THE CHIEF OF POLICE AT IRKUTSK—MEETING WITH EXILED COMRADES—FROM IRKUTSK
TO KARA—STOLEN FETTERS—A DUBIOUS KIND OF DECABRIST—ANOTHER
CONTEST—ARRIVAL AT OUR JOURNEY’S END
The detailed narrative of all that these women had gone through
impressed us greatly; for their sufferings had been severe, and often
caused by the most paltry tyranny. The wonder was that they had ever
been able to hold out. Our indignation against the chief of police,
under whose auspices this sort of thing had gone on, was naturally
roused to such a pitch that we longed for an opportunity to testify our
abhorrence of his conduct. This opportunity was soon forthcoming. A
higher official from Petersburg, who was inspecting Siberian prisons,
came one day with his suite into our cells, and the chief of police was
in attendance. The moment he entered, Làzarev, our head-man, went up to
him, (in accordance with a predetermined agreement of our party,) and
said in loud and distinct tones—
“We are astonished at your impudence in daring to appear before our
eyes, after having by your treatment forced our women comrades into a
terrible hunger-strike.”
The whole company of our visitors hastily took their departure, to the
tune of our comments and ejaculations, which contained nothing
flattering to the evildoer! No untoward results followed our action, and
the ladies heartily rejoiced at this humiliation of their torturer.
From these four we heard much about the conditions of life in Kara, our
appointed destination; as also from another comrade now in Irkutsk, who
could give us his personal experience of the prison there. This was
Ferdinand Lustig—formerly an artillery officer, and afterwards a student
at the Petersburg Technological Institute—who had been sentenced in
1882, in the case of Suhanov and Mihaïlov, to four years’ penal
servitude. He had now ended his term in Kara, and was going to be
interned elsewhere, under police supervision. What he told us was not
comforting: the régime was severe, and the governor of the political
prison—a captain of gendarmerie, named Nikolin—of the worst repute.
Four of us only were to travel eastward together: Maria Kalyùshnaya,
Tchuikòv, Làzarev, and myself. The other seven were to be sent to
various places in the government of Irkutsk; and the nineteen-year-old
Rubinok, whose sad case I have already described, was to go northward to
the deserts of Yakutsk.
* * * * *
At the end of September we started, in company with a party of ordinary
prisoners. We had now before us a journey of some twelve hundred versts
(eight hundred miles), which would take at least two months. Winter in
Siberia begins much earlier than in other places of the same latitude,
even in European Russia, and therefore we had to expect many hardships.
In two days the last steamboat was to start for Listvinitchnaya, across
Lake Baikal, and if we missed that we should have to winter in Irkutsk.
The tempestuous Baikal treated us kindly on the whole, though usually
the autumnal storms are a real danger to voyagers on its waters. It is
often asserted that the scenery of its shores rivals that of the Swiss
mountain lakes; and without myself instituting any comparison, I can
vouch for it that the impression those magnificent hills made on me was
unforgettable.
We had to pass a night at the landing-station on the opposite
shore—Mysovaya; and we had been already shut into our prison, when the
grating of the lock again sounded, and the warder brought in a young
lady, who came straight towards me.
“Sonia!” I cried, in joyful surprise, as I recognised in her Sophia
Ivànova, a dear friend whom I had not seen for six years. Like Sophia
Perovskaya, Vera Figner, and other prominent women of the terrorist
organisation, she had joined the new party of the _Naròdnaia Vòlya_ in
the autumn of 1879, when the society of _Zemlyà i Vòlya_ (Land and
Liberty) was dissolved. It was just during that transition period that I
became acquainted with her and with other Terrorists; and shortly after,
in January, 1880, she was arrested in Petersburg, where she had been
assisting at the secret printing-press whence issued the organ of the
party, named like it, _Naròdnaia Vòlya_ (The People’s Will). At the time
of the arrest an armed resistance was made, in which Sophia Ivànova took
an active part, for which she was condemned to four years’
“katorga.”[71] This sentence having been fulfilled, she was now being
sent for internment into the government of Irkutsk.
