THE FATE OF THE FORTRESS
With the fall of Kinchou and the retreat of Fock's entire division
towards Arthur, all glances were directed to Lieutenant-General
Smirnoff. Those who had believed absolutely in the impregnability of
the former position now lost heart, and began as fast as possible
to clear out of the place, going in Chinese junks to Chifu. When
the battered remnants of the 5th Regiment--the regiment which by
its gallant defence of Kinchou had covered itself with everlasting
glory, and which had lost more than half its men and two-thirds of its
officers--marched into Arthur, it was given a most unexpected, not to
say unique, welcome.
'You are a wretched, undisciplined corps of traitors, cowards, and
blackguards. I will try the lot of you by court-martial. How did you
dare leave Kinchou? Don't dare to show yourselves in Arthur, lest by
your presence you infect the whole garrison with your cowardice,' was
Stössel's greeting.
The regiment had no divisional commander, and no one dared to take its
part. Discipline prevented the officer commanding from replying to
Stössel, and he and his officers had to bear these totally undeserved
insults. One General put the whole blame of the defeat on the regiment,
and assured Stössel (it was not hard to convince him, as he was not at
Kinchou) that the abandonment of the position was solely and entirely
the fault of the 5th Regiment, and the senseless way in which it had
fortified the place.
This cruel and shameful injustice to this gallant regiment was soon
known by all the others, and it had a very bad moral effect on the
whole garrison.
After the Kinchou _débâcle_, the Commandant drew up an order as to the
distribution of the different units in the Fortress, and on June 1 took
it to Stössel for official approval. The latter rudely cut him short,
and, without either reading the order or looking at the scheme, said
that it was inopportune.
'The publication of any such orders with regard to the distribution
of the troops might,' he said, 'become known to the Japanese through
their spies. [He had himself, on May 29, issued an order detailing
troops to various positions on the hills.] The district under my
command has almost entirely passed into the hands of the enemy. Arthur
alone remains, I shall take upon myself the defence of the Fortress.
Its present staff will be broken up, for it is a useless body. My
staff will be sufficient. I will send Colonel Khvostoff to command a
battalion. You will be on my staff. It is impossible for two equal
commanders to be in one place.'
This was on June 1: we actually held on to the district outside the
Fortress for two months after this date.
The Commandant was in an awkward position. Stössel defied him, and
the Fortress, which, thanks to his own efforts and skill, was being
gradually got into a state of readiness, was to be taken from him and
to be commanded by a man who would wreck all. That moment settled the
relationship between these two. It was the first act of the tragedy,
which ended on January 1. Quietly, and with perfect politeness,
Smirnoff answered:
'I was appointed Commandant of this Fortress by the Tsar; the Fortress
Staff is the organ of the Commandant, appointed by Imperial orders. I
have no intention whatever of resigning either the rights entrusted
to me by the Tsar or the duties consequent on them. You, sir, as my
commanding officer, can give me general orders relating to the defence
of the Fortress, but I remain its master until the Tsar himself
deprives me of it. If my removal from the duties of Commandant admits
of no delay, you have it in your power to publish an order to that
effect.'
During this scene those present anxiously awaited the result, for in
those few minutes the fate of Arthur was decided. In an angry voice
Stössel replied:
'I do not mean to remove you from duty. You will remain Commandant, but
I shall run the Fortress. Whether legal or not is my affair; I will
answer for that.'
What could Smirnoff say?
There was a knock at the door; an orderly entered to announce some
officers, and the episode was over. But as every wall has ears, this
incident was soon known to the whole garrison, and indignation knew no
bounds. We were all afraid for the fate of Arthur, and made conjectures
as to the action Smirnoff would take. Some declared he would leave
on a destroyer; others, in indignation, said that Stössel should be
invalided and forced into hospital; others swore that the day and hour
had been settled when Smirnoff would surround Stössel's house with a
whole regiment and arrest him, as well as Fock and others. The moment
would have been an appropriate one, for the discontent in the garrison
was very great, and the hatred of Fock and Stössel had much increased
since Kinchou. Everything depended on Smirnoff's decision; but to
adopt such violent measures was risky--a dangerous precedent for the
discipline of the troops. Stössel also had St. Petersburg at his back.
Even the Viceroy could not interfere with his recent appointment as
Officer Commanding the District, though much against it. Who could say
that Stössel's arrest would not have results quite opposite to those
wished for? It was most likely that St. Petersburg--that hotbed of the
most revolting scandals and intrigues--would represent Stössel's arrest
to the Tsar in such a light as to cause an immediate order for his
release. Was it not all possible?
