Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1873-04-21

In the whole history OF criminal juris-
prudence there has never, probably,
been anything equal to the gigantic
trial which was concluded at Moscow,
Russia, on the 2lst of November, and in
which were arraigned five hundred
prisoners, upward of two hundred Of
whom were convicted and sentenced to
severe penalties. Among the accused
were persons of every station in life
gray.haired men and youth, men and
women; among the latter some highly
accomplished and prepossessing in APP
pearance. All of the prisoners were
charged with one of the gravest ofienses
in the criminal code Of Russia-that of
counterfeiting. That code says: " The
person that counterfeits the coin or cur
rency of the Imperial Government shall
suffer death" Notwithstanding this
rigorous provision, Russia has been
flooded for many years past with well
executed counterfeits Of the Govern
ment treasury notes. The prompt exc
cution of several who were caught in
passing the spurious coin did not mate
rally check the evil. Offers of the
largest rewards did not lead to the de-
tection of the guilty parties.
At length, In July last, a curious acci-
dent gave the government the long
looked. for clue, which led to the discov-
cry of an association of criminals of both
sexes, banded together for the purpose
of circulating the spurious currency, and
which extended from the bleak and
frozen shores of the White sea to the
Volga and the Black sea. In the course
of the two following months, three thou
sand men and women were arraigned,
but after a preliminary examination
twenty-five hundred of them were dis
charged, and about five hundred were
held for trial. Among the latter were
six Frenchmen, of st. Petersburg, who
had been caught printing the counterfeit
notes, and comparatively large mum
ber of women. The prisoners were all
conveyed to Moscow, where they were
confined in the vast vaults underneath
the Kremlin Palace. Criminal law in
Russia is barbarous at the best, and the
male prisoners we're herded together like
so many hogs. They received the coars-
est fare, and straw their only couch.
The women were treated but little better.
On the goth of October the trial was
opened in the large hall of the Kremlin,
which holds nearly FIVE thousand per
sons. The proceedings we're pfotfseted
for a month, and the prosecution
succeeded in establishing the guilt OF
over oRe-third of the accused. Two
hundred and three Of them were found
guilty; among them about fifty women.
Sentence Of death was passed upon
:he six French pPinteF9, end the other
convicted parties were condemned to
hard labor in the gold mines of the Ural
Mountains for life, or for ten years. The
doomed men end women burstinto pierre
inc shrieks and howls, Gal veil they
might; for, in the case Of the former,
the sentence included barbarous fog
ging and branding on the forehead
with red-hot iroHsI While the Wemen,
some of whom were of fine descent,
shuddered at the idea Of having to do
the most menial work for life or ten
years at the station-houses, where the
keepers of tho male prisoners reside. In
their despair some Of the InfortHnates
threw themselves on the ground, and
their piercing cries, mingled with the
clanking of their chains, produced a
truly horrible effect. The excitement
and frenzy of the condemned grew from
minute to minute more intense, and the
Judges, in order to restore quietude, had
to call in the soldiers, who, with their
kant-seblbs, beat the prisoners right
and left, and then dragged them back
10 the vaults Of the Kremlin.