The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki Part 22

Here we may as well tell of the S. B. A. L. mutiny in Archangel in early winter. It is the story of an occurrence both pitiful and aggravating.

After weeks of feeding and pampering and drilling and equipping and s.h.i.+ning of bra.s.s b.u.t.tons and showing off, when the order came for them to prepare to march off to the fighting front, the S. B. A. L. held a soviet in their big grey-stone barracks and refused to get ready to go out because they had grievances against their British officers. This was aggravatingly unreasonable and utterly unmilitary. Severe measures would have to be used. They were given till 2:00 p. m. to reconsider their soviet resolution.

Meanwhile G. H. Q. had ordered out the American "Hq" Company trench mortar section and a section of the American Machine Gun Company to try bomb and bullet argument on the S. B. A. L.'s who were barricading their barracks and pointing machine guns from their windows. Promptly on the minute, according to orders, the nasty, and to the Americans pitifully disagreeable job, was begun. In a short time a white flag fluttered a sign of submission. But several had been killed and the populace that swarmed weeping about the American soldiers reproachfully cried: "Amerikanski nit dobra." And they did not feel at all glorious.

A few minutes later to the immense disgust of the doughboys, a company of English Tommies who by all rules of right and reason should have been the ones to clean up the mutinous mess into which the British officers had gotten the S. B. A. L.'s, now hove into sight, coming up the recently bullet-whistling but now deadly quiet street, with rifles slung on their shoulders, crawling along slowly at sixty to the minute pace--instead of a riot-call double time, and singing their insulting version of "Over There the Yanks are Running, Running, everywhere, etc."

And their old fishmonger reserve officer--he wore Colonel's insignia, wiped off his whiskey sweat in unconcealed relief. His battle of Archangel had been cut short by the Americans who had eagerly watched for the first sign of surrender by the foolish Russian soldiers. The finis.h.i.+ng touch was added to the short-lived S. B. A. L. mutiny when the tender-hearted but severe old General Maroushevsky punished the thirteen ring-leaders of the S. B. A. L. soviet with death before a Russian firing squad. This mutiny was described in various ways and use was made of it by agitators in Archangel. The writer has followed the account given to him by a machine gun sergeant who was handling one of the guns that day. His story seemed to contain the facts and feelings most commonly expressed by American officers and enlisted men who were in Archangel when the unfortunate incident took place.

We are bound to comment that we believe it never would have occurred if a tactful, honest American officer had been in charge of the S. B. A. L.

Americans know how tactless and bull-dozing some British orders--not many to be sure--could be. We fortunately had bluffs enough to offset the bull-dozings. A stormy threat by a sneering, drunken officer to turn his Canadian artillery on the bloomin' Yanks could be met by a cold-as-steel rejoiner that the British officer would please realize his drunken condition, and take back the sneering threat and come across with a reasonable order or suffer the immediate consequences. And then usually the two could cooperate. Such is a partners.h.i.+p war incident.

Late in winter, after the success of the enemy in the Shenkursk area had given the secret sympathizers in Archangel renewed hope that Trotsky's army would at last crush the Allies before Archangel, rumor persistently followed rumor that Archangel was being honeycombed with spies. The sailors at Solombola wore darker scowls and strange faces began to appear at Smolny where the city's power station lay. In the Allied intelligence staff, that is secret information service, there was redoubled effort. We smile as we think of it. About the time of the Bolo General's brilliant smash through our line and capture of Bolsheozerki, menacing Obozerskaya, a few little outbursts were put down in Archangel.

A few dozen rusty rifles were confiscated. Major Young laid elaborate plans for the, to him, imminent riot at Smolny. Soldiers who had learned from experience how difficult it was for their enemy to keep a skirmish line even when his officers were behind with pistol and machine gun persuasion, now grew sick of this imaginary war in Archangel. One company going out to the front on March 27th, was actually singing in very jubilation because they were getting away from battalion mess and "stand-to" for riot-scare.

A distinguished citizen of the world, Sir Ernest Shakleton, visited the city of Archangel in the winter. But no one ever saw him try to navigate Troitsky Prospect in his own invention, the Shakleton boot. How dear to his heart are the thoughts of that boot, as the doughboy recalls his first attempts to walk in them. The writer's one and only experience with them resulted in his taking all the road for steering his course and calling for the a.s.sistance of two brother officers--and "Chi" was the strongest he had drunk, too. Of course the doughboy mastered the art of navigating in them. For downright laughableness and ludicrity the Charlie Chaplin walk has nothing on the Shakleton gliding-wabble. The s.h.i.+mmy and the cheek dance would not draw a second look while a stranger could grin audibly at the doughboy shuffle-hip-s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g along in Shakleton's. Many a fair barishna on Troitsky Prospect held her furs up to conceal her irrepressible mirth at the sight. Aw, Shakletons.

