Russian Officers Degraded.

Hastings Standard, Issue 178, 23 November 1896, Page 4

Russian Officers Degraded.

Renter'; St. Petersburg correspondent telegraphed on (itii September : "An Imperial order >f the <lay has been issuul placing Col. commamier of the :!-">th, or Bielgorod Ki.-gimeM of Dragoons of the Emperor Francis Joseph 1., on the retired list, dismissing Lieutenant P>akounine from the service, ami degrading eleven other (Oncers of the same regiment to the rank-;. No reason for this step is assignid in the order, hut the punishment is known to have been intiieted for the scandalous punishment of Lieut, jiakounitie and the other officers who, when in a state of intoxication, insulted and then attacked an inoffensive civilian, chasing him to his house and forcibly effecting an entrance with the object of heating him. The police had to interfere in order to rescue the civilian from their violence. The colonel was not of the party, but he was included in the order for not having sent a report on the affair to the superior military authorities, who had heard nothing of it until they received a compaiut from the local commissioner of police." Later particulars of the affair stated that a lieutenant named ! »akounine,wbo was drunk, insulted a number of -lews in a wineshop, at Mejibnjie, a small town in Podolia, and attempted to strike some of them, whereupon they gave him a thrashing, lie retreated to the barracks, and'appealed to his comrades to awnge the honor of the regiment. They called out 15<) of their men, who under his leadership looted and burned the wineshop and an adjoinining building, and raised a general riot, in which live Jews were killed and about :»0 injured, while a number of hv.i -h houses and shops were plundered.