Firstly, an extract
from an article which appeared in the Auckland Star, Volume XXXVI, Volume 267
on 8 November 1905. This is a genuine article and concerns Carl Rossegger, who
is Blackwolf’s great grandfather. Blackwolf sent me a transcript of the article
and it is a truly astonishing story. Ignoring the understatement in the
article, an escape from Siberia, across the Gobi desert, China, Tibet, French
Indo-China, then Singapore and finally to New Zealand where he made his home. He later worked as an
architect/engineer designing many buildings around Sydney including the
entrance to Taronga Zoo (where Blackwolf’s father was the vet, then director).
In view of the state of affairs prevailing in
European Russia and Poland at the present time, and of the immense social
upheaval that threatens, which ever increasing imminence, to bring both
Government and State of the Czar tumbling into hopeless and irretrievable ruin,
an account of the personal experiences of one who was drawn into the
revolutionary movement in Russian Poland, and who suffered for that
participation by deportation to Siberia, will doubtless be keenly interesting
to our readers.
Mr C Rossegger, who has recently settled in
Auckland, gave to a “Star” representative, a graphic version of events which he
had experienced on his journey to New Zealand.
About nine years ago, he was an enthusiastic
student in Russian Poland, and eager to take part in any movement that had for
its object the relieving and up-lifting of the suppressed, and the advancement
in general of the rights of man. At this
time, he was living at Lodz, an industrial town of considerable importance
being about 100 miles to south-east of Warsaw.
The greater part of the labouring population in this district is Jewish,
the working population of many of the town being entirely so and the “Yiddisher
Bund” is one of the most powerful revolutionary organisations in that quarter
of Poland. This bund, which, as its name
implies is a Jewish association, is very active in propagating more liberal
principles, and of advocating the substitution of a constitutional Government
in place of the Autocrative: but its methods have always been opposed to open
violence, its members favouring a course that anywhere but in Russia would be
accounted mild and law-abiding. Open air
meetings were frequently held by the bund at this period, however, and this
alone constituted a crime against the State, so that everyone who attended
these meetings did so at the imminent risk of arrest, with the certainty of
being transported to one of the distant and isolated colonies in dreaded
Siberia.
It should be understood, explained Mr Rosegger at
this point, that the Russian working classes are not as violently anti-Semitic
as is represented – in fact, throughout a greater part of Poland and Russia,
the common struggle for greater freedom has created a bond of sympathy between
the various races. Owing to the great
amount of interest taken by the Jewish part of the population in revolutionary
movements, the Government adopted a strong repressive policy towards them and,
accordingly encourages, either openly or secretly, all outbreaks against the
Jews. In this way, the outside world is
largely misled as to the true feeling of the great mass of the people in Russia
towards the Jewish section of the community.
Reverting to his own experiences, Mr Rosegger
said that one night at a meeting of about 300 in the neighbourhood of Lodz, a
strong force of secret police suddenly appeared on the scene and in the
subsequent dispersal of the gathering, fifteen or sixteen of those taking part,
including the speaker, found themselves in the terrible iron grip of the
Russian Political Law. The prisoners
were entrained to Warsaw where, without any unnecessary delay they underwent a
“trial”. The proceedings were carried on
entirely in Russian, which language was wholly unintelligible to the greater
number of the prisoners. The judges at
this remarkable trial seemed to be solely composed of gorgeously attired young
police officials who gravely considered the awful offence that had been
committed by these young fellows, none of whom had given utterance to anything
like the remarks that may be heard at any political gathering in a British
community. The “prisoners” were arrayed
on one side of the hall, closely guarded by warders, who flourished glittering
sabres. The sergeants of the Secret
Police, who conducted the prosecution, explained matters to the Court,
translation being totally absent. After
some lengthy proceedings, the Court rose from their seats and judgement was
delivered in the name of the “Little Father”.
The prisoners were then conducted back to their temporary place of
confinement where, by bribing the warders, they gained the knowledge that they
were invited to spend several years at the expense of the Czar’s Government in
the colonies of Eastern Siberia.
