File No. 861.00/2787
The Chargé in Sweden ( Whitehouse) to the Secretary of State
[Received 10.28 p.m.]
2898. I showed yesterday to the Minister of Foreign Affairs the text of your circular telegram of September 20, 6 p.m. He begged me to inform you that he was in entire accord with the sentiments therein expressed and that he had already authorized the Swedish Minister at Petrograd to join his other neutral colleagues in sending to Chicherin a very strong note of protest against the barbarity of the acts of the Soviet. Chicherin sent a very long reply to this note and ended by stating that if the neutral Ministers exceeded the legal limits to which they were entitled for the protection of their own subjects, this would be considered as attempting to support the counter-revolution. The Minister thereupon added that there was nothing more that could be done.
I pointed out to him that I thought that there were two things alone which interested the Soviet leaders; namely, the money they had stolen and a future asylum where they could enjoy their ill-gotten gains. He said he did not think that the question of asylum entered in since the Bolsheviks knew that once they lost their power there was no hope of escape and he attributed this cause for the bloody delirium now reigning at Moscow and Petrograd. However as regards the money I told him what I presumed he already knew, that the Bolshevik courier who had reached Stockholm on Saturday was none other than Gukovski, former Commissioner of Finance, who had brought eighteen sealed trunks with him and that I had fairly reliable information that part of the contents of these trunks was 60,000,000 rubles in imperial notes. He took note of this and I hope will at any rate keep watch over these funds.
A fairly large quantity of platinum was also brought out but I did not mention this as I understand it is for sale and I thought our [Page 695] Government might wish to buy it. I will make a further report on the platinum soon.