Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - XV. Later Sects
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correspondents, giving names and details of the monstrous
outrages perpetrated upon innocent victims in the name of
Orthodoxy.
“September 8th, 1892.—Permit us hereby to inform you
that in the villages of Kapustintsi and Skibentzi, in the
volost of Babenjetskaja, in the district of Skvirskij and the
province of Kiev, all the male members of evangelical or
Stundist households are taken every day by force, according
to the orders of the ispravnik” (chief of police) “and the
natcholnik” (official next to the Governor) “of the district, to the
public works of the village communities, where they are
forced to work under the guard of gendarmes until quite late.
Then they are again taken out to serve as night watchers, the
women and children being left at home at night. While the
men are thus kept away from their homes by force, the
starosta and starshina” (heads of the town and village), “in
their official capacity, and wearing the badges of authority
on their breasts, get together a band of drunken villains
and break into the homes of the defenceless women and
children, maltreating the latter, and committing the most
heinous outrages on the former, smashing the windows and
destroying everything they come across. In some izbas they
set fire to refuse and rags, and shut the doors on the poor
inmates, thus tormenting them through the whole night. At
sunrise the men are again sent to work at one place, the
women and children at another.
“If any of these Stundists have horses, even they are taken
to the works of the village communities, where they are kept
working all day, and left without food in the night. As a rule,
it is impossible for these unhappy men and women to buy or
sell, or even to prepare food for themselves. In fact, they are
treated worse than if they were criminals sentenced to penal
servitude, and all this they suffer for the sake of the Gospel.
“When they work or serve as night-watchmen they are
always guarded by soldiers. ‘All these sufferings are greater
than we can bear,’ they write; ‘even all our books are taken from
us. We are oppressed to such a degree that we cannot even make
our cries of distress heard by any.’”
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