THE HERO OF PORT ARTHUR.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLVIII, Issue 8133, 1 December 1904, Page 4

THE HERO OF PORT ARTHUR.

Mr Emit Danthesse published in the Echo de Paris on October 6 some very intersting particulars of General Stoessel's career. The general has been described as a German by origin, as a Swisb, Hungarian, Jew. He is a pare Russian, says his biographer of the Echo, the son of a Russian officer, and the grandson of General Ivan Stoesael, who served in the campaign of 1812. The Rue Stoessel, St. Petersburg, is named after the soldier of the Napoleonic wars. Anatoli Mikhailovitch Stoessel, to give the Pori Arthur hero his full name, wbb' born 60 years ago. M. Danthesse describes him as tall and robust. His features express resolution and reserve, the chin reveals energy and will, the thin-lipped mouth is severe, the forehead and the nose mean tenacity. Unlike Dragomiroff and Kuropatkin, who topped the list in the Military Academy, General Stoessel worked his way up from the ranks. He was a captain in some provincial depot when he was called out for the Russo-Turkish War. During the Boxer Rising and tho European expedition to China Stoessel commanded a regiment of Siberian sharpshooters. He was the first to enter Tientsin. He played a brilliant part (in the attack on Pekin, for which he was promoted to the rank of a major-general. When the campaign waß over Stoessel was sent to Port Arthur, where he had been ever since. When the Russo-Japanese War broke out Stoessel was made lieutenant-general, and placed in command of all the fortified area of Port Arthur. General Stoessel's brave wife, whom he married 25 years ago, is described by M. Danthesse, as "une femme une bonne bourgcoise, petite, brune, vive." Stoessel, M. Danthesse says, is not one of the learned soldiers. His bravery is contagious. "There goes the man who never weeps," says the civilian folk. Stoessel stopped the sale of alcoholic liquors in Port Arthur. He thinks music better for his men and the civilians in his charge than brandy. He gives them plenty of it— two concerts every day.