SIBERIA.
SIBERIA--HARDSHIPS OF DEPORTATION--BREAKING THE BAN--THE ABBÉ
SIEROCINSKI--HIS CONSPIRACY--HIS EXECUTION.
In this way I had mounted quickly from the lowest to the highest
status to which a convict can rise in this establishment of ours on
the banks of the Irtiche; and by the beginning of the year 1846 I
might almost have fancied myself merely as a recruit of the omnipotent
bureaucracy of Russia, sadly banished to these distant realms beneath
an inhospitable sky. Very different was this time from the terrible
winter of 1844, when I swept the gutters, hewed or carried wood, and
lived under one roof with all the offscourings of the human race! And,
alas! how many of my brothers, groaning at this moment in the mines
of Nertchinsk or in gangs under the lash--how many indeed of those
who had been condemned to a punishment less severe than my own, would
have thought themselves happy in the position which I had gained at
Ekaterinski-Zavod as early as 1846; and from which, however, I was
perfectly determined to slip away, at the risk even of encountering
the knout and the mysterious dungeons of Akatouia!
The word Siberia embraces a variety of miseries and of trials which
the nomenclature (already very rich) of the Russian penal code is yet
far from being able to define or even to specify. The two principal
categories, deportation (_possilenié_) and penal labour (_katorga_),
only indicate, so to speak, the two great exterior lines of an immense
_vagueness_, which can be filled up at will. Everything is arbitrary in
a sentence which is applied and interpreted by a host of dictators, by
a commission at Tobolsk, by a Governor-General in Siberia by the first
and the last comer, by an inspector and by an overseer.
It is one thing to be deported to Viatka, to Tobolsk, or even to Omsk;
it is another thing to be sent to Bérézov, as was our warm-hearted
Madame Felinska, or to Kamtschatka, like Beniowski or General Kopec,
and so many illustrious compatriots; it is another thing, again, to
serve in the army of the Caucasus, with the right of promotion, that is
to say, with the possibility and the hope of being one day protected
from corporal punishments, or of being placed in a Cossack regiment,
and sent to the Kirghis frontier. One may get off with the _katorga_
in some of the factories or government distilleries, as I did at
Ekaterinski-Zavod; but how many miserable beings labour in the horrible
mines at Nertchinsk, with irons on their feet, and only hoping for
some falling in of the mine to put an end quickly to a life which
has nothing more to hope or to expect in this world. The verdigris
mines are those which are the most dreaded. The disciplined gangs of
Orenbourg, and other places, have the reputation of leading a life yet
more awful than that at Nertchinsk. There the rod and the bastinado are
the daily bread of our poor students and artisans, who are in general
banished thither. There remains the fortress of Akatouia, not far from
Nertchinsk, the last punishment reserved for the greatest criminals,
and for convicts who revolt, or are taken in the attempt to break
their ban. Here it was that Peter Wysoçki, after the bad success of
his conspiracy in Siberia, was at last shut up. I know nothing of this
mysterious place, and I can say nothing about it, for I have never
seen any one who had penetrated its mystery; but I only know that,
throughout Siberia, the very name is pronounced with an indescribable
terror.
The contempt which the inhabitants of the country very naturally have
for the felon, falls back also upon the man who is simply deported; and
the exile may often hear himself insulted with the name of _varnak_, an
indigenous expression which conveys a concentrated notion of abjectness
and infamy. He who is deported has no civil rights, his deposition
cannot be taken in any court of justice, and his wife, if he has left
one in his native country, may contract a second marriage, because
he is counted among the dead. But the legislator who laid down this
last law with regard to the exile defeated his own object, which is
to increase, by any means, the population of Siberia. The convict or
the exiles in its regions can only marry into the worst class, and
among the least respectable of its inhabitants; and what is more, his
children, if any are born to him, must always remain serfs of the
crown. It is true that it is permitted to a wife to follow her husband
into Siberia, and that the most pitiless measures have not prevented
our seeing such instances of devotion as those of Princess Troubetskoï
and Madame Koszakiewicz, with many other Polish ladies; but then the
law forbids her again to leave the country, and her children born in
this land of exile become, in like manner, royal serfs; and we must
point out that there is a peculiarity in amnesties which, even when
granted, only apply to the parents. Any children of theirs that have
seen the light in Siberia cannot profit by the pardon, but require
a special decree. To the Emperor Nicholas, however, these many and
sad restrictions did not seem sufficient. In the month of December
1845, he issued a general order for Siberia, which, among many other
aggravating clauses, declared all deported persons to be incapable of
possessing any property whatever, even chattels and personalty; and
ordered that all who were sentenced to penal servitude should, without
any exceptions whatever, live in barracks. This command caused a
general consternation throughout the country, and the very officials
themselves were heard to declare that it was as cruel as it was
inopportune, inconvenient, and all but impracticable. I do not know if
it ever was rigorously carried into effect; but I may say that these
new measures went for a great deal in determining my resolution to fly
from Siberia; for I preferred exposing myself to every danger rather
than consent voluntarily to return, and be reinstalled in the barracks
of the felons.
