If a workman protested
against this violence, he disappeared, too, in the same secret fashion.
The poor women who used the shed during the day for its legitimate
purpose told from time to time grim stories of blood and evidence of
death struggles on the frozen floor as they began the morning's work.
Several thousand people were missing by the time the Koltchak forces
captured the town.
The ice in the shelter of the bank began to thaw before the more exposed
part of the river, which enabled the people whose friends and neighbours
were missing to put a rude and ineffective screen below the shed in the
hope of recovering the bodies of some of their friends. I knew about the
shed but not about the screen, until I was informed by Regt.
Sergeant-Major Gordon that he had seen several hundred bodies taken from
the river. The following morning I walked into the crowd of anxious
people who were watching the work. The official in charge told me quite
simply that they had not had a very good morning, for three hours' work
had only produced some forty bodies. I looked at these relics of the new
order; they were of both sexes and belonged to every condition of life,
from the gruff, horny-handed worker to the delicately-nurtured young
girl. A miscellaneous assortment of the goods, among other things,
revolutions are bound to deliver.
Pages:
220
221
222
223
224
225
226
227
228
229
230
231
232
233
234
235
236
237
238
239
240
241
242
243
244