An analysis of this classified statement reveals some curious and suggestive facts. It shows in the first place that the largest single class of exiles (5536 out of 15,766) is composed of women and children who go to Siberia voluntarily with their husbands and fathers.[1]
It shows, in the second place, that out of the 10,230 persons sent to Siberia as criminals, only 4392, or less than a half, have had a trial by a court, while 5838 are exiled by "administrative process"—that is, by a mere order from the Minister of the Interior.[2] Finally, it shows that more than one-third of the involuntary exiles (3751 out of 10,230) were sent to Siberia by village communes, and not by the Government.
Every mir, or village commune, in Russia has the right to banish any of its members who, through bad conduct or general worthlessness, have rendered themselves obnoxious to their fellow-citizens and burdensome to society. It has also the right to refuse to receive any of its members who, after serving out terms of imprisonment for crime, return to the mir and ask to be re-admitted. Released prisoners
- ↑ The records of the Bureau of Exile Administration for the four years ending with the year of my visit to Siberia show that the numbers and percentages of women and children who voluntarily accompanied their husbands and fathers to Siberia are as follows:
Year. Whole number
of exiles.Women and
children.Percentage. 1882 16,945 5,276 31 1883 19,314 6,311 33 1884 17,824 6,067 34 1885 18,843 5,536 28 Totals 72,926 23,190 31 - ↑ The proportion of the judicially sentenced to the administratively banished varies little from year to year. In the ten-year period from 1867 to 1876 inclusive, there were sent to Siberia 151,585 exiles; 48.80 per cent. went under sentences of courts, and 51.20 per cent. were banished by administrative process. In the seven-year period from 1880 to 1886 inclusive, there passed through the Tiumén forwarding prison 120,065 exiles, of whom 64,513, or 53.7 per cent., had been tried and condemned by courts, and 55,552, or 46.3 per cent., had been banished by orders from the Minister of the Interior. A prison reform commission appointed by Alexander II. in the latter part of the last decade reported that on an average 45.6 per cent. of all the exiles sent to Siberia went under sentences of courts, and 54.4 per cent. were banished by administrative process.
