CHILDREN STILL SMILE IN RUSSIA.

Dunstan Times, Issue 2989, 29 September 1919, Page 2

CHILDREN STILL SMILE IN RUSSIA.

Hard as it may be to believe, boys and girls still laugh and play throughout Russia, the natural buoyancy of childhood refusing to lie submerged in ibe misery and disorder that swamps the empire. A report of the commission which is maintaining and educating 1,000 children in Siberia, at Petrupavlovsk, Ufa, Irbit, Turaen and Shadrinsk, makes this statement. Thousands of miles from home, cut off from parents and friends, these youngsters, many of whom are from wealthy families, are happy, healthy and thriving in the seven colonies .maintained for them by the American Red Cross. ■ln happier times tho children lived in Petrograd,, but the parents and relatives of most of them have been killed in the fighting and rioting in that unfortunate capital. Too young in most cases to realise the tragedy that has fallen upon them, they romp'and play as do any othev normal young human animals. Dr, S. Scudder. who is in charge of the Red Cross Refugee work in Siberia, reports that the money appropriated for the care of these children is money well spent. The children arc a part of the thousands of children that were sent from. Petrograd when the bloodshed began. They were sent to provinces where food and healthful conditions could be iound. Ranging in age from two to nineteen years, they sprang from every class in the community. Petrograd teachers and •physicians accompanied the children to their destinations for the purpose of looking after their educational and physical welfare. All went well with the various colonies until the advance of the Czechoslovak forces across Russia to Vladivostok:. The bitter fighting which marked the attempt of the GermanAustro and Bolshevik elements to halt the movement of the Czechoslovak soldiers isolated the communities in which the children were situated, cutting off the supplies and funds on which depended their existence. From that time on these youngsters. known as “Petrograd Refugee Children,” have had a hard time of it and many of them are believed to have perished in the struggle. Word of their plight reached the Government at Omsk from time to time and the officials promised relief, but as the Government itself was in financial straits this assistance failed to materialise. Leit to their o\mi iesources teachers and children' raised money by every possible means, concerts arranged by ibe older children and lotteries providing most of tho funds for food. Through the summer of UH 8 the children managed to exist in one way or another, but with the

approach of early Siberian wintei their situation became critical in the extreme. As all were but lightly clad the first spell of cold weather brought much illness. One bv one the colonies split up into smaller groups, each group starting on an aimless journey through the countryside in search of food and better protection from the cold. While a 'majority of the teachers and ohysicians who left Petrograd with the children stuck with their charges through all the hardships and made every effort to keep them eoiufuitable, some of these guardians proved false tjh their trust, deserting the children assigned to their care at the lirst. reverse and leaving the youngsters, many of them mere babies, to shift for themselves. The fate of those who were abandoned in this cruel way is too heart rending to dwell upon. The teachers who remained faithful ... their duty had a difficult time as the moldlis went hy maintaing the orals of the children, weakened as ihev were by cold, lack of food and the fact I hat the winter weather made ji impossible lor them to attend school because of insufficient cloth ing. They grew indolent and careless* of their personal appearance : some took to begging and others, the weaker characters, to stealing. In a

short time, according to the Red Cross report, the children in one of these colonies were literally in rags. Vermin added to their general discomfort. . . . This was the general condition 01 the children in such of the colonies ns remained intact when the situation was brought to the attention of the Red Cross Mission in Siberia just before last Christmas. Red Cross workers were despatched to the colonies and after a wide search managed to gather in more than 1,000 of the children, who were soon re-established in more cheerful environments. Of this work of reclamation the report says : Reorganisation and equipment of the newly formed colonies was started .it once, although very few Red Cross stores were yet available. Every effort was made at local purchase, and bv collecting clothing in adjacent towns the children were soon equipped with fur caps, overcoats and felt boots and were able to leave their overcrowded, stuffy rooms and run

and play in the open like other hoys and girls. Cloth or material for upper clothes was obtained only with threat difficulty through the Czech military headquarters, and it was not until Christmas that Red Cross supplies were available from headquarters at Omsk. Woollen sweaters, blankets and sweets arriving from the Red Cross warehouses in time for Christmas added greatly to the good cheer and comfort of the children. “American hospital supplies were drawn upon to provide underwear, and with the supply of clean linen at hand a fight was begun to rid the children o.f vermin. Though typhus had long since made its appearance in these soldier and refugee filled towns, no disinfecting machines were available for our purpose. The clothing of the children was baked, piece by piece, in the little brick ovens of the peasant homes. These bakings, with plentiful use of the comb and parrafin, solved

the vermin question. “Efforts have been made to lessen the overcrowding, but empty houses are not easy to iind. In the ease of the youngest children, however, a house lias been especially fitted up. and the effect of brighter surroundings and better food on their spirits and the general improvement of their health lias been marked.”

With a view to inoculating a spirit of confidence in the children the colonies haye been placed on a self-gov-erning basis, committees of the boys and girls regulating (lie affairs of the insiiinlion. The Petrograd teachers who were retained under the reorganisation. says the report, regarded this innovation with the gravest doubts, the practice of delegating responsibility to children being unknown in Russia. The report says the arrangement is working splendidly, that the committees maintain better habits and order than was ever the case under the discipline of the teachers.