Chapter 5
THE AMERICAN RED CROSS MISSION IN
RUSSIA — 1917
Poor Mr. Billings believed he was in charge of a scientific mission for the relief of Russia .... He was in reality nothing but a mask — the Red Cross complexion of the mission was nothing but a mask.
Cornelius
Kelleher, assistant to William Boyce Thompson (in George F. Kennan, Russia
Leaves the War)
The Wall Street project in Russia in 1917 used the Red Cross Mission as its operational vehicle. Both Guaranty Trust and National City Bank had representatives in Russia at the time of the revolution. Frederick M. Corse of the National City Bank branch in Petrograd
Up
to about 1915 the most influential person in the American Red Cross National
Headquarters in Washington, D.C. was Miss Mabel Boardman. An active and
energetic promoter, Miss Boardman had been the moving force behind the Red
Cross enterprise, although its endowment came from wealthy and prominent
persons including J. P. Morgan, Mrs. E. H. Harriman, Cleveland H. Dodge, and
Mrs. Russell Sage. The 1910 fund-raising campaign for $2 million, for example,
was successful only because it was supported by these wealthy residents of New
York City. In fact, most of the money came from New York City. J.P. Morgan
himself contributed $100,000 and seven other contributors in New York City
amassed $300,000. Only one person outside New York City contributed over
$10,000 and that was William J. Boardman, Miss Boardman's father. Henry P.
Davison was chairman of the 1910 New York Fund-Raising Committee and later became
chairman of the War Council of the American Red Cross. In other words, in World
War I the Red Cross depended heavily on Wall Street, and specifically on the
Morgan firm.
The
Red Cross was unable to cope with the demands of World War I and in effect was
taken over by these New York bankers. According to John Foster Dulles, these
businessmen "viewed the American Red Cross as a virtual arm of government,
they envisaged making an incalculable contribution to the winning of the
war."1
In so doing they made a mockery of the Red Cross motto: "Neutrality and
Humanity."
In
exchange for raising funds, Wall Street asked for the Red Cross War Council;
and on the recommendation of Cleveland H. Dodge, one of Woodrow Wilson's
financial backers, Henry P. Davison, a partner in J.P. Morgan Company, became
chairman. The list of administrators of the Red Cross then began to take on the
appearance of the New York Directory of Directors: John D. Ryan, president of
Anaconda Copper Company (see frontispiece); George W. Hill, president of the
American Tobacco Company; Grayson M.P. Murphy, vice president of the Guaranty
Trust Company; and Ivy Lee, public relations expert for the Rockefellers. Harry
Hopkins, later to achieve fame under President Roosevelt, became assistant to
the general manager of the Red Cross in Washington, D.C.
The
question of a Red Cross Mission to Russia came before the third meeting of this
reconstructed War Council, which was held in the Red Cross Building,
Washington, D.C., on Friday, May 29, 1917, at 11:00 A.M. Chairman Davison was
deputed to explore the idea with Alexander Legge of the International Harvester
Company. Subsequently International Harvester, which had considerable interests
in Russia, provided $200,000 to assist financing the Russian mission. At a
later meeting it was made known that William Boyce Thompson, director of the
Federal Reserve Bank of New York, had "offered to pay the entire expense
of the commission"; this offer was accepted in a telegram: "Your
desire to pay expenses of commission to Russia is very much appreciated and
from our point of view very important."2
The
members of the mission received no pay. All expenses were paid by William Boyce
Thompson and the $200,000 from International Harvester was apparently used in
Russia for political subsidies. We know from the files of the U.S. embassy in
Petrograd that the U.S. Red Cross gave 4,000 rubles to Prince Lvoff, president
of the Council of Ministers, for "relief of revolutionists" and
10,000 rubles in two payments to Kerensky for "relief of political
refugees."
