Various - Eclectic Magazine of Foreign Literature, Science, and Art, March 1885

Escapes of political and other convicts from Western Siberia are more frequent than is generally supposed, but from Eastern Siberia, though often attempted, they seldom succeed. Save for convicts under sentence of penal servitude, and actually imprisoned, it is easy to elude the vigilance of the police and get away from a convict village or settlement, but it is almost impossible to get out of the country. The immense distances to be traversed, the terrible climate, lack of money, the absolute necessity of keeping to the high roads, prove, except in very few instances, insuperable obstacles to final success. In order to be really free, moreover, it is imperative for a fugitive not alone to pass the frontier of European Russia, but to reach some country where he runs no risk of falling into the clutches of the imperial police. Even in Germany he is liable to be recaptured, and is really safe only in England, France, or Switzerland. Hence, to make good a flight from Eastern Siberia requires a conjuncture of so many favorable and nearly impossible circumstances as to render a complete escape a rare and remarkable event. But the incentives to escape are as great as the obstacles to success. No life can be more horrible than that of a political exile in the far east or far north of Siberia. Even at Irkoutsk the mean temperature is fifty degrees below the freezing-point of Réaumur; for many months of the year the sun in some parts of the country shines but two or three hours in the twenty-four, and for days together darkness covers the face of the land. A man untrained to manual labor, or unacquainted with the arts of trapping and killing wild animals and collecting peltry, turned adrift in the remoter parts of Siberia, runs the risk of perishing of hunger and cold. A Russian refugee, now at Geneva, tells that, during his sojourn in Eastern Siberia, he spent the greater part of the long winter in bed, rising only to swallow some rancid oil, the sole food he could obtain. To escape from such a life as this a man will risk almost anything. Even incarceration in a central prison, or the penal servitude of the mines, can hardly be more terrible. The trouble is, that the way to freedom lies through Western Siberia and Russia in Europe. The road south is barred by the wild tribes that haunt the frontiers of Mongolia and Manchuria, who either kill or give up to the Russians all the fugitives that fall into their hands.

On the other hand, the escape of a prisoner or of a convict under sentence of penal servitude is far more difficult than the flight of an involuntary exile; the latter may leave when he will, the former must either break out of prison or evade his guardians, and being soon missed he runs great risk of being quickly recaptured. How, in one instance at least, by boldness, address, presence of mind, and good luck, the difficulties were overcome, the following narrative, related, as nearly as possible, in Debagorio Mokrievitch's own words, will show. Other fugitives, for instance Nicolas Lopatin, a gentleman now living in Geneva, who escaped from Vercholensk in 1881, may have encountered great hardships, but, being exiles at large, they were neither so soon missed nor so quickly pursued. Debagorio was under sentence of penal servitude, and the flight from Siberia of a man condemned to penal servitude is almost unexampled. Even rarer than an escape is the true account of one, related by the fugitive himself. Imaginary accounts exist in plenty, but, so far as I am aware, no authentic personal narrative of an escape from Eastern Siberia – at any rate in English or French – has ever before been given to the world.

I first heard of Mokrievitch in May, 1881, a few days after his arrival in Geneva, and through the kindness of Prince Krapotkine obtained (and communicated to a London newspaper) a brief sketch of his fellow-exile's adventures; but for certain reasons, that exist no longer, it was not considered expedient to publish the full and complete account which the reader will find in the following pages.

On the evening of February 11, 1879, several friends of the revolutionary cause, of whom I was one, met at Yvitchevitche's lodgings, in the house Kossarovsky, Yleanski Street, Kieff, the town where I was then living. After a short conversation, Anton, myself, and several others left the house with the intention of passing the rest of the evening with our friend, Madame Babitchev. The inevitable samovar was bubbling on the table, our hospitable hostess gave us a warm welcome, cigarettes were lighted, conversation was joined, and an hour or more passed very pleasantly.

Anton was the first to leave, and he could hardly have reached the street when we were startled by a loud report like the firing of a pistol. We stared at each other in consternation, and Strogov, running into the ante-room, looked through the window and listened at the door, in order to find out what had happened. In a few minutes he came back with satisfactory tidings. Nothing unusual seemed to be stirring in the street; and he attributed the report we had heard to the banging of a door in a neighboring café. So we resumed our conversation and our tea-drinking with quiet minds. But five minutes later we were again disturbed; this time by sounds the character of which there was no mistaking. The trampling of heavy feet in the vestibule, hurried exclamations, words of command, and the rattling of arms, told us only too well with whom we had to do.

The police were upon us.

Notwithstanding our desire to resist, we knew that we should be compelled to yield without a blow. There was not a weapon amongst us. A few seconds were passed in anxious thought. Then the double-winged doors were thrown violently open, and we saw that the ante-room was occupied by a detachment of soldiers, with bayonets lowered and ready to charge. From the right flank came the words, loud and clear: “Will you surrender, gentlemen? I am the officer in command of the detachment.”

I looked round and recognized in the officer with the gendarme uniform and drawn sword, Soudeikin in person, then a subaltern in the Kieff gendarmerie, later the famous chief of the political police of the capital.

Despite the imposing military array, the haughty bearing of the officer, the glittering bayonets and stern looks of the soldiers, and the unpleasant sense of having fallen into their toils, the whole affair seemed to me just a little amusing, and I could not help smiling, and saying, in answer to Soudeikin's summons, “Are we then a fortress, Mr. Officer, that you call upon us to surrender?”

“No; but your comrades…” the rest of the sentence, owing to the din, I did not catch.

“What comrades?” I asked.

“You will soon see,” replied Soudeikin.

Then he ordered his men to search us, after which we were to be taken to the police office.

The searching over, we were surrounded by thirty or forty soldiers, with arms at the trail, and conducted to the Libed police station. Even before we reached our destination we could see that something unusual had happened. The building was lighted up, and there was an excited crowd about the door. After mounting the staircase we were led into the waiting-room. It was filled with armed men. Pushing my way with some difficulty through the press, I saw on the other side of the room several of our friends. But, my God, what a state they were in! Posen and Steblin Kamensky were bound hand and foot; the cords so tightly drawn that their elbows, forced behind their backs, actually touched. Close to them were Mesdames Arnfeld, Sarandovitch, and Patalizina. It was evident that something extraordinary had befallen in the house of Kossarovsky, shortly after we left. I could not, however, ask our friends any questions, for that would have been taken as proof that we were acquainted. Yet, from a few words dropped here and there, I soon learnt what had come to pass. They had resisted the police, a gendarme had been killed, and all whom we had left at the meeting arrested.