Page:Lars Henning Söderhjelm - The Red Insurrection in Finland in 1918 - tr. Annie Ingebord Fausbøll (1920).djvu/121

 the chief of the motor-car department."—The Red Guard had a lot of women in its service. They were employed partly as common soldiers, for many woman battalions had been formed, partly as nurses, partly as God only knows what. But there was this curious circumstance that the wives of the Red Guardsmen were not allowed to serve in the Red Guard. In part at least the reason for this was no doubt that ladies with more extensive connections were more heartily welcomed in those circles. So much is suggested by a written communication from the municipal employment office at Helsingfors, which informs the Red Guard that there is great unemployment among the women of the city. "This is in part due to the fact," says the office with polite good fellowship, "that the Red Guard to a certain extent follow the so-called system of favouritism in the appointment of women, and therefore there are women in the service of the Guard who, on account of their moral conduct, are not adapted for work."—A cashier in the Guard sends in a written complaint of the frauds committed by his staff.—The chief of the general staff is taken into custody in the street, together with a Russian colonel, on account of intoxication.—On the 26th March the staff at Helsingfors resolve that the majors are to pledge themselves to go with their men to the front!

What has here been stated will no doubt be sufficient. These examples will not exactly give you any high opinion of the value of the Red army as a fighting power. And yet it was able to offer decent resistance. This—apart from the great lot of artillery, etc.—was due to the fact that the civil war in many ways had an "old-fashioned stamp," and that the innumerable skirmishes, surprises, and actions required more personal courage than discipline and control. In general there was no lack of such personal courage.