In
August 1917 the American Red Cross Mission to Russia had only a nominal
relationship with the American Red Cross, and must truly have been the most
unusual Red Cross Mission in history. All expenses, including those of the
uniforms — the members were all colonels, majors, captains, or lieutenants —
were paid out of the pocket of William Boyce Thompson. One contemporary
observer dubbed the all-officer group an "Haytian Army":
The
American Red Cross delegation, about forty Colonels, Majors, Captains and
Lieutenants, arrived yesterday. It is headed by Colonel (Doctor) Billings of
Chicago, and includes Colonel William B. Thompson and many doctors and
civilians, all with military titles; we dubbed the outfit the "Haytian
Army" because there were no privates. They have come to fill no clearly
defined mission, as far as I can find out, in fact Gov. Francis told me some
time ago that he had urged they not be allowed to come, as there were already
too many missions from the various allies in Russia. Apparently, this
Commission imagined there was urgent call for doctors and nurses in Russia; as
a matter of fact there is at present a surplus of medical talent and nurses,
native and foreign in the country and many haft-empty hospitals in the large
cities.3
The
mission actually comprised only twenty-four (not forty), having military rank
from lieutenant colonel down to lieutenant, and was supplemented by three
orderlies, two motion-picture photographers, and two interpreters, without
rank. Only five (out of twenty-four) were doctors; in addition, there were two
medical researchers. The mission arrived by train in Petrograd via Siberia in
August 1917. The five doctors and orderlies stayed one month, returning to the
United States on September 11. Dr. Frank Billings, nominal head of the mission
and professor of medicine at the University of Chicago, was reported to be
disgusted with the overtly political activities of the majority of the mission.
The other medical men were William S. Thayer, professor of medicine at Johns
Hopkins University; D. J. McCarthy, Fellow of Phipps Institute for Study and
Prevention of Tuberculosis, at Philadelphia; Henry C. Sherman, professor of
food chemistry at Columbia University; C. E. A. Winslow, professor of
bacteriology and hygiene at Yale Medical School; Wilbur E. Post, professor of
medicine at Rush Medical College; Dr. Malcolm Grow, of the Medical Officers
Reserve Corps of the U.S. Army; and Orrin Wightman, professor of clinical medicine,
New York Polyclinic Hospital. George C. Whipple was listed as professor of
sanitary engineering at Harvard University but in fact was partner of the New
York firm of Hazen, Whipple & Fuller, engineering consultants. This is
significant because Malcolm Pirnie — of whom more later — was listed as an
assistant sanitary engineer and employed as an engineer by Hazen, Whipple &
Fuller.
The
majority of the mission, as seen from the table, was made up of lawyers,
financiers, and their assistants, from the New York financial district. The
mission was financed by William B. Thompson, described in the official Red
Cross circular as "Commissioner and Business Manager; Director United
States Federal Bank of New York." Thompson brought along Cornelius
Kelleher, described as an attache to the mission but actually secretary to
Thompson and with the same address — 14 Wall Street, New York City. Publicity
for the mission was handled by Henry S. Brown, of the same address. Thomas Day
Thacher was an attorney with Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett, a firm founded by
his father, Thomas Thacher, in 1884 and prominently involved in railroad
reorganization and mergers. Thomas as junior first worked for the family firm,
became assistant U.S. attorney under Henry L. Stimson, and returned to the
family firm in 1909. The young Thacher was a close friend of Felix Frankfurter
and later became assistant to Raymond Robins, also on the Red Cross Mission. In
1925 he was appointed district judge under President Coolidge, became solicitor
general under Herbert Hoover, and was a director of the William Boyce Thompson
Institute.
|
THE
1917 AMERICAN RED CROSS MISSION TO RUSSIA
|
||
|
Members
from Wall Street financial community and their affiliations
|
Medical
doctors |
Orderlies,
interpreters, etc. |
|
Andrews
(Liggett & Myers Tobacco)
|
Billings
(doctor)
|
Brooks
(orderly)
|
|
Barr
(Chase National Bank)
|
Grow
(doctor)
|
Clark
(orderly)
|
|
Brown
(c/o William B. Thompson)
|
McCarthy
(medical research; doctor)
|
Rocchia
(orderly)
|
|
Cochran
(McCann Co.)
|
Post
(doctor)
|
|
|
Kelleher
(c/o William B. Thompson)
|
Sherman
(food chemistry)
|
Travis
(movies)
|
|
Nicholson
(Swirl & Co.)
