Dynamite in Politics-Historical Assassinations—Infernal
Machines in France—The Inventor of Dynamite—M. Nobel and his
Ideas—The Nitro-Compounds—How Dynamite is Made—The New French
Explosive—“Black Jelly” and the Nihilists—What the Nihilists Believe
and What they Want—The Conditions in Russia—The White and the Red
Terrors—Vera Sassoulitch—Tourgeneff and the Russian Girl—The
Assassination of the Czar—“It is too Soon to Thank God”—The Dying
Emperor—Two Bombs Thrown—Running Down The Conspirators—Sophia
Perowskaja, the Nihilist Leader—The Handkerchief Signal—The Murder
Roll—Tried and Convicted—A Brutal Execution—Five Nihilists Pay
the Penalty—Last Words Spoken but Unheard—A Deafening Tattoo—The
Book-bomb and the Present Czar—Strychnine-coated Bullets—St.
Peter and Paul’s Fortress—Dynamite Outrages in England—The Record
of Crime—Twenty-nine Convicts and their Offenses—Ingenious
Bomb-making—The Failures of Dynamite.
THE attempt to gain political ends by an appeal to infernal machines
is not a new one. It is as old as gunpowder—and the evangel of
assassination is older still. Murder was the recognized political
weapon of the Eastern and Western Empires, and the Chicago Anarchists
have proved themselves neither better nor worse than the “old man of
the mountain” or the Italian princes of the middle ages. During the
reign of Mary Queen of Scots the mysterious explosion occurred in the
Kirk of Feld in which Darnley lost his life. Somewhat later was the
“gunpowder plot,” in which Guy Fawkes and his fellow conspirators tried
to blow up the Houses of Parliament. The petard and the hand-grenade
were the grandfather and the grandmother of the modern bomb, and
murderous invention came to its new phase in the infernal machine which
Ceruchi, the Italian sculptor, contrived to kill Napoleon when First
Consul—a catastrophe which was avoided by the fact that Napoleon’s
coachman was drunk and took the wrong turn in going to the opera-house.
France was fertile in this sort of machinery. Some years later Fieschi,
Morey and Pepin tried to kill Louis Philippe with a similar apparatus
on the Boulevard de Temple. The King escaped, but the brave Marshal
Mortier was slain. Orsini and Pieri made a bomb, round and bristling
with nippers, each of which was charged with fulminate of mercury, to
explode the powder within, meaning to assassinate the Emperor Napoleon
and the Empress Eugenie.
In the year 1866, according to the most trustworthy authorities,
dynamite was first made by Alfred Nobel. In speaking of the invention,
Adolf Houssaye, the French litterateur, recently said:
It should be remembered that nine-tenths, probably, of the dynamite
made is used in peaceful pursuits; in mining, and similar works.
Indeed, since its invention great engineering achievements have been
accomplished which would have been entirely impossible without it. I
do not see, then, much room for doubt that it has on the whole been
a great blessing to humanity. Such certainly its inventor regards
it. “If I did not look upon it as such,” I heard him say recently, “I
should close up all my manufactories and not make another ounce of the
stuff.” He is a strong advocate of peace, and regards with the utmost
horror the use of dynamite by assassins and political conspirators.
When the news of the Haymarket tragedy in Chicago reached him, M.
Nobel was in Paris, and I well remember his expressions of horror and
detestation at the cowardly crime.
“Look you,” he exclaimed. “I am a man of peace. But when I see these
miscreants misusing my invention, do you know how it makes me feel? It
makes me feel like gathering the whole crowd of them into a storehouse
full of dynamite and blowing them all up together!”
Few people know what dynamite is, though it has attracted a good deal
of attention of late, and before considering its use as a mode for
political murder it may be well here to give an account of its making.
