The Lakeland evening telegram. (Lakeland, Fla.) 1911-1922, 1918-11-13
Sutferings of British,
Residents of Moscow
In BOLSheUiki Prisons
(By Associated Press. }

(By Associated Press.
London, Nov. 1z.--Sufferings o.
some of the British residents Of Nos
COW In the Bolshevik prisons in tina
city where they were kept for 81
weeks after having been arrested b!
the Red Guards upon fimsy prefer
are wildly portrayed by Guy BERN
ger. . Reuter- correspondent at Mos
COW who was set free early THU
month and has reached Haparanda
Sweden.
Beringer, in his report wired from
Haparanda, says he was arrested
while In the home of the British chap
lain adjoining the British consulate IL
Moscow. and together with the chap
lain and several other English mer
and women was marched on foot two
miles through the streets to the Lu
byanka House of Detention.
Il was separated from my compan
ions and was led to a room in which
were some thirty prisoners, mostly
civilians including few women"
writes Mr.. Beringer Il spent five
days and nights in this room in which
there was just sufficient space for
the inmates to sleep on the floor.
There was no bed of any kind, for
food we had a piece Of black bread
and afew dips with wooden spoon
into bowl of the thinnest possible
cabbage soup containing some her
ring heads. Eight Of us had to share
the contents of this one bowl. Many
people who were without provisions
from outside we're literally in state
of starvation.
Like the Russian prisoners we were
treated as helots and were addressed
insultingly In the second person sing
ular by low bruites among the Red
Guards.
Late one night when some of the
other prisoners were singing sudden
ly there was a deathlike hush. /
looked up and saw Red Guard Off
Ger and soldiers standing at the op.
ening to the ante-room in which the
priosn guards were stationed. A list
of twelve names of civilians and sol
diers was read out. No one doubted
what this meant. 1t was the list of
those set down for immediate execu-
ton. 1t included two pairs of broth.
Iers. All the condemned men rose
without delay and shook hands with
their neighbors. Not one showed the
slightest fear.
The iron folding doors between
the big room and the ante-room were
then closed. This was done only
when prisoners were taken away for
execution. The doors remained
closed for a few minutes and were
then reopened and the names of two
others soldiers who had previously
been overlooked were called ont.
These also rose without a tremor and
the folding doors were shut second
and last time. The condemned pris.
oners were either shot in the base
ments of the prison with their backs
to the firing party or they were taken
out to the suburbs in motor lorries
and there told to get out and get
away. Then volleys we're poured in
to them while thew were walking cd
running away. The bodies are some
times recoverable by relatives ON
payment of heavy bribes."
Later Beringer was transferred to
Butyrky Jail at the other end of the
city which contained some 5000 pris.
oners. In the cell he occupied there
was Russian ex-judge, few sol
diers and some members of the mid
ole and working classes. The YER
min was as bad as at Lubyanka and
sanitary conditions worse. There
was no possibility of taking a bath
but Beringer was allowed half
hours exercise daily in the yard.
There he and some of the others
received assistance from Major Allen
Wardwell of the American Red Cross
who he writes literally shaved on
behalf Of the prisoners"
"The conditions of our internment
were so vilely sordid that 1t is no
wonder that the minds of some of the
more refined prisoners became un.