|
Thayer
(doctor)
|
Wyckoff
(movies)
|
|
Pirnie
(Hazen, Whipple & Fuller)
|
|
|
|
Redfield
(Stetson, Jennings & Russell)
|
Wightman
(medicine)
|
Hardy
(justice)
|
|
Robins
(mining promoter)
|
Winslow
(hygiene)
|
Horn
(transportation)
|
|
Swift
(Swift & Co.)
|
|
|
|
Thacher
(Simpson, Thacher & Bartlett)
|
|
|
|
Thompson
(Federal Reserve Bank of N.Y.)
|
|
|
|
Wardwell
(Stetson, Jennings & Russell)
|
|
|
|
Whipple
(Hazen, Whipple & Fuller)
|
|
|
|
Corse
(National City Bank)
|
|
|
|
Magnuson
(recommended by confidential agent of Colonel Thompson)
|
|
|
Alan
Wardwell, also a deputy commissioner and secretary to the chairman, was a
lawyer with the law firm of Stetson, Jennings & Russell of 15 Broad Street,
New York City, and H. B. Redfield was law secretary to Wardwell. Major Wardwell
was the son of William Thomas Wardwell, long-time treasurer of Standard Oil of
New Jersey and Standard Oil of New York. The elder Wardwell was one of the
signers of the famous Standard Oil trust agreement, a member of the committee
to organize Red Cross activities in the Spanish American War, and a director of
the Greenwich Savings Bank. His son Alan was a director not only of Greenwich
Savings, but also of Bank of New York and Trust Co. and the Georgian Manganese
Company (along with W. Averell Harriman, a director of Guaranty Trust). In 1917
Alan Wardwell was affiliated with Stetson, Jennings 8c Russell and later joined
Davis, Polk, Wardwell, Gardner & Read (Frank L. Polk was acting secretary
of state during the Bolshevik Revolution period). The Senate Overman Committee
noted that Wardwell was favorable to the Soviet regime although Poole, the
State Department official on the spot, noted that "Major Wardwell has of all
Americans the widest personal knowledge of the terror" (316-23-1449). In
the 1920s Wardwell became active with the Russian-American Chamber of Commerce
in promoting Soviet trade objectives.
The
treasurer of the mission was James W. Andrews, auditor of Liggett & Myers
Tobacco Company of St. Louis. Robert I. Barr, another member, was listed as a
deputy commissioner; he was a vice president of Chase Securities Company (120
Broadway) and of the Chase National Bank. Listed as being in charge of advertising
was William Cochran of 61 Broadway, New York City. Raymond Robins, a mining
promoter, was included as a deputy commissioner and described as "a social
economist." Finally, the mission included two members of Swift &
Company of Union Stockyards, Chicago. The Swifts have been previously mentioned
as being connected with German espionage in the United States during World War
I. Harold H. Swift, deputy commissioner, was assistant to the vice president of
Swift & Company; William G. Nicholson was also with Swift & Company,
Union Stockyards.
Two
persons were unofficially added to the mission after it arrived in Petrograd:
Frederick M. Corse, representative of the National City Bank in Petrograd; and
Herbert A. Magnuson, who was "very highly recommended by John W. Finch,
the confidential agent in China of Colonel William B. Thompson."4
The
Pirnie papers, deposited at the Hoover Institution, contain primary material on
the mission. Malcolm Pirnie was an engineer employed by the firm of Hazen,
Whipple & Fuller, consulting engineers, of 42 Street, New York City. Pirnie
was a member of the mission, listed on a manifest as an assistant sanitary
engineer. George C. Whipple, a partner in the firm, was also included in the
group. The Pirnie papers include an original telegram from William B. Thompson,
inviting assistant sanitary engineer Pirnie to meet with him and Henry P.
Davison, chairman of the Red Cross War Council and partner in the J.P. Morgan
firm, before leaving for Russia. The telegram reads as follows:
WESTERN
UNION TELEGRAM New York, June 21, 1917
To
Malcolm Pirnie
I
should very much like to have you dine with me at the Metropolitan Club,
Sixteenth Street and Fifth Avenue New York City at eight o'clock tomorrow
Friday evening to meet Mr. H. P. Davison.