However hard life in Siberia must of necessity appear to persons under
political sentences, I must confess that ordinary criminals do not
complain of their lot, and that they sometimes appear to prefer it to
their former condition. Serfs and soldiers especially, even when at
hard labour, have often said to us, ‘What have we to regret? we worked
just as hard where we were before, and we were beaten much oftener.’
And yet these very men are, in many instances, not less ready to brave
the knout and the most terrible punishments, by breaking their ban--so
powerful in man is the love of liberty and the love of his own hearth.
During my journey in Siberia I had already remarked, and was struck
by the fact, that numberless fields of turnips edged the roads on
both sides, and that in more than one place these turnips seemed to
have been torn up, while the plantations bore the marks of footsteps.
I learnt afterwards that the natives keep up the supply of roots on
purpose; and that they are intended for the use of fugitives, and to
serve them as food during their nocturnal flights. In villages and
hamlets along the high roads the inhabitants take pains to place over
night, on their window-ledges, bread, salt, and jars of milk, supplies
which are destined for the same persons; and the natives do all this
quite as much from self-interest as from charity, for the great trunk
roads of Siberia are marauded by runaway convicts, and no man can
imagine or describe what perils, what sufferings, and what privations
these desperate wretches undergo in order to escape detection. Those
who have been branded generally use vitriol or cantharides to get rid
of the obnoxious letters; but they seldom fail of being apprehended,
and the best fate that can await them is that they should henceforth
lead a savage life in the woods, where they become, or rather are
again, robbers.
If among the ordinary felons in Siberia the temptation to flight is
so strong, among the political exiles and among my fellow-countrymen
that temptation is very seldom yielded to. The fear of the knout, and
of all corporal punishments, is naturally far stronger among educated
persons, or those whose lot is comparatively easy; then, too, the very
imperfect knowledge of the language, the routes, and the manners of the
country, all unite to dissuade the Poles from so desperate an attempt.
The resource which remains for the Russian peasant in his flight does
not apply or offer itself to the Pole; for him it is no object to be
lost in the boundless woods, or to hide in some obscure community for
life. To obtain his ends, the Pole must reach and cross the confines
of another country; and the immensity of the distances to be traversed
before this can be achieved is well calculated to make him lose all
hope. At the same time, attempts to rise in a body and thus effect
their joint deliverance are not at all rare among political exiles.
The exploits of Beniowski are remembered by all, and they appeal to
many spirits; so that we hear sometimes of a conspiracy, of which the
object is to force its way, by dint of arms and numbers, to Persia,
China, or simply across the Steppes. Sometimes we have even had the
wish to make Siberia itself rise in revolt against the rule of the
Tzar. Peter Wysoçki, who first gave the signal of our revolution in
1831, and who, being taken in battle by the Russians, was deported to
Nertchinsk, formed such a plan as this; and he expiated his temerity in
the fortress of Akatouia. Something similar to his was the conspiracy
of the Abbé Sierocinski, so celebrated ever since in Siberian annals. I
arrived at Ekaterinski-Zavod some years after that bloody tragedy had
been played out; but I have been near Omsk, the stage on which it was
acted; I have seen both the eye-witnesses and many of the actors in
it, and I have collected from their lips the following details of the
dismal story, and I can vouch for their perfect truthfulness.