Footnote 71:
_i.e._ penal servitude.—_Trans._
We were both heartily rejoiced at seeing one another again, but our
meeting could be only a brief one; the steamboat was to start almost
directly on its return journey, and Sonia could not miss it. We
hurriedly exchanged news of ourselves and of our common friends; then
came our parting, and I have never seen her since. To the best of my
knowledge she is still living in Siberia.
* * * * *
Soon after this we arrived at Verkhny-Udinsk, where—as in most Siberian
towns—the prison was filled to overflowing, and no room could be found
for us “politicals.” The sergeant (in Transbaikalia the convoys of
prisoners are always commanded by a sergeant, instead of by a
commissioned officer, as on the previous part of the journey) took us on
to the police-station. As, however, it was late the place was all
deserted, and no official could be found, which disturbed the sergeant
no whit; he simply left us there by ourselves in the office, with
unbolted windows and doors, and went his way. We also were free to go or
stay as we pleased, and were rather surprised at his calm way of solving
the difficulty. But the man knew what he was about. It was true enough
that we could walk off without anyone being the wiser; but what then? It
was, indeed, always easy to escape from prison here; but it was
well-nigh impossible to get any further. Elizabeth Kovàlskaya had twice
escaped from prison in Irkutsk (once disguised as a warder), but on both
occasions she was caught before she had left the town; and if she had
found concealment impossible in a relatively big place like Irkutsk,
with all the allies and money she had at command, the case must
certainly have been hopeless for us, strangers, in a little hole like
Verkhny-Udinsk. Still, it was a curious feeling at the time, as I well
remember, to know oneself free and under no kind of observation, and yet
to be so helpless. We finished by waxing restive and miserable over the
trap we were in.
In this place we met another comrade on his way from Kara, going off to
be interned elsewhere. This was Steblin-Kamensky,[72] whom his wife
voluntarily accompanied. They had been too late for the steamer, and
were now obliged to wait in Verkhny-Udinsk till the way again became
open—three or four months probably. During that time he was at liberty
to go about in the place as he pleased, and naturally we spent together
the two days of our sojourn here, Kamensky telling us all he could of
life in Kara. He was a brilliant talker, and described with an
inexhaustible flow of humour the doings of our comrades in every
particular. True, our laughter over his stories was mingled with much
sorrow and indignation, for what he related was often sad enough. He
told us of the bitter hardships inflicted on our comrades by an inhuman
gaoler, and he described Captain Nikolin, in command over the penal
settlement for “politicals” at Kara, as a malicious, ill-natured man,
continually devising petty humiliations for the prisoners.
Footnote 72:
In 1879 he had been condemned, at the same time as Maria Kovalèvskaya,
to ten years’ “katorga,” for armed resistance to the police. He
afterwards committed suicide in Irkutsk.
These various comrades, from whose personal knowledges we had
information about Kara, all made the same impression upon us. They bore
the stamp of their long imprisonment; their voices were muffled in tone;
anxiety, deep and constant, was painted on their faces; the hair of
nearly all, despite their youth—hardly any had reached thirty—was
prematurely grey. But discouraged and broken-spirited they were _not_;
or at least with one or two exceptions only. Very few of them could
regard the future with any hopeful feelings for themselves personally.
Long years of exile lay before them, doomed as they were to vegetate in
some forsaken corner of Siberia, victims to all sorts of hardships, far
from friends and civilisation. To many it seemed questionable whether
their future lot might not be more dreary than prison life itself. Yet
even the semblance of freedom attracted them—a doubtful freedom
certainly, for the exiles, or “colonists” as they are called, are
subject to a thousand and one restrictions at every turn.
I met one only who looked forward with a steadfast confidence in the
bright side of things, and this notwithstanding the fact that he was
bound for the worst part of Siberia—the government of Yakutsk. Ivan
Kashintsev[73] was then only twenty-five, and full of youth and high
spirits; he declared to me, on the occasion of our meeting at one of the
halting-stations (we already knew each other), that he meant to escape
at all hazards. This, in fact, he accomplished later, and he is now
living abroad.
