Читать книгу The Red Reign - Kellogg Durland - Страница 12

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Arrival in Kutais—A siege city—“The very walls have ears”—Cossack barracks—Loot—“Bloody” Alikhanoff—A dramatic interview—Justification for burning homes—Military outrages—Why the inhabitants of the Caucasus are revolutionists and terrorists.

VAN called me at daybreak. At seven o’clock we alighted at Kutais station. Besides ourselves only officers left the train. A small force of infantry held and guarded the station. The early morning air was heavy with the odor of charred wood; opposite the platform the debris of two buildings was smoldering.

We found a lone cab to convey us to the local hotel—a comfortable inn in normal times, kept, strangely enough, by two old Swiss ladies. In places the streets were almost impassable. Telegraph wires lay in tangled profusion where they had curled when the great poles were felled. The poles, too, lay as they had fallen. Obstacles of every description lay in heaps at intervals. Reinforced sentries guarded each corner. Once we met a patrol of fifty Cossacks, riding by twos behind the scarlet standard of their regiment.

The town was a veritable siege city. Walls of grim ruins faced rows of battered houses. There is a clause in the terms of agreement between nations concerning the conduct of international wars which reads: “The attack or bombardment of towns, villages, habitations, or buildings which are not defended is prohibited.”[3] Kutais town was undefended. It was defenseless. But Russian troops had attacked it with rifle fire and light artillery. On the short ride from the station to the hotel I saw many instances of shell fire and infantry volleys. At the hotel entrance a Cossack stood guard.

Ivan presently brought to my room an employee of the hotel, whom he introduced as a friend of his of twelve years’ standing. “Good,” I replied, thinking the man might prove a source of information. “Get him to tell us what is going on here.” After a moment’s hesitation the man answered: “Ivan, I have known you long and would tell you everything if I dared, but whoever speaks in Kutais, even to a friend, is put in prison and his house burned. I dare not tell you anything.” “That is nonsense,” I replied. “There is no one in this room but ourselves. He can speak with utter frankness,” but the man only shook his head and replied: “Even the walls of Kutais have ears.” Ivan himself yielded to the suspicious atmosphere and added, as if to quiet me, “That is true, sir! One dare not speak in his own room.” No amount of persuasion, not even the persuasion of money, which the man doubtless needed, would induce him to say more.

After breakfast I ventured out for a survey of the town—much to Ivan’s disgust. Ivan was a brave fellow in the mountains, but he had seen the Cossacks of this same General Alikhanoff, who now commanded Kutais, hack off the fingers of fine ladies for the rings they wore, in Tiflis only a few months before.

During the first hour we were out I must have seen

A Georgian village

It was from hamlets like this that General Alikhanoff tried to collect taxes with machine-guns and field-artillery

twenty political arrests. Demolished houses were in every block. Occasionally an entire block had been swept away by fire. That afternoon when I talked with General Alikhanoff he explained to me that when “his soldiers were ordered to burn down a certain house they do not always have time to see that other houses do not burn also!”

Toward noon we came upon a group of Cossack barracks, and I proposed to Ivan that we run through them.

“Not for a thousand rubles,” replied the redoubtable Ivan. But I finally persuaded him.

No soldier above the rank of what we would call corporal was anywhere in evidence. Near a thousand lawless, undisciplined, unrestrained men lounged about the barn-like halls, singing boisterous songs, smoking, and relating stories. Months of service had hardened them and apparently developed traits that lie dormant when they are at home in their own villages. At all events these fellows seemed much more brutalized than any I saw on my expedition from Vladikavkaz. In one room I found a pile of new blankets more than ten feet high, blankets of a quality and texture never before supplied to an army. In this same room twelve or fourteen men were amusing themselves with as many brand new American sewing-machines.

“Where did you get these?” I asked in amazement.

“We bought them,” replied a hulking fellow of at least six feet three, and pointing to a large shop up the street added: “Go up there and learn about it.”

When first I entered these barracks I refrained from much conversation, but as the mood of the men was jovial and amiable I told Ivan to explain to them that I was in Circassian dress only by courtesy, and that in reality I was an American correspondent. At the beginning I entertained some doubt as to the wisdom of this frankness, but as soon as my position was made clear to them they were friendlier than ever, and took it as a great compliment, and honor, that I should wear their costume. They took me all over the barracks, allowed me to photograph them, and even invited me to lunch with them. I was anxious, however, to learn more about the fine blankets and the American sewing-machines.