Nitro-glycerine, although not the strongest explosive known to
science, is the only one of any industrial importance, as the others
are too dangerous for manufacture. It was discovered by Salvero, an
Italian chemist, in 1845. It is composed of glycerine and nitric
acid compounded together in a certain proportion, and at a certain
temperature. It is very unsafe to handle, and to this reason is to
be ascribed the invention of dynamite, which is, after all, merely
a sort of earth and nitro-glycerine, the use of the earth being to
hold the explosive safely as a piece of blotting-paper would hold
water until it was needed. Nobel first tried kieselguhr, or flint
froth, which was ground to a powder, heated thoroughly and dried,
and the nitro-glycerine was kneaded into it like so much dough. Of
course, many other substances are now used, besides infusorial earth,
as vehicles for the explosive—saw-dust, rotten-stone, charcoal,
plaster of Paris, black powder, etc., etc. These are all forms of
dynamite or giant powder, and mean the same thing. When the substance
is thoroughly kneaded, work that must be done with the hands, it is
molded into sticks somewhat like big candles, and wrapped in parchment
paper. Nitro-glycerine has a sweet, aromatic, pungent taste, and the
peculiar property of causing a violent headache when placed on the
tongue or the wrist. It freezes at 40° Fahrenheit, and must be melted
by the application of water at a temperature of 100°. In dynamite
the usual proportions are 25 per cent. of earth and 75 per cent. of
nitro-glycerine. The explosive is fired by fulminate of silver or
mercury in copper caps.
Outside of the French arsenals it is to be doubted if anybody knows
anything more about the new explosive, melinite, further than that
it is one of the compounds of picric acid—and picric acid is a more
frightful explosive than nitro-glycerine. I find in my scrap-book the
following excerpt from the London _Standard_, describing the artillery
experiments at Lydd with the new explosive which the British Admiralty
has lately been examining. The _Standard_, after declaring that the
experiments are “entirely satisfactory,” says:
The character of the compound employed is said to be “akin to
melinite,” but its precise nature is not divulged. We have reason
to believe that the “kinship” is very close. The details of the
experiments which have lately been conducted at Lydd are known to
very few individuals. But it is unquestionable that the results were
such as demonstrate the enormous advantage to be gained by using a
more powerful class of explosives than that which has been hitherto
employed. There could be no mistake as to the destructive energy of
the projectiles. Neither was there any mishap in the use of these
terrible appliances. The like immunity was enjoyed at Portsmouth. A
deterrent to the adoption of violent explosives for war purposes has
consisted in the risk of premature explosion. But there is still the
consideration that the advantage to be gained far exceeds the risk
which has to be incurred. France has not neglected this question, and
she is ahead of us. Her chosen explosive is melinite, and with this
she has armed herself to an extent of which the British public has
no conception. All the requisite materials, in the shape of steel
projectiles and the melinite for filling them, have been provided for
the French service and distributed so as to furnish a complete supply
for the army and the navy. Whatever may be said as to the danger which
besets the use of melinite, the French authorities are confident
that they have mastered the problem of making this powerful compound
subservient to the purposes of war. Concerning the composition of
this explosive great secrecy is observed by the French Government, as
also with regard to the experiments that are made with it. But Col.
Majendie states that melinite is largely composed of picric acid in
a fused or consolidated condition. Of the violence with which picric
acid will explode, an example was given on the occasion of a fire at
some chemical works near Manchester a year ago. The shock was felt
over a distance of two miles from the seat of the explosion, and the
sound was heard for a distance of twenty miles.
The conduct of the French in committing themselves so absolutely to
the use of melinite as a _material_ of war clearly signifies that
with them the use of such a substance has passed out of the region of
doubt and experiment. Their experimental investigations extended over
a considerable period of time, but at last the stage of inquiry gave
place to one of confidence and assurance. So great is the confidence
of the French Government in the new shell that it is said the French
forts are henceforth to be protected by a composite material better
adapted than iron or steel to resist the force of a projectile charged
with a high explosive. In naval warfare the value of shells charged
in this manner is likely to be more especially shown in connection
with the rapid-fire guns which are now coming into use. The question
is whether the ponderous _staccato_ fire of monster ordnance may not
be largely superseded by another mode of attack, in which a storm of
shells, charged with something far more potent than gunpowder, will be
poured forth in a constant stream from numerous guns of comparatively
small weight and caliber.
Combined with rapidity of fire, these shells cannot but prove
formidable to an armor-clad, independently of any damage inflicted
on the plates. The great thickness now given to ship armor is
accomplished by a mode of concentration which, while affecting to
shield the vital parts, leaves a large portion of the ship entirely
unprotected. On the unarmored portion a tremendous effect will be
produced by the quick-firing guns dashing their powerful shells in a
fiery deluge on the ship.
Altogether the new force which is now entering into the composition of
artillery is one which demands the attention of the British Government
in the form of prompt and vigorous action. While we are experimenting,
others are arming.