“The invitation proved irresistible indeed”,
grimly commented Mr Rosegger “ but we were young men and resolute, and all
determined to make a bold effort to escape whenever the opportunity presented
itself.”
At this point, it may be worth mentioning that
political prisoners were kept, until leaving Warsaw, entirely apart from
criminals, and the treatment was very tolerable, while sympathisers all along
the journey provided comforts. It was
also common property that the exiles would attempt to leave their enforced
residence as poor as opportunity should allow and through agents of the
revolutionary committee, money was handed to them which in turn served as
bribes to mollify the drink-sodden warders.
After a detention of about a week in Warsaw, they
were, together with a number of others, exiled to Siberia and started out under
a strong military escort for their distant destination, travelling through
Russia by slow trains to the Siberian border.
At this time, the railway across Siberia did not
extend beyond Krasuoyarsk, a place about 200 miles east of Toulsk, but
political prisoners were usually entrained to Omsk and from their distributed
to their various destinations by road.
The part of which Mr Rosegger was a member set out from Warsaw in the
early part of the winter, and travelling across Russia by train at a very
leisurely speed, Omsk was reached towards the end of December. On the train was a church and services were
regularly conducted for the benefit of the passengers and their guards
throughout the journey. The prisoners
were kept under strict guard, loaded rifles being levelled at them, so to
speak, night and day but apart from this they were not harshly treated, and
were not submitted to the indignities and privations popularly associated with
the lot of exiles bound to Siberia. “Any
undue hardships that are suffered by those unfortunates is usually the result
of petty vindictiveness of the lower officials, due sometimes to the want of a
small bribe” said Mr Rosegger , “and must not be regarded as the deliberate
treatment meted out to political prisoners by the Russian authorities. The Government of the Czar has always been
very keep upon colonising Siberia to effect which it is not at all scrupulous
as to the means. There is no doubt that
were it not for Siberia a great number of persons who are torn from their homes
in Europe and condemned to Siberia as political suspects would remain quietly
at home without any fear of molestation.
It is not, therefore, with the idea of immuring them in dungeons and
loading them with irons that the Government transports its political prisoner
beyond the Urals but with the notion of settling them in different parts of its
Eastern Empire as colonists. Those who
are considered to be dangerous to the State, however, are treated more
rigorously, which usually means being condemned to such a place as Yakutsk, for
instance, banishment to which is held tantamount to a sentence of death.”
At Omsk, the party was divided, some being sent
on to Krosnoyarsk, others to Irkutsk while a few were despatched to the dreaded
Yakutsk, which is held tantamount to a sentence of death. Fortunately, it was not his fate to belong to
this last number, his destination being Irkutsk. The distance between Omsk and Irkutsk as the
crow flies is about fourteen hundred miles, but this was considerably increased
by the route over which they travelled.
The journey was commenced in the early part of January when the whole
country was in the grip of the Ice King, and the outlook as they travelled in
sleighs across the frozen fields was indeed a dismal one. Every guardhouse along the road was provided,
however, with large fire hearths and the “Samovar” was soon steaming and giving
forth the tea which mixed with Vodka, formed a welcome and warmth producing
beverage to the frozen wayfarers, guard and prisoner alike. A great part of the country through which
they journeyed was well timbered and at night as they rested and thawed under
the heat of the great blazing camp fires, the scene was indeed a strange one
and typical with peculiar and terrible force of that anomaly among civilised
nations, “Holy Russia”.
The guards were not bad fellows, however, and
those of the prisoners who were supplied with money were able to obtain a
number of little indulgences that greatly helped to vary the deadly monotony of
the journey.
The sleigh journey to Irkutz occupied in all
about three months for, although they travelled at a rate of from twenty five to
thirty miles a day, the number of stoppages for rest sometimes extending over
several days, protracted the journey very considerably beyond ordinary
limits. The tedium of the route was
occasionally broken by passing large gangs of navvies engaged on the
construction of the Trans-Siberian railroad while roving bands of Kirghiz,
Kalmuks, Teherkess, etc , were often met with.
