For several days the drilling went on, and the women mastered the rudiments of a soldier’s training. On several occasions I resorted to slapping as punishment for misbehaviour.
One day the sentry reported to the officer in charge that two women, one a famous Englishwoman, wanted to see me. I ordered the Battalion to remain at attention while I received the two callers, who were Emmeline Pankhurst and Princess Kikuatova, the latter of whom I knew.
Mrs. Pankhurst was introduced to me, and I ordered the Battalion to salute “the eminent visitor who had done much for women and her country.” Mrs. Pankhurst became a frequent visitor of the Battalion, watching it with deep interest as it grew into a well-disciplined military unit. We became very much attached to each other. Mrs. Pankhurst invited me to a dinner at the Astoria, the leading hotel in Petrograd, at which Kerensky and the various Allied representatives in the capital were to be present.
Meanwhile, the Battalion was making rapid progress. At first we suffered little annoyance. The Bolshevik agitators did not take the project seriously, expecting it to come to a speedy end. At the beginning I received only about thirty threatening letters. Gradually, however, it became known that I maintained the strictest discipline, commanding without a committee; and the propagandists began to regard me as a danger, and sought a means for the frustration of my scheme.
On the evening appointed for the dinner I went to the Astoria. There Kerensky was very cordial to me. He told me that the Bolsheviks were preparing a demonstration against the Provisional Government and that at first the Petrograd garrison had consented to organize a demonstration in favour of the Government. Later, however, the garrison had decided not to march. The War Minister then asked me if I would march with the Battalion in support of the Provisional Government.
I gladly accepted the invitation. Kerensky told me that the Women’s Battalion had already exerted a beneficial influence, that several bodies of troops had expressed a willingness to leave for the front, that many of the wounded had organized themselves for the purpose of going to the fighting line, declaring that if women could fight, then they—the cripples—would do so, too. Finally he expressed his belief that the announcement of the marching of the Battalion of Death would stimulate the garrison to follow suit.
It was a pleasant evening that I spent at the Astoria. Upon leaving, an acquaintance who was going in the same direction offered to drive me to the Institute. I accepted the invitation, alighting, however, at a little distance from headquarters, as I did not wish him to drive out of his way. It was about eleven o’clock when I approached the temporary barrack. There was a small crowd at the gate, about thirty-five men, of all descriptions, soldiers, roughs, vagrants, and even some decent looking fellows.
“Who are you? What are you doing here?” I questioned sharply.
“Commander,” cried the sentry, “they are waiting for you. They have been here more than an hour; they broke through the gate and have been searching the grounds and the house for you. When they became convinced that you were away they decided to wait here for your return.”
“Well, what do you want?” I demanded of the group as they surrounded me.
“What do we want, eh? We want you to disband the Battalion. We have had enough of this discipline. Enough blood has been shed. We don’t want any more armies and militarism. You are only creating new troubles for the common people. Disband your Battalion and we will leave you alone.”
“I will not disband!” was my answer.
Several of them pulled out revolvers and threatened to kill me. The sentry raised an alarm and all the women appeared at the windows, many of them with their rifles ready.
“Listen,” a couple of them argued again, “you are of the people and we only want the weal of the common man. We want peace, not war. And you are inciting to war again. We have had enough war, too much war. We now understand the uselessness of war. Surely you don’t like to see the poor people slaughtered for the sake of the few rich. Come, join our side, and let us all work for peace.”
“You are scoundrels!” I shouted with all my strength. “You are idiots! I myself am for peace, but we shall never have peace till we have driven the Germans out of Russia. They will make slaves of us and ruin our country and our freedom. You are traitors!”
Suddenly I was kicked violently in the back. Someone dealt me a second blow from the side.
“Fire!” I shouted to my girls at the windows as I was knocked down, mindful that I had instructed them always to shoot in the air first as a warning.
Several hundred rifles rang out in a volley. My assailants quickly dispersed, and I was safe. However, they returned during the night and stoned the windows, breaking every pane of glass fronting the street.
XII
My Fight Against Committee Rule
It was after midnight when I entered the barracks. The officer in charge reported to me the events of the evening. It appeared that at first one of the group, a Bolshevik agitator, had made his way inside by telling the sentry that he had been sent by me for something. As soon as he was admitted he got the women together and began a speech, appealing to them to form a committee and govern themselves, in accordance with the new spirit. He scoffed at them for submitting to the system of discipline which I had established, calling it Tsaristic, and expressing his compassion for the poor girls whom I had punished. Declaiming against the war, appealing for peace at any price, he urged my recruits to act as free citizens, depose their reactionary chief and elect a new one in democratic