Dynamite, however, is the weapon with which the “revolution” has armed
itself for its assault upon society. A terrible arm truly, but one
difficult to handle, dangerous to hold, and certainly no stronger in
their hands than in ours, if it should ever become necessary to use it
in defense of law and order.
A number of Russian chemists, members of the Nihilist party, were
the first to apply dynamite to the work of murder. It is to their
researches that is to be credited the invention of the “black jelly,”
so called, of which so much was expected, and by which so little was
done.
Nihilist activity in Russia commenced almost as soon as the emancipated
peasantry began to be in condition for the evangel of discontent.
It was Tourgeneff, the novelist, who baptized the movement with its
name of Nihilism—and the truth is that it is a movement rather than
an organization. It is a loose, uncentralized, uncodified society,
secret by necessity and murderous by belief; but it is a secret society
without grips or passwords, without a purpose save indiscriminate
destruction, and its very formlessness and vagueness have been its
chief protection from the Russian police, who are, perhaps, after all
is said and done, the best police in the world. A statement of Nihilism
by that very famous Nihilist who is known as Stepniak, but who is
suspected to be entitled to a much more illustrious name, runs thus:
By our general conviction we are Socialists and democrats. We are
convinced that on Socialistic grounds humanity can become the
embodiment of freedom, equality and fraternity, while it secures for
itself a general prosperity, a harmonious development of man and his
social progress. We are convinced, moreover, that only the will of
the people should give sanction to any social institution, and that
the development of the nation is sound only when free and independent
and when every idea in practical use shall have previously passed the
test of national consideration and of the national will. We further
think that as Socialists and democrats we must first recognize an
immediate purpose to liberate the nation from its present state of
oppression by creating a political revolution. We would thus transfer
the supreme power into the hands of the people. We think that the will
of the nation should be expressed with perfect clearness, and best, by
a National Assembly freely elected by the votes of all the citizens,
the representatives to be carefully instructed by their constituents.
We do not consider this as the ideal form of expressing the people’s
will, but as the most acceptable form to be realized in practice.
Submitting ourselves to the will of the nation, we, as a party,
feel bound to appear before our own country with our own programme
or platform, which we shall propagate even before the revolution,
recommend to the electors during electoral periods, and afterwards
defend in the National Assembly.
The Nihilist programme in Russia has been officially formulated thus:
_First_—The permanent Representative Assembly to have supreme control
and direction in all general state questions.
_Second_—In the provinces, self-government to a large extent; to
secure it, all public functionaries to be elected.
_Third_—To secure the independence of the Village Commune (“Mir”) as
an economical and administrative unit.
_Fourth_—All the land to be proclaimed national property.
_Fifth_—A series of measures preparatory to a final transfer of
ownership in manufactures to the workmen.
_Sixth_—Perfect liberty of conscience, of the press, speech,
meetings, associations and electoral agitation.
_Seventh_—The right to vote to be extended to all citizens of legal
age, without class or property restrictions.
_Eighth_—Abolition of the standing army; the army to be replaced by a
territorial militia.
It must be remembered that the conditions in Russia are peculiar. The
country is ruled by an autocracy; government is not by the people,
but by “divine right.” The conditions which the English-speaking
people ended at Runnymede still exist in Muscovy. There is neither
free speech, free assembly, nor a free press, and naturally discontent
vents itself in revolt. There is no safety-valve. Russia is full of
generous, high-minded young men and women, who find their church
dead, and their state a cruel despotism. They find themselves face to
face with the White Terror, and they have sought in the Red Terror a
relief. Flying at last from the hopeless contest, they have carried
the hate of government born of bad ruling into Western Europe, and it
is the infection of this poison that we have to deal with here. The
average Russian Nihilist is a young man or a young woman—very often
the latter—who, by the contemplation of real wrongs and fallacious
remedies, has come to be the implacable enemy of all order and all
system. Usually they are half-educated, with just that superficial
smattering of knowledge to make them conceited in their own opinions,
but without enough real learning to make them either impartial critics
or safe citizens of non-Russian countries. We can pity them, for it is
easy to see how step by step they have been pushed into revolt. But
they are dangerous.