Footnote 73:
He was sentenced to ten years’ “katorga” in 1881 for taking part in
the South Russian Workmen’s Union, and in consequence of the
Coronation manifesto a third of this sentence was remitted.
* * * * *
Before those who were released from prison, to live in exile under
police supervision, reached their appointed destinations, they had at
that time many difficulties and delays to encounter. We ourselves went
at a snail’s pace on our way to Kara, but prisoners coming thence
progressed far more slowly. They had to wait at nearly every
halting-station until some convoy on the homeward journey could pick
them up and take them on for a certain part of the way, and sometimes
they were kept in this manner nearly a week at a station. On an average
they barely made five versts a day, and when the distance they had to
travel was some hundreds or even thousands of versts, the journey might
take months to perform.
At each meeting with comrades on the return journey from Kara, I could
not help thinking of my own future, and saying to myself, “What will you
feel like when after long years you tread this path again? Or, indeed,
will you ever tread it?”
* * * * *
One day I found I had sustained an odd loss: someone had made off with a
bag in which I kept some of my belongings, the chief item among them
being my fetters! I had to make the somewhat curious confession to the
commanding officer that, instead of wearing my chains, I had allowed
them to be stolen; and I was rather surprised that, while commiserating
me on account of my personal losses, he did not seem at all agitated
about the loss of the Government’s property.
“What am I to do without my fetters?” I asked him, when I saw that the
absence of this important detail in the attire of a convict left him
unmoved.
“Well, of course we must get some for you somehow,” opined the officer.
“Just wait a moment; there ought to be things of the kind lying about
somewhere.” And he gave the sergeant orders to look in the lumber-room,
where a new pair of fetters was discovered.
“Take care you don’t lose these!” said the officer, as I packed them
among my luggage.
This is a specimen of the indulgent, almost fatherly demeanour which our
guardians more and more assumed towards us as we got further east.
We were by this time in the thick of the Siberian winter and its
severities. We had passed the Yablonovoi mountain ridges, and were
nearing Tchita, the capital of Transbaikalia. At the last station before
our arrival there we observed a great bustle going on among the ordinary
prisoners; the sergeant and the soldiers were occupied with them all
night, continually going in and out in a quite unusual manner. We racked
our brains to imagine what could be on foot; but the riddle was only
solved next day, as will be seen further.
Although the distance from Tchita was considerable for one day’s
march,—about forty versts (twenty-six miles), I think,—we started very
late on the following morning; but after about twenty versts’ march we
came to a lonely farmhouse, standing all by itself on the high-road. We
had heard from our comrades who had been in Kara that an old man lived
here who gave himself out as a Decabrist.[74]
Footnote 74:
The participators in the revolt of December, 1825, on the occasion of
Nicholas I.’s accession, were so called.
Our party halted in the courtyard, we “politicals” were shown into a
room, and the master of the house presently paid us a visit. He
introduced himself by the name of Karovàiev; and was a vivacious old
gentleman, of eminently respectable appearance. According to his account
of himself he had been an ensign in the Guards, had taken part in the
revolt of the Decabrists, and had been exiled to Siberia; he claimed to
be eighty years of age, but did not look more than sixty-five. He made
himself very agreeable, and was most anxious to show us hospitality,
declining to take any money from us. Meanwhile in the next room and the
corridor things were very lively; there seemed to be a sort of combined
market and feast going on, soldiers and convicts eating, drinking, and
hobnobbing together like boon companions.
It was already dark when we arrived at the gates of the prison in
Tchita, where we had at once to engage in a struggle with the governor:
first, because he received the ordinary prisoners first, leaving us to
wait; and next, because he gave us a room which was absolutely unfit for
us to spend the night in. Only after we had made a great fuss, and
threatened him with complaints, did he give us proper accommodation.
