Notes of my Captivity in Russia/Chapter 4
CHAPTER IV.
COMPANIONS IN CAPTIVITY.
My expectation of seeing new guests arrive was soon realized. On the 13th of January, 1795, about twelve o’clock at night, I heard the screaming noise produced by the wheels of a carriage passing over ground covered with frozen snow. The door of the prison was unbolted, and I heard people entering it. I sat upon my bed, and lent an attentive ear to what was going on. The door of the next cell was opened, as well as that of another, and of the third on the opposite side. Notwithstanding the greatest care to keep silence, I heard a trunk placed on the floor, and the voice of Makarow speaking German to a prisoner. I heard also some words in Polish, which seemed to be uttered by a servant. I spent the night in conjectures and uncertainty.
On the following morning, about eleven o’clock, I heard Samoilow’s voice in my neighbour’s room; I did not doubt that it was the beginning of the examination, and of all the ceremonies I had undergone. It appeared to me as if he were visiting other cells, and in an hour he came to me. A satisfaction like that of a fisherman who has just caught some large and fine fish, was apparent on his face. “At last,” said he to me, “your Potocki, Zakrzewski, Wawrzecki, Mostowski, Kapostas,[1] are in our hands.”— “I am sorry,” said I “to see the number of the unfortunate increasing.” “And we have taken too,” added he, “the king Kilinski.” “I have not the honour,” answered I, “of knowing that monarch.” He smiled maliciously, and went out. It seems that he entered my room on purpose to inform me of his triumph, as he had never come to see me since the examination.
In the afternoon I had the pleasure of recognizing in the voice of my neighbour that of my friend Mostowski.[2] Since it was his lot to be in this miserable place, it was a consolation to me, as well as to him, to be so near neighbours. Wishing to acquaint him of my presence in the room next to his, I began to hum a tune, in which was often repeated the word Du-Pont, which is the French translation of his name. Mostowski soon knew my voice and my intention, for, in half an hour after, he answered in the same manner, dwelling upon the word Allemand, which is the translation of mine.[3] We did not dare, however, to make frequent use of this manner of communication, for fear of being observed, and put farther from each other. Mostowski, however, asked Makarow to allow him to send his books to other prisoners, and to have in return the use of theirs. Makarow consented, but gave orders to the officers to examine, leaf by leaf, each book which was sent or returned, to see that the prisoners had not written something upon them. One evening, therefore, the corporal came and asked me for a book; I gave him one, and in a quarter of an hour he brought it back, saying that it was not a good one, and that I was requested to send a better. I understood what was meant, and told him that I would look for one. I sent my guard for some water, and after having taken a comb, I wrote, with one of its teeth, on the first book I had at hand, the following lines: “I have suffered here six weeks; they have flattered and threatened me in turn: I answer with due dignity. Who are the other prisoners here? I have lost the use of my right hand. They have taken all my money from me. Give the bearer a ducat, and be cautious in writing to me. I embrace you heartily.” I was soon convinced that the corporal received the ducat, for the next evening, he brought me back my book, (Vaillant's Travels) and I found in it a blank leaf before the title-page filled unceremoniously with writing. Mostowski informed me in it, that, contrary to the capitulation signed by Suwarow, the first article of which insured to the inhabitants of Warsaw immunity, security, and oblivion of the past, Catherine had given an order, signed by herself, to seize him, as well as Potocki, Zakrzewski, Kapostas, and Kilimski; that Kollontay had saved himself by flight, but had been arrested by the Austrians; that Samoilow had made him offers also, and threatened him, but with less severity than me; that he had answered to the same effect as myself; that they had told him he had only written a romance, and knowing that he had been at Paris in 1793, they had required from him to put down everything that he knew of the policy, views, and plans of those who were at the head of the French revolution.
Mostowski, who was the intimate friend of Vergniaux, made no scruple to tell them all he knew about it; he thought that, by writing these answers, and saying how prominent a part the deliverance of Poland formed in the vast projects of the Girondins, he would prevent the Russians, through fear of consequences, from resorting to extreme and violent measures towards our unhappy country. He was deceived, however, upon that point; for events have proved, that, in spite of all the ambitious intrigues, the changes, the ebb and flow of parties, the republican cabinet faithfully followed the vast and grasping policy of the Gironde in all foreign relations, with the exception of Poland alone. The division of Italy into petty republics, the wresting of Holland from the Stadtholder, and even the conquest of Egypt, were already contemplated at the end of 1793. My friend informed me also that Potocki and Zakrzewski, on account of their bad health, were imprisoned on the other side of the river; that Sokolnicki offered to keep Zakrzewski company, and that Libiszewski was allowed to accompany Wawrzecki, whom they were bringing by another road.
