American National Red Cross; Red Cross and Red Crescent
When we reached Riga, we learned that two hundred and forty peasants had
been waiting on the dock two days, waiting and waiting for the ship from
America. Not waiting for food, for Riga was not in a famine province,
but waiting that they might not miss the opportunity and the honor of
unloading the American ship that had brought food to their unfortunate
brothers in the interior. As soon as they could get into the hold of the
ship, one hundred and forty of them began the unloading. They worked
night and day, without rest, determined to unload the entire cargo
themselves without help. But on the third night our consul, Mr.
Bornholdt, insisted on their having a relief of twelve hours, and when
the twelve hours were up they were all in their places again, and
remained until the cargo was out, declining to take any pay for their
labor. Twelve women worked along with them, in the same spirit, in the
ship and on the dock, with needles, sewing up the rents in the bags to
prevent waste in handling.
Only a part of the "Tynehead's" cargo was in bags; hence for convenience
and economy in handling and the final distribution, we purchased in St.
Petersburg and Riga 43,000 additional bags to sack the rest of the
cargo, which in all amounted to nearly 117,000 bushels of shelled corn,
11,033 bags of flour and meal, besides small amounts of wheat, rye,
bacon, canned goods, drugs, etc., requiring 307 Russian freight cars for
its transportation. Some of this was reshipped on steamboats sent up the
headwaters of the Volga, reshipped again on cars nearly to the foot of
the Ural Mountains, a distance of 3,000 miles from Riga. Notwithstanding
our declaration while in St. Petersburg that neither the Red Cross nor
the American people desired any public ceremonies in the way of
acknowledgments: dinners, excursions and public demonstrations and
illuminations were planned, which we felt ourselves obliged to decline
on the ground we had first taken, that any effort and any money proposed
to be used in this manner would be most acceptable to all Americans if
turned into food for the hungry, whom we had come to help.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account