We Land in Odessa on the Day Set by the Revolutionists for a General Massacre, but Because of Effective Martial Law, Secure Only a “General Situation” Story

Odessa, as we viewed it from our ice encrusted bridge that freezing December morning, was a distinct disappointment. Behind the breakwater that stands between the pounding seas of the Euxine and the anchorage and wharves, the city lay, gray, cold, gloomy and forbidding. From the dirty streets of the shipping district the town scrambles up steeply and spreads itself out over the bleak landscape that lies beyond. Long lines of what the Europeans call “goods wagons,” and what we term freight cars, were strung along both pier and water front. A half dozen or more stranded cargo steamers chained up to the wharves, and a few dreary looking tugboats combined to make the setting of one of the most desolate scenes that I recall. An occasional figure slinking about among the cars, and a single miserable Russian sentinel that stood near one of the gray stone warehouses served only to intensify the utter loneliness of the place. Over a year before I had been in Dalny, pressing close on the heels of the invading army of Japan. Big ten-inch shells from naval turrets miles away at sea, reinforced by brigades of bristling infantry that closed in from the north, had forced the Muscovites to evacuate. The retreating columns had straggled out by the light of blazing warehouses tuned to the crash of falling timber—this destruction their own handiwork to keep Dalny out of the Japanese hands. But even that far finger of the Russian reach, obtained in crazy frenzy of expansion and abandoned in smoke and confusion, was cheerful compared to Odessa. There at least one saw the new life of the Oriental armies that poured in by brigades, divisions and army corps in the place of the retreating Russians, but here in the great commercial city of southern Russia there was a gloom, silence and abandon that spelled revolution, disorder and economic disaster, more loudly than the smoking embers of deserted Dalny. Morris, who did not indulge much in sad reflections, brought me back to the business in hand by the true, if somewhat ungrammatical observation—

“There sure ain’t nothing doing ashore or afloat in these diggings, and that’s a cinch.”

