The San Francisco call., 1896-02-20


| the prisoners Captain Lees considered it
his duty to deliver, by the aid of an in
terpreter, warning lecture on the advisa-
bility of obeyi1g the laws of this country
How much that lecture was needed and
how little attention was paid to it are
shown by this record of three of the men:
One shot dead in San Jose while at
tempting to rob store, another sentenced
to San Quentin for burglary in San Fran
cisco and Kovalev to be hanged tomorrow
Kovalev was regarded by the local
officials as the least vicious and dangerous
of the lot.
The ten prisoners of the Gar were serv-
ing indefinite sentences, according to
their testimony, when they found the op-
portunity to escape from Saghalien. Their
story, as told to Walter P. Stradley the
Commissioner of immigration, was that
Hebrew peddler rowed to the island in
August 1893, and that, being willing to sell
anything that he possessed, he sold his
boat to them.
There is an idea, however, that the ped
dler was murdered by the convicts in Or
der to obtain the boat and to prevent the
owner from giving information to the au-
thorities.
At any rate the boat was obtained, and
with but little food or water the convicts
started for Japan. They were picked up
by an American whaler ten days later and
were brought to this City. Commissioner
Stradley arrested them, put after an in
vestigation the authorities at Washington
ordered that the prisoners be released
The affidavit of Kovalev, signed on No
vember 13, 1893. is as follows:
am 25 years of age. was born in Russia,
in the city of Harcov. l am a shoemaker. l
know nobody in America. l have no money.
rested about fifteen nihilist workingmen in
my native city. l attempted to take their part
and help them ana was arrested as nihilist.
was tried and sent to the island of Sag
halien to serve an indefinite sentence I
escaped the same time and in the same man.
ner as my nine companions. was tranferred
from the whaler Charles W. Morgan to the
whaler Cape Horn Pigeon and arrived here on
| the night of November 8, 1893.
IVAN KovALEv
The story of the rescue of the ten men
is related in the affidavit of Captain J. A.
NJ. Earle of the American whaling bark
Charles w. Morgan, as follows:
On September 3, 1893, while in the Okhotsk
| the boats were down whaling an open boat
came alongside of TIE bark containing ten
Russian subjects, who reported being out ten
days in their boat, during three of which they
had been without food or water.
They said that they had escaped from a
Siberian prison and asked to be taken on
board. As an act OF humanity complied with
their request, for to have left them in that con-
diiion would have meant death. especially as a
gale came up the next day which would have
destroyed their boat.
retained them all on board until September
%, then transferred five of them to the Ameri-
can whaling bark Cape Horn Pigeon, for lack
OF accommodations on my own vessel The re-
naming five gave passage to this port and
provided clothing, as they were in destitute
condition when they came on board my ship.
The Morgan arrived here on Novem ber
Z, 1893, and the Cape Horn Pigeon reached
| port two days later. Kovaev came on the
latter vessel. On the arrival of the con-
victs Commissioner Stradley was notified.
Being in doubt whether the immigration
laws applied to the case. the latter official
telegraphed to Washington for instruc-
tions and he was ordered to arrest and
detain the ten men pending an examina-
tion. On November 9 the convicts were
arrested, the five who arrived on the Nor
gan being then on exhibition at a low
grade saloon theater on Market street.
After the testimony had been submitted
by Commissioner Stradley the authorities
at Washington decided to release the pris-
oners. No notification of the reason for
the decision accompanied the order of re-
lease, but the Commissioner believes that