freight cars, which stood between the passenger train and platform.
The night was dark, the tracks were coated with ice, and everything
was slippery. But we managed to transfer all the colonel’s belongings,
and left him with a guttering candle in his compartment. A Chinese
colonel and his interpreter were put in with him, and the train pulled
out for Vladivostok. Werkstein and I went back to our hotel, and to
bed. We represented the United States in Chita. The next morning two of
Semenoff’s officers were found assassinated in the streets--their backs
had been blown out in the frozen fog of the night before.
XV
ATAMAN SEMENOFF
It will be remembered by the reader that the officer whom I relieved at
Chita, feared assassination. I have no reason to believe that he did
not have good grounds for his fears. Naturally, I assumed that I was
taking over his dangers, when I took his post. And despite the presence
of Semenoff’s army, and his armored train in the railroad yards, there
was a feeling of uneasiness in the city. Sentries were posted in the
centers of the streets, and kept their little fires burning every
night. There were rumors every day that the Bolshevists in the city
were about to rise and slay, or that Bolshevist bands were going to
swoop down upon us from some other city, and complete the destruction
they had begun before Semenoff drove them away.
[Illustration: ATAMAN SEMENOFF, CHIEF OF THE TRANS-BAIKAL COSSACKS]
[Illustration: MONGOL AND TARTAR DESCENDANTS OF CONQUERING HORDES WITH
1919 MODEL “CARS”]
And the fact that the man who threw the bomb at Semenoff in the
theatre was a private in one of the Ataman’s infantry regiments, kept
the officers on the alert. The bomb-thrower, who said his name was
Bernbaum, was reported to have confessed coming from Irkutsk where he
had drawn the number which delegated to him the killing of the Ataman.
He asserted that he had been instructed by the “Maximalists” or
Bolshevists, to go to Chita and join Semenoff’s army, and wait his
chance to kill. His bomb killed a woman in the Ataman’s box, and
wounded several men, the Ataman suffering several wounds from bits of
the bomb.
There were stories of mutinies among Semenoff’s troops, and there were
whisperings that all of Semenoff’s officers were not loyal. Most of his
men were mercenaries anyhow, and the bulk of his forces was made up of
Mongols, Buriats, some Russians who were truly anti-Bolshevist, and
many who had wisely attached themselves to an organization which gave
food, clothing and shelter in exchange for carrying a rifle and doing
guard duty.
When the bomb was thrown from the gallery, one of Semenoff’s officers
jumped up and cried: “I will have everybody in the gallery shot, if you
will give the order, Ataman!”
“No, no, we must not do that!” replied the stricken Ataman. But there
were many arrests, and shortly afterward there were several executions.
Later, the actual bomb-thrower was arrested while escaping toward
Blagoveschensk. I never learned his fate, but heard that he had given
several names to the Ataman’s officers, and that the men mentioned were
not far from Chita. I suspect that on one of the nights I was being
banqueted, there was a shooting party.
I had sent word to the staff that when the Ataman had recovered, I
wished to pay a formal call. We had not recognized Semenoff as an
official governmental head, yet we did make calls on him, just as we
talked with anybody who could give us an inkling as to what was going
on. Instructions were in general to meet everybody on a friendly basis,
but to take no sides.
One evening I got word that the Ataman would see me. I set out for his
residence with a Russian civilian agent, who had come from Manila with
the expedition. His name was Nicholas Romanoff, a name which amused
many of the Cossack officers.
But Mr. Romanoff knew the Ataman intimately, and Mr. Romanoff kindly
suggested to me the things I should say to the Ataman, just as no doubt
he suggested to the Ataman what the Ataman should say to me. This state
of affairs indicates to some extent the ease and ability of American
officers getting an absolute American viewpoint on Russian affairs, and
the Russian and Cossack officers being able to understand fully the
American attitude.
I considered it about as satisfactory a proceeding, for Russian and
American interests, as getting a kiss through a plate-glass window.
I imagine that the interpreters got satisfaction, for they were
automatically turned into diplomats, and controlled both sides. And the
power granted them, made it possible for them to reflect the point of
view from which they might acquire for themselves the most prestige.
