They came in three parties. The first two parties, consisting of about a hundred persons, including thirty women students, arrived at Kem in August, 1924. They included representatives of all parties (Monarchists, "S.R.'s," "S.D.'s," Anarchists, etc.). They declared that they were prisoners of the "political and party" category and demanded that they should be quartered in caves, with the privileges of the other cave dwellers, and receive the increased ration. The administration refused their request. The students declared a hunger strike with the friendly support of all the politicals. After several persons had died of starvation the students were recognised as political prisoners and sent to live in caves on Kond Island.
Kond Island lies about ten miles from the monastery. Formerly "seksoty" (secret Gpu agents) of both sexes used to be sent there; it is their business to promote espionage and paid delation among the prisoners. Nogteff bribes useful people by giving them better rations, gets everything he wants out of them, and when they are no longer required, quarters them in remote caves.
The third party of students (twenty-six in number, including two Anarchists) arrived at Kem in April, 1925. On the journey from Petrograd to Kem they smashed up the trucks in which they were travelling. Their demand to be treated as politicals was refused by the administration. The students, again supported by the politicals, declared a hunger strike, which lasted five weeks. Nogteff appealed to the Gpu, which ordered him to send the students back to Petrograd. I do not know what happened to them afterwards.
The "politicals and party men" carry on all negotiations with the authorities through "General" Eichmans, as they object to having any communication with Nogteff. They dare even to boycott publicly the most exalted representatives of the Gpu and the "Narkomyust" (People's Commissariat for Justice).
At the end of 1924 a so-called "unloading commission," consisting of Smirnoff, Katanian, Gleb Boky and a secretary, came to the Solovky. The prisoners hoped much from it, but their hopes were not realised. The commission certainly unloaded the Solovky, but only as regards shpana; nearly four hundred ordinary criminals were released, but not a single "K.R." or political.
When bidding farewell to the departing shpana, Katanian announced to the assembled prisoners:
"If the prisoners who are being released now reform and become useful citizens of the Soviet Republic, I shall come back next year and liberate another batch."
Thus the fate of the "K.R.'s" and politicals was made dependent on the conduct of ordinary criminals when set at liberty!
The commission stayed in the Solovky three days, and spent most of their time out shooting. The Tchekists exterminated the last survivors of the wild and tame animals, the latter introduced by the monks at some earlier period. On the last day Katanian visited the caves on Solovetsky Island, but the politicals drove him away with cries of "Go away, murderer! To hell with the executioner!"
The public prosecutor of the Supreme Court, Smirnoff, called a meeting and made a long speech. His speech was entirely devoted to controverting "the impudent calumnies of the émigré White Guard Press and foreign bourgeois newspapers." He attacked in particular the émigré Socialist paper Dni[[31]] for "misleading the proletariat of Europe by its criminal falsehoods about the Solovky."