When one reads such a case as that which gave Vera Sassoulitch her
notoriety, it is easier to understand Russia. General Trepoff, the
Chief of Police of St. Petersburg, had arrested Vera’s lover on
suspicion of high treason. The young man was by Trepoff’s order
frequently flogged to make him confess his crime. Sassoulitch called
on Trepoff and shot him. She was tried by a St. Petersburg jury and
acquitted. Immediately a law was declared that no case of political
crime should be tried by a jury, except when the Government had
selected it. The arrest of the woman was ordered that she might be
tried again under the new regulation, but in the meantime her friends
had spirited her away.
A very similar crime was that attempted by another Nihilist heroine,
Maria Kaliouchnaia, who attempted to kill Col. Katauski for his
severity to her brother. In the assassination of the Czar, as I shall
relate, a number of women were concerned, and their bravery was greatly
more desperate than that of their male companions. The Russian woman
is peculiar. I know no better picture of the “devoted ones” than that
given in Tourgeneff’s “Verses in Prose”:
I see a huge building with a narrow door in its front wall; the door
is open, and a dismal darkness stretches beyond. Before the high
threshold stands a girl—a Russian girl. Frost breathes out of the
impenetrable darkness, and with the icy draught from the depths of the
building there comes forth a slow and hollow voice:
“Oh, thou who art wanting to cross this threshold, dost thou know what
awaits thee?”
“I know it,” answers the girl.
“Cold, hunger, hatred, derision, contempt, insults, a fearful death
even.”
“I know it.”
“Complete isolation and separation from all?”
“I know it. I am ready. I will bear all sorrows and miseries.”
“Not only if inflicted by enemies, but when done by kindred and
friends?”
“Yes, even when done by them.”
“Well, are you ready for self-sacrifice?”
“Yes!”
“For anonymous self-sacrifice? You shall die, and nobody shall know
even whose memory is to be honored?”
“I want neither gratitude nor pity. I want no name.”
“Are you ready for a crime?”
The girl bent her head. “I am ready—even for a crime.”
The voice paused awhile before renewing its interrogatories. Then
again: “Dost thou know,” it said at last, “that thou mayest lose thy
faith in what thou now believest; that thou mayest feel that thou hast
been mistaken and hast lost thy young life in vain?”
“I know that also, and nevertheless I will enter!”
“Enter, then!”
The girl crossed the threshold, and a heavy curtain fell behind her.
“A fool!” gnashed some one outside.
“A saint!” answered a voice from somewhere.
With such material it was not difficult to build up the tragedy of
1881. Before the day of the Czar’s death came, there had been desperate
attempts upon his life. Prince Krapotkin, a relative of the Nihilist
of the same name, was murdered in February, 1879, and following this
deed the terrorists applied themselves resolutely to the removal of the
Emperor.
[Illustration: EXCAVATED DYNAMITE MINE IN MOSCOW.]
For instance, in November, 1879, was the mine laid at Moscow. It was
intended to blow up the railway train upon which the Czar was to enter
the city, and for this purpose Solovieff and his comrades laid three
dynamite mines under the tracks. Hartmann, who subsequently figured in
the assassination, was one of the leaders, and here, too, was Sophie
Peroosky, another of the regicides. They hired a house near the railway
tracks and tunneled under the road amidst incredible difficulties and
always in the most imminent danger. One hundred and twenty pounds of
dynamite was in position, but the Czar passed by in a common train
before the imperial one on which he was expected, and his life was
saved. On February 5, 1880, the mine under the Winter Palace was
exploded; eleven persons were killed, but again the Czar escaped.
For some time before March 13, 1881, Gen. Count Loris Melikoff, the
officer responsible for the safety of Czar Alexander II., had received
disquieting reports which gave him the greatest anxiety. On the 10th
of the month Jelaboff, the ringleader of the conspiracy, was arrested
by accident, and the direction of the attempt on the Czar’s life was
accordingly left to Sophie Perowskaja, a young, pretty and highly
educated noblewoman, who had left everything to join the Nihilists. It
is said that on the morning of the 13th Melikoff begged the Czar to
forego his purpose of reviewing the Marine Corps, and keep within the
palace. The Emperor laughed at him, and declared there was no danger.