Next day, when the party was mustered for departure, it became apparent
that the ordinary prisoners had hardly any clothes! Their things had
vanished, and they were literally half naked. A light was now cast on
the events of the preceding night, when there had been such a carousal
at the house of the Decabrist. That respectable and hospitable old
gentleman was evidently in league with the escort, and had provided the
convicts with vodka and other delicacies, in exchange for their
clothing, which no doubt he had obtained at a bargain. That the
transaction might not be discovered before our arrival in Tchita, the
soldiers saw to it that it should be as late as possible before we got
in, so that the inspection should be gone through hurriedly, and the
absence of the clothes not perceived.
In short, the respectable Karovàiev had not established himself in that
lonely spot for nothing. The jollification of the unlucky criminals had
evil consequences for themselves. In proportion as their clothing and
other State property were deficient they were treated to the soundest of
thrashings; and only when that had been administered did they receive a
fresh outfit.
In Tchita we had to part from our good _stàrosta_ Làzarev, who was to be
interned here. We three others determined to secure for ourselves a
thorough rest in this place; for we had been six weeks on the march from
Irkutsk, and were thoroughly tired out. We felt in no hurry to go on; a
prison awaited us, while on the journey we had at least a certain amount
of freedom and variety. Moreover, we knew that there were a number of
our comrades interned at Tchita, and we should be able to see something
of them; while apparently all intercourse with the outer world would
cease for us after this stage, where we must make our last adieux before
the prison doors closed on us. We therefore reported ourselves sick, and
easily got the prison doctor’s consent to our breaking the journey here;
which meant that we should be picked up by the next convoy in about a
fortnight’s time. Our comrades paid us frequent visits; that is, they
came to the prison gate when we were in the courtyard. The most
interesting news they gave us concerned the travels of the American
writer, George Kennan, who had just arrived in Tchita on his return
journey from Kara; and our friends were full of praise for that
excellent man.
During the last days of November we started again, this time in company
with a so-called “family party” of ordinary prisoners—women and children
as well as men going forward to prison and exile. There had not been
much snow that winter, and instead of sledges two-wheeled carts were our
means of transport, travelling in which was a positive martyrdom. The
cold became more intense every day, and tried us severely, although we
wore every warm garment we possessed, so that we moved with the greatest
difficulty. The only way to keep warm was to march beside the carts, and
one can imagine the sufferings of the unfortunate children who were
accompanying their parents into this inhospitable desert. One longed for
the next halting-station and for possibilities of warming oneself, which
even there were not always all that could be desired. The
halting-stations had sometimes not been heated for a good while, and the
ordinary prisoners had first to chop wood with their numb and frozen
hands; even then there was not always sufficient fuel. The stoves, too,
were often out of order, and smoked so badly that to stay in the room
was a misery. It happened repeatedly that we three “politicals” were
accommodated in a peasant’s hut, and sometimes the whole party had to be
quartered in like manner. We were always glad when this happened, for
the wretchedest cabin seemed comfortable in comparison with even the
best _étape_. How often we wished we could be by ourselves in a hut of
this kind during the rest of our imprisonment!
* * * * *
I have said that relations between prisoners and escort were now very
easy-going; strict discipline was no longer the watchword on either
side. This had its disadvantages, the soldiers being often very rough
with the ordinary prisoners. One day, as we were marching to Nertchinsk,
I saw a soldier behaving very brutally to a poor feeble old convict,
knocking him about with his rifle-butt for climbing on to one of the
carts, and apparently only because the soldier had meant to ride on it
himself. I intervened, and called to the sergeant in command that I
should report him for not keeping his men in order. Next day, as we went
through the town on our way to the prison, I stepped into a sausage shop
to buy some provisions, when the soldier whose party I had left called
after me, “Where are you going? What do you want?” I let him shout, and
concluded my purchases. I then saw that the sergeant had driven on and
disappeared, but I only thought that he had taken some short cut to the
prison and would meet us there, and I was much surprised when the
governor of the gaol received me with the information that the sergeant
had reported me for insulting the guard and leaving the ranks without
permission. I suppose he wished to forestall the complaint I had
threatened him with, about which I had quite forgotten, and I now turned
the tables on him by making it in due form. The upshot was that the
sergeant apologised to me in the presence of witnesses, and we were
respectively pleased to withdraw our complaints!