Allusion has been made to the battalion mess of bully and "M. and V."

Another part of the British issue ration was dried vegetables, which the soldiers nicknamed "gra.s.s stew," much to the annoyance of one Lt.

Blease, our American censor who read all our letters in England to see that we did not criticise our Allies. One day at Soyla gra.s.s stew was on the menu, says a corporal. One of the men offered his Russian hostess a taste of it. She spat it out on the hay before the cow. The cow was insulted and refused either stew or hay. Much was done to improve the ration by General Ironside who accepted with sympathy the suggestions of Major Nichols. Coffee finally took the place of tea. More bread and less hard tack was issued. Occasionally fresh meat was provided. But on the whole the British ration did not satisfy the American soldier.

This leads to a good story. One day during the Smolny riot-scare the writer with a group of non-commissioned officers in going all over the area to discover its possibilities for tactics and strategy, visited the Russian Veterinarian School. Here we saw the poor Russki pony in all stages of dissection, from spurting throat to disembowelment and horse-steaks. "Me for the good old bully," muttered a corporal devoutly, as he turned his head away. Here we remember the query of a corporal of Headquarters Company who said: "Where is that half million dogs that were in Archangel when we landed last September?" The Russians had no meat market windows offering wieners and bologny but it sure was a tough winter for food in that city congested with a large refugee population.

And dogs disappeared.

Of the purely military life in Archangel in the long winter little can be said. The real work was done far out at the fronts anyway. No commander of a company of troops fighting for his sector of the line ever got any real a.s.sistance from Archangel except of the routine kind.

Many a commendatory message and many a cheering visit was paid the troops by General Ironside but we can not record the same for Colonel Stewart. He was not a success as a commanding officer. He fell down weakly under his great responsibility. Before the long winter was over General Richardson was sent up to Archangel to take command.

During the early winter a doughboy in Archangel in this spirit of good humor wrote a letter published later in The Stars and Stripes in France.

It is so good that we include it here.

"Sometimes, about once or twice every now and then, copies of The Stars and Stripes find their way up here to No Woman's Land and are instantly devoured by the news-hungry gang, searching for information regarding their comrades and general conditions in France, where we belong, but through Fate were sent up to this part of the world to quell Bolshevism and guard the Northern Lights.

"We are so far north that the doggone sun works only when it feels inclined to do so, and in that way it is like everything else in Russia.

The moon isn't so particular, and comes up, usually backwards, at any time of the day or night, in any part of the sky, it having no set schedule, and often it will get lost and still be on the job at noon.

Yes, we are so far north that 30 degrees below will soon be tropical weather to us, and they will have to build fires around both cows before they can milk them. Probably about next month at this time some one will come around and say we will be pulling out of here in a day or so, but then, the days will be six months long.

"In our issue of your very popular paper we noticed a cartoon, "Pity the boys in Siberia," but what about us, Ed? Now, up here in this tough town there are 269,83l. inhabitants, of which 61,329 are human beings and 208,502 are dogs. Dogs of every description from the poodle to the St.

Bernard and from the wolfhound to the half-breed dachshund, which is half German and half Bolshevik and looks the part.

"The wind whistles across the Dvina River like the Twentieth Century Limited pa.s.sing Podunk, and snowflakes are as numerous as retreating Germans were in France a few weeks ago. We have good quarters when we are here, thank fortune for that, and good food, when it comes up. If we can stand the winter we will be all jake, for a Yank can accustom himself to anything if he wants to. But just the same, we would like to see your artists busy on "The Boys in Northern Russia" and tell them not to leave out the word "Northern."

"We also read in The Stars and Stripes that the boys in Italy had some tongue twisters and brain worriers, but listen to this: Centimes and sous and francs may be hard to count, but did you ever hear of a rouble or a kopec? A kopec is worth a tenth of a cent and there are a hundred of them in a rouble. As you will see, that makes a rouble worth a dime, and to make matters worse all the money is paper, coins having gone out of circulation since the beginning of the mix-up. A kopec is the size of a postage stamp, a rouble looks like a United Cigar Store's Certificate, a 25-rouble note resembles a porous plaster and a 100-rouble note the Declaration of Independence.

"When a soldier in search of a meal enters a restaurant, he says to the waitress, 'Barishna, kakajectyeh bifstek, pozhalysta,' which means 'An order of beefsteak, lady, please: You see, you always say to a woman 'barishna' and she is always addressed in that manner. She will answer the hungry customer with, 'Yah ochen sojalaylu, shto unaus nyet yestnik prepasov siechas' (a simple home cure for lockjaw), meaning, "I am very sorry, but we are right out of food today.' He will try several other places, and if he is lucky he is apt to stumble across a place where he can get something to eat, but when he looks at the bill of fare and learns that it cost him about $7.50 for a sandwich and a cup of coffee, he beats it back to the barracks.