I agreed with the spirit if not with the construction of this comment. A careful survey of the situation, as visible through my binoculars, from the bridge of the France suggested the possibility that the irresponsible population had all gone into the interior to have an agrarian riot or celebrate in some other simple way dear to the Russian heart. Nevertheless, we had not come all this distance and spent three cheerless soaking nights at sea to give up the game at the first sign of discouragement. Here was where the dispatches of his Britannic Majesty came to the rescue. After an elaborate search through the International Signal Code I found a combination of flags which exactly filled our needs, and promptly hoisted to our single halyard the colored bunting of the code which stood for the letters “J. & S.” This means “I am carrying government dispatches,” and implies that everything in sight should co-operate at once. The effect was even better than I had anticipated. A few minutes after our flags had been snapping in the icy wind that blew in from the Black Sea I saw the launch of the quarantine doctor come puffing out from behind some tugboats, where it had been lying in ambush. The doctor himself was standing in the bow. He was a portly man, and willing hands were necessary to assist him up the side of the France. He was one of those foreigners who cherish that most regrettable of ideas, namely, that he could speak English. The result was that he flatly declined to be addressed in any other language. This made it embarrassing and occasioned no end of delay as his English was of the purely school book brand. It contained such pertinent phrases as “How is your wife’s brother? Will you go for a walk in the park to-day? Has your sister’s husband a good pen?” and so on. This was all right, as far as it went, but did not assist me much in the business in hand. He seemed to be wholly unprepared in his vocabulary to take care of such a commonplace and uninteresting subject as a health examination. He held me on deck in the cold while he ran through his available list of sentences, which really gave him an excellent insight into the status of my family, the number of my brothers and sisters and their respective ages. He followed this with a few irrelevant questions about the weather, and ended up with “Do you find Russia a pleasant country?” This seemed to be the last sentence which had stuck in his head. After that he paused for breath, and before he could commence again I got him down into my saloon where we had just been having breakfast. When he saw the table he forgot all about his English aspirations and burst into French, and, with tears in his eyes and a wealth of exclamation, told us how hungry he was. We offered the remnants of the breakfast and he fell on the food with an avidity which was appalling. The remnants went fast and we had to send a rush order to Stomati in the galley for reinforcements. He ate fast and well. Between gulps he told us that in spite of his fine uniform and steam launch, he only drew $40.00 a month for his services. I endeavored to be politely interested, until I found that he had troubles which would fill a book, and so gently but firmly cut him off. When he had finished the last scrap he turned to business with evident regret. It isn’t really business, of course, but it is what passes under that name in Russia. First he took off his coat, then he undid his sword and took off his belt and placed it on the table. He then looked all around the room and asked for a cigar. He got out his penknife and carefully cut off the end, and then lighted it. Great folios of paper were then produced, and sheet upon sheet of printed forms were piled upon the table, and the real work begun. Detailed information as to my lineage, aye, even unto the second generation previous, were called for, until I was ashamed to confess that I did not know my grandmother’s maiden name. Then I had to give all the names of the crew, and these had to be copied in three different blank forms to comply with Russian law. As my staff were Greeks and Turks, with impossible names, we spent perhaps half an hour in making these entries, discussing the correct spelling of each as it was entered in the forms. Hoping to facilitate business, I gave the inspector three fingers of good old Irish whiskey, but I never made a worse mistake. He at once became genial and wanted to take a recess and tell me the story of his life in his school book English. Finally, with the co-operation of the entire staff and the testimony of most of them, under cross-examination, we convinced him and saw him duly enter in triplicate first, that we had no sickness aboard, second, that we had no mysterious corpse packed away below the deck. (Just why anyone wanted to smuggle a corpse into Odessa when the supply there was greatly in excess of the demand, has never been clear to me.) Third, that we were not bringing in any large quantity of fresh water (which might be full of Turkish germs), and a lot of other equally immaterial and ridiculous information. When all was said and done he politely informed me that I could not land until he had made his report and some other official had made some other sort of examination. This seemed to me to be about the limit. With all the dignity at my command I ordered Morris to bring out the dispatches. This he did with a great show of importance. I showed the wretched official the red seals and the official stamps and then said:

“These are the dispatches of his Britannic Majesty, Edward VII. If you choose to take the responsibility of detaining here a moment longer the bearer of such important papers, of course you can do so. I have no means of forcing you. For your own information, however, I will tell you that such action on your part will be reported to the British foreign office and your case will be most vigorously investigated. But you must do as you think best.”

He wilted on the spot, and took us ashore in his launch, where he led us before some dignified gentlemen in gorgeous uniforms who all talked at once in Russian. I waited and tried to look important. My “red sealing waxed” dispatches were again laid out for inspection, and my friend, the medical examiner, evidently repeated my remarks to him, for an orderly was sent on the run for another launch, and I was rushed across the harbor before another and higher official, who was covered with gold lace, where there was another interminable discussion, which finally ended in our being turned over to a burly ruffian in uniform, whom I learned was assigned to act as my chief of staff while I remained in town. Fortunately he spoke a little German, and two minutes after I had him alone I convinced him that his services were unnecessary. His conscience troubled him for disobeying his superior officer, but five roubles fixed that, so, four hours after we dropped anchor, I found myself free to pursue my way unhampered.

