The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1924-10-28
LIE FACTORIES
OF Kept PRESS
EXPOSED AGAIN
Correspondent Shows
Origin Of Stories
BY GERTRUDE HAESSLER
Federated Press staff Correspondent


strange experience to come back
bright and cheerful from al
pleasant holiday and read in
the European and American
press that a war has been going
on in the Very place you have
come from.
For nearly a month | was in
the Caucasus, going afoot thru
the mountains, crossing the
highest mountain range with a
knapsack on my back, sleeping
under the stars, and perfectly
free from interference even
from a stray bandit or so. l
lived in Tifiis and Batum for
nearly a week and found life
perfectly normal.
She Gets the News.
And then on my return to Moscow,
the London Daily Herald informs me
by an official statement from Jor-
DANA, erstwhile socialist president of
the old anti-Soviet state in Georgia,
that while l was peacefully slipping
tea on the sidewalk cafes of lazy Ba-
tum, "the Bolshevik troops disem-
barked at Batum, and made terrible
reprisals on the population, massacr-
ing the old men, women and children.
Houses were being burned, whole vii
lagos destroyed"
Then the Manchester Guardian in
an editorial openly discredits, simply
by deductive reasoning, the Official
and as far as l can see-absolutely
correct statement of the Russian dele
cation in London that a small rising
had been Immediately put down.
See Threat of Intervention.
And then comes wire from Geneva
saying the league of nations is con-
sdering investigating the war be-
tween the state of Georgia and Rus
sia." One can smell the threat of in
tervention there as keenly as the
league of nations smells oil in
Georgia.
American papers elaborated on the
supposed revolt with all their power
full imaginations, reinforced by dis
lance.
What happened? There was spo-
radio uprising which was quickly
QuelIed, and which had been, insti-
gated by a queer combination-the
bandits which even the czarist sol
diers could never deal with, the dis
possessed princes" of Georgia, fight
ing for their nationalized land, and
the pacifist, internationalist Georgian
social-democrats. When we were first
told that these were involved, we
didn't believe it, until the confession
of their envoy himself, who had been
sent to foment the trouble.
No Trouble in Georgia.
My extensive trip in Georgia COW
cred the distance from Vladikavkas to
Tiflis-the heart of the Georgian
mountains-afoot, during the height
VI Tie upIAolubs nfCu III AhAO uui
ing the days of armed suppression of
the uprising. l went by rail to Batum
and lived in Batum during the days
the reprisals were supposed to have
taken place. travelled by sea along
the entire western coast of the eau.
casus, touching at all the important
towns there, during the time that the
pillaging, plundering and massacrine
we're supposed to have taken place
there. The steamer stopped for siS
or seven hours in the larger ports
and for an hour or two in the smaller
ports. We noticed nothing untoward
in any Of those places, and Joined the
populations Of the towns in theil
light-hearted, care-free sea bathing.
And when l returned to Moscow
and read of the war" reprisals, mas
sacres, etc, was not the only one
who had been in. Georgia and seer
nothing of the sort. Hundreds o.
pleasure-seekers, spending their prec
ious annual holiday in Georgia, anC
returning refreshed for their work
were equally amazed to read of the
terrible things that had been goinl
on right under their noses and which
they had neither seen nor heard.