Introduction

In the early summer of 1917 the world was thrilled by a news item from Petrograd announcing the formation by one Maria Bochkareva of a women’s fighting unit under the name of “The Battalion of Death.” With this announcement an obscure Russian peasant girl made her début in the international hall of fame. From the depths of dark Russia Maria Bochkareva suddenly emerged into the limelight of modern publicity. Foreign correspondents sought her, photographers followed her, distinguished visitors paid their respects to her. All tried to interpret this arresting personality. The result was a riot of misinformation and misunderstanding.

Of the numerous published tales about and interviews with Bochkareva that have come under my observation, there is hardly one which does not contain some false or misleading statement. This is partly due to the deplorable fact that the foreign journalists who interpreted Russian men and affairs to the world during the momentous year of 1917 were, with very few exceptions, ignorant of the Russian language; and partly to Bochkareva’s reluctance to take every adventurous stranger into her confidence. It was her cherished dream to have a complete record of her life incorporated in a book some day. This work is the realization of that dream.

To a very considerable extent, therefore, the narrative here unfolded is of the nature of a confession. When in the United States in the summer of 1918, Bochkareva determined to prepare her autobiography. Had she been educated enough to be able to write a letter fluently, she would probably have written her own life-story in Russian and then had it translated into English. Being semi-illiterate, she found it necessary to secure the services of a writer commanding a knowledge of her native language, which is the only tongue she speaks. The procedure followed in the writing of this book was this: Bochkareva recited to me in Russian the story of her life, and I recorded it in English in longhand, making every effort to set down her narrative verbatim. Not infrequently I would interrupt her with a question intended to draw out some forgotten experiences. However, one of Bochkareva’s natural gifts is an extraordinary memory. It took nearly a hundred hours, distributed over a period of three weeks, for her to tell me every detail of her romantic life.

At our first session Bochkareva made it clear that what she was going to tell me would be very different from the stories about her related in the press. She would reveal her innermost self and break open for the first time the sealed book of her past. This she did, and in doing so completely discredited several widely circulated tales about her. Perhaps the chief of these is the statement that Bochkareva had enlisted as a soldier and gone to war to avenge her fallen husband. Whether this invention was the product of her own mind or was attributed to her originally by some prolific correspondent, I do not know. In any event it was a convenient answer to the eternal question of importunate journalists how she came to be a soldier. Unable to explain to the conventional world that profound impulse which really drove her to her remarkable destiny, she adopted this excuse until she had an opportunity to record the full story of her courageous life.

This book will also remove that distrustful attitude based on misunderstanding that has been manifested toward Bochkareva in radical circles. When she arrived in the United States, she was immediately hailed as a “counterrevolutionary,” royalist and sinister intriguer by the extremists. That was a grave injustice to her. She is ignorant of politics, contemptuous of intrigue, and spiritually far and above party strife. Her mission in life was to free Russia from the German yoke.

Being placed virtually in the position of a father confessor, it was my privilege to commune with the spirit of this remarkable peasant-woman, a privilege I shall ever esteem as priceless. She not only laid bare before me every detail of her amazing life that memory could resurrect, but also allowed me to explore the nooks and corners of her heart to a degree that no friend of hers ever did. Maintaining a critical attitude from the beginning of our association, I was gradually overwhelmed by the largeness of her soul.

Wherein does the greatness of Bochkareva lie? Mrs. Emmeline Pankhurst called her the greatest woman of the century. “The woman that saved France was Joan of Arc—a peasant girl,” wrote a correspondent in July, 1917, “Maria Bochkareva is her modern parallel.” Indeed, in the annals of history since the days of the Maid of Orleans we encounter no feminine figure equal to Bochkareva. Like Joan of Arc, this Russian peasant girl dedicated her life to her country’s cause. If Bochkareva failed—and this is yet problematical, for who will dare forecast the future of Russia—it would not lessen her greatness. Success in our materialistic age is no measure of true genius.

Like Joan of Arc, Bochkareva is the symbol of her country. Can there be a more striking incarnation of France than that conveyed by the image of Joan of Arc? Bochkareva is an astounding typification of peasant Russia, with all her virtues and vices. Educated to the extent of being able to scribble her own name with difficulty, she is endowed with the genius of logic. Ignorant of history and literature, the natural lucidity of her mind is such as to lead her directly to the very few fundamental truths of life. Religious with all the fervour of her primitive soul, she is tolerant in a fashion befitting a philosopher. Devoted to her country with every fibre of her being, she is free from impassioned partisanship and selfish patriotism. Overflowing with good nature and kindness, she is yet capable of savage outbursts and brutal acts. Credulous and trustful as a child, she can be easily incited against people and things. Intrepid and rash as a fighter, her desire to live on occasions was indescribably pathetic. In a word, Bochkareva embodies all those paradoxical characteristics of Russian nature that have made Russia a puzzle to the world. These traits are illustrated almost in every page of this book. Take away from Russia the veneer of western civilization and you behold her incarnation in Bochkareva. Know Bochkareva and you will know Russia, that inchoate, invincible, agonized, striving, rising colossus in all its depth and breadth.

