BOLSHEVISM IN ODESSA

Evening Star, Issue 17079, 25 June 1919, Page 4

BOLSHEVISM IN ODESSA

DREADFUL ORGxES,

How the city of Odessa suffered from a systematic camoaign of murder, robbery, and oat-rare after the first entry of the Bolsheviks! on March 15, 1918, te <u> scribed by Mr Courtier-Foster, British chaplain at Odessa. A regime of brutal tyranny was established, “in. which liberty ana safety disappeared. Murders of the most revolting nature were of frequent occurrence, and indiscriminate looting was the order ol the dav. ... Women and girls .engaged in shopping commissions in the lower parts of tha town were seized by bands ol men front the Red Army and carried off to warehouse yards and similar places, -where their fats was worse than death. Indeed, m inanv instances they were found dead on the’’following morning. Orgies which defy description were of daily occurrence. Wins shops and cellars were by degrees broken into and looted throughout tho city. Free drinks from pails and buckets were given to all who cared to have them. Women returning from market in the morning were stopped and. compelled to drink from pails held on high by two soldiers, i —Streets Running With Wine. — On one afternoon it was. his fate, say© Mr Coun ior-Foster. to come away from a slum and find tile streets running red with hundreds of gallons of wine pouring from the smashed vats of a great store. Numbers of Bolsheviks lay flat on tha pavement, with face in the gutter, drinking from the stream which flowed past, carrying with it tha accumulated filth and refuse of the uncleanscd city, "Tins is the Bolshevik idea of * Freedom of Body,’ coupled with the right to maim the public parks and gardens t-ha : >_ane of indescribable obscenities .and a recognition of murder and assassination as the cmtommy methods of dealing with those who.-e ideas of ‘Freedom of Body’ savor of sympathy with the worn-out and benighted si and aids of effete civilisation oi the Allies.” One such instance of tie customary method of manifesting political disapproval robbed me of a Alarming ocouaintanco of many years. General X lived in a flat in Dom Papoodoff. Since the revolution he had retired irom tho army and all public life,_ and carefully abstained from any participation in politics. His extreme discretion, did not avail to save him. He was under suspicion of harboring latent hostility and ivpumiance towards tho all-important Bolshevik conception of “Freedom of Mind and Body.'” One afternoon a parly of soldiers ofiha Bed Army came to hla apartment. _ They found the general in the act ol Goring his front door; ’no vras going out to tea with ,-. ; >nie friend;-. The soldiers told him he was under arrest., and must accompany them. H-o asked permission to tell liis wife. who. he explained, was following him 'in a tew minutes to th% house of a friend. and would bo extremely anxious at his uon-ar-nearano. The leader of tho brii-d T.riusod the request, declaring “She will loiow toon enough I” He also declined to permit one of the men to raw the bell and inform tho family ho had bc-m arrested. The guards led him downstairs. In tb s vestibule they diet him mad, mid, leaving his body in a pen! of Mood, lighted cigarettes and went their way. Three minutes afterwards bis wife came down on her way to Join him at tea, s> ud found her iraslxmd’s corpse in the hall. Two hours later on the same afternoon, other Rod Guards came to the same house and' carried out more “ cxceatkms ” this time in tho fiats of the victims. Frcm day to day one’s social circle dimlnirhed. * Friends with whom one conversed in the evening Shad vanished lb-* following morning. 'Sometimes the Red. Guards in searoMng booses were cord cut with giving insults and taking loot. Frequently their c-bjcct was not confined to murder or irebbery, but to inflict the greatest ponribL amount of mental distress and harassment by repeated and systematic vjf.ita.tk.us, which might or might no!, result- In assaasir.ation. As manv as five search pait-icr- tame to my flat in oik* morning. Some friend* of mine ha-ri tb-rir houses thrown Into the wildest disorder and confusion, and everything overhauled 17 times in one day. Many officers were done to death under fdrcTLmstaiices of unexampled torture and erne! tv. There wes no honor even among thieves, and for nearly a year one r.ev«r bad: a ulghi'a rest without beiirg n waken ad l>v the tumult of shots fired in IShstoeot without or the shrieks o! agony cf some hap)ess victim of the New Civilisation. On one such occasion, wlmu to© night war, more hideous than usual by reason of tha incessant firing, a fontHefc look place between two marauding lamb of Bolsheviks returning from looting expeditions in opposite quarters of the town. Each party know tho spoils oi tho other would bo'of omvddurable value, co the Apostles of Freedom fought each ether to tho death for tho property -which their own proclamations declare no persons bar© a right to. Tbs larger party were the victors. The four members of the smaller band were all left dead in tho street. When on the following morning the death carts made their rounds to gather up the victims of tlta night a pocket of one of tho dead bandits vies found to have been overlooked by tbs triumphant murderers j in it, v.-,w found a further 20,000 roubles. WOMEN SHOPPERS SHOT.

Life became ever of lighter Talus. The brutality oi assassination increased dairy. There lived a few howes further down 14:6 street in which t had my quarters' the voung wife and little son of a junior officer. absent at the time in Pctrograd. film went, one day to draw her allowance, which an:minted to only a few pounds. Bma:! as the sum was, it aroused the cupidity of a few watch fa] Bolsheviks. On the following morning her apartment was found looted*, sard ebo and her boy both dead _ia the bod. toerced through and through with thrusts from bavenets. In the same stnst, the Kanatnaya,. another ghas% affair, earns to my notice. One morc&g at about 11.50 two quietly dressed ladies' ' woie aland ms at the corner waiting the coaiing of a'twmcar. A portv of Bolaiieviks and noticed them as m-unm .v. d; the pcrcecntvd “Bourjouy” ckma. W.timut lira fermaiity of any crick or mockery of n trial—indeed, there was ii" charge poasibie against, the two niiddle-ati*"!. miidie-clars women editing fonii to' ii:« town to make some pur- ( baa's-both were allot dead on the porentvntf at the sited comer. ♦