THE CZAR

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LIV, Issue LIV, 21 August 1920, Page 5

THE CZAR

A VICTIM TOJOLTED LOYALTY ANOTHER BTOKY OF THE MASSACRE. (By Electric Telegraph- —-Copyright) (Published in The Times) LONDON, August 18. The Times has begun a series of articles giving an authentic account of tho murder of tho Russian royalties at Ekaterinburg, in July, 1918, the motives for which were based on the signed depositions of .eyewitnesses examined before a legal commission, as well as a long chain of circumstantial evidence. The articles dispose of numet''ous distorted versions derived from Bolshevist sources, and reveal the Czar’s real attitude' to the Allies. They throw fresh light on a clouded period in Russian history, in which, the .Empress and the -sinister figure of Rasputin appear. The writer is an English journalist, who’ was for sixteen years Times correspondent in Pctrogni,d before the war, and afterwards narrator of the successor; and nrisfor- ■ tunes of the Deniken and Koltchak | armies. : The correspondent narrates that | General DYterich started an inquiry’ regarding tho murders which Nicholas) Sokolov, magistrate and expert crime; investigator, conn doted under the; authority of Koltchak. The correspondent himself wa-s arrested at tho inquiry, and is one of the signatories. Tho "more important records wore ultimately entrusted to the custody oi an j official dossier. , When the Bolslie 1 iks wore aware of the success of (he invostigations, they threatened _to as G sassinate Sokolov, then a fugitive at ; Chita. The perilous smuggling of the I incriminating documents eastwards; through Siberia amid the hastening! debacle of Koltchak’s army reads like 1 a romance, ; The Moscow authorities four days after the murders officially described i the shooting of the Czar after trial as • an act of necessity, and affirmed that the ex-Eirrpress and her children were ■ safe. Investigation has overwhelmingly proved that the whole family, including five children and faithful attendants, totalling eleven, wore shot simultaneously without trial. The evidence shows elaborate preparation for the murders. The victims were all subjected to horrible tortures, mental if not physical, and wore shot in the basement of the house of a Russian Jew, Ipatico, where they had boon for some time imprisoned. The Bolsheviks attempted to hurriedly remove traces iff -the martyrdom ; but Sokolov found ! i Die marks of bullets and bayonet thrusts, and blood-splashed walls. The room had been a shambles, and ,tne perfunctory washing had left tell-tale signs. The assassins carted the bodies ton miles north of the city, where they were buried under the cover of woods surrounded by a cordon of Red guards. When the cordon was _ withdrawn, peasants followed the frail and discovered alongside a dissued iron ore pit a vast collection of relics, including pearls and other jewels in beautiful ( settings of gold, platinum, buttons, corset frames, and a human finger in- ( tact. “It's the Czar they’ve been . burying,” declared the peasants who had been misled by current reports of ; his escape. . : Tho correspondent, examining the . snot afterwards, found topaz beads and , other gems such as the yr*mg princesses , wore. . . i Immediately after the Ekaterinourg , tragedy an Imperial servant escaped . from a Red shooting squad and reportcd that the Grand Duchess Elizabeth had been murdered. Some bodies _wer*’ found in an iron pit. It was evident tho Reds aimed at the wholesale extermination of the Romanoffs. Many Russians, hoping for the restoration of the monarchy, those belonging to German orientation, believed and some still give credence to, any tale of the miraculous escape of the royalities; but even the hope ol the survival at least of the childien must be abandoned. It is established beyond doubt thiG the Czar' rejected attempts to scene nis endorsement of the Brest Lito'-sk Treaty, and fell a victim to loyalty to the Allies. AH the murdered Romanoffs were inconvenient to German as well as international plans.