"Every time you get on a street car ('dramvay') you have to count out 60 kopecs for your fare, and most of us would rather walk than be jammed in the two-by-four buses and fish for the money. Before boarding a car each pa.s.senger usually hunts up a couple of five gallon milk cans, a market basket or two and a bag of smoked herring, so they will get their kopec's worth out of the ride, besides making the atmosphere nice and pleasant for the rest of the pa.s.sengers. If you should see a soldier walking down the street with his nose turned up and his mouth puckered in apparent contempt, you would be wrong in thinking he was conceited, for if the truth be known he has probably just got his s.h.i.+rt back from the washwoman, and she has used fish-oil instead of soap and he is trying to escape the fumes. When you take your clothes to have them laundered and tell the woman to please omit the odor, she'll tell you that she has no soap and if you want them washed to your satisfaction please send in a cake. Anything in the world to keep your clothes from smelling of fish-oil, so you double-time back and get her the soap, and then she gives the kids a bath, and that's the end of your soap.

"When a Russian meets another man he knows on the street, both lift hats and flirt with each other. If they stop to talk, they always shake hands, even if they haven't seen each other for fully twenty minutes.

Then they simply must shake hands again when they leave. When a man meets a lady friend he usually kisses her hand and shows her how far he can bend over without breaking his suspenders. 'Ah,' he will say, 'yah ochen rrad vasveedyat, kak vui pazhavaetye?' which in the United States means 'How do you do?' to which she will reply, 'Blogadaru vas, yah ochen korosho,' or 'very well, thank you.' It is the knockout. A fellow has to shake hands so much that some of them are getting the habit around the company.

"And another thing, Ed, are they really holding a separate war up here for our benefit? Just because we weren't in on the big doings in France is no reason why they should run a post-season series especially for us.

We appreciate the kindness and honor and all that, but what we want to know is where everybody gets that stuff. Believe me, after all the dope we got on the trenches, about pianos and wooden floors, steam heat, and other conveniences, when we see ourselves on outpost duty with one blanket and a poncho, sleeping (not on duty, of course) in twenty-eight inches of pure ooooozy mud, which before we awaken turns into thin, fine ice, it makes us want to cry out and ask the universe what we have done to deserve this exile.

"Now don't think, dear old Ed. that we are kicking. American soldiers never do. We just wanted to have something to write you about, to remind you that we ARE a part of the American E. F., although 'isolated.'

"With best wishes to your paper and a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all the boys, I'll close with the consoling a.s.surance in my heart that we'll meet you back on Broadway, anyway.

C. B. KNIGHT, Corp. "Hq" Co., 339th Inf., American E. F., Archangel, Russia."

XXII

WINTER ON THE RAILROAD

We Come Under French Flag--Thanksgiving Day At Verst 455--Exploration And Blockhouse Building--First Occupation Of Bolsheozerki--Airplane Bombs Our Own Front Line Troops--Year's End Push On Plesetskaya Fiasco--Nichols Makes Railroad Sector Impregnable--Bolo Patrol Blows Up Our Big Six--Heavy Drive By Reds At Winter's End--"I" Company Relieves French-Russian Force--Valorous Conduct Of Men Gives Lie To Charges Of Loss Of Morale.

In the narrative telling of the fighting on the Vaga and Dvina, we have already seen that the Red Guards had disillusioned us in regard to the quiet winter campaign we hoped and expected. Now we shall resume the story of the Railroad, or Vologda Force, as it had become known, and tell of the attempted Allied push on Plesetskaya to relieve the pressure on the River Fronts.

After our digging in at Verst 445 in early November, a Company of Liverpools came from Economia to aid the French infantry and American and French machine gunners, supported by French artillery, to hold that winter front. The American units who had fought on the railroad in the fall were all given ten days rest in Archangel. Soon the Americans were once more back on the front. And it started off uneventful. A French officer, Colonel Lucas, had come into command of the Vologda Force.

American units were generously supplied with the French Chauchat automatic rifles, and ammunition for them, and with French rifles and tromblons to throw the rifle grenades. Earnest business of learning to use them.

Those who were stationed at field headquarters of the Front Sector of the Vologda Force, which was at Verst 455, will recollect with great pleasure the Thanksgiving Day half-holiday and program arranged by Major Nichols, commanding the American forces. He gave us Miss Ogden, the Y.

W. C. A. woman from d. o. U. S. A. to read President Wilson's proclamation. How strange it seemed to us soldiers standing there under arms. And Major Moodie the old veteran of many a British campaign, and friend of Kitchener, the good old story teller praised the boys and prayed with them. Major Nichols and Major Alabernarde spoke cheering and bracing words to the a.s.sembled American and French soldiers. It was an occasion that raised fighting morale.

