Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1883-02-21

CONVICT HUNTING IN SIBERIA.-Sorrv
indeed, even when death does not come tt
put an end to his existence is the lot O
the convict who has succeeded in escaping
from the mines of e. stern Siberia With
out resources of any kind, he must beg or
rob his way back TO Russia. The alterna.
tive of seeking employment is one which
often has disasterous consequences. The
convict of the lowest type regards the
Siberia colonist as an inferior, and has a
saying which describes him as "blind for
three days after birth" But the colonist
has his revenge He works the supercil
ious convict like beast of burden. and
gives him as little rest and as little food
as possible. When wages are demanded
the colonist has an original way of satisfy
ing his laborer. The money is paid without
demur, but, before the convict can get
clear he falls dead, killed by q bullet
from the gun of hisscruel employer. This
method OF payment is sometimes carried
out on large scale. 1t is adopted in the
case of vagabond laborers who, having
| finished their autumn work in the fields,
return to the neighboring village TO be
paid off The wages are forthcoming and
the laborers allowed to depart with their
hardly earned money. But they have no
sooner gone than the peasant farmer
assemblies his neighbors, and having
provided them with horses and firearms.
the whole party salIies forth in pursuit of
the vagabonds. The retiring laborers are
speedily overtaken; most are killed on
the spot, all are robbed, the recovered
money being divided between the farmer
and his confederates. The only respect
shown for authority is the prevalent habit,
where robbery has been the motive of
slaughter, of concealing the dead. The
murdered convicts are usually cut UP and
mutilated, and the remains buried in out
of the way places. This hunting of the
"hunchbacks," as the escaped convicts are
often called in derision, has gone on for
years. entering so deeply into the habits
of the people that it has escaped the
attention of few travellers through eastern
Siberia. Where are the men?" was
asked of a woman left in charge of a small
village adjoining the highway. "Gone
after the hunchbacks,' was The reply,
Such is the prevailing decentralization in
this respect that boys have been heard to
ask their fathers to kill vagabonds in
order that they may see 'how the fellow
will roll on his hump" In some of the
governments it is certain death for a con
vict escaped, or still under supervision, to
be caught returning from the mine.
Occasionally the soldiers initiate the colo.
nists in their exploration of the vaeabond.
The cossack, as well as the ordinary
colonist, covets cheap labor, and is in the
habit of rewarding with an ounce or two
of lead the convict who declines to pass
frnn Nc y
another.
During the colonization of the Trans
baikal region, the hunting of vagabonds
was one of the common diversions of the
newly arrived settlers. From Tomsk to
Chta there is a locality that has rendered
itself notorious for the pursuit on large
scale of escaped convicts. In the Tomsk
government itself whole villages are
described as living solely by the robbery
of vagabonds. The river Karasan has
been so filed with the bodies of murdered
convicts AS to become putrid. Near Fingul
open woods are known as favorite
ground for the slaughter. The whole of
the district Is full Of the memories and
traditions ofSiberian man hunting. Heroes
OF the sport are still alive, Bitkov.
Romanov and Zavorota were each expert
in different ways. Romanov for instance.
gained celebrity in the village of Fingu,
where he was in the babt of living in
ambush close to the highway, and shooting
down every vagabond who passed. In the
autumn evenings Bitkov used to pick off
'tragglers along the banks of the river
Augar. During subsequent sport along
The Blryus there were individual Sberans
who boasted that they had brought down
as many RS sixty and in some cases ninety
Vagabonds. Only upon one of these
hunters of men do the vagabonds seem to
have taken vengeance. They selected
one Paramonich, who had been all his
ife engaged in killing convicls. The
7agabonds assembled together, seized
linn and brought his career to close by
,lunging him : alive in "a caldron of
metal.