But in the case of Mr. Romanoff, there was every evidence that he
displayed discretion and tact. He was the personal interpreter of the
Chief of Intelligence, who had brought him to Siberia from Manila. And
Mr. Romanoff had known Siberia well before he had changed it as a place
of residence, for the Philippines.
At that season of the year we lost the sun about four thirty in the
afternoon, and it was getting quite dark as we approached the Ataman’s
residence. We were halted by the sentry, and on explaining our mission,
were admitted to the hall. Here we were met by officers of the Ataman’s
personal staff, and after the usual bowing, and heel-clicking, left our
furs, and were ushered into a large drawing-room. The room was richly
and tastefully furnished. The high-posted walls were hung with splendid
tapestries, and the floor beautifully carpeted.
There were a few pieces of black furniture, which appeared to be of the
ornately-carven Chinese variety. The whole effect was more oriental
than Cossack, though of course the real Cossack is probably more
oriental than anything else. And, in fact, I had heard that Semenoff
was more of a Mongolian than a Cossack, being according to report, a
Prince of Van. The only place of which I know named Van is in European
Turkey, though there may be a Van in Mongolia.
The Ataman entered, on crutches. I saw a stockily-built man, of
medium height, wearing Prussian blue trousers rather small at the
bottoms of the legs, suggestive of being habitually worn with boots.
He had on slippers. His face was heavily-jowled, very dark, his chin
chubbily-protuberant in the Rubens style. He wore heavy drooping black
mustaches, his black eyes keen and somewhat suspicious, his hair
suggestive of scantness on top, and a Napoleonic lock down over his
low, broad forehead.
His photographs were always made so as to bring out his Napoleonic
points, which I had heard he prided himself upon. He was credited with
carrying a book in his pocket which told how Napoleon acted in every
situation which required a decision, and that when he had to decide
anything, he first consulted the book. Evidently my visit brought up no
point which required a Napoleonic decision--at least, I did not see him
consult the book while I was there.
I was bowed to a chair, and the Ataman let himself down gently on a
couch. He seemed a trifle worried, but he may have been oppressed by
pain. He had only recently induced the banks of Chita to loan him
several million rubles to pay off his army--and a local banker had
called on me that day. After we had talked a little, and I had told the
Ataman that I had heard of his ability as an organizer and leader of
armies, and of his prowess in battle, he appeared relieved, and pulled
the lock on his forehead down a bit more.
The lady who presided over his Chita household came in. The slight view
I took of her as I rose and bowed, leaves me no recollections. Even
had I desired to be courteous to a woman in her position, discretion
counselled as little notice as possible.
I had heard that more than one Russian officer with an admiring eye for
“wives” of other officers, had been picked up dead in the streets. A
sharp look from the Ataman, and the hostess did not linger. I remember
that she did not have on the pearl necklace for which the Ataman was
said to have paid several hundred thousand rubles in Harbin, at a time
when he was short of money for his troops. His domestic régime was
reputed to cost him as much for upkeep as his army. Perhaps, after all,
I was not introduced to the lady who got the pearls.
I had a cigar, and we talked of safe trifles. I was there some twenty
minutes. And as we passed through the line of sentries about the
Ataman’s palace-like mansion, into the cold crisp air, I saw on the
plain below, thousands of lights burning in rude log huts. It was all
so typical of Asia--few palaces and many huts. One man, with an army at
his back, “borrowing” from the banks to cast pearl before swine. What
better conditions to breed Bolshevism? But the same conditions exist
among the leaders of the Bolshevists, who merely play the mobs against
the military exploiters of the people, to get control of the banks and
the money, and to have wealth for spending in the same style. Thus the
ignorance of the people prevent them from escaping exploitation in some
form or another. We of the United States think that it will be settled
by waiting for the people to organize themselves, so that they may
express their will. It is a case of waiting till new generations have
been educated.
People have said to me: “There maybe disorder now in Siberia, but I
believe that the common people know what they are doing, and will do
what they want to do.”
They know what they are doing in the same style that the country yokel
at home knows what he is doing when he goes to New York and buys at
bargain prices several lots in Central Park. The difference between
what he is doing, and what he thinks he is doing, costs him dearly.
The Bolshevists the world over are in the hands of a crafty lot of
confidence men.