Thus we alleviated the ennui of our situation, sometimes writing to each other, sometimes humming what we wished to say, and, when we had to write at greater length, we resorted to other means, which I will hereafter explain. But, alas ! this sweet consolation did not last long. Mostowski's lady, Princess Radziwill, arrived at St. Petersburg, and was so zealous and assiduous in pressing Zubow, Catherine's favourite, that she obtained, at last, permission for her husband's removal into a more wholesome and spacious prison, where he was shut up together with Zakrzewski. Before parting, he promised to send books regularly, and to write to me with invisible ink, marking the place with a pin. He left me on the 15th of February. I need not say how painful this separation was to me.
It was about the same time, I may say, that the principal incidents of my captivity and my communications ceased. Samoilow and Fuchs did not appear any more. Even Makarow, the Chief Intendent of the prison, came only every third month in the course of two years. Thus I scarcely saw a living soul, or heard a human voice. The incidents of prison-life, during this long space of time, were very few. A man enjoying liberty meets with more in the course of an hour; but, if he lived half a century in the world, he would not suffer in his imagination and his heart, nor, perhaps, feel so much as a prisoner isolated and abandoned to himself. Were I to relate all the thoughts and phantoms which haunted my imagination, and the anguish that my heart endured in that solitary place, I could fill volumes, but those narratives would be equally melancholy and useless, and my memory, at this moment, is even reluctant in recalling them. I shall, therefore, confine myself to a few words on my companions in misfortune, confined in the same prison with me, to which I shall add some particulars relative to my mode of living in that captivity, and the few incidents which happened to me until the time of my release.
Siberia and Kamtschatka are the two great bastiles of Russia. Schlusselburg, upon the Lake of Ladoga, is also a fortress where they confine prisoners for life. It is there that the unfortunate Iwan was assassinated by the order of Catherine. The prison in which I was incarcerated formed part of the citadel of St. Petersburg, and was called the Secret Prison. It was used generally for state prisoners, during the time of their examination. I know not why they had departed from this rule in our case. On my arrival I found only two prisoners, of whom Jean-Baptiste Bonneau,[4] the longest confined, had been there two years before I came. He was French Consul-General at Warsaw, was seized at the mansion of the French Embassy in that capital, about the end of the
year 1792, and was imprisoned afterwards, in spite of the laws of nations, because in his despatches, which had been intercepted at the time of the second partition of Poland, he spoke with horror and indignation of this act, and of the conduct of the Empress. He was a man of highly estimable qualities; his mind was refined, and his heart sensitive; a
good husband, father, and citizen, he suffered excessively from his position, being separated from his wife and daughter, who were very fond of him. I did not know that Mons. Bonneau was in that prison until the day after the departure of my friend Mostowski, the corporal having brought me a book of mine, I found in it these words written between the letters on the title-page: “Look in the table of contents.” I looked in it, and found a short note from Mons. Bonneau, in which he told me that he had been imprisoned there for two years, and asked me how his wife and daughter were, saying that he intended to keep up a correspondence with me. In my answer, I consoled him the best way I could respecting the health and fate of his family; as to our correspondence, the manner of performing it through the medium of books seemed to be dangerous, and I proposed to him the following channel. The commodités were situated at the other end of the prison, and close to the front door. When a prisoner wanted to go there, he told the guard, who went out and cried to the sentinel stationed at the door, Pustoli? i. e. “Is there any one in?” and if he answered “No,” the prisoner went out, followed by the guard, and the sentinel at the door placed himself opposite him; he returned with the same ceremonies.[5] I observed in the roof of the commodités, which were very dark, a crevice between the laths and the cross-beam, sufficient to conceal a note safely; I counted the laths to the spot where they formed this little crevice, and described it well to Mons. Bonneau, so as to avoid every mistake.
A few months after, when I was allowed to have pen and ink, we wrote continually to each other, through this medium, without ever being discovered. The Gazette of Hamburg was sent me sometimes, and, as he did not know German, I wrote him extracts from it. We also disputed, now and then, upon political topics. Bonneau, although far from being a wild democrat, seemed still to approve the conquests that his nation was pursuing: I maintained, on the other hand, that this excessive ambition might compromise, and perhaps terminate in the ruin of the cause for which they had undertaken both the revolution and the war, namely, the cause of liberty.
