"A Human Tiger."

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XXVIII, Issue 7775, 20 June 1904, Page 5

"A Human Tiger."

Alexel Nicolaevitch Kuropatkin is recognised as the Czar's ablest general, but he enjoys an unenviable reputation for blood-thirstiness and savagery in his campaigns against the Turcomans. Here is a Pen-and-ink sketch of him at the sack of lihokand :—

" It is twenty-two years since the capture of Geok Tepe. Perhaps Kuropatkin has become less sanguinary with age. But if he should live to be a hundred, and in that time should become as mildmannered and soft-hearted as any humanitarian of the age, he could never live down the memory of the dreadful day. Geok Tepe was a fortress in Central Asia held by the Turcomans, and besieged for a month by Russian forces under Skobeloff. Kuropatkin was the active commander, and when at last the stronghold fell he gave orders to give no quarter on account of age or sex. And here he added the crowning touch to the unlovely reputation as a human tiger which he had gained in the RussoTurkish war. The words of an eyewitness give a faint idea of the glories of civilised warfare as exemplified by this famous general. He says : The whole country was covered with corpses. The morning after the battle tbey lay in rows like freshly-mown hay, as t\ ey had been swept down by the mitrailleurs and artillery. Hundreds of women were sabred, and 1 myself saw little babies bayoneted or slashed to pieces. Many women were dishonored before being killed. The troops, mad with drink and the lust of fighting, were allowed to plunder and kill for three days after the assault.'"