St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1890-02-16
CONFIRMED By KEENAN,.
The Noted Traveller Knew Many
of the Victims.

The Noted Traveller Knew Many
of the Victims.
CHICAGO, Feb. ia telegram, con-
firmatory of the recent report of whole
sale outrages on the persons of political
prisoners at the mines of Kara. Siberia,
was shown to George Kennan tonight.
1t stated that Nine. Sigida had been
hogged to death, Marie Kaluzh-
maya, Maria Karalefskaya and
Nadezhda Smirnitskaya having
poisoned themselves Oh hearing of
Nine. Sigida's fate, and that the brother
of the first named unfortunate had com
mitted suicide from grief. "Such
news" said Mr.. Kennan. his face mant-
ling with Indignation. sis enough to
make mans blood boil. 1t has been
reserved for the closing years of the
nineteenth century to witness this
crowning consummatiOn of Russian
barbarity, the floggIng of helpless and
unprotected women. Well may we ask
ourselves, standing here in liberty's
chosen land how civilized nations suffer
such things to be. OF Madame Sigida.
the principal victim in this tragedy.It
know little, as she was sent from st.
Petersburg to the mines of Kara after
l.
that she was sentenced to long term
some time in the early part of 1887. 1t
seems appalling to think that this poor
creature was deliberately
FLOGGED TO DEATH,
though it would take, perhaps, but q
moderate infiiction of the terrible knont
in the case OF a feeble and doubtless
failing woman. The hardest and
strongest men will sink beyond the pos
sibllity of rallying under so or 100
blows, and yOu can imagine the effect of
such a barbarOuS punishment when
inflicted on a delicately nur-
tured and sickly woman. The
man who committed this outrage
must have been an extraordinary
brute, even for Russian official. I
have seen brutes in Siberia in state of
partial intOXication who might do it, and
it is possible that this fellow may have,
been under the influence of liquor when
he ordered this torture inflicted. This
official in charge of the Kara placer
mines would be invested with full
power to do anything he thought fit,
and he has nothing to check him.
| am well acquainted with
the history Of Marie KaIuz-
hnaya, the first of three suicides. 1t is
an extraordinary one. In 1884, when
only girl of eighteen, she was arrested
upon charge of disloyalty and thrown
into prison. Whilst there every etfoIt
was made to induce her to betray her
associates. For days and days she was
subjected to solitary confinement. under
all almost uncomfortable mental strain,
IGNORANT OF HER OWN FATE
or the fate of her relatives. She, how
ever, successfully withstood for many
months all attempts to frighten her into
a confession or betrayal of the others.
One day gendarme officer in Odessa
named Col. Katanski brought her
sk1llfully forged document purporting
to be confession signed by her rela-
tives, and falling into the trap the
girl told all she knew, obtaining her
own release, but to her horror ascer-
tanning that she alone had been in
strumental in sending her friends to
exile. In revenge for this treatment
she endeavored to aSsassinate the gend-
arme officer, Col. Katanski, shooting at
him with revolver, but only succeed
ing in slightly wounding him in the ear.
For this she was sentenced to the mines
for twenty years. In these mines the
women are not put to work, but are
confined, for the most part, within
the stout log houses constituting
the prison, where they are en-
ployed in va rious menlal offices. 1t
is hopeless. dreary existence. and
many go insane, while suicides are far
from rare. Previous reports allude to
the suicide of others besides the three
mentioned in the Associated Press dis
patch. 1t is possible that among these
may be Anna Pavlovona Korba, school
teacher, Anna Yakimova, PraSkoyia
lvanofskaya and Tatiana Hebedeva,
also school teachers and all young wow
en- who were at the mines of Kara when
visited them. 1t is highly probable
that these women, highly educated, and
of sensitive temperament, shocked be-
yond measure at the appalling finale of
the brutal treatment to which their sis
ter convict has been subjected, have
committed suicide. in addition to the
other two mentioned in. the dispatch,
Madame Kavalefskaya and Madame
SmirnitZkaya. The case or Madame
Maria Pavloona Kavalefskaya is a. par
tIcularly sad one. She is Young mar
ried lady of about thirty-five years of
age. Her husband was teacher in one
of the gymnasia at Klev. She COM
menced
PEACEFUL METHODS OF AGITATION.
but finally joined a secret circle, which
was surprised and captured by the
police. She was sentenced to thirteen
years penal Servitude, her husband, who
had not been present when the arrest
was made, being sent to part of ST.
IBERIA at least thousand miles from his
wife. This separation caused her to go
insane, and she was sent to her hus-
band in hopes that she would recover.
Her recovery took place, when, ON
change of governors, she was taken back
to the mines, and again SeDarated from
her husband. Ihave but little doubt
that the reports of this unfortunate
lady having committed self destructio,,
are true. Poor thing What had she
to live for? The story of her little girl,
who lived at Kiev with relatives all this
time, is peculiarly pathetic. Some of
the letters she wrote to her parents dur
ing their exile are eloquent of the
keen distress the little one
feels at her reinforced separation
from her natural protectors. | see it is.
also reported that the men at the Kara
mines have broken out in revolt. This
statement confirms, in my mind, the
whole story, for whilst the mines ts,.
which the men are sent are somewhat
remote from those where the female
eXiles are consigned, yet 1t would be-
impossible to prevent the news of
this outrage reaching the men.
either by some secret sympathIzer
among the guards themselves, sor
directly and Immediately, as the news
of a great event will spread anywhere.
let what efforts you like be made to sup,
press it. The fiOgging of Nine. Sigida
In itself would have been enough to
have reused them to condition of
frenzy.