Among the most prominent clerics confined in the Northern Camps for Special Purposes are the following:

The Vladika Illarion (Trotsky), head of the diocese of Moscow and the right-hand man of the late Patriarch Tikhon. Neither when at liberty nor in prison has the Metropolitan Illarion ever entered into conflict with the Soviet power; but he has always been a vehement champion of pure Orthodoxy as a counterpoise to the "living Church," which is liberally subsidised by the Gpu. For the defence of his faith, and for his intimate connection with the Patriarch Tikhon, the bishop was sent to Archangel for three years and served his term of punishment under the most horrifying conditions. He returned to Moscow and again vigorously opposed the "living Church," took a skilful part in religious discussions, mercilessly shattered the Communistic babble of his opponent Lunatcharsky,[[23]] and was transported once more — this time to the Solovky.

The Vladika Masuil (Lemeshevsky) directed the affairs of the diocese of Petrograd after the shooting of the Metropolitan Venianin. Sentenced to transportation under Clause 72 of the Criminal Code — "ecclesiastical counter-revolution" — by which the Bolsheviks understand, inter alia, the defence of Orthodoxy against the destructive attacks of the "living Church," the bishop arrived at the Solovky in September, 1924. Six other bishops and monks and twelve laymen were sent there at the same time and for the same cause.

Bishop Seraphim (Kolpinsky), Bishop Peter (Sokoloff), Acting Bishop of Saratoff, and Bishop Pitirim (Kryloff), the Igumen of the Kazan Monastery, as well as about fifteen members of the black and white clergy from that monastery, were all sent to the Solovky under this same Clause 72. Hundreds of other bishops, priests and monks were transported, not only because the religion they professed was "opium for the people,"[[24]] but because they would not approve the plundering of the churches for purposes which had nothing to do with the relief of the famine victims, and which they denounced to the public as the work of the supporters of the "living Church," bought by the Government.

[21] They had taken refuge in Finland after the suppression by the Bolsheviks of the rebellion in Eastern Karelia at the beginning of 1922.

[22] The term "Nepman" was applied to business men who grew rich under the "N.E.P." (New Economic Policy), introduced by the Soviet Government in 1922.

[23] People's Commissary for Education in the Soviet Government.

[24] Lenin's phrase.

CHAPTER VII
THE TCHEKA'S VICTIMS: SOME STRANGE CASES

A Wife and her Husband — Annual "Amnesty" Swindle — Boris Savinkoff's Terrible End — Famine Relief a Crime — Dzerzhinsky in a New Light — An Indefatigable Vermin-hunter — Aged Hostages Tortured.