The great West. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1889-18??, 1890-03-28
Siberian Horrors.

The time has passed when the affairs
Of one nation are no concern of another.
The outrages of the Russian government
in Siberia send a thrill of horror through
the civilized world. 1t is the business,
and that immediate, Of Christian ma
tions to demonstrate with Russia in a
way that she cannot misunderstood on
this subject.
First came the story Of the massacre
Of political exiles at Yakutsk April 3.
Or that day a number of exiles were as
senbled in a room to wait the result of .
petition they had presented to the gov
ernor of Yakutsk. A police overseer ap-.
peared and ordered them to go to the
police station. They did not move i'm
mediately, but argued with the overseer
and desired to know what the chief of
police wanted Of them.
They supposed they had right to do
this. as heretofore political prisoners had
been regarded as on different footing
from common criminals. But in March,
1883. secret orders had been issued from
St. Petersburg that certain political exiles
should be treated in all respects like other
criminals, That meant, among other
things, hogsing for slight attractions of
discipline. Prison officials have freely
applied this order throughout Siberia.
Cossacks sought to force the exiles ut
Yakutsz out Of the room in which they
were. They resisted, one of them draw
ing revolver. Immediately they were
fired upon and attacked with bayonets.
Then such of the exiles as were armed
began to fire. Six of them were killed,
one being woman whose stomach was
torn open with a bayonet. Twelve were
wounded. Of the Cossacks, one SOL
der was killed and two persons were
wounded.
It is to be noted that the Russian gov
eminent strenuously denied this mas
sacre, and the facts only reached the
outside world through the underground
route familiar here in the days of Amer
lean slavery. But there is no doubt of
the truth of the story.
Next came the horror Of the flogging
to death of Niue. Sigida, Nov. 6. The
whip with which the paternal govern
ment of Russia disciplines it's children is
similar to the cat O. nine tails in use at
sea when there were more brutality and
ferocity in the navies of the world than
there are at present. 1t is made Of hard
cned raw hide. with q number Of lashes
attached. Twenty to 100 blows are al.
lowed to be administered with this whip
From March, 1883. till November, 1889,
several exiles had already been hogged
in consequence of the order in March.
But no word except tiendish can charac-
terize the whipping of Mme. Sigida. The
story is that she had been. insulted by
a prison official. She was a beautiful,
delicate woman of the highest culture,
and she resented the insult. For this she
received upon her naked back the whip
ping that killed her.
After the beating she sank down I'm
conscious, and, happily for herself, never
recovered. After her death three other
women prisoners, appalled, at her fate.
took poison end died. One of them was
a girl of IS. What kind of o crazy. hys-
terical government is that which sees in
q girl of 10 a dangerous criminal, and
sentences her to exile and peal servi-
tude?
The lash that cut the life out Of Hope
Sigida ought to whistle around the world
and wake the humanity of the nations.
Time was when the nations took action
on account of the butchery OF Christians
by the Turk. But when did even the un-
speakable Turk do anything worse than
this2