Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1921-11-21
Famine Conditions
in MANY Parts Russia

Samara, on the Nolga, Oct. 21-(By
a Staff Correspondent of The Associ-
ated Press)-The numerical and geo.
graphical extent of the great famine
cannot be given. There is today and
has been as much food available in
Samara for those who have money.
as in Baku, on the Caspian Sea. 1000
miles distant. The Russian refugees
from Bolshevism in ConstantinOple
are suffering from hunger and lack
of clothes almost as much as those
Russians j. Poltava and they in their
turn as much as those in Orenburg.
The Associated Press correspond
ent completed a journey from Con-
stantinople to Moscow by way of
Tifis, Baku, Astrakhan and Samara,
and everywhere found intense misery,
the most sordid of which was seen in
the dreary steppe regon between
Tifis (Georgia) and Baku (port of
Azerbaijan on the Caspian Seal.
There revolution after revolution,
for five years. has left a trail of de-
struction and ruined houses and
wrecked railway stations which can
not be matched in Russia. Added to
the lack of food, is the constant bat
tie with malaria, cholera, and typhus,
and added to these is the cold against
which there is little shelter or fuel.
No more pathetic sight was seen
than that of the Baku central rail-
way station where thousands Of men,
women and children. going nobody
could say where, were camped on
dirty sidings, for the most part
dressed in rags and eating scraps of
food like hunted animals.
To the north, along the Nolga in
Russia, the misery is often of the re-
spectacle. clearly kind At Ca ritzyn
thousands of families are living
in railway cars. Others have been
housed in villas and palaces.
Begging is rather the exception
than the rule everywhere in the fam
inc regions.
The German colonist villages and
towns along the Volga are so clearly
and orderly, surrounded by such flor
id luXuriance of field and forest, that
it is hard to believe their people are
suffering from hunger. AS every
where in Russia, the churches are
open and services are held. At
Volsk. when the correspondent at
tended vespers, he was followed out
Of the church by one of the priests
who begged that food come from
America before his people starved.
In the worst areas there is far
more hunger swelling than was seen
IN Vienna in the winter of 1918.
This is the last stage of starvation
and when it comes. neither food nor
medicine will help.
The majority of such cases are to
be seen in the cities, about the rail-
way station, in the trains or about
the landing stages and on the steam
ers of the Nolga, where hundreds of
thousands Of peasant wanderers are
seeking to reach friends in districts
where they imagine food conditions
are better. The government is trying
to discourage such wanderings but
they are continuing. The distances
made by peasant families are incred-
IDLE. At Saratoy, about the river
front. may be met families from Or
enburg going towards the Ukraine,
where the crops did not fail, and
then families from Astrakhan going
up river TO some one of the German
villages such as Nolsk or Baronov,
While there is perfect order in all
Russia. on every hand the individual
struggle for life, for daily food, is bit
ter and hard. No one thinks of any,
one else. Robbery is limited, as rob-
bers are shot when caught. but trick
cry in small trading is the rule. A
warm place to sleep, something to
eat, and clothing, are the beginning
and end of daily life. Children are
brushed aside. ignored or treated like
little apimals.
A person invited to a meal will cat
twice what good lLaLners would per-
NIT. He is laying in a stock OF food.
building up his body, he figures. for
the winter cold. Those with money
are boarding food. In some places
peasants refuse to sell bread at anv
price. They are afraid OF the winter
famine.