The shop pointed out to me from the barracks windows proved to have been a small department store. I found it decidedly a “had been.” The floor space was a vast heap of merchandise that might have been tossed up by a cyclone. The shelves were stripped. The fittings of the store were twisted and broken. The proprietor, a sorrowful bankrupt Armenian, was perched on an upset counter contemplating his ruin. His nationality was an advantage to me for Ivan was able easily to satisfy him as to my status, and he opened up readily. The previous evening, just after he had closed his place for the night, a crowd of Cossacks—the same whom I had visited in their barracks—had come along with push-carts. They had smashed in his doors and windows, ransacked the whole shop, taken what they wanted of trinkets, blankets, and sewing-machines, and carried off their loot in the hand-carts, leaving behind them the pile of wreckage I saw.

Article 48 of the above mentioned proceedings of The Hague Conference reads: “Pillage is absolutely prohibited.” But under Russian military rule each commander is a law unto himself, and under commanders like General Alikhanoff each soldier is a law unto himself. The laws laid down and accepted by nations for the conduct of international wars do not, strictly and technically, apply to wars between a government and its people, but the laws of nations are merely civilized standards, and Russia, in its war against its own people, falls leagues short of these.

The same grim sights met my eyes on every hand. The same tear-bringing tales were poured into my ears, wherever Ivan was successful in convincing the people that I was trustworthy. General Alikhanoff—“Bloody Alikhanoff” the people called him—was ever and always held responsible for the misery and sufferings, the cruelties, the tortures, the inhumanities. During that one day I heard more deeds of monstrous wrong laid at this man’s door than I had ever heard of any living mortal. I determined to see him, to tell him fairly and squarely of the things the people of Kutais were saying about him, and give him an opportunity to deny them if he cared to do so, before I repeated them to a wider world outside of Russia. Or, if they were true, I would have his justification of them.

Ivan described General Alikhanoff as a “Persian Turk,” which was by no means an inappropriate description. He was a Moslem, born within the region of olden Russian domination. Originally his name was Ali Khan, which name he Russianized by putting the two words together and adding “off.” Alikhanoff has a unique record in the Russian army. Some years ago he was sent to Turkestan, where his ruthless pacification methods won for him the title of “Bloody Alikhanoff.” Three times he has been reduced to the ranks for his excesses, and on one of these occasions because of his corruption. Drastic punishment of this character is rarely applied in Russia, and indicates the monstrous misuse of power of which this man had been guilty. In the spring of 1905, General Alikhanoff was sent to Nakhitchevan, where he remained until Prince Napoleon was appointed governor-general of Erivan, when he was recalled. The pacification of Georgia was placed entirely in the hands of Alikhanoff, who, as governor-general of the district, was in supreme command, responsible only to the Czar. Kutais, where I found him, is the central and most important province of Georgia.

Kutais is on the southern slope of the central Caucasus, and a little more than midway between Tiflis and the Black Sea. The population of the city of Kutais is made up of Georgians, Mingrelians, Armenians, Kurds, and Jews. A polyglot population with diverse traditions, with but one thing in common—a wholesome and heartfelt dislike for Russia. The hillsides of the province are spattered with miserable hamlets; valleys that should have been beautiful are unlovely, marred by desolation, where excessive taxation and endless government impositions have produced a condition of ugliest poverty. The taxes levied upon these people were so far in excess of the prosperity in the region[4] that in the autumn of 1905 and the spring of 1906 the people ceased to pay any taxes at all, mostly because they could not, and so General Alikhanoff was sent with a force of about 18,000 troops into the district to collect the taxes and to “restore” order. At five o’clock Ivan and I drove to the official residence of the military governor-general. As I stepped out of the carriage at the door, Ivan naïvely remarked that he

Alikhanoff’s Cossacks

would await me in the carriage. It took considerable persistence to persuade him to follow me. The general was asleep, we were told, but we might wait for him if we chose. “Come to-morrow,” pleaded Ivan, but I knew it would not be safe for me to retreat, having once got successfully over the threshold of the official residence with him, for I already realized that the sense of insecurity and fear which possessed the entire population was taking fast hold on my interpreter, and as his services were essential to the success of my interview I dared not risk losing him. We took seats in the outer hall to abide the time when the general should awake and be ready to receive us. Several times the outer door was opened to officers of the household. As each drew off his overcoat, he took from his right hand pocket a revolver, and usually, with the revolver in his hand, disappeared through one of the three doors leading from the main hall, or up-stairs.

