Albuquerque morning journal. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1903-1926, 1918-11-18
PRISON INMATES
IN RUSSIA GIVEN
CRUEL TREATMENT
Many Arrests Made on FIimsy
Pretexts by BoIshevikii
Prisoners Are HuddIed To-
gether in One Small ROOM
isr MORNING JOURNAL srEc,A- LEASED wsri

fsr MORNING JOURNAL spEclA- LEASED wIsEl
London, Nov. 17.-Meetings of some
OF the British residents of Moscow in
the Bolshevik prisons in that city,
where they were kept for six weeks
after having been arrested BY the red
guards upon flimsy pretexts, are WV
, IDLY portrayed by Guy Reringcr, a
Reuter- correspondent. at Moscow who
was set free early this month and has
reached Haparanda, sweden
Beringer, in his report from Hapa-
randa, says he was arrested while in
the home of the British chaplain ad-
joining the British consulate in Mos
COW, and together with the chaplain
and several other English men and
women, was marched on foot two
miles through the streets to the Lu-
byanka house of detention.
II was separated from my compan-
ions and was led to a room in which
were some thirty prisoners, mostly ci-
villains, including few women"
writes Mr.. Beringer. Il spent five days
and nights In this room in which there
was just sufficient space for the in
mates to sleep on the floor. There was
no bed of any kind, for food we had
a piece of black bread and a few dips
with a wooden spoon into a bowl of
the thinnest possible cabbage soup
containing some herring heads. Eight
of us had TO share the contents of this
one bowl. Many people who were
without provisions from the outside
were literally in a state of starva-
ton.
Like the Russian prisoners we were
treated as helots and were addressed
insultingly in the second person sim
gular by low brutes among the red
guards.
Late one night when some of the
other prisoners were singing, sudden
ly there was deathlike hush. l looked
UP and saw a red guard officer and
soldiers standing at the opening to
the ante-room in which the prison
guards were stationed. A list of twelve
names of civilians and soldiers was
read out. No one doubted what this
meant. 1t was the list of those set
down for immediate execution. All the
condemned men arose without delay
and shook hands with their neighbors.
No one showed the slightest fear.
1.-THE iron folding doors between the
big room and the ante-roon were then
closed. This was done only when
ton. The doors remained closed for
a few minutes and then were reopened
and the names of two other soldiers
who had previously been overlooked
were called out. These also rose with
out a tremor and the folding doors
were shut a second and last time. The
condemned prironers were either shot
in the Easements of the prison with
their backs to the firing party or they
were taken out to the suburbs in mo-
tor lorries and there told to get out
and get away Then volleys were
poured into them while they were
walking or running away The bodlesI
are sometimes recoverable by rela-
tives on payment of heavy bribes."
Later Beringer was transferred to
Butyrky Jail at the other end OF thel
city, which contained some 1900 prls-
oners. In the cell he occupied there
was a Russian ex-judge, few sol
diers and some members of the MD
die and working classes, The verminl
were as bad as at Lubyanka and sanl- !
tary conditions worse. There was no
possibility of taking bath but Berlin
ger was allowed half hour exercise
daily in the yard. !!
There he and some others received
assistance from Maj. Allen Wardell of
the American Red Cross who, hei
writes, Literally shaved on behalf of
the prisoners
1.-THE conditions of our internment
were so vilely sordid that it is no Won
der that the minds of some of the
more refined prisoners became UNI
hinged" Beringer writes.
1.-THE Bolshevik leaders show no
mercy. In their newspapers they hold
up Marat as the ideal friend of the
They urge that his example
should be followed and preach the ex-
of the entire middle
class"