Occasionally, they passed on the road a squad of criminal convicts bound
for Saghalien. These dismal processions
dragged along to the accompaniment of jangling leg irons and fierce short
orders from the Cossack escorts to the lagging wretches whom they guarded. Each convict was attired like a zanv, one
side of his body being clothed in black and other half in grey, while even his
head was treated in similar manger, one half of it being short close, while on
the remaining half the hair grew long.
These unfortunates were chained together, and frequently linked in like
manner to their guards. The whole
country through which the caravan passed seemed to be alive with uniformed
Russians, the white caps and big boots of the Russian officials being
everywhere in ample evidence.
When the party finally arrived at Irkutzk the
prisoners were severally taken before the Governor of the district, examined
registered and handed passports. They
were then allotted to certain districts, closely guarded by patrols of Cossacks
and on pain of severe penalties forbidden to wander byond certain circumscribed
areas. Beyond this, however, they were
fairly well treated.
After a “political has been a short time in the
country and should express a desire to settle permanently, he is afforded
facilities for doing so in the shape of practical assistance from the
Government. The authorities supply him
with money to obtain implements and stock to start with and he is exempted from
all taxes for twenty years. Under these
conditions, the expatriated political may if he becomes reconciled sufficiently
to his lot to throw himself with energy into the task, eventually becomes
comparatively wealthy as the soil in many parts of the country is extremely
fertile and with ordinary cultivation productive of heavy crops. “Needless to say” remarked Mr Rosegger,
“these manifold inducements to settle in Siberia are seldom regarded by the
deported suspect with the favour desired by the ‘Little Father’s’ paternal
Government.
ESCAPE OF POLISH EXILES THROUGH THE CHINESE
EMPIRE. ONLY TWO ESCAPEES SURVIVE.
Mr C Rosegger, who is now in Auckland, and who in
our issue of the 8th inst gave an account of the arrest of himself
and other young students in Poland and their deportation to Siberia, thus
describes the escape of the exiles:
Among the political “prisoners” who were interned
at the Irkutsk colony, several of the younger exiles had been forming a plan,
and made elaborate preparations to make an attempt to regain liberty. At the time when our party was “settled on
the land” this plot was nearly ready, and I joined the participants, twelve all
told. In a manner which prevented
suspicion ammunition and good were being stored at certain secret places. Partly by bribe and partly by drugging some
of the guards, service rifles and revolvers were obtained and preparations were
concluded without having roused the slightest bit of suspicion amongst the
guarding troops. An old friendly Mujik,
who had a farm some 50 miles south west of Irkutsk was the authority on
geography in that broken and rugged country.
During the last days of April, on a stormy and clouded night, the dash
for freedom was made.
Our party numbered 12 exiles and the Mujik
guide. We had about 18 horses, three of
which were loaded with ammunition and food.
To go beyond the reach of the guards it was necessary to reach the top
of a steep mountain range and follow that ridge for about five miles,
descending by a narrow, pathless and scrub-covered gully to the river Kitoi
which was flowing on the southern side of the mountains. We soon found there was a little used log
–raft ferry which we borrowed for our immediate requirements. The ropes were cut, and some of the fugitives
moved the raft up-stream, punt fashion, with poles.
The remainder decorated the raft with branches of
fir trees so as to hide the outline of horses and men should a lightning reveal
the floating group to a casual Cossack patrol.
About 4 o’clock in the morning we passed such a troop, who were sleeping
round a low burning camp fire on the bank, with one drowsy guard humming a
melancholic song. It was a moment of
great excitement.
The greatest silence had to prevail so as not to
attract the attention of the trooper.
