J. V. Stalin
The Shooting of the Twenty-Six Baku Comrades by Agents of British Imperialism
First Published: Izvestia No. 85,
April 23, 1919
Source: J. V. Stalin, Works, Volume 4, pages 261-268. Foreign Languages Publishing House, Moscow, 1953
Transcription: Hari Kumar for Alliance-ML
HTML: Mike B. for MIA, 2005
We present for the attention of our readers two documents(1)
which testify to the savage murder of responsible
officials of Soviet power in Baku by the British imperialists in the
autumn of last year. These documents are taken from the Baku
Socialist-Revolutionary newspaper Znamya Truda(2) and the Baku
newspaper Yedinaya Rossiya (3), that is to say
from the very same circles which only yesterday called in the aid
of the British and betrayed the Bolsheviks, and which are now
forced by the course of events to denounce their allies of yesterday.
The first document tells of the barbarous shooting without trial of
26 Soviet officials of the city of Baku (Shaumyan, Djaparidze,
Fioletov, Malygin and others) by the British Captain Teague-Jones on
the night of September 20, 1918, on the road from Krasnovodsk to
Ashkhabad, to which he was convoying them as war prisoners.
Teague-Jones and his Socialist-Revolutionary and Menshevik partners
hoped at first to hush up the matter, intending to circulate false
testimony to the effect that the Baku Bolsheviks had died a "natural" death in prison or hospital. But evidently this plan fell through,
for it turns out that there exist eye-witnesses who refuse to keep
silent and who are ready thoroughly to expose the British savages.
This document is signed by Chaikin, a Socialist-Revolutionary.
The second document recounts a conversation that the author of the
first document, Chaikin, had with the British General Thomson
towards the close of March 1919. General Thomson demanded that
Chaikin should name the eye-witnesses of the savage murder of the 26
Baku Bolsheviks by Captain Teague-J ones. Chaikin was prepared to
present the documents and to name the witnesses on condition that a
commission of inquiry were set up composed of representatives of the
British command, the population of Baku and the Turkestan
Bolsheviks. Chaikin furthermore demanded a guarantee that the
Turkestan witnesses would not be assassinated by British agents.
Since Thomson refused to agree to the appointment of a commission
of inquiry and would give no guarantee of the personal safety of the
witnesses, the conversation was broken off and Chaikin left. The
document is interesting because it indirectly confirms the barbarity
of the British imperialists, and not merely testifies but cries out
against the impunity and savagery of the British agents who vent
their ferocity on Baku and Transcaspian "natives" just as they do on
Negroes in Central Africa.
The story of the 26 Baku Bolsheviks is as follows. In August 1918,
when the Turkish forces had come within a short distance of Baku and
the Socialist-Revolutionary and Menshevik members of the Baku
Soviet, against the opposition of t he Bolsheviks, had secured the support of the majority of the Soviet and had called in the aid
of the British imperialists, the Baku Bolsheviks, headed by Shaumyan
and Djaparidze, being in the minority, resigned their authority and
left the field clear for their political opponents. The Bolsheviks
decided, with the consent of the newly-formed British,
Socialist-Revolutionary and Menshevik authority in Baku, to evacuate
to Petrovsk, the nearest seat of Soviet power. But on the way to
Petrovsk the steamer carrying the Baku Bolsheviks and their
families was shelled by British ships which had followed in pursuit
and was convoyed to Krasnovodsk. This was in August.
The Russian Soviet Government applied on several occasions to the
British command, demanding the release of the Baku comrades and
their families in exchange for British prisoners, but the British
command invariably refrained from replying. Already in October
information began to come in from private persons and
organizations to the effect that the Baku comrades had been shot.
On March 5, 1919, Astrakhan received a radio message from Tiflis
stating that "Djaparidze and Shaumyan are not in the hands of the
British command; according to local information, they were killed
last September near Kizyl-Arvat by the arbitrary act of a group of
workers." This, apparently, was the first official attempt on the
part of the British assassins to lay the blame for their atrocious
act on the workers, who were boundlessly devoted to Shaumyan and
Djaparidze. Now, after the publication of the above-mentioned
documents, it must be taken as proven that our Baku comrades, who
had quitted the political arena voluntarily and were on thier way to Petrovsk as evacuees, actually
were shot without trial by the cannibals from "civilized" and
"humane" Britain.
In the "civilized" contries it is customary to talk about Bolshevik
terror and Bolshevik atrocities, and the Anglo-French imperialists
are usually depicted as foes of terror and shooting. But is it not
clear that the Soviet Government had never dealt with its opponenets
so foully and basely as the "civilized" and "humane" British, and
that only imperialist cannibals who are corrupt to the core and
devoid of all moral integrity need to resort to murder by night, to
criminal attacks on unarmed political leaders of the opposing camp?
If there are any who sitll doubt this, let them read the documents
we print below and call things by their proper names.
When the Baku Mensheviks and Socialist-Revolutionaries invited the
British to Baku and betrayed the Bolsheviks, thye thought they would
be able to "use" the British "guests" as a force; they believed that
they would remain the masters of the country and the "guests" would
eventually go back home. Actually, the reverse happened: it was the
"guests" that became the absolute masters, while the
Socialist-Revolutionaries and Mensheviks became direct accessories
to the foul and villainous murder of the 26 Boshevik commissars. And
the Socialist-Revolutionaries were compelled to go into opposition,
cautiously exposing their new mssters, while the Mensheviks are
compelled to advocate in their Baku newspaper Iskra (4)a bloc with the Bolsheviks against
the "welcome guests" of yesterday.
Is it not clear that the alliance of the Socialist-Revolutionaries
and Mensheviks with the agents of imperialism is an "alliance" of
slaves and menials with thier masters? If there are still any who
doubt this, let them read the "conversation" between General Thomson
and Mr.Chaikin reproduced below and honestly say whether Mr. Chaikin
resembles a master, and General Thomson a "welcome guest".
Signed J.Stalin.
(1) The two documents - "execution of the Twenty-Six
Commissioners" and "Conversation Between General Thomson and Mr
Chaikin, March 23, 1919" - were appended to the article (Izvestia,
April 23, 1919)
(2) 'Banner of
Labour' - a newspaper published by the Socialist-Revoltuionary
Committee in Baku from January 1918 to Novmeber 1919
(3) 'United Russia' - a
newspaper of Cadet trend published by the so-called Russian National
Committee of Baku from December 1918 to July 1919
(4) Iskra
(Spark) - a newspaper published by the Menshevik Committee in Baku
from November 1918 to April 1920