Foreign military journalists in Manchuria in 1904-1905: features of daily activities

Mamonova Yuliya Olegovna ORCID: 0000-0003-1283-5729 independent researcher 6 Belinsky str., Novosibirsk, 630008, Russia iulia.mamonova@gmail.com

One of the key foreign policy events of the early 20th century was the clash of interests between Russia and Japan in 1904-1905. — together with the troops of the opposing sides, a large number of non-combatant guests from all over the world came to Manchuria. Many of them recorded their impressions of what was happening in the Far East in various forms and with varying degrees of detail. Among them were "professional eyewitnesses" — war correspondents who arrived to collect material for news agencies and editorial offices of periodicals. Valuable journalistic observations of foreigners can be found not only on the pages of newspapers: after returning home, the authors often published collections of correspondence from the theater of war. The totality of their creative heritage did not become an independent object of study, but in the last two decades research papers have been devoted to individual journalistic texts and their authors ^[1-7]. The British reporters received the most attention, while a significant part of the evidence of military personnel was left out of historical research.

The research tools enriched as a result of the anthropological turn allow us to look at the scientific and cognitive value of the testimonies of foreign war correspondents from a different angle, opening up new ways to use these texts as the basis of a source base or supplement to it.

The correspondence of journalists covering the Russian-Japanese war covers a wide range of topics and can act as an independent object of research, as well as an important source for studying the events of the war, the state of its participants, the attitude of the public towards it in Russia and in the world, as well as enrich the source base of historical and imagological research. Referring to the texts of correspondents can contribute to the study of the history of censorship, the world press, and familiarity with the conditions of professional activity of authors may be of paramount importance in this regard. The war of 1904-1905 broke out during a period rightly called the heyday of military journalism in the research literature ^[8]. Sensational reports everywhere transferred bloody battles from the theater of military operations directly to the living rooms of readers ^[9], and the presence of a war correspondent on the scene became a matter of prestige for any newspaper ^{[10, P. 23]}. Studying the circumstances of the creation of correspondents' records performs many functions, including allowing you to assess the information capacity in relation to each of the issues analyzed by researchers.

On the pages of their books, representatives of the European press willingly shared their impressions about the difficult conditions of a reporter's daily work in Manchuria. The difficulties encountered often prompted the authors to compare their situation with the conditions created for other guests of the theater of war. In particular, in discussions about the problems of interaction with censorship, the gaze of foreign journalists could be directed at representatives of Russian periodicals. Some foreigners admitted that it was hardly possible to compete with them professionally: the actions of Russian journalists were less constrained and more often encouraged by the authorities, as a result of which they sent news texts faster and in large volumes ^{[11, S. 356]}. Foreigners really occupied a special position in the press corps, since compatriots in the military were treated with less suspicion, and the staff of the censorship department had a greater variability in the forms of control over their correspondence.

In some cases, it was possible to influence the publication of certain information even after the censorship procedure in case the censors made any mistakes. In particular, in April 1904, the head of the censorship department at the headquarters of the Commander-in-Chief, E. F. Pestich, in a telegram to the publisher of the newspaper Novoye Vremya, A. S. Suvorin, pointed out the undesirability of printing some of the telegrams of military commander I. A. Ladyzhensky that had been missed "by misunderstanding" ^[12]. With the telegrams of foreign guests, the censors had no right to make mistakes, control of their activities was recognized by the military authorities from the very beginning as especially difficult ^{[13, C. 30]}. It required careful supervision, numerous preventive measures and greater competence on the part of persons working with military personnel, which, combined with the alienness of the environment, which required outstanding adaptive potential and ingenuity from foreign reporters, complicated their working conditions and indeed could somewhat distinguish the situation of foreigners from the conditions of activity of representatives of Russian periodicals. Nevertheless, some foreign journalists found friends among the latter and shared with them the hardships of military life. An illustration of this can be the friendly relations of Irishman F. McCullagh from the New York Herald and A.M. Rykachev, a correspondent of the newspaper Nasha Zhizn ^{[14, P. 229-230]}.

The materials published by the journalists demonstrate that they were not alien to a sense of unity due to common problems, and from time to time they acted together. On the pages of the books there are references to the collective search for the best solution to everyday problems and joint movements in positions, some cases of mutual assistance. However, the nature of the relationship among foreign war correspondents could have a different connotation — there were cases of competition in the professional community. Military commanders united more often with their compatriots, especially for representatives of the British and American press. This trend provides some grounds for the conditional division of the corps of foreign reporters into two camps: one of them was made up of British and Americans, the other — subjects of other states. And if the former could not pay attention at all to colleagues from other countries and their working methods in their testimonies, then employees of other European publications occasionally spoke about the professionalism of British and American journalists, and often quite critically.