At Nertchinsk, Tchuikòv and I were taken to the men’s prison, and Maria
Kalyùshnaya was given a separate cell. I shall never in my life forget
the picture that prison presented. From the dimly-lighted corridor one
could see into the various rooms, where the prisoners were already lying
down, as it was late. Packed closely side by side they lay not only on
the wooden bed-places (which were two wide shelves running along the
walls one above the other), but all about the floor; there was literally
not an inch of vacant space. Most of the men were clad in shirt and
trousers, but many had only trousers on, and lay uncovered on the filthy
floor. The throng was so dense, that in order to get to the “privileged”
room we had actually to step on the bodies of the sleepers. The stench
was pestilential, the wooden tubs filled with excrement were everywhere
about, and as they were leaky their contents had been trodden over the
whole floor. Although most of the men were asleep, here and there groups
of excited card-players squatted on the floor or the bed-places, and
throughout the whole place there was a deafening babel of sounds. The
general effect was most gruesome, a circle of the Dantean Inferno was
the only possible comparison.
The “privileged” room was also full of people, and we found there some
comrades from Kara—Tchekondze and Zuckermann. They were lying close
together on the crowded floor, and we with difficulty found a vacant
spot, so that we could lie down near our friends. Zuckermann was known
to me: he was a compositor, who in the middle of the sixties had trudged
on foot from Berlin into Switzerland, where I subsequently had made his
acquaintance. He had gone to Russia later, and had worked at the secret
printing-press of the _Naròdnaia Vòlya_, where he was arrested at the
same time as Sophia Ivànova. I had been told by comrades how heroically
he had behaved during the trial. In order to shield the others he had
taken all blame on his own shoulders, declared that it was he who had
fired the first shot in resistance to the gendarmerie, and so on. He had
been condemned to eight years’ “katorga” and sent to Kara, where he had
become the darling of the whole prison. Always sunny-tempered, full of
wit and fun, he spread good humour everywhere; moreover, he was
unselfishness personified, ever ready to help others at his own expense,
one of those people who are called “too good for this world.” Even as we
lay on the floor in that horrible place he told stories and jested,
drawing the most glowing imaginary pictures of his future life in
Yakutsk, whither he was being sent for internment. The reality,
unhappily, turned out widely different from his sanguine prophecies.
Poor merry Zuckermann could not hold out against the hardships and
loneliness of his place of exile, and he put an end to his own life.
Tchekondze I had not met before, but we had many common friends. He came
from Gruzia, and had graduated in the Petersburg college for artillery
officers. With other Caucasians he had then participated in the
Propagandist movement, had been arrested in 1875, and sentenced in the
“Trial of the fifty” to banishment; but he had escaped from Siberia, and
had been recaptured and condemned to three years’ penal servitude. He
was now going into exile in Yakutsk. He impressed one as a
strong-willed, careful, practical man, who would never be at a loss, but
would find a sphere of usefulness under any circumstances; and so indeed
he proved in his after life. The privations he suffered during long
years of exile undermined his health, however. When sent to Western
Siberia in the early nineties he fell seriously ill and died in Kurgan,
on the threshold of Europe, in 1897.
At last, on the morning of December 24th, 1885, we arrived at Ust-Kara,
a little village wherein is situated the prison for ordinary convicts
and the prison for women “politicals.” Here we had to part from Maria
Kalyùshnaya, and I saw her that morning for the last time. Tchuikòv and
I had fifteen versts more to travel to Nizhnaya Kara, where was the
prison for male “politicals”; and we had to wait till next day for the
commandant, who received in charge both ourselves and the ordinary
criminals. Our luggage was put into a cart; and accompanied by a guard,
we marched off, having previously donned our fetters in due form.
