Kaledin was marching north....
The Soviet of Moscow had set up a Military Revolutionary Committee,
and was negotiating with the commandant of the city for possession
of the arsenal, so that the workers might be armed.
With these facts was mixed an astounding jumble of rumours,
distortions, and plain lies. For instance, an intelligent young
Cadet, formerly private secretary to Miliukov and then to
Terestchenko, drew us aside and told us all about the taking of the
Winter Palace.
"The Bolsheviki were led by German and Austrian officers," he
affirmed.
"Is that so?" we replied, politely. "How do you know?"
"A friend of mine was there and saw them."
"How could he tell they were German officers?"
"Oh, because they wore German uniforms!"
There were hundreds of such absurd tales, and they were not only
solemnly published by the anti-Bolshevik press, but believed by the
most unlikely persons-Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviki who
had always been distinguished by their sober devotion to facts....
But more serious were the stories of Bolshevik violence and
terrorism. For example, it was said printed that the Red Guards had
not only thoroughly looted the Winter Palace, but that they had
massacred the _yunkers_ after disarming them, had killed some of the
Ministers in cold blood; and as for the woman soldiers, most of them
had been violated, and many had committed suicide because of the
tortures they had gone through.
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