[Illustration: A WOMAN DRESSED AS A SOLDIER, WHO WENT THROUGH SEVERAL
FIGHTS.]
Finally, Smirnoff, in spite of the many suggestions and proposals,
decided to settle the matter as peacefully as possible. He accordingly
sent for General Kondratenko and Colonel Reuss, and told them that he
recognized the necessity for a division of authority, and so was quite
prepared to give up all his powers, save only the actual defence of the
Fortress, for which he intended to remain responsible. Reuss expressed
regret for all that had happened, and promised to use his power to keep
evil influences from getting at Stössel.
Next day Order 285 was issued by the Officer Commanding the District,
and clearly showed that Stössel was not inclined to conciliation:
'As the enemy has appeared in the area of the Fortress, and the 4th
East Siberian Rifle Division, with its artillery, has joined the
troops in it, I now assume supreme command of the defence, and, in
order to centralize authority, the Chief of my District Staff will
in future be present at the Council of Defence established under the
presidency of the Commandant. All resolutions, etc., of the Council
will be given to him to report to me for my confirmation.'
Why did he publish the order? Its only result was to take the control
of the Fortress from the hands of the real chief, who, according to all
regulations, should have been in supreme command. Then, when Fock's
entire Division arrived on Wolf's Hills, a council was summoned,
at which the question of what further steps were to be taken was
brought up--whether the outer positions on Green Hills were to be
held, or whether the defence of the advanced fortified positions of
the Fortress was now to begin. The Commandant protested against the
latter, energetically insisting that the Green Hills must be held,
because the Fortress itself was not quite ready, and, what was more
important, because Wolf's Hills and Ta-ku-shan and Sia-gu-shan Hills
were not fortified, and were most important strategic points. Fock
asserted that it was unsound to attempt to hold the enemy on field
positions; that it would be a mere waste of men and ammunition, which
might be so essential for the defence of the Fortress itself, to which
a withdrawal must sooner or later be made. It would be wiser to neglect
Wolf's Hills and retire at once into Port Arthur, and so commence its
defence with the maximum number of men. Stössel agreed with Fock. Then
the Commandant explained his scheme in detail, and pointed out that as
soon as the blockade became strict the Japanese would get possession of
Wolf's and Sia-gu-shan and Ta-ku-shan Hills; that, in that case, the
inner and outer harbours would be impossible for ships, as the waters
could be reached by indirect fire, and that none of our works could be
successfully held.
Smirnoff's brilliant and lucid statement carried the council, which, by
a majority of votes (including Stössel's), decided that Fock's Division
should be sent back to occupy the best of the outer positions still in
our possession. It is interesting to note that as the country had not
even up till now been thoroughly reconnoitred by the District Staff,
they were unable to say at the meeting which were the best remaining
positions! Of the splendid positions on the heights at Nangalin no
one had given a thought. According to the reports of our scouts and
reliable Chinese, these were already occupied by the Japanese. Next
day some of General Stössel's staff rode out to choose positions.
They stopped on the chain of hills named Upilazy, which border on
Inchenzy Bay and Green Hills, stretching along the Lunwantun Valley
to the little bay of the same name. The hills on the line of these
positions, stretching for more than seventeen miles, were commanded by
Kuen-san Hill. The positions on the Upilazy chain of hills (ten miles)
were held by mixed companies of the four reserve battalions and the
7th Division with two companies of the Frontier Guards. To these were
added eight field batteries and one howitzer battery. Fock took up
his quarters at the seventh mile (the railway now only ran for twelve
miles), and kept on repeating what he had said at the council--that
it was only wasting men and ammunition to hold these positions--and
was apparently quite ready to retire. Smirnoff, however, insisted on
their being held. Engineers were sent to the flanks (there was only
one sapper company of 800 men in the Fortress), and the fortification
of the seventeen-mile-long positions was commenced. Fock would not
hold the right, because he said the enemy would attack his left, and,
as the position was too big for one division, Smirnoff sent the mixed
companies above mentioned from the Fortress troops to hold the right.
Owing to this the left was strongly fortified, but the right hardly at
all.
The enemy having now taken complete possession of Dalny, at once
used it as their base. There, quietly and comfortably, without any
interference from us, they carried out the landing of troops for the
investment. Ten transports would arrive daily, bringing everything
necessary for the concentrating army. The railway from Dalny and
all the rolling-stock was in perfect order, and by it troops, guns,
ammunition, provisions, etc., were transported to the front. Everything
smiled on them: our fleet did not hinder them in any way; they had
command of both sea and the land.
During all this time our intelligence services were very badly run, our
only source of information being the Chinese, who, working both for us
and the enemy, naturally favoured the latter, as the District Staff
paid a starvation wage.