The President's Thanksgiving proclamation was transmitted to the American troops in Russia through the office of the American Emba.s.sy.

The soldiers listened intently to the words of Mr. De Witt C. Poole, Jr., the American Charge d'Affaires who since the departure of Amba.s.sador Francis, was the American diplomatic representative in European Russia. His message was as follows:

"The military Command has been asked to make this day a holiday for the troops, so far as military requirements permit, and to communicate to them upon an occasion fraught with tradition and historical memories, the hearty greetings of all Americans who are working with them in Northern Russia.

"The American Emba.s.sy desires the troops to know that both here and at Was.h.i.+ngton there is a full understanding of the difficulties of the work which they are being called upon to do and a desire no less ardent than their own that they should realize as soon as possible the blessings of the peace which is foreshadowed by the armistice on the Western Front."

The chief note in the President's proclamation which lingered on the doughboy's ear was as follows:

"Our gallant armies have partic.i.p.ated in a triumph which is not marred or stained by any purpose of selfish aggression. In a righteous cause they have won immortal glory and have n.o.bly served their nation in serving mankind."

Work of building blockhouses went rapidly forward under the steady work of the 310th Engineers and the cheerful labor of the infantrymen who found the occupation of swinging axes and hauling logs through the snow to be not unpleasant exercise in the stinging winter weather that was closing down. A commodious building began to go up at 455 for the Y. M.

C. A. French-Russian force under a terrific bombardment and barrage of machine to use for winter entertainments for the men stationed in that stronghold.

Exploration of the now more available winter swamp trails went on carefully. The chain of lakes and swamps several miles to the west ran north from Sheleksa concentration camp of the Bolos to Bolsheozerki, parallel to the Railroad line of operations. This Bolsheozerki was an important point on the government road which went from Obozerskaya to Onega. It was thought wise to protect this village as in winter mail would have to be sent out of Archangel by way of Obozerskaya, via Onega, via Kem, via Kola, the open winter port on the Murmansk coast hundreds of miles away to the west and north. And troops might be brought in, too. A look at the map will discover the strategic value of this point Bolsheozerki. American and French troops now began to alternate in the occupation of that cl.u.s.ter of villages.

A sergeant of "M" Company might tell about the neat villages, about the evidences of a higher type than usual of agriculture in the broad clearing, about the fis.h.i.+ng nets and wood cutters' tools, and last, but not least about the big schoolhouse and the winsome barishna who taught the primary room.

Nothing more than an occasional patrol or artillery exchange took place on the railroad although there was an occasional flurry when the British intelligence officers found out that the Reds were plotting a raid or a general attack. It was known that they had begun to augment their forces on our front. Sound of their axes had been as constant on the other side of No Man's Land as it had on our side. They were erecting blockhouses for the winter. Occasionally their airplanes exchanged visits with ours, always dropping a present for us. No casualties resulted from their bombs directed at us. Unfortunately one day our bombing plane mistook our front line for the Red front line and dropped two big bombs on our own position and caused one death and one severe wound.

The accident happened just as an American company was being relieved by a French company. And it was a good thing the commander of the company consumed the remainder of the day in getting his excited and enraged men back to Obozerskaya because by that time the men were cooled off and the nervous Royal Air Force had no occasion to use its rifles in self-defense as it had prepared to do. They wisely stayed inside, as in fact did the few other English sergeants and enlisted men at Obozerskaya that ticklish night. The few wild Yanks who roamed the dark, without pa.s.s, had all the room and road. There was a particularly good mission at once found for this American company on another front, whether by design or by coincidence. A board of officers whitewashed the Canadian flyers of the Royal Air Force and the incident was closed.

Of course all the accidents did not happen to Americans. During the winter on the Railroad, a sad one happened to a fine British officer. A brooding enlisted man of the American medical corps went insane one dark night and craftily securing a rifle held up the first Englishman he found. He roundly berated the British officer with being the cause of the North Russian War on the Bolsheviki, told the puzzled but patiently listening officer to say a prayer and then suddenly blew off the poor man's head and himself went off his nut completely.

With the beginning of the winter campaign Pletsetskaya's importance to the Red Army began to loom up. Trotsky's forces could be readily supplied from that city and his forces could be swiftly s.h.i.+fted from front to front to attack the widely dispersed forces of the Allied Expedition. It was seen now clearly that the fall offensive should have been pushed through to Plesetskaya by the converging Onega, Railroad and Kodish Forces. And plans were made to retrieve the error by putting on a determined push late in December to take Plesetskaya and reverse the strategic situation so as to favor the Allied Expeditionary Forces.