The situation in Odessa at this time was intolerable, as I found within an hour after I had delivered the dispatches to the British consul, and had an opportunity of getting down to work. That day, as I then learned, was the Czar’s birthday. For weeks previous there had been talk of another grand demonstration on the part of the revolutionists. It had been pleasantly rumored that there was to be a promiscuous killing to be conducted under the auspices of the revolutionary committee. These prearranged events rarely materialize in Russia, as the gentlemen supposed to be in charge of such proceedings are generally dug out of their cellars and are well on their way to Siberia on the date set for their entertainments. My experience in five visits to Russia during the period of convulsion was that the average Muscovite revolutionist has no equal (off the stage) for simplicity and ineffective activity. The moment you set eyes on him you know he is a revolutionist. His hair stands on end, his eyes are wild and his dress is in disorder. In fact, nothing is lacking to complete the make-up of the part. Every time he has an opportunity he climbs on a barrel or some other conspicuous spot in a public place and proceeds to air his ideas. He will point out at the top of his lungs the advantages of bombs and miscellaneous assassinations. He has a well developed programme as to what ought to be done with the Czar, and as for the grand dukes, he simply tears out his hair in handfuls when he talks about them. When he isn’t engaged in talking he goes off and buries himself in a garret and writes inflammatory and compromising letters and articles, which he leaves about just as a stage hero does important family papers. The police (whom you know to be police, just as quickly as you recognize a revolutionist to be a revolutionist) stand around and look wise and make notes. The moment any trouble is brewing they go out and make a big bag of assorted anarchists, bombists and inoffensive but loquacious students, who have been airing their undigested views on sociology and politics. When people get together for the glorious riot which has been planned for months in advance, lo and behold! All of the leading spirits are kicking their heels in the nearest fortress or packing up their belongings for a trip into Siberia. So it was at this time in Odessa. The revolutionists had been talking so long about what they were going to do on the Czar’s birthday that everybody in town knew of their plans, which, among other variations, included a massacre of all foreigners. I never learned just why the foreigners were to be massacred, but it seemed to be admitted in revolutionary circles that this was the proper thing to be done. General Kaulbars of Manchurian war fame had been made military governor of South Russia. He had rushed in two regiments of barbarous looking Cossacks, who had been instructed to “fire with ball” at the first sign of trouble, and they certainly looked as though they were prepared to do it. The order was published and everybody knew what to expect.

In spite of these precautions nearly everybody in Odessa was living in a state of nerves as to what might happen. The erratic behavior of the mutinous fleet the summer before, headed by the battleship Knias Potempkin, had aroused general apprehension as to what extent irresponsibility might carry the situation. The people distrusted the army and the army the people. The soldiers hated their officers and the officers feared their own soldiers, and both officers and soldiers distrusted the population of the town, while the foreigners had no confidence in anybody. The so-called Jewish massacre a few months before did not tend to quiet the minds of the peaceful residents. At that time the town had been given over for three days into a free-for-all fight and general riot, where everybody killed anybody they had it in for, and a few Jews thrown in for luck. All of the foreign consulates had made detailed preparations for trouble. Rendezvous had been agreed upon for the mustering of the various flocks. A company of soldiers was to be allotted to each consulate to act as an escort to the water front, where ships were held in readiness for immediate departure to places of safety. The residents had been out of touch with the outer world for weeks, owing to the postal and telegraph strike and railroad tie-up. All seemed to think that their respective governments were trying to do something to relieve them and that the international fleet that at last accounts had been making its silly demonstration off the Dardanelles, was going to be allowed to pass through into the Black Sea. No one thought that the Sultan would make any objection to allowing a few cruisers to pass the Bosphorus to protect the trembling subjects of the European governments at the various ports, but while the foreigners at every port where Russian supremacy still held were sitting up nights waiting to be murdered, and praying for the protection of the blue jackets, six inch rifles and machine gun batteries, those very warships were sitting peacefully outside Macedonia, conducting their childish and ineffective bluff.

