GENERAL STOESSEL.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1714, 4 January 1905, Page 20

GENERAL STOESSEL.

THE HEROIC DEFENDER OF FORT ARTHUR. It is the bad luck of the Russians that during the three great military crises Avhich? they have had to face during the last half-century they have had to rely on men of foreign name and foreign blood to pull them through Ayith credit. It Avaa Todleben, a man of German origin, Avho held the Southern Port Arthur, Sevastopol, against four nations for a year of unparalleled horror. It Avas the same German, Todleben, who ringed round Plevna Avith an irrefragable circle of stone and steel, after even the human whirlwind, Skobeleff, had failed to break in; and it is a man of the same race, the “German" Stoessel, avlio has held Port Arthur throughout the awful agony of all these months.

Yet Anatole Mikhailovitcli Stoessel; though the bearer of a German name, lias probably assimilated as much of the Slav as it is possible for a German to do. His family traditions are insepamtely bound up Avith Russia and Russia's army. His grandfather, General Ivan Stoessel, fought against Napoleon and goA-erned Tsarskce Selo; liis fi.ther, Mikhail Stoessel, joined the Orthodox Church and served in the Emperor's Uhlan Guards; and he himself, born fifty years ago, served not Avitliout distinction in the RussoTurkisb War. Yet as late as 1900 Stoessel ay-as knoAvn only as commander of a Siberian Rifle Regiment; and his chance did not come until the Boxer rising, AY-lien lie ■was the first commander to enter Tientsin, 'and rose to the rank of major-general for dash displayed in the attack on the Chinese capital. A STERN FIGHTER. BUT NO TACTICIAN.

Stoessel is essentially an engineer. “Stoessel is a bad soldier,” said his own commander, Kuropatlcin. “Put him with equal forces against a Gourko or a Skobeleff, and you’ll find him tricked and cut to pieces in twenty-four hours. But stick him behind one of his own earthworks, where there's no quesion of manoeuvring, and all the forces of earth and hell will not prevail against him.” So when the war broke out, and the Czar's counsellors tried to appoint the clever soldier Linievitch to command Port Arthur, Kuropatkin stood firm that Stoessel was the man, and gained his paint. Since then Stoessel's career is a matter of history. It confirms what the best Russian authorities anticipated—that he was a stern fighter and a first-rate engineer, but an indifferent general in the field. The comparative ease with which the Japanese took Nanshan and the outlying forts at Port Arthur, the desperate resistance they met with when they came to face the German general behind the essential defences of the town, prove that Kuropatkin was right. UN HEROIC CHARACTERISTIC S.

Stoessel lacks most of the ordinary physical and mental attributes of the successful soldier. Podgy, undistinguished, with sleepy eyes, and trimbearded, somewhat common-place face- —he is the antithesis of the di~.,hing and somewhat vain-Muscovite warrior. In St Peterburg it used to be said that “Stoessel rose rapidly through his solemn manners and his dingy uniform,'' and there was probably some truth in the sneer, for “Anatolii Mikhailovitch'' had the style and manners of the Swiss militia soldier, and the vivacious and immaculate Russian staff could not help suspecting depth beneath the studious officer's undazzling exterior. Those who dislike Stoessel—and they are many—declare that he has no feelings. Certainly he never shows any. Stolid, taciturn, and absolutely devoid of humour, Stoessel is a typical Teuton, totally out of touch with' the somewhat hysterical sentimentality of his adopted nation. His discipline is as tough as his fortifications and as sharp as hies bayonets. ‘‘The man is remorseless,” wrote a Russian officer, shortly after the Japanese landing at Pitsewo, who had seen a nine-teen-year-old soldier shot and cast into a dishonoured grave for a breach of duty in which there was more studidity than neglect. “Carry out the sentence. It saves lives in the end,” is Stoessel's grim retort to any court-martial that sends in recommendations of mercy. And the drunkard, the sleeping sentry, the culprit in some trivial act of insubordination, is flogged, or shot, or even hanged without mercy, because, with his Teutonio arithmetic and cold-blooded reasoning, Port Arthur's defender has worked it out that shooting one man for a breach of duty may some way indirectly “save the lives” of a whole battalion in the day of battle. That such a man could be “oopular” io

fchd usual seias© of that misused word is not to he expected. Popularity among a populace is won by "paaem at ciroenses, And B#t witti the whip a.nd the eoaffold. Before the fighting Stoessel's officers dreaded his rigid justice, which spared nobody, and his men, having no experience of his prowess as a fighter, and knowing only that by origin h© belonged to the hated “Nlemtsi” (Germans), regarded him withoirt enthusiasm. Things have changed since then. The few messages that have com e through from the beleaguered fortress speak almost gushingly of the adoration which the garrison feel for their commander. Both nave come to know one another on the field of battle; and the Russians have realised once more -that it is an “alien” who has again kept their flag from dishonour in face of the most tremendous tragedy in their history.