I—"RUSSIA IS A REPUBLIC—YOU ARE FREE"
The exiles in the Irkutsk prisons were watching eight fellow prisoners who were being flogged. Suddenly, in the doorway, an official appeared. It was the Provincial State Attorney. There was a look of great tidings in his face.
"Russia is a republic," he cried. "You are free."
The news of the revolution had reached across the vast stretches of Siberia. It was a moment of tense excitement. Bewilderment and then jubilation beset the exiles. An hour later began one of the strangest spectacles in modern history—the exodus from Siberia. It is estimated that a hundred thousand political exiles began their race back to Russia.
Traveling from the most inaccessible mines and settlements, they journeyed by sledge or trudged on foot to the nearest point on the Trans-Siberian railway. It was a race against time. The Spring thaw was approaching. If the exiles did not reach the railroad within two weeks the roads would be impassable. The wilderness would become a sea of mud. Far in the north, in the coldest settlements of the lower Lena, it would be impossible to move forward until the ice breaks on the river two months later.
The first large party consisted of one hundred and fifty political convicts and administrative exiles, including twenty members of the Jewish revolutionary band. The exiles were traveling in special cars and had been on the road continuously from March 24, five days after they first heard of the revolution.
The cars were met by a vast crowd at the railroad-station, which cheered them tumultuously. The returning exiles returned the cheers, but they were in a deplorable physical condition—shaggy, uncouth, unwashed, and extremely emaciated.
Many were crippled with rheumatism, two had lost hands and feet from frostbites, and one, who attempted flight a week before the revolution, had been shot in the leg when he was recaptured. He was lying in a prison-hospital when he learned that he was a free man.
Five days after the triumph of the revolution 6,000 exiles entered Irkutsk, but the vast majority were unable to proceed west, owing to the lack of rolling-stock. These encamped about the town and along the railroad, and at least a month will be needed before they can be sent home.
The crowds at Tyumen cheered the famous terrorist, Nicolai Anuikhin, who shot and killed the chief of the Petrograd-Warsaw Railway in 1906. His victim, General Fuchloff, was about to kidnap 400 railroad strikers and send them to Siberia.
Anuikhin, who introduced himself as "a released jailbird," is a gigantic, broad-shouldered, elderly man, with a gray imperial and an excited manner of speech. He said:
"After one year in European convict prisons I spent ten years in the Alexandrovsk prison, fifty miles from Irkutsk. This is the biggest convict jail in Russia and contained 12,000 ordinary criminals and about 500 political prisoners, mostly sentenced to life katroga, the severest form of Russian punishment short of death.
"I spent the first five years in the so-called probation class, with hands and feet manacled and chained to a wheelbarrow which I had to take everywhere. In addition I was repeatedly flogged by order of the Governor. The Assistant Governor, during the absence of his chief, ordered daily floggings for his own satisfaction.
"The occupants of the different dormitories communicated by means of tappings and other systems of signaling. Although we also had means of communication with the outside world, we knew nothing of the revolution until the morning of our release.
"After our release we learned that the Assistant Governor, on getting the news of the revolution, declared that he would give a farewell flogging, 'in order to prepare my jailbirds for sweet liberty.'"
Among the political prisoners from Tobolsk was Alexander Popoff. He was sentenced to death for an alleged plot against the Emperor, a charge which he declares was a fabrication by the police. Popoff, who is a highly intelligent artizan, was chained by the wrists and ankles for four years. In describing his release, he says:
"A most remarkable feature of amnesty day in Tobolsk was the sudden demand for blacksmiths. The prison blacksmith, fearing the vengeance of the convicts, fled, and private blacksmiths, in the general orgy of revolutionary triumph, could not be found.
"In the meantime sixty chained men waited for their liberation. The newly formed committee of public safety, unable to find blacksmiths, drove the still chained convicts to the dismissed Governor's palace, where a banquet had been prepared, and we had our first free meal. Above the din of speeches and cheers for the Russian Republic could be heard the jangling of our shackles."
The news of the revolution reached the prisoners in Siberia by various channels, but in all cases the announcement was unexpected and dramatic. In several places the police were wise enough to tell the news themselves in order to escape the danger of suddenly finding themselves in the power of men they had abused with impunity for years. The exiles rarely rose against their jailers. Basil Muravin, once a social revolutionist, tells this story:
"When the revolution occurred I was in the small Udinsk transport-prison awaiting the arrival of other convicts for dispatch together to the east. I had long lost hope of pardon when I learned that I was free. The discovery came in a most dramatic way. I was at the time in chains as a newcomer of unknown character. I heard a sudden shouting and afterward a terrific rifle-firing. It sounded as if a million cartridges had exploded in quick succession.
"Next bullets began to fly over the prison-yard. Finally a bullet cut the halyard of the Russian flag which waved over the prison-building. The flag dropped on the roof and shortly afterward a crowd stormed the prison and hoisted there a revolutionary ensign. My last experience of the old régime was a visit by the former Governor of the jail, who, fearing retaliation, begged me to sign a statement acquitting him of ill-treatment. Though his treatment of the convicts had been bad, I agreed, not desiring to mar Russia's new freedom by acts of petty vengeance."
In another case the priests announced the revolution in the churches.
Fifty exiles, who were in the congregation, rushed out, determined on vengeance on the local police-captain, who was a wanton tyrant. They were met by the policeman's ten-year-old daughter, who stood before her father and exclaimed, "Kill me first!" The child's action saved the captain's life.