Allied Commander, General Ganin, had released some hundreds of Austrian and German Poles from the prison camps and formed them into regiments. In his haste to get these units complete he forgot to inquire into the antecedents of the officers chosen to command them. So careless, in fact, were the French that the Russian authorities awoke one morning to find one of their most dangerous prisoners, a well-known German officer spy, von Budburg, in full command of this alleged Allied force. Von Budburg had, like a true patriot, taken care to choose his subordinates from men of the same type as himself.

Later on the French Staff became aware of the nature of their handiwork and sought help and advice from the Russian military authorities about disarming their new German Legion. A sudden descent on their quarters by another Polish unit, with some new Russian units standing by to render help if necessary, ended in these French proteges being disarmed and got back safely to their prison camp.

Allied help to Russia is like a jig-saw puzzle, a mystery even to the man who devised it. A straight-forward recognition of the Omsk Government would have been an honest hand for honest work, but where would Allied diplomacy have come in? Diplomacy is only necessary when there are ulterior objects than mere plain, unambiguous a.s.sistance to a helpless friend. What are these hidden objects? The Allies had better be cautious how they proceed in the diagnosis and dismemberment of this great people or they may find themselves on the operating table with this giant holding the knife. In spite of the Biblical legend I prefer England to be a pal with Goliath!

We arrived at Barabinsk on the morning of March 26, and after arrangements for the meeting were completed, took a walk round the market. A Russian market is a thing of joy and colour. There are no buildings: just a huge s.p.a.ce in the centre of the town where thousands of s.h.a.ggy, ice-covered horses stand each with an ice-covered sledge. The peasants, men and women, in huge fur coats which reach to the snow-covered ground, harmonise perfectly with the cattle they control.

Their fur coats form a study in colour--patchwork coats from calfskins which combine every shade from white to rusty red; goatskins, from long straight black to white; curly bearskins from black to brown and brown to polar white; wealthy peasant women, with beautiful red fox furs hiding neck and face, their eyes glistening through the apertures which served the same purpose for the first and original tenant. The sledges contain everything--wheat, oats, potatoes, onions, rough leaf tobacco, jars of cream, frozen blocks of milk, scores of different types of frozen fresh-water fish from sturgeon to bream, frozen meats of every conceivable description, furs--in fact, the finest collection of human necessities to be found in any one place in the world. Prices were very high for home produce and simply absurd for foreign or distant productions. Colonel Frank was in need of a small safety pin (six a penny at home), and found that the price was seven roubles--14s. 3-1/2d.

old money, and 3s. 6d. at the rate at which the British Army are paid.

Everything else was in proportion.

A very fine meeting was held in the works, and much good done in securing the confidence of the workmen in the efforts of the Supreme Governor, Admiral Koltchak, to create order out of chaos.

We arrived at Omsk on the morning of the 28th, and on the 29th I gave a lengthy report to Admiral Koltchak, who expressed his hearty thanks and impressed upon me the necessity of continuing my journey to the Urals.

He had received from the official heads of departments reports stating that the effect of my mission had been to improve the general att.i.tude of the workmen all round. And he was most anxious that this effort to enlist the workmen's interest in an ordered State should be pushed forward with vigour.

A further discussion upon general affairs, especially the policy of the French command in Siberia, took us through tea. I have absolute confidence in the character of the admiral, but the pigmies by whom he is surrounded are so many drags on the wheels of State. There is not one that I would trust to manage a whelk-stall. They have no idea of the duty of a statesman. Little pettifogging personal equations and jobs occupy the whole of their time, except when they are engaged upon the congenial task of trying to thwart the Supreme Governor. The patriotism of the front officers and soldiers, and the medieval chivalry of the Cossack are the only things left upon which to rebuild Russia. This naturally limits the architectural features of the new edifice, but the pioneer is always limited to the material at hand.

CHAPTER XVIII

OMSK RE-VISITED

It is quite interesting to watch the oscillation of the Omsk mind from one orientation to another. At the time I left for the East the stream of favour flowed strongly in the English direction. General Knox started on a tour of Siberia in connection with the formation of the new Koltchak army; Sir Charles Eliot went to Hong-Kong; General Bowes was left to deputise for General Knox, and Colonel Robertson for Sir Charles Eliot. In three short weeks every sign of British influence had disappeared. The English were nowhere; the favour was shared equally by France and j.a.pan.

The j.a.panese had either learned how to behave themselves towards the Russians or they had received instructions from home. During the first three months I was in Siberia their arrogance was simply sublime, but after the armistice with Germany--upon whose power to defeat the Allies they banked their all--they were a changed people, so far as outward appearance and conduct were concerned. They talked about their alliance with England, their friendship with Russia, their love of France. When the j.a.panese try, they can make themselves very agreeable; indeed, so charming that it is impossible to resist their advances. That was their att.i.tude then to all except the Chinese, whom they hold in the greatest contempt, and to the Americans, whom they fear. With a clear field their new policy made great headway.