But luck was with us, and we passed unobserved: and at the next bend of
the river landed and disembarked on the southern bank following a pathless
gorge upward. The raft was set adrift
and a pursuit made difficult, no tracks being left to follow beyond the
northern bank of the river. In a
cave-like recess of the gorge the first rest was made in the forenoon. A few hours of sleep were very refreshing
and, as a result, the second stage of the journey up the next range and along
the ridge for a few miles was made far quicker than the previous night’s
portion. The pursuers much have been led
to follow an entirely wrong scent, for they never molested us.
The farm of the Mujik was reached in a few days,
and after having received full instructions as to the directions we bade
farewell from our faithful guide and followed as nearly as possible a southerly
direction.
FATAL ENCOUNTER WITH TROOPS
We were moving in a kind of extended order, having
a vanguard of two and two pairs of side scouts.
About ten days after the escape, we sighted a small troop of frontier
guards, who were moving on the foot of the range from which the fugitives were
just descending. The soldiers did not
notice the caravan. Several of our
number proceeded in their descent, against the warning of the rest. As it happened, a few stragglers of the
guards put in an appearance, and the sharp report of a few shots proved the
folly of the too eager scouts. Needless
to say, the shooting attracted the attention of the main body, which at once
stopped, turned, and thus saw two strange horsemen. It was lucky that we were not close
together. The soldiers were thus unaware
of our full number and the existence of pack-horses. As it was, the encounter proved to be
disastrous enough. The troops, although
at a great disadvantage, being visible to anyone who hid among the trees of the
slope, managed to kill five of us, but paid a dear price for them by losing
over twenty. The night was setting in,
and prevented successfully an immediate pursuit. Two more of our diminished number were
missing, and were probably captured by the soldier.
We, the remaining five, with three pack-horses,
proceeded on the southward journey unmolested and reached, after another week,
the outskirts of a bare, rocky and hilly plateau. This was the northern part of the great
Asiatic.
DESERT OF GOBI
Desert it was only in certain times of the year,
for upon closer investigation plenty of hard, stubby herbage and even a kind of
grass, was found growing in the protected places between rocks and hills. The horses were thus provided for, and wild
mountain sheep proved a very good food for the travellers.
Several camps of Therkess were encountered, who
treated the wayfarers very well indeed, especially on the understanding that we
were enemies of the Russia troops, who did not seem to be popular amongst those
half-civilised Tartar nomads.
Although all immediate danger of a further
encounter with Russian troops seemed to have disappeared, we deemed it wise not
to use the caravan route from the Baikal to Peking, but keep to the west of it
and try to reach the Erzerun route, which reached the Great Wall.
3000 MILES ACROSS CHINA
The trip across the Mongolian desert, or rather
around the eastern part of the desert, was dreary and monotonous. After six weeks the summer heat began to burn
the grass and herbage and to dry up what water there was left of the spring
rains. The ancient southern caravan track
was reached at the end of July by two emaciated travellers with three horses,
all more like skeletons than live beings.
Three of our small number who escaped the bullets of the boundary guards
had succumbed to the greater foes “thirst and heat” and so had most of the
hardy horses.
HOSPITABLE TREATMENT BY A CHINESE MERCHANT
We met a Chinese tea merchant who was on his
return journey from Turkestan, where he had sold his tea. His knowledge of some French words made an
understanding comparatively easy, and we managed to pick up quite a lot of
Northern Chinese while we were travelling as his guests. In slow stages proceeded the camel caravan on
its road. The beasts of burden here used
had two humps, and were ugly, shaggy brutes.
After two months of comfortable travelling, we
reached the “Great Wall” which was in excellent preservation at that part not
far from the “Hwang Ho” (Yellow River).
We had by this time quite regained our strength and made our minds up to
do a bit of travelling in China rather than go straight to Peking. So we parted from our friendly host, who
presented us with some money, small brass coins of infinitesimal value as
compared with European money, beaded up by holes on strings which, however,
represented quite a formidable sum in
the Celestial Empire. Many hearty “Chin
chin”, and we went up the river.
