File No. 861.00/3062
The Consul at Irkutsk ( Thomson) to the Secretary of State 2
[Received October 28, 1918, 8.50 p.m.]
In reference to the question Ufa hostages3 which involves safety Allied subjects in Moscow, please communicate if possible to Major Wardwell, Red Cross, Moscow, that Vice Consul Williams, Chelyabinsk, telegraphed contents of Catchpool representative [report to] International Red Cross and American, British, French and neutral consuls at Moscow relative to his efforts to secure the release of women hostages held at Ufa. The report shows that Catchpool decided on arrival at Ufa, in violation [spite] of hostility there to complete liberation women, to request their release on parole in Ufa while he was to proceed at once to Vyatka, where Bolsheviks have taken their hostages from Ufa, with a letter signed by these women thus conditionally released, addressed to Bolsheviks, Vyatka, in which they ask Bolsheviks to release the men to International Red Cross. The plan approved by governor of Ufa, who has signed the protocol, authorized the release of the women on parole immediately.
Then French Consul Bayard, Ekaterinburg, who manifested hostility toward the plan from the first, secured arrest of Catchpool by Czech espionage organization and laid three charges against him: (1) having a forged ticket of admission to the government conference then in session; (2) having a falsely signed paper, French Consul General, Moscow (on examination Czechs, American and British Consuls from Ekaterinburg found all Catchpool papers quite satisfactory); (3) French Consul charged that in conversation Catchpool has shown sympathy with Bolsheviks for whom doubtless was collecting information, and French Consul urged that he be forbidden to return to Moscow. Catchpool answered the fact that he was [Page 713] chosen by the authorities in Moscow to carry out the mission was a proof of his sincerity.
Czech authorities refused to free him unless he would sign paper that would not try to return to any part of Russia held by Bolsheviks. Catchpool reluctant to sign because he felt responsibility to Moscow consuls to return, but the British and American Consuls from Ekaterinburg advised against the attempt to return under the circumstances, and on their advice he signed.
French Consul, Samara, was with British and American Consuls in the joint protest in the matter to the Russian Government at Samara and, since this directly concerns the French citizens held in Moscow, attitude of French Consul at Ekaterinburg inexplicable.
[Catchpool requests] communicate with Major Wardwell, Red Cross, Moscow, through the Department, inform failure of efforts his representative for the reason given; communication from here is impossible.1 No answer from our joint protest against taking hostages to the Samara government, although thrice repeated. Should the protest be repeated to the new government, Omsk? Will endeavor to obtain information relative to the present situation, Ufa.
- Sent via the Consulate at Vladivostok (No. 232, Oct. 28).↩
- See despatch from the Consul in Moscow, Sept. 2, ante, p. 680.↩
- Telegram repeated, Nov. 1, to the Chargé in Sweden, with instructions: “Please ask Wardwell what this telegram means. Department has no information whatever regarding hostages taken by Czechs and Bolsheviks.”↩