The general’s nap proved a long one, for it was after seven when an orderly appeared to announce the general as ready to attend to business. I sent up my card. An aide-de-camp of the rank of colonel presently came down to inquire the purport of my business. To him I explained carefully my relations with the officers of the regiment with whom I had been traveling and presented my letters and credentials. The colonel reported to the general and returned to me with the message that four days from then at three o’clock in the afternoon General Alikhanoff would receive me for two hours. “I do not desire two hours of his time, but two minutes,” I replied, “but it is most important that I have those two minutes with him to-day.” It was only after considerable insistence that the colonel consented to again intrude upon the general, but when he did word was immediately brought back that I would be received at once. During the second disappearance of the colonel a farcical scene was enacted between Ivan and myself. The aide-de-camp had scarcely disappeared up-stairs when Ivan, apparently overcome by the fear of seeing General Alikhanoff face to face, started toward the door.

“Now that it is arranged, sir,” he said, “I will return to the hotel, sir, and wait for you.”

“No, no, Ivan,” I said, “you must come with me, for if General Alikhanoff speaks nothing but Russian and Tartar, I shall be in a hopeless predicament with him.”

“You want me to go into the room with Alikhanoff, sir—‘Bloody Alikhanoff!’ No, sir!”

“Yes, you must. I need you,” I replied.

He glowered at me in a fright palpably real and started doggedly toward the door. I stepped in front of him so as to prevent his escape.

“No, sir!” he argued. “Not to Alikhanoff. I took Baron de Hirsch to the top of Kazbek, sir, and I have hunted with the Duc d’Orléans for a month in the high mountains, sir, and I was with the correspondent of the London Times in the bad days,—but I never had to do anything like this, sir. I shall go back to Tiflis to-night.”

There was determination in his voice and for the first time I became seriously alarmed, for as I had no way of knowing whether the general spoke French, I could not risk going alone into his presence. But Ivan pushed steadily to the door. At the threshold I felt that I must act instantly or lose him, for he was forcing his way past me in spite of all I could do. So, drawing my revolver, I said very quietly:

“Ivan, the officers coming back from Manchuria tell of how the Japanese placed machine guns behind their regiments when they were sent into battle and at the first indication of retreat these guns opened fire. Now, you know that General Alikhanoff probably will not harm you.”

“No, not now, sir,” he interrupted, “but after you are away, sir, he will send his soldiers to Tiflis for me.”

“Nonsense,” I answered. “I am responsible here and I will tell him that I made you come with me.” He shook his head and once more started past me.

“Ivan,” I said, determinately, “you may get by Alikhanoff, but you cannot get by me,” and I shook the revolver menacingly before him. The poor man was almost beside himself and I suffered for him. But it was the only thing I could do. He looked at the revolver in my hand, then scrutinized my face, and, shaking his head despairingly, he slowly returned to near the front of the stairs and folded his arms in dumb resignation.

Two guards were standing in the hall and witnessed this little scene, but they evinced no other sign than of amused interest. The fact that they did not understand our conversation did not arouse their suspicions or their fears.

When the Colonel returned with the word that I was to be presented to the general at once, Ivan and I were conducted up-stairs. At the door of the ante-room a guard stepped up and a second aide-de-camp apologetically asked me to leave my arms outside. I drew my saber and dagger from their sheaths, my revolver from its holster, and handed them to an orderly. Ivan here saw another opportunity to avoid meeting “Bloody Alikhanoff.” “I will stand by them,” he exclaimed eagerly.

“No, thank you, Ivan,” I replied. “You must come with me.” But now that I had been stripped of my arms, I had not the same means of impressing him as before, and in spite of me he started to slink away. Fearful lest I lose him after all, I clutched at him firmly by the coat-sleeve. He realized that there was no escape, and so, with the expression of a man who accepts the worst, when it is the inevitable, he yielded.

A sentry stood upon the threshold of the chamber. We passed by him and entered a large salon with highly polished hardwood floor. A small room led off from the farther end, into which the general was just stepping. He was a tall man and heavily built. Though his back was toward us, I could see that he wore the undressed jacket of a Russian officer, highly polished riding-boots, and spurs which clanked as he walked. His head was inclined slightly forward, but I noted that he pulled impatiently at his long, heavy mustache, now partly gray. We paused for a second, long enough for him to disappear into the smaller room, and then, at a signal from the colonel, followed him. There were others in the smaller room, but at the moment I did not notice them particularly, for General Alikhanoff received me at once with cold courtesy. I was pleasantly surprised when he greeted me in French and I briefly explained to him who I was and why I had come to see him. After a brief introduction, I asked his indulgence that I might address him through my interpreter.

“But, why?” he asked. “You speak French.”

“Very badly,” I answered, “and it is most important that I understand you precisely.” I did this chiefly because I wanted the opportunity of studying his features and expression, as I could better do when he was addressing the interpreter than when he was speaking directly to me. He acquiesced and motioned me to a chair before his desk.

At this point, an officer took his stand by my right