W.
B. Thompson, 14 Wall Street
The
files do not elucidate why Morgan partner Davison and Thompson, director of the
Federal Reserve Bank — two of the most prominent financial men in New York —
wished to have dinner with an assistant sanitary engineer about to leave for
Russia. Neither do the files explain why Davison was subsequently unable to
meet Dr. Billings and the commission itself, nor why it was necessary to advise
Pirnie of his inability to do so. But we may surmise that the official cover of
the mission — Red Cross activities — was of significantly less interest than
the Thompson-Pirnie activities, whatever they may have been. We do know that
Davison wrote to Dr. Billings on June 25, 1917:
Dear
Doctor Billings:
It
is a disappointment to me and to my associates on the War Council not have been
able to meet in a body the members of your Commission ....
A
copy of this letter was also mailed to assistant sanitary engineer Pirnie with
a personal letter from Morgan banker Henry P. Davison, which read:
My
dear Mr. Pirnie:
You
will, I am sure, entirely understand the reason for the letter to Dr. Billings,
copy of which is enclosed, and accept it in the spirit in which it is sent ....
The
purpose of Davison's letter to Dr. Billings was to apologize to the commission
and Billings for being unable to meet with them. We may then be justified in
supposing that some deeper arrangements were made by Davison and Pirnie
concerning the activities of the mission in Russia and that these arrangements
were known to Thompson. The probable nature of these activities will be
described later.5
The
American Red Cross Mission (or perhaps we should call it the Wall Street
Mission to Russia) also employed three Russian-English interpreters: Captain
Ilovaisky, a Russian Bolshevik; Boris Reinstein, a Russian-American, later
secretary to Lenin, and the head of Karl Radek's Bureau of International
Revolutionary Propaganda, which also employed John Reed and Albert Rhys
Williams; and Alexander Gumberg (alias Berg, real name Michael Gruzenberg), who
was a brother of Zorin, a Bolshevik minister. Gumberg was also the chief
Bolshevik agent in Scandinavia. He later became a confidential assistant to
Floyd Odlum of Atlas Corporation in the United States as well as an adviser to
Reeve Schley, a vice president of the Chase Bank.
It
should be asked in passing: How useful were the translations supplied by these
interpreters? On September 13, 1918, H. A. Doolittle, American vice consul at
Stockholm, reported to the secretary of state on a conversation with Captain
Ilovaisky (who was a "close personal friend" of Colonel Robins of the
Red Cross Mission) concerning a meeting of the Murman Soviet and the Allies.
The question of inviting the Allies to land at Murman was under discussion at
the Soviet, with Major Thacher of the Red Cross Mission acting for the Allies.
Ilovaisky interpreted Thacher's views for the Soviet. "Ilovaisky spoke at
some length in Russian, supposedly translating for Thacher, but in reality for
Trotsky .... "to the effect that "the United States would never
permit such a landing to occur and urging the speedy recognition of the Soviets
and their politics."6
Apparently Thacher suspected he was being mistranslated and expressed his
indignation. However, "Ilovaisky immediately telegraphed the substance to
Bolshevik headquarters and through their press bureau had it appear in all the
papers as emanating from the remarks of Major Thacher and as the general
opinion of all truly accredited American representatives."7
Ilovaisky
recounted to Maddin Summers, U.S. consul general in Moscow, several instances
where he (Ilovaisky) and Raymond Robins of the Red Cross Mission had
manipulated the Bolshevik press, especially "in regard to the recall of
the Ambassador, Mr. Francis." He admitted that they had not been
scrupulous, "but had acted according to their ideas of right, regardless
of how they might have conflicted with the politics of the accredited American
representatives."8
This
then was the American Red Cross Mission to Russia in 1917.
In
1917 the American Red Cross also sent a medical assistance mission to Rumania,
then fighting the Central Powers as an ally of Russia. A comparison of the
American Red Cross Mission to Russia with that sent to Rumania suggests that
the Red Cross Mission based in Petrograd had very little official connection
with the Red Cross and even less connection with medical assistance. Whereas
the Red Cross Mission to Rumania valiantly upheld the Red Cross twin principles
of "humanity" and "neutrality," the Red Cross Mission in
Petrograd flagrantly abused both.