Previous to the opening scene of our revolution, the Abbé Sierocinski
had been superior of the convent of St. Basil, at Owrucz, in Volhynia,
and at the same time director of the schools in that place. He took
an active part in the movements and political agitation of 1831, and
finally fell into the hands of the Russians, when the Emperor Nicholas
despatched him to Siberia to serve as a private in one of the regiments
of Cossacks; and thus for several years did the former superior of a
convent, mounted and in a Cossack dress, pursue the Kirghis of the
Steppes with a lance in his hand and with a sabre at his side. Now
there existed at Omsk a military college, and one day, being in want of
a professor, the authorities bethought themselves of the ex-Basilian,
whose capabilities were well known, and who was therefore, especially
on account of his knowledge of French and German, recalled from his
life on the Steppes. Thus the old head of a convent and the old Cossack
became by order of the government a professor in the military school
of Omsk, although he did not cease to be a private and to belong to
his former regiment. In his new position Sierocinski soon gained all
hearts and obtained a large number of acquaintances and friends. His
physical constitution was delicate and nervous, but he was gifted by
nature with a spirit of rare enterprise and with great courage. He
conceived the idea of a vast Siberian conspiracy, into which should be
drawn all the exiles, all the soldiers in garrison, and many of those
officers in whose minds the ideas and the sufferings of Pestel still
survived, while he wished the natives of the country, the Russians,
and even the Tatars to take a part in it. There is no doubt that the
elements of revolution and revolt are not wanting in Siberia; how and
why it is so would take me too long to explain in this place, but
those who know the country well are fully aware of this feature in
it. Discontent is very general, although the causes and the degrees
of it are sundry and manifold, and differ so widely as to be almost
contradictory. It is only by the presence of the garrisons that the
country is kept safe within the iron-bound circle of the empire. Yet it
was precisely in the garrisons themselves that Sierocinski sought and
found the great number of sympathisers. His plan was to seize, by means
of the conspirators and old deported soldiers, upon the fortresses and
principal strongholds; this they were to do at a given signal, and then
they were to await the progress of events; while in case of check or
defeat they were to retire under arms into the Kirghis Steppes of the
_Khanat_ of Tachken, where there were many Catholics, or into Boukhara,
and from thence press on into the English territories in the East
Indian peninsula. The centre of the conspiracy was at Omsk, where they
had all the artillery of the place at their disposal. The signal for a
general rising was given; but on the very eve of the day on which it
was to take place, three of the conspirators revealed everything to
the commandant of the place, the same Colonel Degrawe whom I mentioned
on my way through Omsk. Sierocinski and his accomplices were seized
that same night, and couriers started off in all directions to give
orders for arresting an endless number of persons. Thus was the plot
discovered at the very moment when it was to have taken effect, and an
enquiry began which lasted for a long time. Two commissions, selected
and sent down the one after the other, were dissolved without coming to
any decision, so obscure and so complicated was the whole affair; and
it was only a third board, composed of persons chosen and despatched
expressly from St. Petersburg, which succeeded in bringing the trial to
an end. By order of the Emperor Nicholas, the Abbé Sierocinski and five
of his principal accomplices, among whom was an officer of the wars of
the empire more than sixty years of age, by name Gorski, and another
Russian, Mélédine, were sentenced to receive each seven thousand lashes
(with the rods) and ‘without mercy;’ in fact, the sentence consisted
exactly of these five words, ‘Seven thousand lashes without mercy’
(_bez postchadi_). The other persons under arrest, about one thousand
in all, were condemned some to three thousand, some to two thousand,
some to one thousand five hundred lashes and to hard labour for life,
while others were simply sent to work in the penal settlements.
The day of execution arrived; it was at Omsk, in the month of March
1837. General Galafeïev, who was celebrated for his cruelty, and who
had been sent down from the capital by reason of this shining quality,
was at the head of the dismal procession. By daybreak two whole
battalions were drawn up in a great open space near the town; one of
these was destined to officiate on the principal culprits, the other
on those condemned to a smaller number of lashes. I do not intend to
detail in all its minutiæ the butchery of that terrible day; I shall
but notice the fate of Sierocinski and his five companions. They were
led upon the ground, their sentence read out, and they began to run
the gauntlet (_skvosstroï_): the blows fell, as the imperial order
directed, _without mercy_, and the cries of the sufferers went up to
heaven. None of them lived to receive the prescribed number of lashes.
All (and they were executed one after the other) after passing through
the ranks twice or thrice fell upon the snow, which was crimson with
their blood, and then expired. The Abbé Sierocinski had been purposely
reserved to the last, in order that he might witness the sufferings
of all his friends. When his turn came, and they had stripped him and
tied his hands to the bayonet, the surgeon of the battalion came up to
him and offered him a flask containing some strengthening drops, but
he refused them, saying, ‘You may drink my blood, but I will not drink
your drops, and I do not want them!’ The signal was given, the fatal
march began, and the old superior of the Basilican convent chaunted in
a loud clear voice, ‘_Miserere mei, Deus, secundum magnam misericordiam
tuam_.’ General Galafeïev called to those who struck, ‘Harder! harder!’
(_pok repché_), and for several minutes the priest’s chaunt rose above
the whistling of the rods and the _pok repché_ cries of the commanding
officer.... Sierocinski had only passed once through the ranks, that
is to say, he had only received one thousand blows, when he fell upon
the snow bathed in his own blood, and senseless. In vain they attempted
to place him on his feet. He was then laid on a tumbril prepared
beforehand for the purpose, and fastened to a support in such a way as
to let the blows fall on his back and shoulders, and thus a second time
he passed along. When this second passage was gone through, his groans
and screams were still audible; but they got gradually weaker, though
he did not expire till after the fourth turn; the last three thousand
lashes were only laid upon a corpse.
A common grave soon received those who were either killed that day or
whose deaths followed soon after their punishments; both Russians and
Poles perished, and were buried thus. The friends and relations of
those who lie there were permitted to place the symbol of our faith
over that memorable tomb; and as late as 1846 one might still behold a
great wooden crucifix that stretched its black arms across the steppes,
sharply defined against the sparkling and spotless whiteness of their
snows.