STAFFED BY CRIMINALS.

Gisborne Times, Volume IX, Issue 823, 11 February 1903, Page 2

STAFFED BY CRIMINALS.

MURDERERS AND BURGLARS ON THE SIBERIAN RAILWAY. Some most interesting and important facts concerning the management and staff of the Siberian Railway are revealed in a little statistical work which has just been published in St. Petersburg. From this it appears that no fewer than 11,112 persons have been appointed on the railway, the population of a fair-sized provincial town. Of this army of men, it is only possible to describe the occupation of two-thirds prior to their entering the service of the railway, while 3985 are mysteries as regards their previous careers. No one can say what they formerly did for a living. One would not be far wrong, however, in assuming that they were ah convicts who had destroyed the traces of their crimes and taken false nameß.

Of the 11,112 employees only 473 had ever attended a secondary school, aod only about 4000 bad been to a school of any kind ; the rest could neither read nor write. The most extraordinary fact, however, is that over a thousand of the officials employed on the railway bad been banished to Siberia for murder and robbery, burglary, or other heinous offences, and no fewer than 597 murderers were appointed as conductors, guards, stationmasters, etc. I How pleasant a journey on the .Siberian railway must be when one knows that the officials have been criminals of the worst class, and that the conductor who collects one’s ticket may have been condemned seven times for murder, and may take not only one’s ticket but one’s purse !

Jn view of these facts, the recent act on of the Minister of Finance in summarily dismissing a large number of employees is not to he wondered at