The
American Red Cross Mission to Rumania left the United States in July 1917 and
located itself at Jassy. The mission consisted of thirty persons under Chairman
Henry W. Anderson, a lawyer from Virginia. Of the thirty, sixteen were either
doctors or surgeons. By comparison, out of twenty-nine individuals with the Red
Cross Mission to Russia, only three were doctors, although another four members
were from universities and specialized in medically related fields. At the
most, seven could be classified as doctors with the mission to Russia compared
with sixteen with the mission to Rumania. There was about the same number of
orderlies and nurses with both missions. The significant comparison, however,
is that the Rumanian mission had only two lawyers, one treasurer, and one
engineer. The Russian mission had fifteen lawyers and businessmen. None of the
Rumanian mission lawyers or doctors came from anywhere near the New York area
but all, except one (an "observer" from the Department of Justice in
Washington, D.C.), of the lawyers and businessmen with the Russian mission came
from that area. Which is to say that more than half the total of the Russian
mission came from the New York financial district. In other words, the relative
composition of these missions confirms that the mission to Rumania had a legitimate
purpose — to practice medicine — while the Russian mission had a non-medical
and strictly political objective. From its personnel, it could be classified as
a commercial or financial mission, but from its actions it was a subversive
political action group.
|
PERSONNEL
WITH THE AMERICAN RED CROSS MISSIONS TO RUSSIA AND RUMANIA, 1917
|
||
|
|
AMERICAN
RED CROSS
MISSION TO |
|
|
Personnel
|
Russia
|
Rumania
|
|
Medical
(doctors and surgeons)
|
7
|
16
|
|
Orderlies,
nurses
|
7
|
10
|
|
Lawyers
and businessmen
|
15
|
4
|
|
TOTAL
|
29
|
30
|
|
SOURCES:
American Red Cross, Washington, D.C.
U.S. Department of State, Petrograd
embassy, Red Cross file, 1917.
|
||
The
Red Cross Mission to Rumania remained at its post in Jassy for the remainder of
1917 and into 1918. The medical staff of the American Red Cross Mission in
Russia — the seven doctors — quit in disgust in August 1917, protested the
political activities of Colonel Thompson, and returned to the United States.
Consequently, in September 1917, when the Rumanian mission appealed to Petrograd
for American doctors and nurses to help out in the near crisis conditions in
Jassy, there were no American doctors or nurses in Russia available to go to
Rumania.
Whereas
the bulk of the mission in Russia occupied its time in internal political maneuvering,
the mission in Rumania threw itself into relief work as soon as it arrived. On
September 17, 1917, a confidential cable from Henry W. Anderson, chairman of
the Rumania mission, to the American ambassador Francis in Petrograd requested
immediate and urgent help in the form of $5 million to meet an impending
catastrophe in Rumania. Then followed a series of letters, cables, and
communications from Anderson to Francis appealing, unsuccessfully, for help.
On
September 28, 1917, Vopicka, American minister in Rumania, cabled Francis at
length, for relay to Washington, and repeated Anderson's analysis of the
Rumanian crisis and the danger of epidemics — and worse — as winter closed in:
Considerable
money and heroic measures required prevent far reaching disaster .... Useless
try handle situation without someone with authority and access to government .
. . With proper organization to look after transport receive and distribute
supplies.
The
hands of Vopicka and Anderson were tied as all Rumanian supplies and financial
transactions were handled by the Red Cross Mission in Petrograd — and Thompson
and his staff of fifteen Wall Street lawyers and businessmen apparently had
matters of greater concern that Rumanian Red Cross affairs. There is no
indication in the Petrograd embassy files at the U.S. State Department that
Thompson, Robins, or Thacher concerned himself at any time in 1917 or 1918 with
the urgent situation in Rumania. Communications from Rumania went to Ambassador
Francis or to one of his embassy staff, and occasionally through the consulate
in Moscow.