It was a frightfully cold day, and despite the chains and our heavy
clothing, we stepped out briskly as though we were in a hurry to get
under lock and key. We knew that this was our last tramp in the open,
that for many long years there would be only a trot round the
prison-yard for us, and our thoughts dwelt dismally on the prospect.
“There is your prison,” said one of the soldiers, and pointed out, a
little way ahead, a stockade made of tall posts set side by side.
Suddenly there appeared coming towards us a group of people—two women, a
Cossack, and a man in civilian dress. “Victor!” I cried, recognising the
latter as we approached nearer. It was my old friend Victor Kostyùrin,
whom I had not seen for nine years.[75] He was now being removed from
prison to his place of internment.
Footnote 75:
He had been sentenced in 1879 to ten years’ “katorga,” on account of
the assault on Gorinòvitch (see page 11).
After hasty greetings he introduced me to the two ladies who accompanied
him—Natalia Armfeld and Raissa Prybylyèva, both “colonists” in Kara.
Kennan has given Natalia Armfeld’s story in his book,[76] and I will
only mention here that in 1879 she (with Maria Kovalèvskaya) was
implicated in armed resistance to the gendarmerie, and sentenced to
fourteen years and ten months’ penal servitude. Raissa Prybylyèva had
been a member of the _Naròdnaia Vòlya_, and had been sentenced in 1883
to four years’ “katorga.”
Footnote 76:
_Siberia and the Exile System_, by George Kennan.
Victor and I had, of course, much to say to each other, but our time was
short, for our guards naturally did not see the fun of remaining longer
than necessary in the freezing cold of the open field, and a few brief
sentences were all we could exchange.
“A Frenchman would have had a lot to say about this,” I said: “we two
friends meeting on the threshold of a prison, one going in, the other
coming out.”
Another pressure of the hand, and we parted.[77]
Footnote 77:
Everyone will see the dramatic element in this situation if it is
remembered that this friend had been tried and condemned on account of
that attempt to kill the spy Gorinòvitch, in which Deutsch had been
the chief actor; and that now the one had just finished his term of
imprisonment, while the other was commencing his.—_Trans._
“Shall we ever meet again?” I asked.
“Ah yes!” cried one of the ladies. “We shall all meet in Petersburg at
the triumph of the Russian revolution.”
For her, at least, that hope was vain. Natalia Armfeld died at Kara in
1887, and Raissa Prybylyèva (who married afterwards the exile Tiutchev)
is also no longer among the living. Kostyùrin still lives in Tobolsk;
but since that day our paths have never again crossed.
* * * * *
Tchuikòv and I were now taken to the guard-room, which was close to the
prison. Our arrival was notified; and soon there appeared, accompanied
by some of the gendarmes, the governor of the prison, an officer of
Cossacks named Bolshakov, a man who had been described to us by our
comrades as respectable and humane.
We and our luggage were carefully searched. Of our clothes only our warm
under-garments were left in our possession; everything else was to be
taken to the wardrobe-room, except certain articles which were reserved
that Commandant Nikolin might decide whether we should be permitted to
retain possession of them.
“You need not put the fetters on again,” said the captain of the guard,
Golubtsòv. “They are not necessary here.”
It was evening before we were ready to be taken on by the gendarmes to
the prison—the goal of my long wanderings. Since my arrest in Freiburg
twenty-two months had elapsed; I had travelled about 12,000 versts
(nearly 8,000 miles), and I had visited more than a hundred different
prisons.
“Guard, there!” cried our escort. A bolt flew back with a crash, and we
stepped across the threshold.
[Illustration: MARTINOVSKY]
[Illustration: STARINKYEVITCH]
[Illustration: SUNDELEVITCH]
[Illustration: ZLATOPOLSKY]
[Illustration: PRYBYLYEV]
[Illustration: YEMELYANOV]
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