February 22,1918
Germans reported in Finland
For the last week Russia has been cut off from Western Europe by revolution and civil war in Finland. Outgoing passenger traffic has been suspended or greatly inconvenienced by damage to the railways. British and other travellers anxious to leave Russia are deterred by accounts of the spread of Russian revolutionary methods and hooliganism in Finland. Armed men enter trains to examine luggage and help themselves to anything that pleases them. An officer here in hospital tells me that he was wounded at Viborg while rescuing a lady from a party of armed ruffians who were robbing her of her money and her overcoat. The officer shot two of them with his revolver, but received a bayonet wound in the breast, and was dragged insensible by the lady into a yard. Efforts are being made to provide steamer accommodation from the southern Finnish coast, but it is only safe for neutrals.
There is great uncertainty as to the contending forces in Finland. According to one version, the White Guards are being driven northwards, and pushed back to the Bothnian Gulf by the Red Guards. Another version represents the Red Guards as being pressed on all sides by White Guards.
A large proportion of the working proletariat in the urban and industrial centres of Southern Finland is thoroughly leavened by germs of Russian Bolshevism. These are the Red Guards. The White Guards in the north and west represent bourgeois classes, and the latter are aided by the return of Finns through Riga, who have served and been trained in German Finnish battalions. It is said that there are German officers amongst the White Guards, and that they receive instructions from Germany.
An alarming rumour circulated here this evening that German troops have landed on the Finnish coast. Dvinsk was occupied by the Germans yesterday afternoon. This places them 330 miles from Petrograd on the main line railway. The burning question is: will they come here or not?
Detachments of partisans are to be formed for the purpose of harassing the invaders. The Russian troops in retreat have been ordered to destroy everything, so that more frightful devastation will be committed in this already ruined country.
A large proportion of the working proletariat in the urban and industrial centres of Southern Finland is thoroughly leavened by germs of Russian Bolshevism. These are the Red Guards. The White Guards in the north and west represent bourgeois classes, and the latter are aided by the return of Finns through Riga, who have served and been trained in German Finnish battalions. It is said that there are German officers amongst the White Guards, and that they receive instructions from Germany.
An alarming rumour circulated here this evening that German troops have landed on the Finnish coast. Dvinsk was occupied by the Germans yesterday afternoon. This places them 330 miles from Petrograd on the main line railway. The burning question is: will they come here or not?
Detachments of partisans are to be formed for the purpose of harassing the invaders. The Russian troops in retreat have been ordered to destroy everything, so that more frightful devastation will be committed in this already ruined country.
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