Thus, the reporter of the German Berliner Tageblatt R. Gedke mentioned the "sucked out of the finger" reports of British military officers ^{[11, S. 207]}. Frenchman R. Rakuli from Le Temps believed that the fact of his unauthorized trip with several colleagues in army positions could have become known to the censorship department precisely due to complaints from the British and Americans due to professional rivalry ^{[15, P. 105]}. The representative of the Hungarian German-language publication "Pester Lloyd" A. Spaich drew attention to the words of one of his interlocutors about their great earnings, earned only by the fact of staying in Manchuria. In addition, the reluctance of the British and Americans to leave the theater of operations voluntarily was noted: due to the preservation of funding from the editorial offices, the prospect of being expelled looked much more attractive to them ^{[16, S. 165]}. Apparently, the reporters involved in the professional competition also did not miss the opportunity to emphasize the integrity of their fellow compatriots. So, the Scotsman D. Story, a journalist for the Daily Express, introduced into the outline of his narrative the praise received from the chief censor in Manchuria for representatives of the English press, who at that time had never violated the instructions of the caesura department: "only a British correspondent seems to put his personal honor above his professional interests" ^{[17, P. 176-177]}. There were exceptions: difficult circumstances, distance and isolation were able to smooth out the resentments that arose on national grounds ^{[10, P. 28]}, and competition could flare up between compatriots. For example, Colonel F. E. Ogorodnikov reported on a complaint by a reporter from the American Collier's Weekly, J. F. Archibald, against his compatriots, journalists F. McCormick and A. G. Simpson ^{[18, L. 579]}. Nevertheless, the correspondents tried to act separately, if possible, using "special and top-secret methods" ^{[19, S. 42]}, trying to gain access to unknown other information and gradually acquire a network of connections useful from the point of view of obtaining such information.

As for the interaction of the authors with representatives of the armed forces, the materials of the testimonies of foreigners abound with examples of a very benevolent attitude towards them and many words of gratitude addressed to Russian servicemen. For example, Lord Brooke of Reuter's Telegram Co. dedicated his collection of materials to soldiers and officers of the Russian army "in memory of their kindness and hospitality." Englishman M. Baring, a journalist at the Morning Post, also called hospitality a widespread quality in Russia, regardless of social status and other characteristics ^{[20, P. 67-68]}, recalling with pleasure cases of self-care on the part of military personnel. Moreover, their lack of basic necessities was not an obstacle to this: despite the difficulties, provisions were shared everywhere with military commanders. The Irishman F. came to a similar conclusion. McCullagh, who witnessed similar situations that occurred, to his surprise, at any time of the day ^{[14, P. 114-115]}.

Of course, not everyone was happy to have foreign guests: office materials store not only concerns (often not unfounded) from the censors who worked with them, but also from the command staff. Thus, the head of the Eastern Detachment, F. E. Keller, found a significant number of journalists very shy for his unit ^{[18, l. 349]}. In the published texts of foreigners, there are also few episodes of distrust shown towards them. In some cases, prejudice was to blame for this — the same M. Baring noted the presence of a chilling effect and the primary negative reaction of interlocutors from recognition of their nationality and which newspaper he was a correspondent for ("Morning Post", in his opinion, was considered the most Russophobic ^{[20, P. 68]}). In others, there are specific incidents. For example, O. von Schwartz, referring to the story of one of the officers, wrote about how British reporters prevented F. E. Keller's Eastern Detachment, namely, an unexpected flank attack on the Japanese planned during the fighting. The enemy should not have discovered the battalion and battery behind the hill, but "suddenly, God knows where", two English correspondents with huge cork helmets and white tropical suits appeared on the hill, thus rendering a service to the Japanese in detecting Russian troops ^{[19, S. 61]}. There were also obvious conflict situations. Such were the Frenchman L. Nodot from Le Journal, whom the Russian soldiers mistook for a spy ^{[21, C. 271-274]}, and R. Ulrich from the German K?lnische Zeitung, who dealt with soldiers angry at the German speech ^{[22, S. 197]}. However, sharp corners were often smoothed out, and this was partly due not only to the difficulties experienced at the front together, but also because of the consolidating effect of the "war with others" on Europeans. In relation to foreigners, the troops often showed loquacity, curiosity in the rear (General Staff officer A. A. Ignatiev, who was responsible for receiving foreign military agents in Manchuria, even noted the tactlessness of curiosity towards foreigners in the rear ^[23]) and friendliness on the front line. Lord Brooke, for example, noted that the officers warmly welcomed the military personnel, were glad to see them and did not miss the opportunity to demonstrate the technical capabilities of weapons, discuss certain news ^{[24, P. 57]}.

