The Real Siberia: The Start from Moscow

In 1901, British Journalist John Foster Fraser travelled from Moscow to Vladivostok, and back again, mostly by rail. On his return, he recorded his experiences (and prejudices) in “The Real Siberia”.

Over the next few weeks, Siberian Light will be publishing a series of excerpts this fascinating book.

Today, Fraser departs from Moscow:

THE bell in the big stuccoed and whitewashed ‘JL’ Moscow station gave a clang. Thereupon brawny and black-whiskered men took off their caps, put their arms about each other’s necks, and gave a brother’s kiss upon the lips.

There was uproar. The train for Siberia was starting. A bunch of officers, well-set young Russians, in neat white linen jackets with gold straps on the shoulders, crowded a window and laughed good-byes to friends.

From the windows of the next car were the uncouth faces of peasants, their hair tangled and matted, their red shirts open at the throat. They were stolid and brutal. They were the moudjiks emigrating to the mysterious, evil-omened Siberia. On the platform stood their wives-dumpy, unattractive women, in short skirts, and with gaudy handkerchiefs about their heads. They did not understand the language of farewell. With eyes tear-red and with quivering lips they looked upon the hulking hairy men with the sleepy animal faces. But they said nothing.

Three mechanics, drink laden, came reeling along, bumping everyone with their kits. Their eyes were glazed, and they grinned slobberingly and lurched like coal barges beating up against a gale.

The bell clanged twice. Everybody must get aboard now. Once more the brother’s kiss. From the car window the young fellows got long and ardent hand grips. They were in the blush of life, and off to Siberia with laughter in their hearts.

Standing a little back was an ordinary soldier, a fair-haired lad, slim and beardless. He was at attention, his heels clapped, his arms taut by his side. He was more than head and shoulders taller than the wizened little woman, her tanned old face all seared with care, who was clutching at him, and kissing him on the tunic and dulling its whiteness with mother’s tears. And she was praying a mother’s prayer.

Clang, clang, clang! Three times, and all aboard now.

There was a shrill whistle. The cars creaked and moved. Everybody, in the train and on the platform, made the sign of the cross. The perilous unknown was ahead of them.

Some husky shouts of farewell were thrown from the windows, and there was some dimness of eyes. Even a scampering foreigner felt the solemnity of the occasion. But in a few seconds we were in the sunshine of a blazing afternoon, and the train was lumbering on its way to Siberia. It was Thursday afternoon, August 22nd, 1901.

This was not the famous Siberian Express about which so much has been written and which starts twice a week from Moscow, “the fairest jewel in the crown of the Czars,” for the far-off city of Irkutsk in Central Siberia, a continent away indeed, 3,371 miles, and which is reached in exactly eight days. The Russians are an enthusiastic and credulous people, and in all the world they think there is nothing so magnificent as this Siberian Express. They come in their hundreds to the Moscow station every Tuesday and Saturday night, the grandees in their furs and their pearls, the red-shirted, matted-haired moudjiks, and the shaven-chinned, American felt-hatted commercial men who have the spice of the West in their veins, and they all stand and gaze at the people Siberia-bound as most of us will look at the first traveller to Mars. Siberia is a long way off. Has anybody ever returned from Siberia? Hearts grow big and words choke. Tears stain many cheeks. Yet laughter and merriment rings over sorrow.

Remembering this is slothful Russia and not slap-dash, bang-about America, it is a luxurious train, is the Siberian Express, with its electric lights, restaurant, library, observation car, bath rooms, ladies’ boudoir, piano, and all that is considered “up-to-date” in travelling. Europe is now looking towards Siberia as half a century ago it looked towards Western America - it is the wheatfield of the world; it has the finest grazing to be found in the two hemispheres; no horses are like the Siberian horses; its butter is shouldering “best Danish” from the market; great areas yield coal and iron; its hills ooze gold. There is a Siberian “boom.”

The rich speculators, engineers, Government officials, Germans searching for trade, to build a bridge or to open a store, all travel by this train. It is invariably crowded. You have to sleep four in a coupé, two on the seats and two on the improvised bunks above. To be sure of a place you must book weeks ahead.

I had no desire to travel like this. I am a vagabond fond of taking things slowly. So what did it matter if it took eight or eighteen or twenty-eight days to reach Irkutsk? I had no mining concession. It was the last thing in my mind to open a store. Mine was but a mission of curiosity. I wanted to see Russia; I wanted to see the poor, crushed, depraved Russian peasants; above all I wanted to see Siberia. So I did what no wise foreigner had ever been known to do before. I travelled by the ordinary daily train that jogs alone, slowly, stopping, at the wayside stations, picking up moudjiks, putting moudjiks down. It took very much longer, but there was a charm about that. Besides, it was much cheaper and it required only a very small bribe pressed into the hand of the black-whiskered, astrakan-capped conductor to get a carriage to myself. I spoke four words of Russian, and I carried all my belongings in a couple of bags.

Off to Siberia!

This post is the first in a series of excerpts from John Foster Fraser’s “The Real Siberia”. Further excerpts can be found in the Siberian Light archive.

The full text of The Real Siberia is available online at Friends & Partners.

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