The Hartford republican. (Hartford, Ky.) 18??-1926, 1918-11-01
reign OF TERROR
OF RUSSIAN REDS
French Revolution Pales
Before Russian
Deeds.


several neutral observers who have
Just arrived in Sweden. These men
have watched Bolshevik activities in
the two great Russian cities for many
weeks. They have had no personal
interests involved and no personal
friends affected by the reign of
slaughter and torture, which proba-
bly, is unparalleled in the worlds his
tory.
While thousands, perhaps. have
been executed the list of victims is
far less appalling than the ruthless
manner in which political prisoners
have been sent to death without a
semblance of legal trial, the heart
lessness with which they were treated
and the utter indifference of the Boil
shevik officials to appeals of heart
broken relatives who have been kept
IN suspense and not allowed to learn
what has become of loved ones.
Verified stories of scenes at Mos
COW and Petrograd prisons eclipse
descriptions of the barbarism of the
Middle Ages and make the cruelty of
the French Revolution seem almost
humane. Women prison officials,
and many of them are women, are
even more heartless than men and
trample under foot all the better in
stincts expected of their sex.
In Petrograd Madame Jakovleva
has been placed at the head of the
commission for suppression of cOun-
ter revolution and it is greatly to her
credit that the terror has abated
somewhat under her administration.
She apparently hesitates to shoot and
imprison with the same indifference
that characterized the regimes of
Moses Uritzky and William Shatoff.
an American trained anarchist, who
held the post for short time after
Uritzky was assassinated late in Au-
gust.
From the time that Moses Uritzky,
Commissioner for Elections to the
Constituent Assembly of Russia, was
assassinated, up to October l, sixty
eight hostages. including five priests,
? were shot by the Bolsheviki, accord
ing to Petrograd dispatches quoting
the newspaper Pravda.
But the women in subordinate
positions with the counter revolution
airy commissions and in the prisons,
many of them typical, short haired,
leather jacketed women who are so
numerous in the ranks of the reds,
are utterly devoid of humanity to
men, women and even children charg-
ed with counter revolutionary activi-
ties. These prisoners are herded in
TO various jails, frequently without
any charge being made and shuffled
about from prison to prison in such
helter-skelter manner that no records
are possible.
An old Russian officer, whose name
the correspondent can not give for
obvious reasons, searched the jails in
Moscow for many weeks trying to find
He was told repeatedly by women
clerks who ran through the books in
differently that the lists were incom-
plete. Finally he applied to a wo-
man who looked at her book con-
temptuously, announced brusquely
both shot" and resumed her tea
drinking and cigarette smoking.
A woman of the Bourgeoise who
swooned at the Lubbianka prison in
Moscow upon being told that her hus-
band had been shot the night before,
received no attention whatever from
the women officials. Distracted
mothers. wives, sisters and daughters
are turned away daily from various
inquiry bureaus without any effort
being made to relieve their anxiety.
Almost without exception the wo-
men officials were more heartless
than the men. Women intrusted
tary cells, where their friends can not
children from the better class apart
ments and houses and with taking
clothing from formerly well-to-do
families, also are harsher in their
methods In many cases than their
male associates.
The prosecutions of families of Off
GERS supposed to be associated with
the Czech-Slovak movement is especi-
ally cruel Persecution has been hit
upon as more effective in breaking
down the anti-Bolshevik movement
than wholesale executions.
Peters, the head of the Moscow
Counter Revolutionary Commission,
and so many of the prison officials
and execution squads are Let's that
the feeling among the Russians
against the Let's is growing more
bitter every day
Because of food shortage, lack of
organization, and the incompetence Of
officials. prisoners often go fo' days
---,gt1,,ut TODD a, prousIaI ouI mneonf-