It was in the military environment that foreign war correspondents found the main sources of information about the situation at the front, drew information about the emotional state of military personnel, and closely studied their views on what was happening. Reporters tried in every possible way to expand the circle of interviewees: among them were high—ranking officials (D. Storey, in particular, managed to talk with the Governor in the Far East, E. I. Alekseev ^{[17, P. 286-288]}), to ordinary ones - for correspondents who know Russian. Among the latter was M. Baring, who showed extreme interest in "ordinary people". Russian Russian was admired by Lord Brooke for his application of his excellent knowledge of the Russian language, which made the reporter of the Morning Post the main translator for his British comrades ^{[24, P. 2]}. Russian language proficiency was an important competitive advantage. Thus, the correspondent of the German "T?gliche Rundschau" M. T. Bermann emphasized the exclusivity of his professional experience, based on an excellent knowledge of Russia, its people and language, noting that all this allowed "to hear a lot of what was not heard by most foreigners" ^{[25, S. 3-4]}. O. von Schwartz, who also owned Russian Russian and signed all the necessary documents in Russian, also noted the need for language knowledge (along with the military) for the correct assessment of the situation by military officers, along the way pointing out that some journalists did not have them ^{[19, S. 302]}. Indeed, ignorance of foreign languages, according to researcher M. Martin, was at that time one of the leading characteristics for French correspondents ^{[10, P. 28]}, and therefore officers who spoke European languages were significantly in the lead in terms of numbers among those interviewed by military officers. Russian Russian was apparently a small number: in addition to the above-mentioned reporters, according to the records of journalists and some documents of the censorship department, F. McCormick, R. Ulrich, F. McCullagh also spoke Russian. Knowledge of the Chinese language turned out to be even less common among military journalists, and many military officers risked making an impression about what they saw solely on the basis of communication with the most educated part of society. However, they could be helped by the personal experience of other foreigners, mediation and other sources of information.

The description of difficulties in everyday life on the pages of books by foreign military officers was often supplemented by a comparison with the living conditions of other representatives of the foreign contingent in Manchuria, of which there were many: in addition to journalists and a number of civilians, who were mainly medical personnel, military attaches were present in the theater of operations, and the materials of journalists demonstrate their active interaction with each other. Some reporters especially focused the reader's attention on the complete independence of journalists in solving food and housing issues, which significantly distinguished their position in Manchuria from military agents ^{[19, S. 302]}. Living in hotels and Chinese fanzas was possible only at the beginning of the journey to the front. As a rule, more often foreigners camped in tents and were constantly in search of the best options for overnight accommodation. Thus, many of them sometimes resorted to the help of their compatriots, missionaries, who were not easy to find: "perhaps landing on the Moon would be as easy as finding an overnight stay in Liaoyang" ^{[15, P. 61]}. Foreigners who found themselves in the theater of war, like other guests of Manchuria, put up with the cold, lack of all amenities, crowding, endless "clouds of greedy midges" and rats, the need to take care of their own safety in case of possible, including Hunghuz, attacks. And, of course, the reporters remembered the numerous risks associated directly with the fighting or the sanitary and epidemiological situation. Numerous cases of dysentery, sunstrokes, fevers and infection with local infections have been recorded in the journalistic environment.