There was no incident until after the review. As the Emperor drove back
beside the Ekaterinofsky Canal, just opposite the imperial stables, a
young woman on the other side of the canal fluttered a handkerchief,
and immediately a man started out from the crowd that was watching the
passing of the Czar, and threw a bomb under the closed carriage. There
was a roaring explosion, a cloud of smoke. The rear of the vehicle was
blown away, and the horror-stricken multitude saw the Czar standing
unhurt, staring about him. On the ground were several members of the
Life Guard, groaning and writhing in pain. The assassin had pulled
out a revolver to complete his work, but he was at once mobbed by
the people. Col. Dvorjitsky and Captains Kock and Kulebiekan, of the
guards, rushed up to their master and asked him if he was hurt.
“Thank God! no,” said the Czar. “Come, let us look after the wounded.”
And he started toward one of the Cossacks.
“It is too soon to thank God yet, Alexander Nicolaivitch,” said a
clear, threatening voice in the crowd, and before any one could stop
him, a young man bounded forward, lifted up both arms above his head,
and brought them down with a swing. There was a crash of dynamite,
a blaze, a smoke, and the autocrat of all the Russias was lying on
the bloody snow, with his murderer also dying in front of him. Col.
Dvorjitsky lifted up the Czar, who whispered:
“I am cold, my friend, so cold,—take me to the Winter Palace to die.”
The desperate Nihilist had thrown his bomb right between the Czar’s
feet, and had sacrificed his own life to kill the Emperor.
Alexander was shockingly mutilated. Both of his legs were broken,
and the lower part of his body was frightfully torn and mangled. The
assassin—his name was Nicholas Elnikoff, of Wilna—was even more badly
hurt. He died at once.
[Illustration: “IT IS TOO SOON TO THANK GOD!” THE ASSASSINATION OF CZAR
ALEXANDER II.]
The Czar was taken into an open sled, and although it was claimed he
received the last sacrament at the Winter Palace, most of those who
know believe that he died on the way there.
In the meantime the police, with the utmost difficulty, rescued the
first bomb-thrower from the maddened mob. The man, whose name proved to
be Risakoff, coolly thanked the officers for preserving him, and then
tried to swallow some poison which he had ready. In this he was foiled,
and he was taken to prison.
[Illustration: THE CZAR’S CARRIAGE AFTER THE EXPLOSION.
From a Photograph.]
The infernal machine used by Elnikoff was about 7½ inches in height,
and its construction is exemplified in the annexed diagram. Metal tubes
(_b b_) filled with chlorate of potash, and enclosing glass tubes
(_c c_) filled with sulphuric acid (commonly called oil of vitriol),
intersect the cylinder. Around the glass tubes are rings of iron (_d
d_) closely attached as weights. The construction is such that, no
matter how the bomb falls, one of the glass tubes is sure to break. The
chlorate of potash in that case, combining with the sulphuric acid,
ignites at once, and the flames communicate over the fuse (_f f_) with
the piston (_e_), filled with fulminate of silver. The concussion thus
caused explodes the dynamite or “black jelly” (_a_) with which the
cylinder is closely packed.
[Illustration]
I said above that Jelaboff, the real leader of the conspiracy, had been
arrested on the 10th. He was merely a suspect, and it was some time
before the police realized what an important arrest had been made.
Only two hours before the murder of the Emperor, Jelaboff’s house was
searched, and there was found a great quantity of black dynamite,
India rubber tubes, fuses and other articles. Jelaboff had been living
here with a woman who was called Lidia Voinoff. This Lidia Voinoff was
arrested on the Newsky Prospect, on March 22nd, and almost immediately
identified as Sophia Perowskaja, the young woman who had given the
handkerchief signal to the bomb-throwers, and who was wanted besides
for the Moscow railway mine case. On the prisoner were found papers
which led to the search of a house on Telejewskaia Street, where a
man named Sablin committed suicide immediately on the appearance of
the police, and a woman named Hessy Helfmann was arrested. A regular
Nihilist arsenal of black jelly, fuses, maps of different districts of
St. Petersburg, with the Czar’s usual routes marked upon them, copies
of papers from the secret press, etc., were found. While the police
were still engaged in the search of the premises Timothy Mikhaeloff
came in by accident. He was taken, and on him was found a copy of the
new Czar’s proclamation, and penciled on the back were the names of
three shops with three different hours in the afternoon. The officers
descended on these places and gathered in customers, shop-keepers and
everybody else about the place,—a process which brought in Kibaltchik,
the Nihilist chemist and bomb-maker.
