The reforms of 1884 demonstrated that the more nu- merous the administration in the penal colony, the better. The complexity and dispersion of affairs demand a complex mechanism and the participation of many people. It is important that minor matters should not distract officials from their main duties. Furthermore, because the island commandant has no secretary or government employee always available, he has to spend the greater part of the day issuing orders and preparing documents, and this com- plicated and tedious office work takes up almost all the time which should be spent in visiting prisons and making the rounds of settlemems.
In addition to being in charge of the police depan- ments, the district commanders must distribute food rations to the women, participate in all kinds of commissions, inspections, etc. The prison wardens and their assistams are charged with the duties of investigation and policing. Under such conditions the Sakhalin official must either work beyond the Iimits of his strength and, as the saying goes, until he goes insane, or he can throw up his hands and place the entire burden on his convict clerks, as most often happens. In local offices the convict clerks are not only kept busy copying, but they also have to write out impor- tant documents. Since they are often more experienced and more energetic than the officials, and this is true especially of novices, the convict or settler sometimes has to do all the work of the office, writing up all the account books, and doing all the necessary investigation. Then, after work- ing for many years, the clerk, through either ignorance or malice, mixes up all the documents, and since he is the only one who can make head or tail of the mess, he be- comes indispensable and irreplaceable; the result is that the administration cannot do without his services. There is only one way to get rid of such a clerk—by replacing him with one or two honest officials.
\Vhere there exists a large number of educated people, a public opinion inevitably arises; and then there is no question of anyone, even a Major Nikolayev, setting him- self up with impunity against the moral law and customary
ethical behavior. And as community life develops, so gov- ernment service slowly begins to lost its forbidding charac- ter, and the number of insane, drunkards and suicides decreases.1^
See N. V. Busse, Sakhalin Island and the Expedition of 1853- '854•
Lopatin, ''Report to the Governor-General of Eastern Siberia/' Mining Journal (1870), No. io.
At the Korsakov Police Department I saw the following per- taining to I 870:
List for the lower ranks stationed m the Post at the Putyatinsky coal mines on the Sortunay River.
Vasily Vedernikov—as the senior, he is a ^^tmaker, and serves as the baker and cook.
Luka Pylkov—demoted from senior for negligence and arrested for drunkenness and impertinence.
Khariton Mylnikov—was not caught at anything, but is lazy.
Evgraf Raspopov—an idiot and incapable of any work.
Fedor Cheglokov} Wefe caught stea'ing money an.d in my
G rig0fy I vanov ( Pfesence were observed behavmg vio- ' I ent ly, bemg d runk and insu bofdinate.
—The Post Commandant at the
Putyatinsky coal mine on Sakhalin Island, DISTRICT SECRETARY F. LITKE
N. Sm iy tells the story that not so long ago, in 1885, a
general who was reviewing the Sakhalin army asked a soldief pfison guafd:
"Why afe you caffying a fevolvef?"
"To intimidate the penal convicts, youf wofship!"
"Then shoot at that tfee stump," the genefal commanded.
Gfeat confusion followed. The soldief was unable to with- dfaw the fevolvef ffom his holstef no mattef how he tfied, and he succeeded only when someone came to his assistance. He faised the revolver and was handling it so inexpeftly that the ofdef was countefmanded. Instead of hitting the tree stump he could easily have sent a bullet into an onlookef.
—Kronstadt Newr (1890), No. 23
Sintsovsky, "Hygienic Conditions of the Convicts," Health (1875), No. 16.
6 In the Voyevodsk prison I was shown a convict, a former convoy soldier, who had aided vagrants to escape in Khabarovka and had escaped with them. In the summer of i 890 a free woman accused of arson was being held in the Rykovskoye prison. The prisoner Andreyev, who was in the neighboring cell, complained that he could not sleep nights because the convoy guards were visiting this woman and carousing. The district commandant solved the problem by replacing the lock on her cell and taking the key with him. The guards found another key to fit the lock, and the district commandant could no longer control them. The nightly orgies continued.
' This gives rise to an obvious injustice: The better soldiers who remain with their regiments receive only their soldiers' rations, while the less skilled soldiers serving at the prison receive both their rations and a salary. Prince Shakhovskoy complained in his book The Probtem of Orgonizing Sakhalin Islond: "The main con- tingent of the guards (66 percent) consists of privates from local regiments who receive a government salary of twelve rubles and 50 kopecks per month. Their illiteracy, low level of intelligence, and their complaisant attitude toward the bribes which fall within the scope of their activity, and also their complete lack of military discipline and their incomparably greater freedom of action result not infrequently in unlawful arbitrary treatment of the prisoners or in undue degradation before them." The present commandant of the island is of the opinion that "many years of experience have demonstrated the utter unreliability of guards detached from the local regiments."
M The senior guards receive 480 rubles and the junior guards 2 16 rubles annually. After some time this salary is increased by one- third and then by two-thirds, and is sometimes even doubled. Such a salary is considered excellent, and minor officials such as tele- graph operators are tempted to leave their posts to become guards at the first oppormnity. It is feared that if schoolteachers are even- rually assigned to Sakhalin and paid the customary 20 to 25 rubles per month, they will definitely leave their positions to be- come guards.
Because it was impossible to find free people locally who would take on guard duty and equally impossible to recruit more men from the local regiments without seriously diminishing their ranks, the island commandant in i 888 decided to enlist settlers and peasants who were formerly convicts into guard duty, if they were found to be reliable and could pass the tests. But this measure was unsuccessful.
9 See Lukashevich, "My Acquaintances in Due on Sakhalin," Kronstodt News (1868), Nos. 47 and 49.
Prior to 1875, penal servitude on Northern Sakhalin was under the direction of the supervisor of the Due Post, an officer whose superior lived in Nikolayevsk. After 1875 Sakhalin was divided into two districts: Northern Sakhalin and Southern Sakha- lin. Both districts, which were part of the Primorskaya Oblast, were subject to the military governor in civil affairs and to the commander of the army of the Primorskaya Oblast in military affairs. Local administration was entrusted to district commandants. The title of Commandant of Northern Sakhalin was given to the supervisor of convicts on Sakhalin Island and Primorskaya Oblast, who resided in Due, and the title Commandant of the Southern District was given to the officer in command of the 4th East Siberian Line Battalion, who resided in Korsakov. The local gov- ernment, both military and civil, was concentrated in the hands of the district commandants. The administration was entirely military.