MOGDOW UNDER THE TERROR

New Zealand Herald, Volume LV, Issue 16969, 1 October 1918, Page 6

MOGDOW UNDER THE TERROR

BED ORGY OP CARNAGE. i ■ MEM DRUNK WITH KILLING. Times. LONDON, Sept. 29. The Mosoow correspondent of the Berlin Lokal Anzeiger, telegraphing in the middle of September, gave i. frightful account of th( Red Terror there. Ha said a red billow of blood was flowing from Moscow over the whole Empire. The. Bolshevik leaders declared that the Bed Terror would purify the atmosphere, saying that the executions were nothing compared with the millions sacrificed in the war. During the whole Franca Revolution not so many aristocrats were executed as were executed In Russia, last month with only the faintest of trial. An Extraordinary Commission, with branches andt subbranches in the provinces, was ordering executions as it pleased, tho last decree ordering the seizure and execution of the bourgeoisie as hostages whenever counterrevolutionaries created a disturbance, surpassing any previous horrors. The recent executions Included former Ministers to the Tsar— Chwostofi, Makaroff, and Prqtopopoff, Many others playing an important part in most recent history have been brought before the court and ordered to reveal all the secrets of the Tear's Government. Afterwards they have been dragged from their cells at dead of night, conveyed to Petrovsky Park and shot by sailors. Details of these wholesale nocturnal executions were kept secret. Thoy took place in a guarded square, brilliantly lighted wif,h are lamps, where & squad of soldiers was always kept in readiness to receive victims from prison. No time was wasted, no pity expended. The majority met death with dignity, The executions m the provinces include numbers of well-born women and priests. The executioners become victims of the execution habit like morphia , maniacs, eagerly volunteering their services, and ,m& unable to sleep unless they hare shot j someono dead. Several Grand ' Dukes .and members of the Kerensky Cabinet are I kept in prison at Moscow. The Bolsheviks laughingly tell the people: " Don't be Imi patient, they are only spared till a little later." Relatives of the hostages know nothing of the day or hour of execution. Wives, mothers and sweethearts are ignorant of the fate of their loved ones, and go everywhere seeking tidings. Wholesale ; terror has had a bludgeon-like effect, and so cowed and terrorised tho population that the whole of Moscow could he put ; to the sword without insurrection.