The evidence was soon got in shape, and early in April the trial
began. It was shown that Jelaboff was agent in the third degree of
the Revolutionary Executive Committee; that he had issued the call
for volunteers for the killing of the Czar, and that forty-seven
persons had offered themselves, out of whom Risakoff, Mikhaeloff,
Hessy Helfmann, Kibaltchik, Sophia Perowskaja and Elnikoff had been
accepted. Elnikoff was dead, but the others, with Jelaboff, were put
in the dock. They all confessed except Hessy Helfmann, and upon April
11th all were condemned to death, with the proviso needed under the
Russian law that the sentence of Sophia Perowskaja should be approved
by the Czar, as she was a member of the class of nobles, and a noble
may not be put to death without the Emperor’s concurrence. The Czar
concurred, and on April 15th, at 9 a. m., all the prisoners save
Hessy Helfmann were hung. This woman was reprieved because she was
about to become a mother. The execution was a most brutal one. It
took place on a plain two miles out of the city, in the presence of a
hundred thousand people. The prisoners were taken out of the fortress
on two-wheeled carts, surrounded by drummers and pipers, who played
continuously and loudly, so that nothing the condemned might say could
be heard by the crowd. At the scaffold the drummers were stationed in
a hollow square around the gallows, and a deafening tattoo was kept up
from the time the prisoners were brought in until their bodies were
cut down. The hanging was very cruel. Each person was mounted on a
small box, after kissing each other passionately all round. They said
something, but it could not be heard for the drumming. The executioner
was said to be evidently drunk. There was no drop. When the signal was
given the condemned were pushed off their boxes and left to strangle.
Mikhaeloff’s rope broke twice, and the attendants held him up while
the executioner tied a new cord around his neck and over the beam. The
bodies were buried privately.
The present Czar has had several narrow escapes, none of them more
nearly fatal than the conspiracy of the book-bomb in March last. On the
13th of March, 1888, the anniversary of his father’s terrible death,
the Czar made the usual visit to the Cathedral of St. Peter and Paul,
where the body of Alexander II. is buried. For some time before the
ceremony St. Petersburg was full of rumors that a catastrophe was
impending, and, although the police took the most careful precautions,
the Czar himself paid no attention to the warnings of the “Third
Section,” and would permit no alteration in the preparations for the
requiem.
In Christmas week of 1887, the Russian agents at Geneva, in
Switzerland, reported the presence in that city of two revolutionary
agents who seemed to have the closest relations with the committee of
the discontents in London and Paris. They were shadowed for a time, but
lost. In February they reappeared in Berlin. They were known to be in
communication with the St. Petersburg Nihilists. Before facts enough
had accumulated to justify their arrest they disappeared once more
and were believed to have gone to the Russian capital. The facts were
reported to the Czar, but he laughed at Chief Gresser of the capital
police.
[Illustration: THE NIHILISTS IN THE DOCK.
1. Risakoff. 2. Mikhaeloff. 3. Hessy Helfmann. 4. Kibaltchik. 5. Sophia
Peroffskaja. 6. Jelaboff.]
In solemnizing the requiem of the late Czar a public progress was made
to the Cathedral, amid a dense throng of citizens, among whom were
all the detectives that Chief Gresser could get together. In a small
café in one of the side streets of the Morokaya two of the detectives
ran across a couple of uniformed university students—in Russia the
students have a peculiar costume—who were acting suspiciously. They
were conversing in a most excited manner with a man dressed as a
peasant. The trio were watched. At the café door they separated, but
all three made by different routes for the Newsky Prospect, the chief
drive of the capital and the one along which the Czar was to return.
The peasant was lost by the detectives, but the other two were kept in
sight, and the suspicions of the police were made all the more keen
by the fact that the young men passed each other in the crowd several
times with an elaborate appearance of not knowing each other. One of
them had a law-book in his hand; the other had a traveling-bag over his
shoulder.
[Illustration: EXECUTION OF THE NIHILIST CONSPIRATORS.]
A few moments before the Czar was to pass on his return from the
Cathedral the students came together and whispered, and the two
were immediately and quietly arrested. Their names were given as
Andreieffsky and Petroff, university students, and this was proven to
be the truth.
A thrilling discovery was made, however, at once. The innocent-looking
law-book was really a most dangerous infernal machine—sufficiently
powerful not alone to kill everybody in the Czar’s carriage, but many
in the crowd, and perhaps to have blown down some of the neighboring
houses. The traveling-sack was full of dynamite bombs of the ordinary
spherical pattern.
