PLEVNA AFTER THE SURRENDER.

Thames Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2819, 26 February 1878, Page 2

PLEVNA AFTER THE SURRENDER.

Shocking S*3ik.&S3 of the Sick and "Wooadod. Eomfcle Soenos emor? the Lixiag and the Dead. [FBOK THJS DilIT VBWS ] PutvHA, December 17. "; ""

Plevna is full of horrors, and after the turmoil of the past four month* the com* plete niieuce no* seems strange and oppressive. As I rode into the,tows along ; the loTteha road the other evening just : after sunset, not a sound broke, the dead quiet, and the only liring thing I net was here ami there a stray dog, which slunk away to his horrible meal among the shallow grates in front of the redoubts on. the hills. The deserted breastwork! that crossed the road at frequent. intervals seemed quite purposeless. It waa utterly -' impossible to realise that here on the very spot only a few days before we had scurried across the open placet/ and dodged behind the mounds of earth, while the rattle of the rifles went on continually, . and the air was filled with the staging of->* ballets that just here had swept, again andS again, the lines of the assailing forces, atid that many thousands had fallen within a stone's throw. From the shoulder of the'bill called' Aroden, where the road winds around - i under the embrasures of the redoubts I which were stormed by General Skobeloff ! with such fearful loss! Plevna was seen lying down in the valley, and only one or two twinkling lights'showed that it was inhabited. AH around on. every side the whole landscape was quiet' as the desert? No lines of blue smoke and little camp fires now marked the. trenches. Not ft single tent broke the bare surface of the hillsides, and only the great square; vt*>' doubts-and the zig-sag line 61 breastworks proved that thii was the Plevna of a week ago. ■■ '■ With all the' vivid recollections of the various incidents of the liege, tbe most active imagination could not picture tbe thousandth part of the frightful suffering, the awful misery'and wretched*" ness that are found within the narrow limits of the town, nor draw the faintest: outline of the sickening spectacle; the panorama of ghastly horrors, that is almost unparalleled since the terrible plagues i of past centuries. Human beings lying like sheep in the streets; houses lilted with dead; hundreds stretchiag their hands feebly heavenward for a morsel of bread or a drcp of water, and no help that; could be commended to alleviate their, 1, sufferings or save the wretched creatures from their painful death. Even iW the midst of these scenes, which the pen of Dante alone could render, with alKtheV terrible rhythm of the poem attracting every ear with its irresistible force, even after days of constant contact with human suffering in every, form, with death,in , every aspect, I can scarcely bring myself . to repeat the story, of what had passed in ' Plevna since the surrender. I have become in a measure callous now to what I, see every hour in the day, yet the horror' of the first few momentary impressions is still so vividly impressed - upen me that I' '■ \ cannot, refer to it without pain. When the Turks made the. sortie they.. : left the sick and wounded, of whom then were thousands* entirely without attendants. There was never a regular hot-* pital in Plevna;.the sick being transported' .: to Sofia, and the small ambulance corps was at all times insufficient to care for the wounded, even before the town was surrounded. Of course the attendants at '•' the hospitals thought only of their own safety when the sortie was made, and

they joined their lot with those who tried to break through the Bussian line*. The day'and night of the battle pasted, and the sufferers received no food or water, - and their festering wounds were undressed. The flowing morning the Bussiam entered and took possession, and mr.de the depone of rejoicing with the visit of the Czar and the Imperial staff; but this celebration of the event, however short it may hare seemed to the viotors, wa3 a long season of horrible suffering fo# the wretched helpless captives, who stretched their skeleton haads in vain to-.■ wards heaven, praying for a bit of breed or a drop of water. Neither friend nor foe was there to alleviate their sufferings, or to give the trifle needed to save them from a painful death., and they died by hundreds; and before the morning of the" third day the dead crowded the living in ; every one of those dirty, dimly-lighted rooms which served to shelter the wounded from the cold and wei, but eon* fined them in a foul and fetid atmosphere of disease and death. It whs only on the morning of the third | day after those wretched, tortured creatures had been left to their fate that the Russians found opportunity and means to begin, first, the separation of thVliving.' from the dead, and then the care of the former. The mosques, the largest houses* '"■ and many of the small dwellings had b*en fiUed with sick and wounded. Overcrowded in every ease, and at I hare before said, from the first without proper attention, these temporary hospitals were, at the best, most filthy and pestilential, and the air was tainted with the stenehof

