The Union daily times. [volume] (Union, S.C.) 1918-current, 1922-02-06
THOUSANDS OF
RUSSIANS STARVE


(By the Associated Press). - When
the SHOWS melt next spring
the Russian steppes will be strewn
with skeletons. They will resemble the
high prairics of the American ccun-
try in the days when big cattle out
fits had insufficient hay to carry their
stock through hard winter.
But among the skeletons of cattle
and camels there will be the bones
Of hundreds of thousands men, wo-
men and children who fell exhausted
in their quest for bread, who lived
the simple lives their peasant ance,-
tors lived for centuries and had little
conception Of the political upheaval
which made this famine more terri
bic than that of 1891.
They wandered, and millions o.
them are still wandering. There was
nothing to eat in their homes, so they
started on the trek for bread. Some
drifted westward to the Volga and
found death in the typhus ridden rail
way centers or among the horrors of
refugee camps along the Nolga; 9TH
crs started for Turkeston; still 9TH
ers started eastward towards Siberia
the land of gold and wheat which has
always been so alluring to the Rus,
sian mouiik who heard little of it's
vaStness, its hardships and its heart
lessness. The peasant knew nothing
Of modern ways. They We're unable
to buy tickets on the railroads, unable
to get permits to ride on trains bur-
dencd with the Red army and food for
Moscow and Petrograd. When their
animals dropped dead the families
walked on, always hoping that food
lay over the next knoll
But the country districts have no
grain, or if peasant families have a
small supply they conceal it in the
effort to prolong their own lives until
another crop is harvested In the
larger towns there is food for sale
at fabulous prices, but the starving
refugees have neither money nor
goods to exchange and can only sit
down to wait death or trudge on
uciiii OhSS olIlh VI
The bodies that lie along the rail
roads are collected on cars and hauled
to- centers, where they are piled in
frozen, snow covered heaps to await
burial. Freezing refugees remove all
garments from the dead, so the frozen
bodies are nude when the scavangers
collect them. Families drift apart
and wander aimlessly on to their in
cvitablc fate. Human instincts are
lost and they become little better than
beasts. The city and town popula-
tions arc so hardened to suffering
that they are little moved by the
misery which lies all about them.
Death seems more merciful in the
country for the refugees; they sink
into the white covering of the endless
plain, and wolves strip their bones.
From Perm and Ekaterinburg to
the Caspian sea death is stalking
over the steppes. Russians, Cossacks.
Kalmucks, Kirghiz and Tartars alike
are meeting their end with hopeless
ness and patience begotten Of GEN.
turics Of unequal struggle against
political cXtortion and unfavorable
climatic conditions made worse by
ignorance of scientific methods Of till
ing the soil.
American corn will be too late to
save many Of these wanderers
through the steppes as we'll as the
families who have elected to make
their villages remote from the rail
ways rather than endure the hard
ships and death their neighbors have
suffered along the main lines Of
transportation. Entire village popu-
lations have died in the provinces
each of the Volga and the animals
which survive are so weak it is i'm
possible to get adequate horse power
to deliver food to the thousands of
snow bound, destitute settlements far
from food stations.
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