It must be made unmistakably clear here that the motives responsible for this book were purely personal. In its origin this work is exclusively a human document, a record of an exuberant life. It was the purpose of Bochkareva and the writer to keep the narrative down to a strict recital of facts. It is really incidental that this record is valuable not only as a biography of a startling personality, but as a revelation of certain phases of a momentous period in human history; not only as a human document, but as an historical document as well. Because Bochkareva always has been and still is strictly nonpartisan and because she does not pretend to pass judgment upon events and men, her revelations are of prime importance. The reader gets a picture of Kerensky in action that completely effaces all that has hitherto been said of this tragic but typical product of the Russian intelligentsia. Kornilov, Rodzianko, Lenin and Trotsky and some other outstanding personalities of the Russian revolution appear in these pages exactly as they are in reality.

Not a single book, as far as I know, has appeared yet giving an account of how the Russian army at the front reacted to the Revolution. What was the state of mind of the Russian soldier in the trenches, which was after all the decisive factor in the developments that followed, during the first eight months of 1917? No history of unshackled Russia will be complete without an answer to this vital question. This book is the first to disclose the reactions and emotions of the vast Russian army at the front to the tremendous issues of the revolution, and is of especial value coming from a veteran peasant soldier of the rank and file.

Perhaps surpassing all else in interest is the horrible picture we get of Bolshevism in action. With the claims of theoretical Bolshevism to establish an order of social equality on earth Bochkareva has no quarrel. She said so to Lenin and Trotsky personally. But then come her experiences with Bolshevism in practice, and there follows a blood-freezing narrative of the rule of mobocracy that will live forever in the memory of the reader.

Bochkareva left the United States towards the end of July, 1918, after having attained the purpose of her visit—an interview with President Wilson. She went to England and thence to Archangel, where she arrived early in September. According to a newspaper despatch she caused the following proclamation to be posted in village squares and country churches:

I am a Russian peasant and soldier. At the request of the soldiers and peasants I went to America and Great Britain to ask these countries for military help for Russia.

The Allies understand our own misfortunes and I return with the Allied armies, which have come only for the purpose of helping to drive out our deadly enemies, the Germans, and not to interfere with our internal affairs. After the war is over the Allied troops will leave Russian soil.

I, for my own part, request all loyal free sons of Russia, without reference to party, to come together acting as one with the Allied forces, who, under the Russian flag, come to free Russia from the German yoke and to help the new free Russian army with all forces, including Russia, to beat the enemy.

Soldiers and peasants! Remember that only a full, clean sweep of the Germans from our soil can give you the free Russia you long for.

Isaac Don Levine.

Yashka

My Life as Peasant, Exile and Soldier

Part I

Youth

I

My Childhood of Toil

My father, Leonti Semenovitch Frolkov, was born into serfdom at Nikolsko, a village in the province of Novgorod, some two hundred miles north of Moscow. He was fifteen when Alexander II emancipated the serfs in 1861, and remembers that historic event vividly, being fond even now of telling of the days of his boyhood. Impressed into the army in the early seventies, he served during the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78, and distinguished himself for bravery, receiving several medals. When a soldier he learned to read and write, and was promoted to the rank of sergeant.

Returning home at the end of the war, he passed through Tcharanda, a fishermen’s settlement on the shore of a lake, in the county of Kirilov, within thirty miles of Nikolsko. No longer dressed as a muzhik, military in gait and bearing, with coins jingling in his pocket, he cut quite a figure in the poor hamlet of Tcharanda. There he met my mother, Olga, the eldest daughter of Elizar Nazarev, perhaps the most destitute inhabitant of the place.

Elizar, with his wife and three daughters, occupied a shabby hut on the sandy shore of the lake. So poor was he that he could not afford to buy a horse to carry his catch to the city, and was compelled to sell it, far below the market price, to a travelling buyer. The income thus derived was not sufficient to keep the family from hunger. Bread was always a luxury in the little cabin. The soil was not tillable. Elizar’s wife would hire herself to the more prosperous peasants in the vicinity for ten kopeks (about 2½d.) a day to labour from sunrise to sunset. But even this additional money was not always to be had. Then Olga would be sent out to beg for bread in the neighbouring villages.

Once, when scarcely ten years old, little Olga underwent a harrowing experience, which she could never later recall without horror. Starting home with a basketful of bread, collected from several villages, she was fatigued but happy at the success of her errand, and hurried as fast as she could. Her path lay through a forest. Suddenly she heard the howling of a pack of wolves. Olga’s heart almost stopped beating. The dreadful sounds drew nearer. Overcome by fright, she fell unconscious to the ground.

