Evening capital journal. (Salem, Or.) 1888-1893, 1889-11-25
A WIFE'S DEVOTION.
The Story OF q Helpless Victim Of
Russian Cruelty.
Outline Of . We1l-Authonticated Tragedy
Illustrating tho Terrible Hardships
Incident to Exile by Administra-
tive Process.

tive Process.
In the year 1879 there was living in the
town Of Ivangorod, in the province OF
Chermigof, skilful and accomplished
young surgeon named DR.. Baillie, writes
Mr.. George Kennan in one Of his Cent,,ry
articles on Russia. Although he was a
man Of liberal views, he was not an aeita-
tor nor revolutionist, and had taken no
active part in political affairs. Some time
in the late winter or early spring of 1879
there came TO him, with letters of intro
duction, two young women who had been
studying In one Of the medical schools for
women in st. Petersburg, and had been ex.
PEELED and ordered to return to their
homes in central Russia on account of their
alleged political "untrustworthiness
(neblagonadezhnosD. They were yerv
anxious to complete their education and To
fit themselves for useful work among the
peasants; and they begged DR.. Baillie to
AID them IN their studies, to hear their
recitasions, and to allow them to make use
OF his library and the facilities of his
office. As they were both in an "illepal -
position-that is, were living in a place
where, without permission from the
authorities, they had no right to be-it was
DR.. Baillie's duty as q loyal subject to hand
them over to the police, regardless of the
fact that they had come to him with
letters OF introduction and peti-
ton for help. He happened, how
ever, to be man OF courage, independence
and generous instincts; and instead of be-
traying them, he listened with sympathy To
their story, promised them his aid, intro
duced them to his wife, and began to give
them lessons. The year 1879 was a year of
intense revolutionary activity in Russia.
Attempts were constantly being made by
the terrorists to assassinate high Govern |
ment of1cials; and the police, in all parts of |
the empire, were more than usually susp- |
cious and alert. The visits of the Young |
girls to DR.. Baillie's house and office soon
attracted the attention Of the local authorl-
ties in Ivangorod, and they took steps to as
certain who they were and where they had |
come from. An investigation showed that |
one Of them was living on forged pass
port, while the other had none, and that
both had been expelled from ST. Petersburg
for political "untrustworthlness." Their
unauthorized appearance IN Ivangorod,
when they should have been at their homes,
and their half-secret visits-generally at
night to the house Of DIR. Balllie, were re-
garded as evidence Of political conspiracy,
and on the 10th Of May, 1879, both they and
the young surgeon were arrested and ex-
lied by administrative process to Siberia.
DR.. Baillie eventually was sent to the arctic
village Of Verkhoyansk, latitude $3.50, in
the province Of Yakutsk, where he was
seen in 1882 by Engineer Melville, Lieuten-
ant Danenhower, Mr.. W. II. Glider and
all the survivors Of the arctic ex-
ploring steamer Jeanette. At the time
NJ Nv Rai1liQfa haniahuonf xry;f |
beautiful young woman, twenty-four or
twenty-five years Of age, was expecting con-
hnement, and was therefore unable to go to
Siberia with him. As soon as possible,
however, after the birth of her child, and
before she had fully recovered her strength,
she left her nursing baby with relatives and
started on Journey Of more than 5000
miles to ioin her husband in village stu-
ated north Of the Arctic Circle and near the
Asiatic pole OF cold She had not the
necessary means to make such journey by
rail, steamer and post, as Lieutenant
Scheutze made it in 1855, and was there
tore forced to ask permission Of the
Minister Of the Interior to travel
with party of exiles. As far as the city of
Tomsk in Western Siberia, both political
and common criminal exiles are transported
in convict trains or barges. Beyond that
point the common criminals walk, and the
politicals are carried in telegas, at the rate
Of about sixty miles week, stopping in an
etape every third day for rest. At this rate
of progress Mrs. Baillie would have reached
her husbands place Of exile only after six
teen months of incessant hardship, priva-
ton and suffering. But she did not reach it.
For many weeks her hope, courage and love
sustained her, and enabled her to endure
without complaint the jolting, the suffocat-
ing dust, the scorchinR heat, and the cold
autumnal rains on the road, and the bad
food, the plank sleeping -benchssr the ver-
min, and the pestilential air OF the etapes;
but human endurance has its limits. Three
or four months of this unrelieved misery,
with constant anxiety about her husband
and for the babe that, for her husbands
sake, she had abandoned In Russia, broke
down her health and her spirit She sank
into deep dependency and eventually began
to show signs of mental alteration After
passing Krasnoyarsk her condition be-
came such that any sudden shock
was likely completely to overthrow her
reason-and the shock soon came. There
are two villages in Eastern Siberia whose
names are almost alike-Verkholensk and
Verkhoyansk The former is situated on
the river Lena, only $50 miles from lrkutsk'
while the latter is on the head waters OF the
Yana, and is distant from Irkutsk nearly
2,7OO miles. AS the party with which she
was travelling approached the capital OF
Eastern Siberia her hope, strength ana
courage seemed to revive. Her husband
she thought, was only few hundred miles
away, and in few more weeks she would
be in his arms. She talked Of him constant
ly, counted the verstposts which measured
her slow progress toward him, and hteraiiy
lived upon the expectation Of speedy re-
union with him A few stations west OF
Irkutsk she accidentally became aware, Tor
the first time, that her husband was not IN
Verkholensk, but in verkhoyansk; that she