The economic conditions could scarcely reach a worse stage than those existing at that time in all South Russia. Business was absolutely at a standstill, credit had collapsed and thousands of men had been thrown out of employment. The demand for most of the products of local manufacture had fallen off to almost nothing. The directors of enterprise dared not accumulate a surplus of their product for fear their warehouses would be destroyed at the next spasm of riot, so factories had closed up and the employÉs were in the streets, destitute and in the middle of winter. Most of the better class had left town, closed their residences, and dismissed their servants, who were also out of town. The railroad, telegraph and postal men were all on a strike, the end of which was not in sight. Most of them had no funds, and were begging on the streets. Everybody who had any money was sitting on it with a gun in each hand. With ten thousand beggars on the streets and the coldest weather of the winter biting through bone and marrow, and a ravenous hunger turning the ordinary docile man into little better than a brute, and with thousands of such at large, there is small wonder that people felt apprehensive. The bakers dared not bake for a day ahead for fear their shops would be broken open and looted, which indeed was happening every day. The Jews, who comprise nearly a quarter of the population, were “squeezing” everybody that came into their clutches and constantly fomenting trouble on the outside. It was probable that any day a mere street brawl might in a moment turn into a massacre, and these Russian massacres mean the unleashing of every element of evil which the town contains. The news that came in from the agrarian districts was increasingly serious, and everyone was guessing as to what the outcome would be. The reports that came in indicated that all over Russia, sometimes peaceably and sometimes with violence, the peasants were taking the land into their own hands. Stories of burning estates and fleeing land owners circulated in every quarter. The question that everyone was asking was if the peasants ever take the land, who will ever take it away from them. Surely the army, that was manifestly sullen and discontented and trusted by no one, could not be looked to for performing such a task. As a matter of fact, people generally felt that the soldiers in time of trouble are more to be feared than any other element in the community. The Czar had just issued his latest manifesto increasing the pay and the standard of living of his army, but the effect was about the same as that of turning up the wick of a lamp when the oil is gone. There was a momentary flare and then less light than ever before. The soldiers and everyone else viewed it at best as a confession of weakness wrung from the sovereign by his realization of his own desperate plight. Anyway, not even the most optimistic soldier believed that he would ever get the promised raise of pay. Patrols of the forbidding looking Cossacks were riding about the streets from morning until night. The plodding of their horses’ hoofs in the snow and the metallic jingle of sabers, were almost the only sound one heard in the streets. All else was quiet as the grave, and save for the shivering and destitute begging from house to house, there was almost no one else abroad in this bitter cold.

Considering our high hopes for a general uprising the day passed quietly enough. Only a bomb episode along in the afternoon testified that the spirit of anarchy and revolution still smoldered beneath the surface. Not much of an event it was, even at that. Only an unsuccessful attempt to assassinate one of the local tyrants of the detective force. It would make a scare head for a local police story perhaps, but out here for the man who had the only access to the world’s cable, it was only a “significant incident.” The immediate scene is dramatic, terrible. A cold gray court-yard rises beyond a gate, at which stood a half frozen sentinel, gloomy, imperturbable, silent. Across the court was the office of the victim sought. Within the compound a half dozen bodies, now torn and mangled, masses of clothing and human flesh, lie steaming in the cold, while pools of blood freeze in little lakes of red stained snow. The frost-bitten earth crunches dryly under the feet of the clumsy officers, who, note-books in hand, are compiling their reports of the incident. One of them turns over with his heavy boot the stiffening carcass of the perpetrator of the outrage, himself torn to shreds by the explosion of his own bomb. With white teeth clinched, and glassy eyes glaring up to the gloomy December sky, he lies, soaked in his own blood, amidst the wreckage he has created, a grim evidence that no tyrant is safe in a country where there are dozens willing and eager to sacrifice their own lives to remove even one of the cogs of the vast engine of despotism, the machine that has been grinding them smaller and smaller during these many centuries. No wonder the prefect of police turns his heavy visage from the scene in which he was cast to play such an important role. He is putty colored beneath his beard as he passes to his carriage, saber dragging in the snow and spurs ringing sharply on the threshold of the great gate. The dull sentry hears the sound and comes to a present. The police officers salute. The prefect climbs into his sleigh, weighted down with rich furs, the driver cracks his whip, and they are off up the street at a gallop. He has escaped this bomb, but how about the next, and yet again the one to follow that? Perhaps he is thinking what will be the ultimate end, as he is driven away through the softly falling snow.