When she regained her senses, she found herself alone. The wolves apparently had sniffed her prostrate body and gone their way. Her basket of bread was scattered in all directions, trampled in the mud. Out of breath, and without her precious burden, she arrived home.

It was in such circumstances that my mother grew to be nineteen, when she attracted the attention of Leonti Frolkov, who was then stopping in Tcharanda on his way home from the war. She was immensely flattered when he courted her. He even bought her a pair of shoes for a present, the first shoes she had ever worn. This captivated the humble Olga completely. She joyously accepted his marriage proposal.

After the wedding the young couple moved to Nikolsko, my father’s birthplace, where he had inherited a small tract of land. They tilled it together, and with great difficulty managed to make ends meet. My two elder sisters, Arina and Shura, were born here, increasing the poverty of my parents. My father, about this time, took to drinking, and began to maltreat and beat his wife. He was by nature morose and egotistical. Want was now making him cruel. My mother’s life with him became one of misery. She was constantly in tears, always pleading for mercy and praying to God.

I was born in July, 1889, the third girl in the family. At that time many railroads were being built throughout the country. When I was a year old, my father, who had once been stationed at Tsarskoye Selo, the Tsar’s place of residence near the capital, decided to go to Petrograd to seek work. We were left without money. He wrote no letters. On the brink of starvation, my mother somehow contrived, with the aid of kind neighbours, to keep herself and her children alive.

When I was nearly six years old a letter came from my father, the first he had written during the five years of his absence. He had broken his right leg and, as soon as he was able to travel, had started home. My mother wept bitterly at the news, but was glad to hear from her husband whom she had almost given up for dead. In spite of his cruelty toward her, she still loved him. I remember how happy my mother was when my father arrived, but this happiness did not last long. Poverty and misery cut it short. My father’s harsh nature asserted itself again. Hardly had a year gone by when a fourth child, also a girl, arrived in our family. And there was no bread in the house.

From all parts of our section of the country peasants were migrating that year to Siberia, where the Government allowed them large grants of land. My father wanted to go, but my mother was opposed to it. However, when our neighbour, Verevkin, who had left sometime before for Siberia, wrote glowingly of the new country, my father made up his mind to go, too.

Most of the men would go alone, obtain grants of land, till them, build homesteads, and then return for their families. Those of the peasants who took their families with them had enough money to tide them over. But we were so poor that by the time we got to Chelyabinsk, the last station in European Russia, and the Government distribution point, we had not a penny left. At the station my father obtained some hot water to make tea, while my two elder sisters were sent to beg for bread.

We were assigned to Kuskovo, eighty miles beyond Tomsk. At every station my sisters would beg food, while father filled our teakettle with hot water. Thus we got along till Tomsk was reached. Our grant of land was in the midst of the taiga, the virgin Siberian forest. There could be no thought of immediately settling on it, so my father remained in Tomsk, while the rest of us were sent on to Kuskovo. My sisters went to work for board and clothing. My mother, still strong and in good health, baked bread for a living, while I took care of the baby.

One day my mother was expecting visitors. She had baked some cakes and bought a pint of vodka, which she put on the shelf. While she was at work I tried to lull the baby to sleep. But baby was restless, crying incessantly. I did not know how to calm her. Then my eyes fell on the bottle of vodka.

“It must be a very good thing,” I thought, and decided to give a glass to baby. Before doing so I tasted it myself. It was bitter, but I somehow wanted more. I drank the first cup and, the bitterness having somewhat worn off, I drained another. In this manner I disposed of the entire bottle. Drowsy and weak, I took the baby into my arms and tried to rock it to sleep. But I myself began to stagger, and fell with the child to the floor.

Our mother found us there, screaming at the top of our voices. Presently the visitors arrived, and my mother reached for the bottle, only to discover that it had been emptied. It did not take her long to find the culprit. I shall always remember the whipping I got on that occasion.

Toward winter my father arrived from Tomsk. He brought little money with him. The winter was severe, and epidemics were raging in the country. We fell ill one by one, father, mother, then all the girls. As there was no bread in the house, and no money to buy anything, the community took care of us till the spring, housing and feeding us. By some miracle all of us escaped death, but our clothes had become rags. Our shoes fell to pieces. My parents decided to move to Tomsk, where we arrived barefoot and tattered, finding shelter at a poor inn on the outskirts of the town.

My father would work only a couple of days a week. He was lazy. The remainder of the week he idled away and drank. My sisters served as nursemaids, while my mother worked in a bakery, keeping the baby and me with her. We slept in the loft of a stable, with the horses stamping below us. Our bed was of straw laid on the floor, which consisted of unshaven planks thrown across logs. Soon the baker’s wife began to object to feeding an extra mouth, which belonged to me. I was then over eight years old.