XVI
FAMINE IN CHITA
There had been much discussion at home in the newspapers about famine
in Siberia, and in Vladivostok this fear of famine was uppermost in the
minds of diplomats, military chiefs, and civilian relief agencies. In
fact, there was every evidence in Vladivostok that the inland cities of
Siberia were already suffering from hunger, and with a severe winter
ahead, there was much apprehension for the country people.
The refugees pouring into Vladivostok, clamoring for food, depicted a
state of starvation in the towns from which they had come. And data
on food-prices gleaned from refugees and the inland press, as well
as reports by travellers, all combined to strengthen the belief that
famine faced the whole country.
And my first meals in Chita made me suspect that there was much truth
in the reports that Mother Hubbardsky’s cupboard was bare. I went to
dinner with my chief the first evening in the city. We sought the best
restaurant and scanned its menu with care; and after considerable pains
we were able to order a meal--a modest one--at a cost of about twelve
rubles each. Our rubles had cost us a dollar for eight in Vladivostok.
So our dinner amounted to a dollar and a half each. Then we spied four
scrawny, spotted little apples pyramided on a plate on the counter. We
ordered them, ate them, and asked for our bill. The apples alone had
cost us thirty-six rubles--or a dollar and twelve cents each!
An officer has to pay for his own food. In Vladivostok at the officers’
mess, three meals a day cost a dollar and a quarter. In Chita, six
dollars a day, without apples, was the prospect ahead. My orderly was
allowed a dollar and a quarter a day for his subsistence. With that, he
could buy exactly one poor meal. The situation was rapidly losing its
humorous aspect. After all, was Vladivostok right about that famine?
Yet all along the line I had seen an abundance of food for people who
seemed to be eating all the time. Evidently there was a wrench in the
machinery somewhere. It was a case of “Who’s looney now?”
We stocked up immediately with rye bread, cheese and dried fish--all
purchased, the orderly said, from peasant women near the station.
The faithful Werkstein had brought with him a little sugar, some
tea, chocolate in bars, and a few cans of army beef. He turned my
wardrobe in the hotel room into a pantry; and with a samovar from the
kitchen, prepared my meals. It was well below freezing in the room,
and I usually wore my furs. There were forests all around the city.
But no one could be hired to cut wood. Was not everybody free? (How I
wished that our Congress would ship me a consignment of those parlor
Bolshevists who were in the United States preaching the beauties of
Bolshevism!)
One evening, some of Semenoff’s officers asked me to go to their
garrison mess. “A little Russian supper,” they explained rather
apologetically. The supper began at nine. We sat down at a tremendous
table covered with dishes, and glasses in groups. There was a startling
array of bottles. Presently a delicious soup was served. Then came
soldier-servants bearing great salvers on which were fishes the size
of young whales--decorated with fantastically carved vegetables. Next
arrived coveys of quail and partridge. Viands strange and barbaric
followed--dishes that suggested China and Arabia, others of Cossack
origin. O shade of Lucullus! O Herbert Hoover!
The Cossack band in an adjoining room played national airs. The
different kinds of glasses were emptied in as many toasts. And to my
great relief, the speeches began. I say relief, because naturally, I
thought the meal was over. Not so. Still the heaped salvers came. By
now, I had reached the point where I could only weakly pretend to eat.
My hosts watched me like hawks, insisting that I rally my appetite.
They showed irritation when I demurred faintly. They demanded that I
eat and drink to prove the unlimited friendship of the United States
for Russia. And I wondered how our diplomats had ever survived the
hospitality of such a country.
At last I saw that my only hopes lay in a limit to the Cossack
capacity. Again and again, I told myself, “They have reached
it!”--only to realize that what I had suffered was but a prelude to the
feast.
At about three in the morning, the vodka and wines having been
exhausted, champagne was served--in large, stein-like glasses. And a
British officer who had just come to observe conditions, was startled
when Irish porter showed up in stone jars. “Why!” he exclaimed, “We
don’t have this at home any more! In England it’s a fond memory. And
here they have it by the case!”
A little supper! And there was one such about every night. I had come
looking for famine: I began to fear I would die of over eating. One
could be forgiven a chuckle. The staff in Vladivostok had expressed
some remorse over having to send me away from a mess which boasted
three courses and a choice of two canned fruits for dessert!