undressed wounds, and the corps** wtteh - lay unburied i a the courtyards. . - Th-* first tc^m entered in one of these charnel • houses contained ninety odd Turks. Of these, 37 were dead, tail many others on the point of death. R. teous groacs came from between rigid lips, and painful cries for water, and torn* made feeble signs for food. One or two of the strongest raised themselves, and fixed their hideous, sunken eyes with such a beseeching stare on those who had come to free them from, the company of the dead, that it would have softened the hardest heart. The small room, dimly lighted by a high window with one pene cf glass, wm crowded with the forms of thirty or forty ragged, filthy, hnman be* ings. Many of thesi forms were motionless, and scarcely audible groans were heard from one or two who raised with difficulty their bony hands to their lips, to signify their peed of food. There were fait whispers of "Somewater," * Bom. water!" piteous to hear. The dim light was concentrated on the half-nalred body of an old ma^ stretched across the en-, trance, wbithef he had dragged himself in tHe Icat hoar* of his agony in hope of succour, of tit' least df a breath of'fresh »ir: for'in the unventilated room "the !a» was thick with putriiicdCUr?; •KeKlioftt'' out when the door was opened, over* ppirerinp stropg men, and causing them to turn sjck and faint. The o)$ fttjn^ hands were clutched |v the rigpur of pa|n<

ful death on his nude and meagre breast, and his head lay against the Tory crnck of the door, so that it is opened only by rude force. Living and dead were lying togather undistinguishable along the walls behind the door and under the window. The room is one of fifty where a similar spectacle is presented. The pavement of the mosques is covered with crouching forms, some moving at intervals, others motionless and silent. Here and there the faces of the dead come out in ghastly relief, with a fixed expression of great Nothing can bo done but to drag the dead from the living, let in the light and the air, and give wafer and nourishment ia hope of saving some who remain alive. Small enough was the force of men who set about this painful task, and meagre enough their means. Three open peasants' ox-carts were all that were available for the revoval of the dead, and fifty soldiers to carry the bodies from the rooms to the carts, and bury them in the ditches. As fast as possible bread and water were distributed, and the* feeble wretches fought each other with last breath in their greed for the nourishment. Some propped up against the wall slowly ate until the unraistakeable pallor came over their faces and their eyes were fixed in death. Even the effort of eating the long-needed food was too great for their waning strength. The living clutch for the remaining morsel in the dead man s hand, struggle for it with all their feeb c power, and curse each other and wrangle over the spoil, perhaps to fall dead themselves before they can eat the bread. The three open oxen carts began the removal of the dead at once, and as I' write the work still goes on. The hospitals daily supply more freight of this kind than the slow-moving teams can carry away to the ditches outside. The disinfection of the hospitals was promptly effected. As fast as possible with the imall force of men at hand, the rooms were emptied one after another. After a day or two some of the Bulgarians were compelled to serve instead of-the soldiers, and they set themselves about the ; hated task with a brutality terrible to witness. They drag the bodies down the stairs by the legs, the heads bumping from step to step with sickening thuds, then out into the court through the filthy mud, where they sling them into the cart with the heads or legs hanging over the side, and so continue to pile up the load with a icore of half-naked corpses. It is horrible to hear the conversation of the men who do this work. They perhaps bring out a body still warm, the heart still beating, a^d the flush of life on the cheek. One says, "He is still alive," and proposes to leave him*without stopping to decide the question. The others cry, " Devil take him J He will die before to-morrow, any way. In with him." And so the living goes in with the dead, and is tumbled into the grave. I have seen this myself, and the man who has charge of the disinfection of the hospitals and burial of the dead told me that he doubted not that such cases occurred leveral times daily. When the three carts are full they start awsy through the streets toward the ditches outside the j town. The horrible load jolts and shakes, and now and then a body falls out into the mud and is dragged into the cart tfgain, and thrown down and jammed in solidly to .prevent a recurrence of the accident. This heartless proceeding goes on in the public streets, crowded with men, women, and children of the place, the soldiers, the wounded, and the sick; and after so many days of the same spectacle, no one any longer pays any attention to the transport of the dead., Over a thousand have been already carted away, and from the hospitals come about a hundred daily.

