Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 39, Number 2, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 7 September 1906 — GIRL TERRORISTS. [ARTICLE]

GIRL TERRORISTS.

The J Cmr la la Greatest Dancer from Female Assassins. The Czar of Russia never stood in greater danger of assassination than he does to-day, Disaffection is so widespread and the terrorist propaganda has entered so many walks of life that for auglit he knows one who is the nearest to him may have takeman oath to remove him. I’rhaps he stands in greater danger from women than from men, for to women have been delegated some of Alie!3nqsfT danger-" 011 s work of the crew of assassination. As t far began to assume nihilist leadership and became even more fanatical than the men. Some of them proved absolutely fearless' nnti regardless of their own lives. They cut off their hair and as men studied in the colleges, particularly along the line of chemistry, until they became expert makers of deadly explosives. Young women of the highest rank dressed themselves as peasants, and sought menial employment that they might be' emissaries of nihilism. The Princess Tomborskoie was found working among washerwomen spreading the propaganda, and the universities became mere training schools for such as she. Many of them have been sent to Siberia. ' 1. ■ One of these wofnen leaders was Mme. Catherine Berschkovsky, a member of an aristocratic family, who was imbued with revolutionary ideas from her youth. She lectured to the peasants till silenced by the government. Then, under various disguises, she traveled about until 1874, when she was arrested and sent to Siberia with some 500 others. She was - the first woman to be sentenced to hard labor in the mines. She escaped, but was recaptured and kept g convict till 1896. In the recent outbreak of assassinations women and girls have committed many of • the most daring attacks on officials of the regime. The instance most familiar is that of the killing of Luzhanoffsky, chief of the secret police, by Marie Spiridonova, who has been called the second Charlotte Corday. She is only 17 years old. After shooting the official she was subjected to such inhuman cruelty by the Cossacks, who sent her at last to the hospital wi h a fractured skull and many frightful wounds on her body, and there was a great outcry throughout all Russia against Such barbarism. Recently one of these fanatical women committed suicide because her plans at assassination had failed. She was Barbara Printz of Moscow, daughter of Lieut. Gen. Printz. Among her friends at school had been the daughters of Gov. Gen. Gaulbars of Odessa. These young ladies sent her an invitatidn to pay them a visit. She told her superiors among the nihilists of the opportunity presented by the invitation, and they commissioned her to kill the governor general. She went to Odessa and was daily a visitor at the palace of the governor, though part of the time oe •upying a room at a hotel. Friday sh< started from the hotel to go t’o the gov ernor’s palace, having in the meantime learned the easiest means of gaining en--1 ranee to his presence. Beneath her cloak she carried a bomb. Accidentally she dropped the bomb on the street and it exploded with terrific force, but she was not injured. Knowing that any further effort at assassination would now be fruitless, she returned, to the hotel and killed herself with a revolver.