[Illustration: Fig. 1. Interior. Fig. 2. Exterior.
A. Glass Tube. B. Fulminate. C. Bullets. D. Dynamite.]
I reproduce here a diagram of the book-bomb from the excellent account
of the attempted assassination given by the New York _World_ a few days
after it occurred.
The outside was made of wood and pasteboard, so artistically that only
the closest inspection would discover the fact that the machine was
not really a book. In the center of the interior, in the place marked
_C_, were a number of hollow bullets filled with strychnine, which
poison was also plastered upon the outside of the missiles. Above this
were small compartments filled with fulminate, with a glass tube of
sulphuric acid. To the tube was tied a string, which would break it
when thrown, spilling it into the fulminate and thus exploding the
dynamite with which the whole of the hollow parts of the interior was
densely packed. Fully a hundred people must have been killed had the
bomb been exploded as intended. The expert who examined the bomb, after
handling the bullets carelessly put his finger in his mouth, and was
seriously, though not fatally, poisoned.
Hardly had the arrest been made when the Czar was notified at the
Cathedral. He ordered that the news should be withheld from the
Empress, although he was himself visibly affected. He sprang into his
sleigh with the Czarowitz, and drove by an unused route to the railway
station. The Czarina followed shortly after in a carriage, greatly
agitated by a presentiment of evil. Not until the train had started
was she informed of the occurrence. She burst into tears, and was
inconsolable for the rest of the journey. Once safe in his Gatschina
Palace, the Czar is said to have given vent to his feelings in the
strongest language, heaping anathemas upon the heads of the Nihilists,
and threatening dire revenge.
Less than two hours after the arrest of Andreieffsky and Petroff their
companion peasant fell into the hands of the police. His name was
Generaloff, a native of Jaroslav, South Russia. He had been actively
engaged in the Nihilist propaganda for some time past. He also carried
bombs on his person.
These arrests were supplemented by numerous others. The lodgings of
the prisoners in the suburbs of St. Petersburg known as the Peski
(the Sands) were searched, and other explosives as well as documents
incriminating other persons were found. As a result the procession
of prisoners to the Peter and Paul’s Fortress for a time was almost
unremitting, and no one felt safe against police intrusion. All three
of the prisoners were subsequently executed.
England shortly afterward became the mark for the next development of
the dynamite war. It is the fact that shortly after the assassination
of the Czar an attack on the British Government was begun.
Prior to this there had been two outrages in 1881—one an attempt to
blow up the barracks at Salford with dynamite, the other a gunpowder
explosion at the Mansion House, London.
The record of the year, as compiled by Col. Majendie, the Inspector of
Explosives, then runs on:
_1881: 16 May._ Attempt to blow up the police barracks at Liverpool
with gunpowder in iron piping. Damage to the building was
inconsiderable, and no one hurt.
_10 June._ Attempt to blow up the Town Hall, Liverpool, by an infernal
machine probably filled with dynamite. A great number of windows
broken, and some iron railings destroyed, but no one injured. The two
perpetrators captured.
_14 June._ A piece of iron piping filled with gunpowder exploded
against the police station at Loanhead, near Edinburgh. Some windows
broken, but no other damage effected.
_30 June._ An importation of six infernal machines at Liverpool from
America in the “Malta,” concealed in barrels of cement. They contained
lignin dynamite, with a clock-work arrangement for firing it.
_2 July._ An importation of four similar machines at Liverpool in the
“Bavaria.”
_September._ An attempt to produce an explosion at the barracks,
Castlebar. A canister containing gunpowder was thrown over the wall,
close to the magazine. The lighted fuse which was attached fell out,
and no harm was done.
_1882: 26 March._ An attempt to blow up Weston House, Galway, with
dynamite in an iron pot enclosed in a sack. Five persons were
afterwards convicted of the outrage.
_27 March_. A 6-inch shell charged with explosive thrown into a house
in Letterkenny. The explosion caused considerable damage.
_2 April._ An attempt to destroy a police barrack in Limerick by
firing some dynamite on the window sill.
_12 May._ A discovery of a parcel containing 12 lbs. to 20 lbs. of
gunpowder, with lighted touch-paper or fuse attached, at the Mansion
House, London.
_1883: 21 January._ An explosion of lignin dynamite at Possil Bridge,
Glasgow. Two or three persons passing sustained slight injury.
