VICTIMS Of THE REDS

Hokitika Guardian, 1 April 1927, Page 3

VICTIMS Of THE REDS

RUSSIA’S 2,(j(J3,0C0 ORPHAN c lULDKLN.

Ton-bile hut authentic is the picture of life in Bolshevik Russia, given in I’rotessor KaiTgreu s "Bolshevist Russia” (Allen and Unwin, 12s Oil) by far the best book yet published on tile present e.minion of tho Soviet dominions.

Mr Karlgren is Professor of the Slav languages at Copenhagen, and is by nationality a Swede, lie lias a thorough knowledge of Russia and is a master of the Russian language.

Communism, he tells us, has not brought “upliit.” in Russia:

As soon as we come to the villages

we notice nl once what a perfect pest tlie Komsomols (.Communist young people's unions) are ... In the evening, and throughout the night the village street ,to which the Komsomol soon transferred its activity, resounded with noises of a horrible nature; the inhabitants lay trembling in their lints behind boiled doors, shuddering for fear ol the young ruffians’ fresh exploits.” The moral standard is of the lowest; “From tin* Komsomols moral infection spreads to the Pioneer Unions (children). A parly report In Deeomher 11*25 states that here and there

cases are noticed of sexual Ms cesses

among the Pioneers (ti to it) years old).”

Care for the sick hardly exists : “Hospitals have been closed throughout the land . . . even in the*. Leningrad government. 3,00!) hospitals have ( eased to exist. In the Riasan government the hospital generally consists of two rooms with an unhealed waiting room; the patients lie there in their imu clnllies . . and 3d a day is allowed for their maintenance; in the Pskov government this allowance is 2il a day.

This meagre allowance is all they have in a country where prices are iniiili higher limn in England. As for the Russian unemployed, their

position is de.-pernle. “Only 31 per cent of the whole miniher gel any assistance at all, and the assistance given amounts to Ms or JOs per month, i.e , a pittance upon which it is quite impossible to live.’ The condition ol the orphan children is heartrending:

“In numbers calculated by the Commissariat lor Public Health at ‘he fabulous total of 2.OIXUHK), they wander a bout tba streets and shuns, Iriemlless and bo-neless. . . A workman describing travel impressions ill l’>avda at the beginning l 'l PJ2li says: “I came to the town of Omsk; titer.' at the very station neglected dtildivn were lying quite naked. . Attcrwards ! came to Samara. and. saw stark naked children lying on the hare ginund cowering together in the CM" . , . The state o! toe country sc’io.Js in keeping w itli i his picture ot squan 1 “In the beginning of I**2l t primary school-master's salary itt the 'm. os amounted to 11.5 roubles a month (■'its) in the country to 10.13 roubles ( o 0; (';,!) . . These irregularly paid pittances ■ . • serve at most to stave oil’ actual starvation hut do no more. Even the half-starved peasants look upon the schoolmaster and mistress its a kind of beggar proletariat. The school itselt is furnished with none of the amenities ol civilisation. “The schools that are still wonting present a perfectly incredible picture With their broken windows, scoring roofs, slanting walls, they gke the impression of hopeless decay ' . ! visited various villages where the school lav desolate or had been nda’ited to another purpose ill one village the Soviet’s chief represent'! Live there had installed his horse '■> >(. Can such a stale of affairs last r For Pro lessor Karlgren is quite dear that evervbodv in Russia except a eiv Communist officials is miserable. But he savs that the peasant is completely inert.' and the town artisan in bis wretchedness is buoyed up by the dream of a great world revolution which is to ease his position bv making all the world as miserable as himself.