But what about the proletariat of Chita? These officers were eating,
but were the poor starving to death in cold weather? I visited the
open-air free market in a square of the city. The peasants were selling
cabbage, dried salmon, salmon-roe, spheres of cheese, rye and white
bread in tremendous loaves, quail, partridge, pheasant, beef, pork,
sausage, frozen milk and frozen soup--precisely the things I had eaten
at the “little supper.”
The prices ran high. But--the people had plenty of Bolshevist money.
However, this money was greatly depreciated in value. Nevertheless,
the vendors at the market expected as many of my Imperial rubles for
any purchase as they asked the residents of the city, who, of course,
had local currency. So now I understood that the apple which I had
bought in the restaurant at a dollar and twelve cents (or nine Imperial
roubles), would, at nine roubles Bolshevist money, have cost a resident
of Chita, only about ten cents. What had happened to me, can best be
expressed in this wise: A man takes silver dollars to a city where
disks have been stamped “One dollar,” and where the merchants do not
care whether he gives them tin or silver--the price is the same! So
the apples were not high; the explanation is that money was plentiful
and cheap. And now I understood why Vladivostok was worrying over
interior statistics. The department heads mistook high costs reported
in Bolshevist rubles, for lack of food.
But those statistics related mainly to sugar, tea, salt, candles and
other staples, commonly regarded as necessities, but turned by the
speculators into luxuries. Most of the Siberian speculators are of the
pack-peddler variety, because freight shipments are costly, and the
goods liable to loss. One Chita shipper paid seventy-five thousand
rubles for a car in Harbin to move sugar to the Trans-Baikal. The
engineer got one thousand rubles to haul it; the conductor of the train
got one thousand rubles to insure the car’s being cut off at Chita;
and I heard that the side-track was rented to the shipper while the
car was being unloaded. He assured me that he had doubled his money
in spite of paying so much “grease.” But the railroad men, who are
opposed to “Exploitation of the masses,” thought they were making the
capitalistic speculator pay the “grease!” Those railroad men had not
been paid for six months, and some of us Allied officers worried about
it, and gave the crews credit for staunch loyalty to the Russian cause
by sticking to their jobs. Also, a large Red Cross train went up the
line and presented these poor, starving magnates who ran the trains,
with new clothing!
Captain B----, a Russian serving Semenoff, invited me to his room
in the hotel for tea. His wife brought from the wardrobe baskets of
cookies and candies. Trunks disgorged tinned fish, bar chocolate and
tinned milk. In one corner of the room was a sack of sugar; in another
were sacks of flour. Those living quarters resembled a corner in the
warehouse of a wholesale grocer. And everybody was stocked up like
that. Moreover, they all had orders with the local dealers to send them
more provisions whenever more arrived. It was a case of everybody his
own grocer. I had found the Chita stores bare. No wonder.
I never saw any famine in Siberia. In fact, the only place that I
heard it discussed was in Vladivostok. There, the flocks of refugees,
seeking free food and shelter, were responsible for the belief in it.
No doubt many of them did need aid--especially the women and children.
And in the handling of those needy, our Red Cross did gallant service.
But among the refugees were hundreds of able-bodied men who found it
pleasant to be refugees. These men were not likely to report that the
districts from which they came were plentifully supplied with food.
And as these men kept pouring in from all parts of the country, a
consolidation of their reports presented a false picture of conditions.
What I looked for in the interior of Siberia, contrasted with what
I found, was happily, if ridiculously, disappointing. But in 1920 a
similar hunt might result less humorously. To feed men stops their
work; to stop work stops production. And lack of production spells
future need. So next year,--who knows?--it may be possible to find
famine in Siberia--if meanwhile the people of that country consume
their total reserves on the strength of our promise of generous aid.
In my humble opinion, the United States should avoid, in Siberia, all
Christmas-Tree talk.
XVII
NEW YEAR WITH THE JAPANESE
New Year’s Day, 1919, began for me at fifteen minutes after midnight,
with a thunderous knocking at the glass door of my room. This was
rather disconcerting, for there had been rumors the night before that
the Bolshevists were going to rise in the city, and slay. The glass
door, with its colored paper stuck in the panes, was not ideal for
siege purposes; but it had certain advantages, in that I could shoot
through it while the Bolshevists were breaking it in.