When I left the prison I used every means to get Mons. Bonneau also liberated, and he was released ten days after me.
The second prisoner, whom I found on my arrival, was a stranger to me. All that I could learn of him through Mons. Bonneau was, that he seemed to be a Frenchman, and was imprisoned for having arrived at St. Petersburg without a passport. After six months of hard captivity, his mind became deranged; they sent him to an hospital, but scarcely had he recovered, when they put him again into prison, and he relapsed into a state worse than ever. He was not however cured this time in an hospital, but kept in prison. Sometimes he was quiet and appeared stupefied; but now and then the house resounded with his cries and howlings. Often he chanted the mass and vespers in a beautiful voice I saw him once passing through the corridor, when the guard opened the door for his going out; he seemed to be twenty-five years old, and to have a very fine countenance, but pale and worn out. Although he was not fond of reading, I sent him my books, and he spoiled several of them unintentionally, for it seems that he wrote something on them, and the officer, without any ceremony, tore the leaves out. I perceived, however, once in a book which was brought back from him, words written with blood, as he was not allowed to have either pen or ink. I could not well make out what he wished to say; but it was something like the words: “I am Karpen,” and then, “it is for you that I am here Pol...” I sincerely pitied the condition of this unfortunate young man. When he made too much noise and disobeyed, they were often so cruel as to flog him. They gave him one shilling per day for his food, he had some milk in the morning, and soup with a piece of meat for dinner and supper; the half of this little was stolen by the officer.
When I was released, I related to those Poles who had some influence, the melancholy fate of this young man, and begged them to use their interest in his behalf; but as I left the town soon after, I was not able to ascertain what became of him. They put Mons. Kapostas into the cell which was left by my friend Mostowski, who had been brought in at the same time. He was a rich banker, born in Hungary, and established for a long time at Warsaw. He had a small, weak body, but an uncommonly firm and energetic character. It might be said of him that the blade wore out the scabbard. The activity of his mind, and the violence of his passions, had annihilated half of the little physical power which nature had bestowed upon him. He enjoyed great credit among the citizens of our capital, and was one of the most zealous and generous defenders of the national cause. With all this, he had the art or happiness not to offend his inquisitors too much by his answers to their questions; but he was not on that account better treated.[6]
Two months after his arrival at this wretched prison, he was attacked by terrible fits of epilepsy. Being separated from him only by a wall, at a time when I least expected, I heard him all at once uttering dreadful cries, rolling on the floor, and struggling with his illness, without being able to assist him. It was the most cruel sensation I ever felt. Kapostas’ health was soon so much shaken by those fits, that the physician, at last fearing for his life, remonstrated with Samoilow; but all he could obtain for the prisoner was permission to walk upon the draw-bridge for half an hour every day during fine weather, accompanied by his guard. This relief, however insignificant it appeared, did him a great deal of good, and his fits became less frequent. Man, abandoned to solitary life, and having for his companion his imagination alone, has more than one danger to fear; for this
imagination, which at first amuses us by the variety of its dreams and phantoms, is soon fixed, frequently upon a single image or favourite object, magnifies it beyond measure, and, finally, drives every other idea out of our head, and leads our reason entirely astray. Kapostas had naturally a great bias for metaphysics and occult sciences; he knew Hebrew; the works of the Rabbis treating on the Cabala, and those of Schepher and the Martinists had entirely turned his head. He believed that by subjecting himself to a certain mode of living, using a certain food, isolating his thoughts and heart from every affection and every foreign idea, and by combining some verses of the Bible for conjuring, he should be able to communicate with invisible spirits, to unveil the secrets hidden from the eyes of the vulgar, to transfer himself into the empyrean regions, and to see, in fine, the Author of the universe, and converse with him. Every day, at sunset, I heard him pronouncing his Hebrew evocations, and, although the spirits did not answer him, he believed simply that he had combined improperly his verses from the Bible, and never was discouraged. He had another, and much more useful occupation; this was, to teach his servant to read and write. He also explained to him the Holy Scriptures, but in his own way, for he pretended that the words of Scripture were always symbolical, and that their true sense was only known by those who were conversant in the science of the Cabala. We lived together as good neighbours, and corresponded with each other now and then. He was released two days after me.