The uninitiated, no doubt, view with skepticism the accuracy of quickly gathered news, and perhaps think that a few days on the situation is a ridiculously short time in which a man can gather any definite information. This is in a measure true. There are times where weeks of study are essential, but these are not the stories a special war correspondent is after. Where he is in demand is on the spot where there is a “visible” situation. When things quiet down he usually withdraws, and the political and economic correspondents send the more analytical and perhaps profounder stuff. But these men in a riot, disaster or “emergency” are often lost in the shuffle, and here it is where the war correspondent can often cut in and beat by days the men who have been on the spot gathering routine political news for years. Unimpeded by long association the special man sees at a glance the most picturesque and prominent features. Trained as he must be to quick action, and methods of getting out his copy, his reports are often days ahead of the resident correspondent.

The first thing for a “story” is a general view of the situation. Two hours divided among the consulates and embassies of America, Great Britain, France and Germany give the general official idea, which is always conservative. Next a round of the newspaper offices and one gets the (sensational) radical impressions. If there is anything big one can always find a half dozen war correspondents in the bar of the biggest and best hotel in town. From them one gets the sensational and spectacular elements and an unlimited amount of exaggeration. Three hours’ driving about town with an interpreter interviewing and talking with everybody available, from the man loafing on the corner to the prefect of police, gives the local color and atmosphere for your cable. Late in the afternoon a man has in his head a mass of material ranging from the most lurid stories of the correspondents to the “official protests” that “all is well and no further trouble anticipated.” The rest is merely a matter of perspective. As he writes, the correspondent must weigh the sources of his information and estimate their probable accuracy. Experience and many previous failures, and a sort of sixth sense, acquired perhaps in work on a local paper, render quick and almost subconscious judgments on news values more accurate than the uninitiated might imagine. It is at this point that a man’s work ruins him with his office, or he makes good. The editor is not asking for literature, but for a quick survey of the situation. So it is that the man who can talk with the most people in the shortest time, and from such evidence make a connected and truthful story, is the man that is wanted. From the combined conversations of perhaps forty informants, ranging through all classes in the community, he must pick and choose the salient features and the most reliable evidence on which to base his story. In ten hours a good newspaper man can get the material for a column cable on almost any “visible situation.” This in the main will be accurate and correct. The moment he has gotten his message off, he begins to sketch out his campaign for the coming days or weeks which he expects the trouble to last. He picks out a half dozen reliable agents and sends them all over town, interviewing, observing, collecting data and local color in all quarters. If he knows his business he has a small but efficient staff in forty-eight hours, which keep him posted as to the general trend of affairs all over the city. If the wires are working, he can probably pick up local informants in neighboring towns to reinforce his story with ideas and viewpoints. If there is fighting going on he tries to see it without too much risk, so as to get the “local color,” which only presence on the scene can give. The dull days are filled in by interviews with as many prominent people as can be induced to talk. Thus, what seems to an outsider as a difficult proposition and one involving guesswork and inaccuracy, becomes a very simple matter.

It was in much this way that I gathered material for my Odessa cable. I had not time to collect a local staff, for I only remained thirty-six hours, but I made out fairly well on the collection of local information by turning Morris and three or four members of my crew loose for the day to talk with everyone possible. My dispatches to the consulate gave me quick and easy access to the official view, while a number of stranded war correspondents at the hotel regaled me with information, which they could not get out themselves on account of the telegraph and postal tie-up all over Russia. One rarely drops on a good situation without meeting a handful of old friends on similar business bent. In Odessa almost the first man I met ashore was Lionel James of the London Times, in my opinion the best of all the English cable correspondents. He had been in command of the Times dispatch boat Haimun in the Russo-Japanese war, and for months had been competing in the news zone against the dispatch boat I was operating for the Chicago Daily News. I first met him in Chefoo Harbor and again in Ping Yang Inlet in Korea. He joined the second army and scored a beat on the cable from Lioa Yang, which broke the Japanese securities in the London money market. I lost track of him and did not see him again until Red Sunday days in Petersburg. I was hurried up from a little investigation of a war scare in the Balkans and almost the first man I met in the hotel in Petersburg was James. For a few weeks I saw him daily, and again we parted. He had been on half a dozen assignments and I around the world when we met on the street in Odessa that cold December day.

By six that night I had my evidence all in and was aboard the France ready for the run to the uncensored cable in Roumania.