The French methods are quite different. Theirs is a drawing-room attack, and at this sort of thing the ordinary Britisher cuts but a sorry figure. Hence the field was also pretty clear for them, and they made full use of their opportunities. With a judicious word over a cup of tea an editor who refuses a bribe finds his or her talents a glut on the market. A joke around a _samovar_ reduces the rank of a particularly Russophile general. The glorious time they are having reaches its climax when you hear the polite condolences to the victims uttered in exquisite French.

But Colonel Robertson had gone to "Vlady," and his place had been taken by a typical Britisher in the person of Consul Hodgson, who took a correct measure of the situation, and in less than forty-eight hours herded the whole caboose back into their own compounds. It is surprising that the influence of one virile, definite personality can be so great, and it proves how necessary it is that in this seemingly endless turmoil only the best men should be burdened with the responsibility of our representation. I started on my mission to the Urals with absolute confidence that, in the absence of General Knox, our interests in Omsk would not suffer so long as they were in the hands of our senior consul.

After infinite trouble with Russian official elements, I started on my western journey on April 5. The mission consisted of Colonel Frank (liaison officer), Madame Frank (translator), Regt-Sergt.-Major Gordon, in charge of an escort of twenty-two N.C.O.s and men, with one machine gun. We were now entering the district behind the Ural front. These towns had not long been cleared of the Bolsheviks, so that it was interesting to discover how far their ideas had gained possession of the minds of the people. The new Russian armies were rapidly pushing forward. Their progress had been made more general and persistent since the end of November, 1918, the date on which the Czechs finally refused to take part in the great Perm offensive. When they read in the English papers of January, 1919, how the Czech, Italian, French, and Allied forces had inflicted defeat upon the Bolsheviks at Perm, it caused a grim smile to pa.s.s over the faces of the Russian officers who did the job. Not a single Czech, Italian, French, or Allied soldier fired a shot after Admiral Koltchak a.s.sumed supreme command. There is one notable exception. The armoured trains from H.M.S. _Suffolk_, under the command of Captain Wolfe Murray, continued to fight along the Ufa front well into January, 1919. Only the intense cold and the necessity of recoupment and re-equipment caused them to retire to Omsk. The British Navy fighting on the Urals was the only reminder the Russian soldier had that the Allies of his country had not entirely deserted her.

We arrived at Tumen on April 7, and held a fine meeting of the workmen, who seemed quite pleased to hear that the Bolsheviks were not likely to return. These workmen looked upon the Bolshevik rule as on some horrible nightmare. They cared for little else so long as you could a.s.sure them on this point. So ghastly was the dream from which they had awakened compared with the flowery promises held out to them that I readily believe "Ivan the Terrible" would have been received at that moment as a saviour. This was a dangerous feeling which I tried my best to combat, for the excesses of the Bolshevik regime have prepared the way--and were deliberately intended so to do--for a return to absolutism.

We arrived at Ekaterinburg at the same time as General Knox arrived from Chilliyabinsk. His first words were congratulations on my C.B., news of which had just arrived. I visited Consul Preston, and read the evidence he and his French colleague had collected relative to Bolshevik outrages on the workmen of the district. It was too sad to think about. This was the place where the Tsar and his family were imprisoned and murdered. Of them it could be fairly alleged that they were responsible for the crimes of the old regime; but what crimes have the poor workmen and peasants committed that the most fiendish cruelty should be reserved for them? I give it up! Perhaps there is some reason or justification; all I can say is I have not heard it, neither can I imagine what it can be.

I held a meeting of railway workmen and officials, and was surprised at the attention and earnestness of the audience. They hungrily devoured every sc.r.a.p of information as to our English trade union organisation and work, and requested that a further meeting should be held next day in a great carriage works in the centre of the town. This proved to be one of the most remarkable gatherings I have ever attended. A fine platform had been erected at one end of the main workshop. A sea of faces under huge multi-coloured _papahas_ spread over the floor, while every carriage was covered with human ants; even the beams of the building carried its human freight. Clearly it seemed to me that the resurrection of Russia had begun; the destruction of Russia began from the head, its re-birth is from the ground.

CHAPTER XIX

IN EUROPEAN RUSSIA

Nevanisk is situated just over the European boundary of the Urals.

Before the Bolshevik came it was a great iron centre, one firm alone employing three thousand workmen. When I arrived there the various works were practically derelict and its vast collection of machinery idle. The streets were deserted, and it was estimated that half of its inhabitants had been destroyed. It was, and now it is not. The few remaining inhabitants were valiantly pulling themselves together, and if order and some sort of law could be established, they were confident that they could rebuild their life again. We talked to them and encouraged them to continue their struggle against the blight that had defiled their homes and their country. Their hopes seemed to revive from our a.s.surance of English working-cla.s.s sympathy. I am pleased they did not know that we had some people mad enough to wish to inflict similar wounds upon our own country.

A pound of sugar cost thirty-five roubles, a pair of 3s. 11d. goloshes two hundred and fifty roubles, one pound of bread seven roubles. These were the things we wished to buy, and so made the discovery of their price; we bought bread only, as the thing we could not do without.