The war with Japan in 1904-1905 claimed the lives of some war correspondents. Two foreigners did not return home: the captain of the German Landwehr, Karl Baron Binder von Krieglstein from Berliner Lokal Anzeiger and a British citizen, an employee of the Associated Press Agency, Middleton ^{[13, Appendix No. 36]}. The latter died in the summer of 1904 from dysentery in Lyandyasyan, and the episodes associated with this fact were reflected in the testimonies of his British colleagues D. Story ^{[17, P. 136-140]} and Lord Brooke ^{[24, P. 44-47]}. However, only documentary materials can shed light on the abundance of difficulties associated with this event. An American, an employee of the same agency, F. McCormick, filed a petition for permission to accompany the body of the deceased as an executor ^{[18, L. 347]}, who had a dubious reputation in army circles due to the many scandals and violations of order associated with his name ^{[13, Appendix No. 76]}. The authorities were seriously afraid of possible provocations during the removal of the body. For example, the acting head of the marching diplomatic office of the governor in the Far East, G. A. Planson, pointed out the need to "ensure that foreigners do not take advantage of this opportunity for extraneous purposes" ^{[18, pp. 285-285 vol.]}.

So what did foreign war correspondents see and what events of the war did they find? Here, the clerical documentation of the military department comes to the aid of the reporters' texts to build a framework and form a superficial idea of the cycle in which their authors were involved. In particular, the lists of foreign war correspondents in Manchuria, maintained at the Headquarters of the Commander-in-Chief, became an important component of it. The documents contain the names of the reporters, the dates of their arrival or approval, and the time of termination. In some of the versions, it is possible to find other data — for example, information about the number of horses and servants accompanying reporters ^{[18, l. 265-266 vol.]}. However, the exact number of correspondents was difficult to account for: some of them used exclusively mail, and therefore did not need the title of war correspondent, remaining unknown to censorship. Others could have temporary permission to correspond due to the lack of a complete set of documents, and then left the theater of war, without having received the status they had previously coveted ^{[13, p. 31]}. It should be remembered that the transformations of the censorship system also entailed a lot of clerical problems and errors in documents. Some dates of arrival and departure of journalists may not be found in the lists, and information appearing in various sources often contradict each other.

An illustration of the latter can be attributed to the ambiguity with the order of admission of military personnel to the front line. The Scotsman d. Storey claimed that he was the first accredited foreign correspondent in Manchuria, and, taking into account representatives of the Russian press, the fourth. In his book, published at the end of 1904, he published a letter from the head of the censorship department, E. F. Pestich, stating this fact ^{[17, P. 63]}. However, he did not go through all the stages of censorship approval alone — his constant companion was the above-mentioned G. Middleton ^{[26, L. 12, 14]}. Colleagues acted together at the beginning of their journey and were accredited at the same time. In addition, the names of reporters who were ahead of D. Storey appear on the lists of the censorship department. The first foreigner among them is P. Giffard, a correspondent of the French "Le Matin". Already on March 8, 1904, he arrived in Harbin, and 2 days later he was accredited ^{[27, L. 72]}. Until the April influx of press representatives, according to the documents, the reporter remained the only officially approved foreign journalist in the theater of operations. Already in July 1904, being confident of the coming victory of Russia, he returned home ^[28]. It is not known whether such discrepancies were the result of any clerical errors or evidence of the censors' assistance to some of their wards. However, it is still necessary to take into account the special position of D. Storey: according to the characteristics given to him by G. A. Planson, he won the sympathy of all who had to deal with him ^{[26, L. 24]}. The journalist sought to demonstrate to his compatriots the disadvantage of the hostile attitude towards Russia, which, as he believed, was the fault of British publicists, he wanted to point out to the public "the good sides of Russia" and the common interests of the two countries. When leaving Manchuria, the writer announced his intention to publish a book called "The First Phase of the War", in which he could possibly find encouragement and support, planned to stop by St. Petersburg and report to the Foreign Ministry ^{[26, l. 25]}. Thus, comparing the texts of military commanders with other sources can provide many subjects for further study.

There are several stages in the dynamics of the number of foreign journalists present in Manchuria. The first of them covers the time period from the first days of the war to April 1904. The absence of accredited foreigners (as mentioned above, there was only one Frenchman on the lists of the censorship department), the insufficiency of the documentary base, the ambiguity of the procedure for accreditation and censorship give reason to consider this phase rather as preparation for the upcoming reception of foreign guests. Requests for approval as military correspondents to the army have been received since the first days of hostilities: already on January 29, this issue was raised by the General Staff in relation to several foreigners and one representative of the Russian press ^{[13, p. 30]}. It is important to remember here that the time of arrival of the military commander did not always correlate with his statement. For example, F. McCormick, an American accredited in April 1904 from The Associated Press and The Reuter's Telegram Company, wrote in a letter to the censor that he was the first to raise the issue of correspondence, but was approved by the last of the "pioneers": "I am not complaining at all, but I want to note this fact <...> it is puts me in an awkward position, which I must immediately explain by telegraph to London" ^{[13, 79]}. Another example is the French citizen L. Nodot, who, shortly before the outbreak of military events, had already sent a telegram from Manchuria ^[29]. Despite the fact that at that time, by chance, he ended up in Port Arthur, the Frenchman officially joined the army much later - a few months later ^{[13, C. 35]}. Therefore, it should be remembered that the number of accredited military personnel in the theater of military operations is not only a measure of the interest of the world community in the events in the Far East. First of all, these data serve as an indicator of the readiness of the military authorities to take this interest into account and join the struggle for influence on public opinion, allowing journalists to join the troops and giving them the right to correspond.