The care of the sick and wounded is now rapidly being systematised. The few Russian doctors that are detailed for the service are ; working yery bard, and also the Turkish surgeons who remain here; Taut the corps is not one quarter large enough to properly attend to the patients. Some of the hospitals are light, airy, and well purified; but the mosques are still dark, foulrsmelling, and crowded.; The dead He for many hours nnattended, and the horrible eights and sounds defy description, »i In thes midst of this the few >Bussian Sister* ot Charity move about Suietly busy from daybreak till dark, ringing comfort to hundreds _ whose wounds they drests, and whose pains they alleviate.

I have given but a slight outline of the scenes that hate- passed before my eyes iince i came here. A long detailed account alone could give anything like an idea of the climax and final act of the drama of Plevna. The town is full of similar picture*. Along the streets are frequently seen one or two wounded who have crawled out from the hospital and lie dying in the mud. There is no valid excuse for this wilful disregard of human life. The cause is evident, namely, lack of system. The Russians knew that Plevna must fall, and they expected to find thousands of starring men there, and thousands of- badly attended wounded. The surrender must have been, as it probably was, a surprise, but the day before the expected event was not the time to Srepare for it. There should have been etailed a month ago proper officers to prepare everything for the care of the surrendered troopß. There can be no excuse for the fact that only three open ox-caGrts-^an be found to transport .the dead, and only a score of Bulgarians, who run away at every opportunity, can be detailed to perform the duty of burying the dead. Out on the plain near the bridge over the Vid are bivouacked 15,000 or 20,000 prisoners, fighting for bread, miserable beyond description, in the cold, with hundreds of unburied dead covering the ground near the spot where the first attempt was made to break through 5 and day after day passes and their condition does not change, simply because there can be nothing like prompt attention in similar cases where there is no idea of system. The story of the hospitals, of the prisoners, and of the [Russian disasters all hang on one thread. But the horrors of Plevna are not all in the town. Some are in the Valley of the Yid^ In the redoubts which the Russians stormed, hundreds on hundreds of stilj imburied bodies lie; the whole ridge of the wooded niountainj the valley beyond, $d the hill furtlie? on, where Stand the two redoubts overlooking the town, taken With terrible loss by General Skobeloff, on September 30, are strewn thickly with the corpse? of the Eussians who fell on those days. Some of these bodies have tfeeh partly covered with [pur spadesfu.l of dirt, b^t most of them lie as tjiey fell. Ss6i all as they fell, for the flogs have torn away the limbs of many, and the birds of prey hare pecked fit thpir skull?. |n the |ppi* of wfcter Tie corpses half decayed ;

pale, withered hands and feet stick out of the soil on all sides, and horrible dead, mummified faces stare at one from every little hollow in the ground, and from among every clump of bushes. Some ot these bodies have been put v graves within a day or two, but still the whole region is strewn thickly with these dreadful mementoes of the fight there nearly three months ago. Around the redoubts the ground is furrowed dug with thousands of shells, nnd tons of pieces cot.t the earth. I*, is interesting to observe how few sheila went into the redoubts, or struck the edge of the redoubts. The majority plunged into the ground just in front. The Turks built great traverses across the redoubts, and under these dug deep bombproof shelters, where they were as safe from harm from the shells as in Constantinople ; but the whole surface of the hill is literally riddled with holes large enough to bury horses in, and all about Ho great unexploded shells. Even away in the ravines where the soldiers' huts aro, bullets, fragments of clothing and equipments, cover the ground; and one frequently finds in the most unexpected spots, lougnnburied bodies, or., sodden in the path one Sees the limbs of human bodies who fell and wero left there until many feet passing trod hard the thin layer of earth over them. , . . Plevna is one vast charnel-house, surpassing in horror anything that can...be imagined. -, '." ..