The last of the Polish prisoners brought at the same time with Kapostas, was Kilinski. He was a shoemaker by trade, but, born with boldness, activity, and a truly popular eloquence, he became a personage of distinction, as soon as the revolution, and especially the insurrection at Warsaw, had shewn the people his importance and powers. Ten thousand operatives and shopmen were obedient to his voice. It was quite natural that the commander of such an army could no longer be looked upon as a shoemaker. He promised to levy a regiment from the citizens of Warsaw, was made their Colonel, and nothing could have been done better; for he procured at first one thousand men to our army, and then, being engaged with his military duties, he seldom attended the council, of which he was a member, thus sparing us many disputes and delays in the debates. It was strange to see young men of the first families, who held but the commission of Lieutenant or Captain, calling upon Colonel Kilinski in the business of the service, and paying him all the respect due to his rank. People wondered at those things in France; but in Poland, where the aristocracy was at its zenith, and the people were scarcely looked upon, such an instance struck many with horror.
Kilinski, retaining the propensities of his early profession, was in the habit of getting tipsy; and having once a dispute with Colonel Granowski, he gave orders to his regiment to take arms, and wished to attack that of his adversary. He was, however, an excellent man, and far from having the sanguinary character of certain popular monsters at that time in France.
The Russians apparently endeavoured to make Kilinski expiate, by a thousand insults, the crime of his having been a Colonel. They gave him but 25 kopeikas per day. He bore his misfortune, however, with courage, and amused me often with his letters to Kapostas, which the latter gave me to read. Their style was not at all that of a Colonel, but rather that of a shoemaker. He felt most the want of female society, and this was the object of all his complaints; as to decency, Petronius is a vestal compared with him. He wrote also his own life, very interesting from its naïveté, and pourtraying well the manners of our people. Fearing that it might be discovered, I advised him to burn the chapter describing the part he had taken in the revolution, as he applied in it the same epithets to the Empress as if she had been the wife of a cobbler. He observed religiously all holy-days, even the carnival. On Shrove-Tuesday he put on his best Polish dress, with a beautiful girdle, embroidered with gold and silk, and all this to go to the commodités, for the poor fellow could go nowhere else. He was released at the same time as Kapostas.
During the whole time of my captivity there were only three other persons brought into our prison. The first of them in the month of August 1795. I learnt afterwards that this was a young man who had been formerly in Potemkin's service, and who, I know not for what reason, had disclosed to the government how Madame Branicka had taken into her possession Prince Potemkin's diamonds, of which the latter had a full chest, belonging partly to the Empress and partly to himself. Branicka, his niece, who was with him at the time of his death, carried off the finest of them. The Empress, and the heirs of Potemkin, and amongst them Samoilow, being equally interested in their recovery, shut up this young man only to frighten him, and thus to compel him to disclose further particulars relative to this robbery; seeing, however, that he knew nothing more than what he had at first declared, they released him at the end of a fortnight. Branicka, the favourite and confidente of the Empress, loved and treated by her as her own sister, was put out of favour, and exiled to her estates of Bialocerkiew. Thus heaven apparently wished to punish, in the wife, the criminal ambition of her husband.[7]
In the month of July 1796, two other prisoners had been brought. Their examination lasted more than six weeks. Samoilow came three times himself to examine them, and a day scarcely elapsed without their having a visit from Makarow. Sometimes they were taken from prison at 12 o'clock at night, to be brought before the court. These nightly visits recalled always to me the mysteries and horrors of the Holy Inquisition. The length and activity of these proceedings proved that they attached great importance to them, and that the case of the prisoners must have been very intricate. At length, on the 14th of September, Makarow came again to examine one of the prisoners. During the examination, he raised his voice, which shewed us that he was very angry; and after an hour's altercation, I saw two soldiers dragging one of those unfortunate prisoners to the casemates, where heart-rending cries were soon heard, and I could not doubt that they were extorting answers under the rack or bastinado. The yellings of this unhappy man were very painful to my feelings. Voltaire, however, and other philosophes-courtiers, have elevated the immortal Catherine to the skies for having, as they say, abolished the torture!
After my enlargement, I learnt from Russian officers themselves, that one of those prisoners was a cashier, and another a counsellor in the loan bank, both gentlemen and fathers of families. A deficit of 600,000 roubles was found in the bank. These inferior functionaries acted only by the orders of their minister, who alone was guilty; they underwent, however, the punishment. Paul I. caused them to be released.