By
October 1917 the Rumanian situation reached the crisis point. Vopicka cabled
Davison in New York (via Petrograd) on October 5:
Most
urgent problem here .... Disastrous effect feared .... Could you possibly
arrange special shipment .... Must rush or too late.
Then
on November 5 Anderson cabled the Petrograd embassy saying that delays in
sending help had already "cost several thousand lives." On November
13 Anderson cabled Ambassador Francis concerning Thompson's lack of interest in
Rumanian conditions:
Requested
Thompson furnish details all shipments as received but have not obtained same
.... Also requested him keep me posted as to transport conditions but received
very little information.
Anderson
then requested that Ambassador Francis intercede on his behalf in order to have
funds for the Rumanian Red Cross handled in a separate account in London,
directly under Anderson and removed from the control of Thompson's mission.
What
then was the Red Cross Mission doing? Thompson certainly acquired a reputation
for opulent living in Petrograd, but apparently he undertook only two major
projects in Kerensky's Russia: support for an American propaganda program and
support for the Russian Liberty Loan. Soon after arriving in Russia Thompson
met with Madame Breshko-Breshkovskaya and David Soskice, Kerensky's secretary,
and agreed to contribute $2 million to a committee of popular education so that
it could "have its own press and... engage a staff of lecturers, with
cinematograph illustrations" (861.00/ 1032); this was for the propaganda
purpose of urging Russia to continue in the war against Germany. According to
Soskice, "a packet of 50,000 rubles" was given to Breshko-Breshkovskaya
with the statement, "This is for you to expend according to your best
judgment." A further 2,100,000 rubles was deposited into a current bank
account. A letter from J. P. Morgan to the State Department (861.51/190)
confirms that Morgan cabled 425,000 rubles to Thompson at his request for the
Russian Liberty Loan; J. P. also conveyed the interest of the Morgan firm
regarding "the wisdom of making an individual subscription through Mr.
Thompson" to the Russian Liberty Loan. These sums were transmitted through
the National City Bank branch in Petrograd.
Of
greater historical significance, however, was the assistance given to the
Bolsheviks first by Thompson, then, after December 4, 1917, by Raymond Robins.
Thompson's
contribution to the Bolshevik cause was recorded in the contemporary American
press. The Washington Post of
February 2, 1918, carried the following paragraphs:
GIVES
BOLSHEVIKI A MILLION
W.
B. Thompson, Red Cross Donor, Believes Party Misrepresented. New York, Feb. 2
(1918). William B. Thompson, who was in Petrograd from July until November
last, has made a personal contribution of $1,000,000 to the Bolsheviki for the
purpose of spreading their doctrine in Germany and Austria.
Mr.
Thompson had an opportunity to study Russian conditions as head of the American
Red Cross Mission, expenses of which also were largely defrayed by his personal
contributions. He believes that the Bolsheviki constitute the greatest power
against Pro-Germanism in Russia and that their propaganda has been undermining
the militarist regimes of the General Empires.
Mr.
Thompson deprecates American criticism of the Bolsheviki. He believes they have
been misrepresented and has made the financial contribution to the cause in the
belief that it will be money well spent for the future of Russia as well as for
the Allied cause.
Hermann
Hagedorn's biography The Magnate: William
Boyce Thompson and His Time (1869-1930) reproduces a photograph of a
cablegram from J.P. Morgan in New York to W. B. Thompson, "Care American
Red Cross, Hotel Europe, Petrograd." The cable is date-stamped, showing it
was received at Petrograd "8-Dek 1917" (8 December 1917), and reads:
New
York Y757/5 24W5 Nil — Your cable second received. We have paid National City
Bank one million dollars as instructed — Morgan.
The
National City Bank branch in Petrograd had been exempted from the Bolshevik
nationalization decree — the only foreign or domestic Russian bank to have been
so exempted. Hagedorn says that this million dollars paid into Thompson's NCB
account was used for "political purposes."
William
B. Thompson left Russia in early December 1917 to return home. He traveled via
London, where, in company with Thomas Lamont of the J.P. Morgan firm, he
visited Prime Minister Lloyd George, an episode we pick up in the next chapter.