THE INTERIOR OF CHINA
The country in this part of the empire was not
very densely populated, it being very hilly and broken and the Chinese have an
objection apparently to cultivate or inhabit elevations. For a ridiculously small sum, we purchased
the permission to use one of the small river craft to travel up stream. Through changing scenery, large fields
alternating with densely wooded low hills and rock-strewn, bare mountains, the
river was winding its course and had a considerable current so that our horses,
which we had lent to the skipper, came in very handy to give a “pull”.
It was early in November when we arrived at
Singanfu. By that time, we were fairly
well able to understand the colloquial spoken in those parts of China. We learned on arriving that the Prefect, the
highest official in the town, had bought a steam launch which was somehow not
in working order. We saw our chance and
offered at once to repair the craft. As
luck would have it, nothing serious was the matter with that new engine except
that the engineer had somewhat altered the valve setting. Being able to make the boat once more fit for
use brought us together with the official, who was a very liberal and advanced
man. He had spent two years in European
universities and spoke French excellently.
Upon learning our history, he invited us to stay with him and to come
with him in the early spring when he intended going to some place in Eastern
Tibet. Of course, this offer was gladly
accepted.
TRAVELLING IN TIBET
After four months, we left Singanfu as members of
the mandarin’s party. We were travelling
on horseback, whereas “His Excellency was borne in a palankin” of very
comfortable design. The densely
populated river flats were slowly narrowing as we neared the western mountains
and soon we found ourselves amongst the grandest and most majestic mountain
scenery.
After a fortnight of, under the circumstances,
very rapid travelling we had arrived at the Tsishan Mountains where the
mandarin owned a magnificent summer residence.
He intended to make the return trip to Singanfu via the river, and his
launch was coming up stream to meet him at Jamakar on the head-waters of the
Yellow River, about 40 miles from the official’s land-house.
We were now in Tibet, at least in the eastern
province, Kukunor, of that mysterious country.
Of course, we wanted to go to Lhassa, but our host managed to divert our
attention from that perilous project and advised us to cross the ranges to
reach the head-waters of the Yangtsekiang, or further south of Mekong. So, understanding the impossibility to reach
the sacred city, we started southward. Our
hose presented us with a very useful passport, which caused that we were treated
as officials travelling on government business.
After crossing the Datsky Range, we arrived in
about five days in Thudi, and ancient town on the Upper Yangtsekiang, which was
called here Murussa.
A DENSE POPULATION
We visited a very interesting Buddhist Lhamasery
situated on the southern hills and, after a brief stay at that monastery, proceeded southward to Surnam, near the
springs of the Mekong. About 130 miles
down the river we reached the ancient Post route from China to Lhassa. All the country seemed to be alive here; every
square foot of the fertile river flat
was cultivated. Hundreds of little
villages and many landhouse were dotting the green fields. About 160 miles further down the river we
reached Kianka, an old and very romantic frontier town near which we re-entered
China proper. The river winds through
that country for a distance of about 300 miles.
We crossed the Post-road to India near Keng Hunt, and reached on the
left bank, French China and on the right part of Burma. We sighted the first Europeans here, and were
well received by the French officer who commanded a small garrison. From here we had about 820 miles of
down-river trip until we reached the vast delta of the giant river. Towards the
end of July, we reached and sea border and, in the capital of Rench India,
Saigon, we managed to obtain a place in a vessel bound for Singapore.
I then
propose to enter the realms of fiction here and state on his travels through
China and Tibet, Carl Rossegger heard rumours of the Jīn de Guǒjiàng Guàn de
Nián Shén. After settling in Auckland, he realised that he was never going to
settle to normal life after his extraordinary journey across Asia. With what
little money he had, he purchased a steam-boat passage back to that great
continent and followed the little knowledge he had learnt about the Golden
Jhamjarh of Sticky Gods. After many false starts, he finds himself in Djelibad,
assisting the girls of Hilda Rumpole College on their dig for Scythian remains
and artefacts. We shall hear more of this great adventurer…
To be continued...
