Americus times-recorder. [volume] (Americus, Ga.) 1891-current, 1902-05-09
DRIVEN TO
PILLAGE r. canine
Details Of Late Disorders In
Southern Russia.
cRANARlEs AND BARNS SACKED
Violence Is Reported From Twelve to
Fifteen Villages, While Three Es.
tates In Kharkoff and 43 in PoltaVa
Have Been Devastated,

Rave Been Devastated.
st. Petersburg, May 8.-A represen.
tative of the Associated Press, after
personal investigation of the situation
in southern Russia, writes from Mos
COW under date of Saturday, May 3,
as follows
Comparative order has been re-
stored in the government of Poltava
and Kharkoff, but the Neasants are
only outwardly quiescent, believing
that the grant of division of lands of
noblemen will be effected during the
coming autumn, leaving the Hardy
landowners only 20 acres and a yoke
of oxen each.
Authentic particulars of the disor-
ders prevailing during the last three
weeks show they were largely due to
extreme suffering from famine, which
was utilized by agitators to foment
rising. The peasants were not the
only believers in the issue of an i'm
perial ukase permitting a division of
the property of the nobility, and a
charitable distribution of potatoes by
the steward of the Duke of Meklen-
burg's estate at Kharloffka tended to
confirm this belief.
"The people of the whole country
side, often led by the village mag
mates, streamed to the Kharloffka and
other estates, afoot, horseback and in
wagons, demanded the keys of the pan
tries, granaries and barns and carried
off their contents. Rich Cossacks suf-
fered equally with the noblemen.
When landowners refused to deliver
up the keys the peasants broke down
the doors, quietly seized foodstuffs and
returned home, even well-to-do peas
ants sharing in the plumber. When
unoppOsed the peasants contented
themselves with supplying their imme-
diate needs, but when baked they
burned and destroyed, carried off live
stock and desolated estates Most of
the difficulties occurred where the in
habitants of the villages were already
on strained footing with the neigh
boring landowners.
Violence is reported from IL to Is
villages, while three estates have been
devastated in the Kharkoff govern
ment and 43 in the Poltava govern
ment. To add to the CONSERVATION 200
Cossacks arrived at Poltava after the
regular military forces had restored
order. The troops fired on the people
in two or three cases, and in one in
stance the peasants attacked the
troops with stones, whereupon the lat.
ter fired, killing several persons and
wounding a score, among whom were
women and children. Corporal punish
ment was administered right and left
without over scrupulOus inquiry into
the guilt of the people iogged. Some
estimates place the number of turbu.
lent peasants as high as 10000.
There was similar occurrence at
Kharkoff, whose governor general,
Prince Oboloensky, was particularly
severe.
General Eugene Michelovich- -Douk.
vovsky was among the sufferers. His
estate at Mechek was ruined and he
himself was seized and beaten. He is
still i'll from the effects of the treat
ment he received.
"As an example, of the extent to
which the ranks of the famine strick-
en- villagers are, swollen by the re-
turn of unemployed factory workers,
it is pointed out that one iron works
which heretofore employed 10000 to
10000 people is now employing only
5000 for three days a week"