The Mysteries of Modern London

by George R. Sims

All of them have paid the fare to London. Some of them have hidden about them the fare to America or Canada. But others are penniless. They have been robbed at the Russian frontier. They have had to part with every rouble to pass the officials. Sometimes they have given up everything to the sentries to save themselves from being shot down.

It is a peaceful Sunday evening in London, but here are all the horrors of war. And of all London's myriad people, only a few active sympathizers in the Jewish community know of this human tragedy working itself out in London's heart.

Let us leave these unhappy ones massed together in quiet street, in crowded yard, and in the packed room, and pass into another room in which the committee are now sitting, as they will sit on far into the night, examining every man in turn as to his trade, his means, and his prospect of earning a living if room is found for him in one of the ships which the sympathy and philanthropy of their co-religionists have secured for these poor wandering Jews.

Let us sit at one of the long deal tables at which members of the committee are cross-examining the applicants for guidance and assistance, receiving money, making out tickets, and dispatching the refugees to various parts of the world.

A squarely built man of about thirty, pale, haggard, and with a hunted look in his eyes, comes forward. He tells his story. He is a builder of wooden houses. He had served his time, and had been home but for a few weeks, when he was ordered to rejoin. He talked the matter over with some fellow-reservists. They made up their minds to escape. They sold their possessions, got together a little money from their friends, and started. There were six of them, and they got into a train. After travelling a long time they came to a station, at which the carriage was entered by soldiers, who dragged four of the company out. The men were charged with being deserters. Two of the company remained in the train; the man standing now at the table was one of them. But they knew their turn would come, so they scrambled out on the other side of the line and ran for their lives across the country.

A party of soldiers started in pursuit. The men reached a river and leapt in. The soldiers fired and killed one. The man at the table swam to the opposite bank and made good his escape. For many hours he went on and on in his wet clothes, shivering with cold, his limbs benumbed. He endured the most terrible privations; but at last he reached the frontier, got into Germany, and with the money concealed about him purchased a ticket to London.

He stands before us in London to-night, waiting to know where the committee can send him for the roubles which he still has left. He receives a ticket for a ship leaving for Canada, drops a knee in the Russian manner of salutation, and goes forth gleefully into the street to think out the future in the London lamplight.

The man who takes his place is a fine-looking young fellow. Where has he come from? When he is asked, he answers, "Mukden."

Everyone at the table looks up at that. Is it possible that a Russian deserter has made his way from Mukden to Whitechapel? Yes. Here are the facts vouched for, proved beyond dispute.

This man had been serving a year in the Mukden garrison. During a sortie he, with some hundreds of other Russian soldiers, was forced on to a frozen river. The ice gave way, and they all fell in, the Japs firing at them from the bank. An officer in the same regiment as the Jewish soldier was wounded in the head, and was sinking, when the Jew got hold of him and swam with him to the bank. The officer was taken to the hospital, and the Jewish soldier followed him there shortly afterwards, suffering from pneumonia.