The aspiration for freedom, which under normal cir- cumstances is one of the most noble attributes of man, sometimes drives convicts from Sakhalin. A strong young convict will attempt to escape as far as possible into Siberia or to Russia. He is usually captured, tried and returned to penal servitude, but this is nat so terrifying. There is a certain poetry in the slow halting march back across Siberia, in the constant change of prisons and companions and convoy guards, and in the adventures he enjoys on the way. This is more like freedom than being in the Voyevodsk prison or working in a road gang. His strength sapped by age, and with no faith in his powers of walking, he escapes to some nearby place: the Amur River or the taiga or the mountains, going as far as he possibly can from the prison, and so he avoids seeing the same walls and the same peo- ple, or hearing the same clattcring of chains and the same convcrsations of the convicts.
The old convict Altukhov, who lives at the Korsakov Post, a man of sixty or more, escapes in the following way. He takes a piece of bread, closes up his hut and, going no more than half a verst from the post, he sits on the side of a mountain and gazes at the taiga, the sea and the sky. After sitting there for three days he goes home, brings out more supplies and again returns to the mountain. There was a time when they used to beat him, but now they only laugh at his escapes.
Some escape to enjoy freedom for a month or a week; therc are some who find even one day sufficient. One day, but it is mine! The yearning for freedom seizes some peo- ple periodically and resembles drinking bouts and fits of epilepsy. They say it appears at certain times of the year or month, and reliable convicts who feel an attack coming on always inform the officials of a forthcoming escape. All escapees without exception arc flogged with birch rods or lashes. These escapes are often quite astonishing in their in- congruity and absurdity. It happens that a sensible, discreet family man will escape without clothing, without bread, without any aim or purpose, in the knowledge that he will eventually be captured, and he docs this at the risk of his hcalth, at the risk of losing the trust of the administration, his comparative freedom and sometimes his pay, at the risk of freezing to death or of being shot. These absurd results should convince the Sakhalin doctors who decide whether a convict is to be beaten that in many cases they are not dealing with a crime but with a disease.
Life terms should also be numbered among the reasons for escape. It is well known that our system of penal servi- tude goes hand in hand with the colonization of Siberia. A person sentenced to penal servitude in Siberia is removed from normal human environment without any hope of ever returning; he is dead to the society in which he was born and bred. So the convicts say, "The dead never return from the grave!" It is this absolute despondency and despair which prompt the convict to decide on escape and to change his fate—it cannot be worse! And this is ■ the ex- pression they use when a man escapes: "He wants to change his fate!" If he is captured and brought back, they say that fortune did not favor him—he was unlucky. Es- capes and vagrancy are inevitable and indispensable evils connccted with penal servitude for life, and they serve as a kind of safety valve. If a convict were deprived of his hope of escaping as the only means of changing his fate, if he thought he would never return from the dead, then without this outlet for his despair, he would probably give vent to despair in some more brutal and more horrible way.
There is still another common reason for escapes. The convicts have a curious belief in the legality of escape, and they regard it as easy, and imagine they will not suffer for it. In fact escapes arc difficult, they arc cruelly punished and they arc regarded as serious crimes. These strange be- liefs have been bred in the people for generations and their beginnings arc lost in the mists of those ancient days when escapes could easily be made and they were even encour- aged by the authorities. A work manager or a prison warden thought he had been punished by God if his pris- oners did not escape, and he was overjoyed when large numbers of prisoners left him. If 30 or 40 men escaped before October 1, the day when winter clothing was issued, this meant a profit of 30 to 40 sheepskin coats for the warden.
According to Yadrintsev, one work manager was heard to greet a new party: "Whoever wants to stay, go get your clothes. Whoever wants to escape gets nothing!" The ad- ministration appeared to approve of escapes, and no one in the entire population of Siberia had any feeling that there was any sin in escaping. The convicts tell about their es- capes with a smile or with an air of regret because the escape was unsuccessful; it would be useless to expect re- pentance or pangs of conscience. Of all the escapees with whom I spokc thcrc was only onc sick old man, fencred to a ball and chain for numcrous cscape auempts, who pas- sionately rcproachcd himself, rcgarding his attcmpts at escape stupid rather than criminal. "\X'hcn I was youngcr I did stupid things," hc said, "and now I must suffcr for thcm."
Thcrc arc many rcasons for cscaping. Among thcsc I includc dissatisfaction with thc prison regimen, thc abom- inablc food, thc brutality of somc officials, idlcncss, inapti- tudc for work, illncss, lack of will power, a tcndcncy toward imitativencss, lovc of advcnturc. Somctimcs cntirc groups of convicts cscapcd in ordcr to "havc a good timc" on thc island, this good timc bcing accompanicd by mur- dcrs and various kinds of barbarism which causcd panic and uncrly infuriatcd thc pcople.
Permit mc to tell a story about an escapc which was madc for thc sakc of vcngcancc. Privatc Bclov woundcd com-ict Klimcnko whcn capturing him and brought him to thc Alcxandrovsk prison. Aftcr rccovcring, Klimcnko again cscapcd, this timc with thc solc purpose of cxacting vcnge- ancc on Bclov. Hc wcnt dircctly to thc guard post, whcrc hc was capwrcd and dctaincd. "'Lead your advcnturcr back again," his companions told Bclov. "It's your hard luck." And so hc did. On thc way thc guard and thc prisoncr struck up a convcrsation. It was autumn, windy and cold. Thcy stoppcd to havc a smokc. \X'hcn thc soldicr drew his colLtr up in ordcr to light his pipc, Klimcnko grabbed his gun and killed him on thc spot. Hc thcn returncd to Alex- androvsk as though nmhing had happencd. Hc was arrcstcd and hangcd soon aftcrward.
And here is anmhcr story about a man who cscaped for lovc. Convict Anem, whosc surnamc I do not rccall, twcnty ycars old, a guard at thc govcrnment house in Naybuchi, was in lovc with an Ainu woman who lived in a yurt on thc Nayba Rivcr, and it is said that his love was rccipro- catcd. For somc rcason hc was suspected of theft and he was punished by being transferrcd to Korsakov prison, ninety versts away from the Ainu woman. He escapcd from the
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post to Naybuchi in order to visit his beloved and he kept on escaping until they shot him in the leg.