Page:Albert Beaumont - Heroic Story of the Czecho-Slovak Legions - 1919.djvu/68

 Our first dispute was at Kursk, with the commander of the station and the local garrison of Bolsheviks, Colonel Anton of OvsieienskoAntonov-Ovseyenko [sic], who took upon himself to ask us to surrender our arms before proceeding further. He claimed to have orders from Moscow, but whether this was true or not, we were determined not to surrender. Our movement was suspended for awhile, and after much discussion an agreement was reached with him on March 18 to surrender some of our machine-guns and batteries. Many of these were really superfluous, having been collected after the battle of Bakmatch, and he did not know how much we retained. It was very important for us, of course, to have free passage beyond Kursk, as this station was still some 400 kilometres from Pensa, our next point of concentration, and where our troops from Bakmatch were to form their junction with those coming from Poltava. The later were moving towards Pensa, vià Kharkoff, Kubiansk, Rkiscevo, and Balashof, whilst those from Bakmatch had to pass through Orel, Yelez, and Tambof.

Professor Masaryk himself went to Moscow to secure the free passage of our troops, and on March 20 he obtained the written authorisation from Lenin and Trotsky to continue the transport of our columns unmolested to Siberia. On his return he declared that his impression was that Lenin was anxious we should get away as soon as possible. But German intrigues, doubtless, were again at work, and, to the surprise of our commanders and the members of our National Assembly, the Soviet of Pensa, on the arrival of our first detachements, announced on March 24 that we should not be allowed to proceed further unless we completely disarmed. Thus the Moscow Government one day signed a solemn pact, and the next day was ready to rescind it. No reliance could be placed on such men. Discussion and wranglings ensued between the local Bolshevik Commissioner and our delegates. We declared that it was impossible that he should have received such an order from Moscow, and we showed him the written authorisation. He showed us the telegram from Moscow. There was no further doubt. The Moscow Government wanted us to give up our arms. This we would not do without some further agreement. On March 26 a Bolshevik plenipotentiary, instructed from Moscow, once more made a proposal which we were obliged to accept. Three battalions out of each regiment were to be disarmed, and only one battalion was to retain a certain number of rifles, with 100 cartridges for each rifle, and one machine-gun. Each echelon consisted of about one battalion, so that the rifles had to be distributed among various echelons in order not to leave them entirely without defence.