_21 January._ An explosion of lignin dynamite at Buchanan Street
Station, Glasgow, in a disused goods shed.
_15 March._ An explosion at the Local Government Board Office,
Whitehall, causing considerable local damage.
_15 March._ An abortive explosion of lignin dynamite outside a window
at the _Times_ office.
_April._ Two infernal machines, containing 28 lbs. of lignin dynamite
(probably home-made), discovered at Liverpool. Four persons were
convicted and sentenced to penal servitude for life.
_April._ The discovery of a factory of nitro-glycerine at Birmingham,
and of a large amount of nitro-glycerine brought thence to London.
The occupier of the house and others were subsequently convicted and
sentenced to penal servitude for life.
_30 October._ An explosion in the Metropolitan Railway, between
Charing Cross and Westminster, unattended with personal or serious
structural injury.
_30 October._ An explosion on the Metropolitan Railway, near Praed
Street. Three carriages sustained serious injury, and about sixty-two
persons were cut by the broken glass and debris, and otherwise injured.
_November._ Two infernal machines discovered in a house in
Westminster, occupied by a German named Woolf. Two men were tried, and
in the result the jury disagreed and a _nolle prosequi_ was entered on
behalf of the Crown.
_1884: January._ The discovery of some slabs of Atlas Powder A
(American make), in Primose Hill tunnel.
_February._ An explosion in the cloak-room of the London, Brighton,
and South Coast Railway at Victoria Station of Atlas Powder A
(American make), left in a bag or portmanteau.
_27 February._ The discovery of a bag containing some Atlas Powder A,
with clock-work and detonators, at Charing Cross Station.
_28 February._ A similar discovery at Paddington Station.
_1 March._ A similar discovery at Ludgate Hill Station.
_April._ A discovery of three metal bombs, containing dynamite
(probably American make), at Birkenhead, in possession of a man named
Daly, who was afterwards sentenced to penal servitude for life.
_30 May._ An explosion of dynamite at the Junior Carlton Club, St.
James’ Square. About fourteen persons were injured.
_30 May._ An explosion of dynamite at the residence of Sir Watkin
Williams Wynn, St. James’ Square.
_30 May._ An explosion of dynamite in a urinal under a room occupied
by some of the detective staff in Scotland Yard. It brought down a
portion of the building, besides severely injuring a policeman and
some persons who were at an adjacent public-house.
_30 May._ A discovery of Atlas Powder A, with fuse and detonators, in
Trafalgar Square.
_28 November._ An attempted destruction of a house at Edenburn, near
Tralee, occupied by Mr. Hussey. The injury, which was doubtless
accomplished with dynamite, was less serious than was intended, and no
one sustained bodily harm.
_12 December._ An explosion of a charge of dynamite or other
nitro-compound under London Bridge, fortunately doing very little
damage.
_1885: 2 January._ An explosion in the Gower Street tunnel of
the Metropolitan Railway, caused by about two pounds of some
nitro-compound fired apparently by a percussion fuse. Damage
inconsiderable.
_24 January._ An explosion in the Tower of London, caused, beyond
all reasonable doubt, by about five to eight pounds of Atlas Powder
A (American make). Three or four persons were slightly injured, and
considerable damage was done to the Armory.
_24 January._ An explosion of Atlas Powder A (American make), in
Westminster Hall. Three persons were injured severely, and others
slightly, and very considerable damage was done to the Hall and
surroundings.
_24 January._ An explosion in the House of Commons (probably caused by
a similar amount of the same explosive). No persons were injured, but
very considerable damage was done to the Houses of Parliament.
_February._ A discovery of dynamite (of American make) in a house in
Harrow Road, Paddington.
_9 March._ A discovery of Atlas Powder A in the roof of a saw-mill at
Bootle.
As a result of these various conspiracies and political outrages,
twenty-nine persons were convicted.
Some of the bombs used in the London explosions were very ingeniously
made. Usually they had a clock-work arrangement which released a hammer
and exploded the infernal machine at the time set. Others again had a
time fuse depending upon the percolation of acid through parchment.
In every case, however, the destruction wrought by the explosives was
ridiculously disappointing to the conspirators, and in England as
elsewhere the event proved that high explosives are a delusion and a
snare from the revolutionist’s point of view. They are greatly more
dangerous to the persons who employ them than to the people or the
property against which they may be aimed.