His deputy, Raymond Robins, was left in charge of the Red Cross Mission to
Russia. The general impression that Colonel Robins presented in the subsequent
months was not overlooked by the press. In the words of the Russian newspaper Russkoe Slovo, Robins "on the one
hand represents American labor and on the other hand American capital, which is
endeavoring through the Soviets to gain their Russian markets."10
Raymond
Robins started life as the manager of a Florida phosphate company commissary.
From this base he developed a kaolin deposit, then prospected Texas and the
Indian territories in the late nineteenth century. Moving north to Alaska,
Robins made a fortune in the Klondike gold rush. Then, for no observable
reason, he switched to socialism and the reform movement. By 1912 he was an
active member of Roosevelt's Progressive Party. He joined the 1917 American Red
Cross Mission to Russia as a "social economist."
There
is considerable evidence, including Robins' own statements, that his reformist
social-good appeals were little more than covers for the acquisition of further
power and wealth, reminiscent of Frederick Howe's suggestions in Confessions of a Monopolist. For
example, in February 1918 Arthur Bullard was in Petrograd with the U.S.
Committee on Public Information and engaged in writing a long memorandum for
Colonel Edward House. This memorandum was given to Robins by Bullard for
comments and criticism before transmission to House in Washington, D.C. Robins'
very unsocialistic and imperialistic comments were to the effect that the
manuscript was "uncommonly discriminating, far-seeing and well done,"
but that he had one or two reservations — in particular, that recognition of
the Bolsheviks was long overdue, that it should have been effected immediately,
and that had the U.S. so recognized the Bolsheviks, "I believe that we
would now be in control of the surplus resources of Russia and have control
officers at all points on the frontier."11
This
desire to gain "control of the surplus resources of Russia" was also
obvious to Russians. Does this sound like a social reformer in the American Red
Cross or a Wall Street mining promoter engaged in the practical exercise of
imperialism?
In
any event, Robins made no bones about his support for the Bolshevists.12
Barely three weeks after the Bolshevik phase of the Revolution started, Robins
cabled Henry Davison at Red Cross headquarters: "Please urge upon the
President the necessity of our continued intercourse with the Bolshevik
Government." Interestingly, this cable was in reply to a cable instructing
Robins that the "President desires the withholding of direct
communications by representatives of the United States with the Bolshevik
Government."13
Several State Department reports complained about the partisan nature of
Robins' activities. For example, on March 27, 1919, Harris, the American consul
at Vladivostok, commented on a long conversation he had had with Robins and
protested gross inaccuracies in the latter's reporting. Harris wrote,
"Robins stated to me that no German and Austrian prisoners of war had
joined the Bolshevik army up to May 1918. Robbins knew this statement was
absolutely false."
Harris then proceeded to provide the details of evidence available to Robins.14
Harris
concluded, "Robbins deliberately misstated facts concerning Russia at that
time and he has been doing it ever since."
On
returning to the United States in 1918, Robins continued his efforts in behalf
of the Bolsheviks. When the files of the Soviet Bureau were seized by the Lusk
Committee, it was found that Robins had had "considerable
correspondence" with Ludwig Martens and other members of the bureau. One
of the more interesting documents seized was a letter from Santeri Nuorteva
(alias Alexander Nyberg), the first Soviet representative in the U.S., to
"Comrade Cahan," editor of the New
York Daily Forward. The letter called on the party faithful to prepare the
way for Raymond Robins:
(To
Daily)
FORWARD July
6, 1918
Dear
Comrade Cahan:
It
is of the utmost importance that the Socialist press set up a clamor
immediately that Col. Raymond Robins, who has just returned from Russia at the
head of the Red Cross Mission, should be heard from in a public report to the
American people. The armed intervention danger has greatly increased. The
reactionists are using the Czecho-Slovak adventure to bring about invasion.
Robins has all the facts about this and about the situation in Russia
generally. He takes our point of view.
I
am enclosing copy of Call editorial which shows a general line of argument,
also some facts about Czecho-Slovaks.