Typhus was raging in almost every house. General Knox was inoculated, but I decided to run the risk. Doctors had largely disappeared, owing to the hatred of everybody with a bourgeois education.

I wonder what sort of jokes or fun G.B.S. could make out of it. There _is_ fun in it somewhere. The contrast between the original idea of the revolution and the outcome of those ideas are so grotesque in their realisation that it looks as though some hidden power were indulging in a Mephistophelian laugh at the expense of mankind.

We next arrived at Taighill, where the same effects had been produced, though on a smaller scale. It was Palm Sunday, and the great bell of the cathedral was booming through the surrounding pine forest calling the faithful to prayer. In the square of the town near by a statue of Alexander II lay in the mud, having been thrown down by the revolutionaries. Quite near a white figure of a woman, intended to represent the Enthronement of Liberty, had been hurled from its recently constructed base, and formed the roadside seat of five or six of the raggedest starvelings to be found in the world. An inscription on Alexander's statue states that it was raised to commemorate his emanc.i.p.ation of the peasants from serfdom. The Bolsheviks had not time to write _their_ inscription; but it did not matter--the empty houses and deserted streets were quite enough. By means of much elbow labour they had smoothed out the inscription on the statue of the Tsar Liberator and for the time made all things equal again.

The meeting at Taighill was a repet.i.tion of the others, and we pa.s.sed on to Kushva. This place had been badly mauled. The Bolshevik Commissar was evidently an anarchist pure and simple. All the hatred of cla.s.s and creed which had generated under the Romanoffs found expression in this man's deeds. The amount of venom which he put into his administration and work was worthy of his cause. The effect of his policy, however, produced results exactly opposite to those he hoped for. The first evidence of his zeal lay upon the snow in front of the railway office. A huge steel safe with the door wrenched off and the contents missing indicated the strength of his principles. The official who had lost the key was thrown into the well near by to stimulate the memory of other safe-owners; but this official was not alone in his glory, for several railway workmen who refused to help rob this identical safe found a watery grave with their superior. Altogether over seventy people met their death in this well, workmen, _bourgeoisie_--all in one holocaust.

But the majority were of no cla.s.s; their only offence seemed to be that they had called themselves Social Revolutionaries. They have been the subject of the most bitter hatred by the Bolshevik leaders. The Bolshevik contention is that for men or women to call themselves Socialists, and then to hesitate to take a hand in the complete extermination of the bourgeois ruling cla.s.ses, now there is a chance of doing so in Russia, is to act the part of poltroon and traitor to the cause. The "treachery" is all the greater if the objector is a workman or a workwoman.

The Bolsheviks are quite honest about their purpose--the transfer of power and property by murder and robbery from the _bourgeoisie_ to the proletariat. If a member of the proletariat is so mad that he refuses or hesitates to act his part in this scheme, then those who have been called by the force of events to a.s.sume a dictatorship on his behalf are ent.i.tled to destroy him as an unconscious enemy to himself and his cla.s.s. In the same way no mercy can be shown to the Social Revolutionaries who, while professing allegiance to definite proletarian domination, shrink from definite action now that the time for action has arrived.

The Bolshevik Commissar of Kushva, acting on this principle, succeeded in a short time in raising a formidable opposition amongst the workmen in the surrounding districts. When the local school-mistress, a girl of seventeen, found a temporary grave in this sort of Black Hole of Calcutta the wells of Kushva and Taighill became a dreadful portent to the simple Russian _mujik_.

The opposition began at the big Watkin Works, where over six thousand men were employed. Though possessing no military organisation, the workmen decided to resist by force the entrance of the Bolshevik Terror into their midst. With the help of several young engineers they managed to regiment themselves into some kind of military order. They selected with great skill the strategic positions for fortifications, and held the whole district against the repeated attacks of the enemy. Once the Bolshevik line of the Urals west of Ekaterinburg struck from north to south, from Kunghure to the Caspian, as the crow flies, for three thousand versts, except for one great loop enclosing the Watkin Works.

But in November, 1918, the Bolshevik line swept forward, submerging these valiant workmen warriors. Admiral Koltchak's Chief of Staff naturally concluded that the workmen had given up the struggle and had made terms with their hated enemy.

This surge forward of the Bolsheviks had been greatly a.s.sisted by the unfortunate defection of the Czech forces, who had left the front at the suggestion of their local National Council. General Gaida had thrown up his Czech commission, and had been given command of the right wing of the new Russian army. The admiral proceeded at once to put his new army to the test by an attempt to recover the lost ground and, if possible, save the remnants of the Watkin workmen. Everybody now knows how, in a temperature of over "60 below," these recently mobilised Siberian recruits re-established the fighting fame of the Russian soldier by sweeping the Terrorist forces from their positions and entirely destroying them at Perm. Imagine General Galitzin's surprise when the advance began to find these Watkin workmen still holding their district and rendering valuable help to their relieving comrades! The Kushva Soviet Commissar had built better than he knew.

This district is remarkable for the valuable and extensive deposits of iron and sulphur, which seem inexhaustible. One huge hill has a store of about 800,000,000,000 tons, almost untapped except for uncovering work necessary to estimate its capacity.