I got out of bed without making any reply to the summons. I had opened
the tiny trap-door in the wall which served as a ventilator, and the
room was well chilled, for there was no heat in the radiators. It was
about fifty below zero outside--and about the same inside.
Turning on the electric drop-light at my desk, I put on my purple
dressing-gown, and slipped my automatic into its pocket. Then I
unlocked and threw open the door, stepping discreetly to one side, a
habit one soon acquires in a country so free and equal as Siberia.
The hall was quite dark. I made out a figure close at hand, and in
the light from my electric lamp I caught the gleam of gold shoulder
straps. A Russian officer clicked his heels, bowed, and spoke my name
in good English.
I bade him enter, supposing he was an officer sent by the Ataman. But
he had just reached Chita by special train from Omsk, and was bound for
Vladivostok. He came to tell me of a Bolshevist uprising in Omsk, some
ten days before, which had been put down. Many Bolshevist prisoners
released from the prisons by their friends outside, had been shot.
This news did not surprise me at the time. I had been told three
weeks before that the Bolshevists would rise in Omsk on that very
date, release the prisoners, and attack the Kolchak garrison. I made
an effort to recall who had foretold the uprising, and remembered a
drosky-driver who spoke English with whom I had drunk tea in a station
down the line. On the supposition that he was merely boasting for my
benefit when he claimed to be closely in touch with the Bolshevists,
I had let the story pass as idle talk, for if one attempted to report
all rumors, a dozen secretaries would be required by every officer in
the country. But now I realized that the drosky-driver was in reality
in the confidence of the Bolshevist leaders at Omsk, several thousand
versts away. He had foretold the exact date of the uprising now
reported to me.
My Russian officer’s train had encountered Bolshevists at two stations,
and from the second his train had been run back for the purpose of
reinforcing his guard. When he ran down the line again to where his
progress had been opposed, he got through without difficulty, for in
the meantime the Bolshevists had been driven away.
Having warned me of these facts, he was obliged to hasten back to his
train. With a click and a handshake he was away, and I went back to
bed, not quite sure I had not dreamed a chapter from a book with a
Prisoner of Zenda flavor.
I shivered myself to sleep, having been chilled to the bone while I
listened to the adventures of the Russian officer, and carried on, as
the British say, till Werkstein came thumping at my door at eight to
tell me that I must hurry to catch a train for a New Year’s celebration
at a station some sixty versts away, where some of Semenoff’s garrison
was to make merry. Of course, it was thirteen days before the Russian
New Year, but the Cossack never misses an excuse to celebrate anything.
I found myself with a violent headache, due to having taken cold while
sitting directly under the ventilating trap, which I had forgotten to
close while I talked with the Russian officer. Doubtless his haste to
get back to his train was induced by the terribly cold air flowing into
my room, but he had been too polite to call my attention to the open
trap. He must have thought me most inhospitable.
The prospect of going away to a celebration was not alluring as I
looked out the window and saw Chita almost completely hidden by a
frozen fog. It was nearly sixty below zero, and rapidly getting colder.
Werkstein ordered the samovar, and I had tea in bed. I do not wonder
that the Russians drink so much tea. We drank it all the time in
Chita, and my ordinary day’s tea-drinking ran as high as thirty hot
glasses. The effect was not good on my nerves, and I discovered that I
had become garrulous. Tea and much talk go together, which is why the
Russian produces conversation in great quantities.
Mr. S----, the missionary Y. M. C. A. man, came to kindly offer
his services as an interpreter in case I would go to General Oba’s
reception at his headquarters at eleven. I am afraid that Mr. S----
suspected the towel the faithful Werkstein had insisted on putting
about my head, but he was too broad-minded a gentleman to hint at his
suspicions.
The Oba reception lured me. It was but a couple of blocks away, and if
I still felt badly when I got there, could leave and return to bed.
So I got up and shaved, and dug out a white shirt. After all, a white
shirt is a wonderful thing, especially if it comes out of a package
wrapped by one’s wife on the other side of the world, and redolent of a
subtle but familiar perfume.
I also decided to discard temporarily the tremendous boots I had been
wearing, and got out my dress boots and spurs, considering them the
only fitting footwear with a white shirt and stock. Besides, a soldier
on a diplomatic mission cuts rather a sorry figure unless he can
produce the proper metallic click with his heels.