IN DARKEST RUSSIA. !

Auckland Star, Volume LV, Issue 270, 13 November 1924, Page 12

IN DARKEST RUSSIA. !

WITH WRANGEL'S ARMY. A DOCTOR'S STORY. OUTRAGES AND MURDERS. Stories of terrorised, famine-stricken Russia, during that post-armistke period when the Bolshevik regime held the country in its grip, and of ravaged Ireland, when Sinn Fein activities made that country a counterpart of Russia, have drifted from time to time to New Zealand. A graphic story of the condition of things in both countries was given to the ■■Star" this morning by Dr. H. if. Crickitt, surgeon of the ship Cumberland, now lying at the Queen's wharf. Dr. Crickitt was in Russia with the British Military Mission from April, 1919, to 1920, and later went to Ireland. He was in both countries vlien the "reign of terror" was at its height. After the armistice, Salonika having been evacuated, Dr. Crickitt became medical • officer ,to the 47th Division, R.A.1 ,1 ., which was a part of the Britisli Military Mission. In June, 1919, the j division joined the army under the Russian General Wrangel, which was fighting its way towards Tsaritzin. The R.A.F. did a little bombing and straffing/ and the Bolsheviks were pushed back to Tsaritzin, which is on the Volga and. about 485 miles from Ihe Army base at Novorossisk. Tsaritzin was taken on June 29, 1919, and the Bolsheviks pushed about another 150 j miles up the Volga. Wrangel, however,: overestimated his troops and his supplies, and was forced back again to within iive miles of the recently-taken town. The Reds even got within uic outskirts of the town, but Wrangcl's army managed to hold them back for some time. The position remained practically unchanged until just after Christmas. Then the Reds broke through I he line of Denikin, the Russian General-in-Chief, this being made possible by two of his regiments going over, en bloc, to the Bolsheviks, and thus leaving a gap in the line, through which Boudini, commander of the Reds, who had previously been a sergeantmajor in the Russian army, entered. His army pushed its way through, outflanking Denikin's troop?. A general retreat followed, the 47th Squadron, with Dr. Orickitt, leaving in tradns. Great hlockages were caused on the' lines by troops and refugees, and it I was three weeks before Ekilerinovar, 400 miles down the line, was reached. "On the way, we saw stations crowded with refugees trying to escape from the Bolshies," eaid doctor. "Wo took as many ac possible on our trains. During the passage down we also saw, swinging from trees, man)' spies who had been caught in Wrangcl's army. Appalling Conditions. "Typhus fever was sweeping the country." continued the doctor. "Hundreds of Russians, both civilians and troops, were dying. We even saw them dead and dying at the stations. At Ekilerinovar 1 niv sixteen dead taken from a troop train one day, and fourteen i the next. Tlic conditions generally were ! p.ppallin?. The people were penniless. Tsaritzin was a grain-growing centre, ■but there was no grain to sow. Starvation was on every pide. Besides the : typhus fever there was cholera. The atrocities of the Bolsheviks were horrible. They went in for ' .rlove-' making.' that is, they would cut the skin of a victim's arm up near the ,, elbow, and rip it right down to the' fingers. Tliein they would kill, and flinij the dead into pits. In one instance, of which I was told by a Miss KiefT, a number of Russians were made, to walk in single file down a flight of steps in a small room. As they came down, the Reds shot them until the place ran with blood. In another instance a sixlpcn-ycar-olj schoolgirl wasoutraged, and then hanged to a tree and shot. There were innumerable dimilar atrocities." Continuing, the narrator said that, on reaching Kkilcrinovar, tbe squadron, which was supposed to go to a seaport for embarkation, was asked to stay with Denikin until the families of the Russian I officers ha<l been evacuated.' Volun-1 teers wore called for, and the majority of the British Military Mission Bgreod to stay. There was a possibility of it having' to march S5 miles to Novorossisk, because the lines were being cut behind by the Green Guards. These guards were deserters from the old Russian Army, who lived in the hills as brigands, and would fire upon the i trains going down. Thorn was a. possibility of a tight with the guards, but ultimately the mission returned to Novorossisk by train without mishap. At tliis place numbers of aeroplane;, guns and tanks, left by the refugees, had to be destroyed in case they fell into the hands of the enemy. After this the British evacuated to Thcodosia. in the Crimea, by the ?ca. taking tlie Russian officers and their families with them. The doctor then vent to Sevastopol, and thence to Constantinople. He was then demobilised, but joined up again, and was sent back to ' Constantinople as medical oiTicer at the 82nd general hospital. In March. 1921, he was again ordered home to be demobilised, but, on reporting at the War Ofiice. was asked to renew his contract and go to Ireland. This he did. and on March 31, 1921. was made first medical officer at the King George Hospital. Dublin, where he sa'v a. good deal of the fighting between the Republicans and the Black and Tans.