Fraternally,
PS&AU Santeri
Nuorteva
Unknown
to its administrators, the Red Cross has been used from time to time as a
vehicle or cover for revolutionary activities. The use of Red Cross markings
for unauthorized purposes is not uncommon. When Tsar Nicholas was moved from
Petrograd to Tobolsk allegedly for his safety (although this direction was
towards danger rather than safety), the train carried Japanese Red Cross
placards. The State Department files contain examples of revolutionary activity
under cover of Red Cross activities. For example, a Russian Red Cross official
(Chelgajnov) was arrested in Holland in 1919 for revolutionary acts
(316-21-107). During the Hungarian Bolshevik revolution in 1918, led by Bela
Kun, Russian members of the Red Cross (or revolutionaries operating as members
of the Russian Red Cross) were found in Vienna and Budapest. In 1919 the U.S. ambassador
in London cabled Washington startling news; through the British government he
had learned that "several Americans who had arrived in this country in the
uniform of the Red Cross and who stated that they were Bolsheviks . . . were
proceeding through France to Switzerland to spread Bolshevik propaganda."
The ambassador noted that about 400 American Red Cross people had arrived in
London in November and December 1918; of that number one quarter returned to
the United States and "the remainder insisted on proceeding to
France." There was a later report on January 15, 1918, to the effect that
an editor of a labor newspaper in London had been approached on three different
occasions by three different American Red Cross officials who offered to take
commissions to Bolsheviks in Germany. The editor had suggested to the U.S.
embassy that it watch American Red Cross personnel. The U.S. State Department
took these reports seriously and Polk cabled for names, stating, "If true,
I consider it of the greatest importance" (861.00/3602 and /3627).
To
summarize: the picture we form of the 1917 American Red Cross Mission to Russia
is remote from one of neutral humanitarianism. The mission was in fact a
mission of Wall Street financiers to influence and pave the way for control,
through either Kerensky or the Bolshevik revolutionaries, of the Russian market
and resources. No other explanation will explain the actions of the mission.
However, neither Thompson nor Robins was a Bolshevik. Nor was either even a
consistent socialist. The writer is inclined to the interpretation that the
socialist appeals of each man were covers for more prosaic objectives. Each man
was intent upon the commercial; that is, each sought to use the political
process in Russia for personal financial ends. Whether the Russian people
wanted the Bolsheviks was of no concern. Whether the Bolshevik regime would act
against the United States — as it consistently did later — was of no concern.
The single overwhelming objective was to gain political and economic influence
with the new regime, whatever its ideology. If William Boyce Thompson had acted
alone, then his directorship of the Federal Reserve Bank would be
inconsequential. However, the fact that his mission was dominated by
representatives of Wall Street institutions raises a serious question — in
effect, whether the mission was a planned, premeditated operation by a Wall
Street syndicate. This the reader will have to judge for himself, as the rest
of the story unfolds.
Footnotes:
1John Foster Dulles, American Red Cross (New York: Harper,
1950).
2Minutes of the War Council of the
American National Red Cross (Washington, D.C., May 1917)
3Gibbs Diary, August 9, 1917. State
Historical Society of Wisconsin.
4 Billings report to Henry P. Davison, October
22, 1917, American Red Cross Archives.
5The Pirnie papers also enable us to fix
exactly the dates that members of the mission left Russia. In the case of
William B. Thompson, this date is critical to the argument of this book:
Thompson left Petrograd for London on December 4, 1917. George F. Kennan states
Thompson left Petrograd on November 27, 1917 (Russia Leaves the War, p. 1140).
6U.S. State Dept. Decimal File,
861.00/3644.
7Ibid.
8Ibid.
9Robins is the correct spelling. The
name is consistently spelled "Robbins" in the Stale Department files.
10U.S. State Dept. Decimal File,
316-11-1265, March 19, 1918.
11Bullard ms., U.S. State Dept. Decimal
File, 316-11-1265.
12The New
World Review (fall 1967, p. 40) comments on Robins, noting that he was
"in sympathy with the aims of the Revolution, although a capitalist "
13Petrograd embassy, Red Cross file.
14U.S. State Dept. Decimal File,
861.00/4168.
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