We learnt also, afterwards, that our prison, old, and built entirely of wood, was constructed by Peter the Great, and that the first prisoner who had been shut up in it was his own son Alexis, put to death by that cruel hero. Beniowski had been also there, but only during a fortnight, being, after that time, exiled to Siberia. He occupied the same room I lived in. Foreigners of distinction, officers, priests, had lingered there in turn, but few of them had remained so long as we, as their fate had been immediately decided on.
- ↑ All Members of the Supreme National Council during the Polish Revolution of 1794.
- ↑ Thaddeus Mostowski, at the time of the celebrated Diet of four years, (1788–91,) Castellan of Racionz, distinguished himself among the Polish patriots who attempted the political regeneration of their country. He was afterwards Minister of the Home Department in the Duchy of Warsaw, under Napoleon, and remained in the same office in the kingdom of Poland until the last revolution. From that time he retired to France, and died in Paris in 1842.
- ↑ Pont means in Polish, most, bridge, and Allemand, Niemiec, a German.
- ↑ Jean Baptiste Bonneau, born at Montpellier in 1739, entered, when very young, into diplomacy. In 1780, he came to Poland as chargé d'affaires of the Prince Xavier of Saxony, the son of Agustus III., king of Poland. After this he was actively engaged in the negotiations regarding the opening of the commerce of Poland with France, through the Black Sea, and obtained from the Polish Government measures favourable to that project, by which he attracted the attention of the French Government, and, in 1793, Mons. Descorches de la Croix, the French Ambassador at Warsaw, being recalled, Mons. Bonneau was appointed in his place. His long residence in Poland, his profound knowledge of the laws, manners, and language of the country, rendered him highly qualified to discharge those duties. He did not, however, perform them long. The Russians having become again masters of Warsaw, imprisoned Mons. Bonneau, in the course of the same year, 1792, and all the papers of the French legation, which were in his hands, being seized, he was conducted as a prisoner to St. Petersburg, where he remained four years in close captivity. Paul I., at his accession to the throne, released him, but he found that his wife and his daughter had sunk under the grief caused by his misfortunes. In Paris he was surrounded with Poles, who had taken refuge in France, to labour for the restoration of their country. Bonneau, from being French Ambassador at Warsaw, became, I may say, Polish Ambassador to the French republic. He shared the counsels, projects, and hopes of the Polish emigrants. On the occasion of the foundation of the Polish Legions, he wrote to General Dombrowski as follows: “What sensitive heart, what man who can appreciate the illustrious and valiant nation, worthy of a happier lot, does not share with me the same sentiments? Living for a long time amongst you, I have enjoyed the advantage of being able to appreciate you more highly, because I have been able to know you better. Your nation did too great honour to herself in falling, her existence becomes too necessary to Europe to be forgotten. Accept my best wishes in that respect, and share the hope which animates me.” He speaks with the same warmth in his letter addressed in 1798 to General Bernadotte, then the Ambassador of the French republic at the court of Vienna. “I thought, indeed, that among the interests intrusted at this moment to your care, those of unhappy Poland, so important in themselves, and in respect to the general system, could not have been forgotten. I thought, moreover, and persuaded myself, that as I submitted, on my return from my long captivity, a plan for the restoration of that interesting country, the views of which were not disapproved, the government might have resolved to make use of it in the instructions with which they deemed it necessary to provide you. On that supposition, Citizen Ambassador, accept the offer of every aid in my power, and dispose of my services.” It is a singular thing, that a man, who had to attribute to Poland all his sufferings, the loss of his fortune, the death of those who were dearest to his heart, his long captivity, should be ready to devote himself to that unhappy cause. We may justly apply to Mons. Bonneau the motto which the Poles now-a-days have prefixed to the name of their noble friend, Lord Dudley Stuart: Causas non fata sequor. Mons. Bonneau died at Paris in March 1805.
- ↑ The plan below, which we find drawn by Niemcewicz upon the margin of his manuscript, represents the prison in which he was confined.
- ↑ When he reproachingly told Samoilow, that according to the capitulation of Warsaw, and Suwarow's word of honour, who, in the name of his sovereign, had guaranteed an amnesty to the citizens of the capital, he never expected to be seized and shut up in a prison, Somoilow answered, with truly admirable frankness: “State reasons know neither good faith nor justice.” This political creed, professed by all despots, ought to be engraven upon marble and brass, for the benefit of nations—(Note of the Author.)
- ↑ Xavier Branicki, Grand-General of Poland, a famous partisan of Russia, to whom the author alludes here, was one of the leading men in the confederation of Targowica, odious in the memory of every true Pole.
