THE RUSSIAN TERROR.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 13846, 8 March 1907, Page 5

THE RUSSIAN TERROR.

«s> BOMB OUTEAGE A 1 SEBASTOPOL. A GENERAL INJURED. Press Association—By Telegraph—Copyright. ST. PETERSBURG, March 7. (Received March 7, at 9.28 p.m.) A serious bomb outrage is reported from Sebastopol. General Nepluneff, the commandant at that town, was driving through the town when a bomb was thrown at him. It shattered the earriago and injured the general in tho feet. UNKNOWN MURDERERS. (Faou Odr Own Correspondent.) ST. PETERSBURG, January 17. Tho most disquieting thing about tho present terrorist campaign in itussia is flic refusal o{ the Terrorists to give their names. In any other country in the world a mail who is himself convinced that ho dies a martyr for his people is buoyed up principally by the liopo that that people will never let his name die. In ancient Greeco and Rome, during the French Revolution, and during the various troubles that havo taken place in Ireland, this fact is very noticcable, and I think that history in general would havo fewer political martyrdoms lo chronicle it the martvrs know beforehand that, onco the breath loft their bodies, their names would be consigned to complete oblivion. It there ever.was a set of men who might bo exported to shout out their names from tho housetops, to mako speeches from the dock, and to leave memoirs behind tliem, it would surely bo the Russian revolutionists, who do not believe in .1 hereafter, and whose only reward is, therefore, tho fame they can achieve among their fellow fanatics. Tet, tho Terrorists are now dying, one after another, without allowing their names lo becomo known. One o[ them is inscribed in tho official records as " the murderer of Count Ignaticff," a second as "the murderer of General Pavloff," a third as "the murderer of General von dcr Liumitz," and so on. It might bo supposed that the Russian Government was patflj- responsible for this owing to an easily .comprchonjiblo dislike to adding the names of new "heroes" to a list already sufficiently long, hut, on tho contrary, tho polico are always extremely' anxious to get tho names of these murderers inasmuch as their' history, particulars of the company (hoy frequented, etc., might enable, tho authorities to got some information about tho Terrorist organisation and of tho sources which supply tho funds for carrying on this dreadful civil war. IDENTIFICATION OF TERRORISTS. In fact tho polico attach such importance to this point that they take tho most extraordinary measures for tho identification of Terrorist murderers. The first thing they do when they seize a murderer is to photograph him from many, different points of view. As such photographs are' rarely successful, owing to want of co-operation on the part of the subject, tho latter is frequently photographed while asleep and after (loath. Such photographs being also of littlo use, the head of a political murderer is now •Severed from the body immediately after death and placed in a. glass jar filled with a peculiar mixture of spirits'; selected by tho best, chemists in this land of great chemists, and said to possess the property not only of preserving the features but of, so to say, reanimating them. Theso jars are stored in tho headquarters of tho secret polico on the Moika, a stone's throw from the hotiso in which this article is being written. On tho other hand, the revolutionary organisation takes every precaution against the names of its emissaries I being discovered. It orders a man to come to St. Petersburg from, say, London or Geneva. He comes. He repairs to a certain house where he strips off all his foreign clothing and dons a new suit, in tho pockets whereof are only revolvers and cartridges. He is then instructed minutely as to tho habits of his victim, after which ho leaves to do his work. When his work is done, lie is captured as a. matter of course, but he proudly refuses to give his name. "MY WORK IS DONE." "It's of no 9onsoqucnce," said the murderer of Count Ignatielf, on regaining consciousness after an unsuccessful attempt at suicide, "my work is done." In Ihe old days when the polico had a murderer on their hands for months they invariably managed to persuade him to break silence, hut in these days of " military field courts," with tho execution coming 24- hours after' tho crime, tho police have not enough time to bring their weighty arguments to bear on tho condemned man. What with the photographing, the trial, and other formalities, tho poiico inquisitors have no chance now of a, nice, quiet interview with the murderer in some subterranean dungeon. Tho courts-martial, largely the work of the late General l'avloff. are grim affairs. The only representative of tho public is a police inspector, and the proceedings end with tho signature of tho death warrant by tho military commander of tho district wherein the crime was committed. This is done so that the Czar's name will in none of these documents, and that the Czar will not know of the execution and cannot therefore exercise his prerogative of mercy. Tho defect of this arrangement is that sometimes innocent men and boys are condemned to_ dcriji by a handful of officers, inflamed with vodka and with loyalty, and after sentcnco is pronounced by tho local military bumble, it is immediately carried out. It is oflicially admitted that this horrible mistake has l>ccn made more than once. The system of execution is strangely primitive and barbarous, possibly because, up to a. few years ago, capital punishment, might almost lie regarded as unknown in Itussia, and there are not therefore to bo found hero functionaries possessing a traditional or hereditary knowledge of how tho dreadful thing may bo dono in the swiftest and least revolting manner. A WARD PROCESSION. One night last month a friend of mine was returning at a very late hour from a dinner to which he had been invited by some Russian friends in it famous restaurant on Ivreslovsky Island, near St. Petersburg, when ho suddenly met a weird procession. It consisted principally of Cossacks, who wore escorting three carriages, tho first containing several military and ono polico officer; the second a condomucd man, manacled, smoking a cigarette, and surrounded by guards; and tho third, tho executioner. The condemned man was a nameless political murderer, and, so far as I am concerned, his victim is also nameless, for I havo quite forgotten him. The murderer looked as serene as a saint, and I am told that his bearing was, throughout, extremely hold and contemptuous. Tho executioner, on tho other hand, was in a horrible state of collapse, and had evidently been drinking. I was afterwards tokl that ho had tjeen' serving a long term of imprisonment for a disgraceful crime, and was getting it. very much reduced by consenting lo act as executioner. The procession went to Sestroretsk, on the Finnish border (political prisoners are now, for some reason or other, executed -'and buried at a distance from lite capital, generally at some place on the Gulf of. Finland), but, at tho last moment, Ihe executioner refused to do his work, and was only mado to give way by lioiiig reminded that under martial law his absolute refusal would be punished by death. Tho prisoner, still calmly smoking his cigarette, was then made to stand on an empty soap box while Iho executioner went, to work in a most clumsy and amateurish way, passing the rope over Iho branch of a trco and finally kicking tho soap box from underneath tho prisoner. It is disgusting and almost incredible how much the work is bungled sometimes, but it is impossible to go into details on this subject.