From mid—April to mid-July 1904, there was a surge in accreditations, which allows us to draw the lower boundary of the next stage - the stage of steady growth in the number of press representatives, active interaction of military authorities with reporters, progress in regulating the activities of the latter through trial and error. However, this milestone was difficult to overcome: the journalists who arrived could not get to the front due to the concentration of forces and the preparation of the theater of war. Even with the issuance of appropriate passes, the arrival of military commanders and their submissive expectation of further decisions from the military authorities, discussions about the expediency of their presence still did not subside. So, in the spring of the first year of the war, it became known that the army commander A. N. Kuropatkin no longer wanted the presence of foreign correspondents in the combat area, and therefore they had to stay in Mukden ^{[18, L. 527-527 vol.]}. As a result of the May discussions, A. N. Kuropatkin nevertheless agreed with the need for their stay, but set a completely impossible condition for many — to correspond only in German or French due to the absence of people in the army who spoke English at a sufficient level. Foreigners were notified of this immediately before their departure to Liaoyang, which caused a violent reaction. However, later in correspondence between the chiefs of staff of the Manchurian Army and the Governor in the Far East, it turned out that this order was the result of a misunderstanding and in fact had no force ^{[18, l. 541]}. There were still experts in English among the censors. In addition, such actions were considered undesirable from a political point of view.

Correspondence from foreigners indicates that such misunderstandings affected the conditions of the journalistic activity of foreigners in Manchuria in the form of delays at all stages of the work process, especially often they occurred in the first time after accreditation. In particular, the result of the above incident was the belated admission of the British and Americans to the front lines, while the military commanders of other countries could already begin to perform their professional duties. The compilers of the report on the use of censorship noted that the duality in management, which remained until October 1904, probably served as the main source of such situations — the freedom of access of correspondents to the front was affected by clashes between the Army Commander and the Governor's Staff due to the desire of each side to control the approval and direction of military personnel to the troops independently ^{[13, P. 36]}. In July 1904, the correspondent corps in Manchuria had the largest number of accredited foreigners — 20 people, i.e. more than half of their total number for the entire period of the war. The number of press representatives who were briefly in Manchuria (who arrived and left the Russian army within one month) in July was also particularly high.

The July peak was followed by a gradual outflow of foreign journalists. This trend continued until the end of February 1905. The decrease in the number of journalists with the troops occurred unevenly — until the autumn, the proportion of the contingent remained significant, and since November, the pace of those leaving Manchuria has accelerated somewhat. This was partly due to the policy of the editorial offices — some of them recalled their employees, no longer counting on serious military action in the winter and doubting that the information received from correspondents would pay off the costs of their presence in the Far East. In addition, according to the testimony of some reporters, even in the changed conditions, it was still not so easy to get into their ranks. For example, the Austro-Hungarian citizen A. Spaich, who arrived at the theater of military operations at the end of January 1905, recorded the following recognition by the head of the censorship department: "for a long time we have refused other correspondents with similar requests to enter the theater of military operations" ^{[16, S. 161]}. On the other hand, journalists at this time often expressed a desire to go home themselves due to fatigue and fears associated with the upcoming harsh winter ^{[27, l. 285]}. This period seems to be the longest: its upper limit was the Battle of Mukden, which impoverished the composition of reporters in the troops at the expense of the remaining journalists in Mukden occupied by the Japanese. There were four foreign war correspondents in Japanese captivity: the Frenchman L. Nodot, the American R. Little, the Irishman F. McCullagh and the German von Krieglstein ^{[14, P. 371]}. Sending journalists to the front to replace those who had dropped out for some reason was already a rare phenomenon at this stage. From the events of February 1905 until the end of the war, the number of war correspondents did not undergo significant changes, 4 times lower than the July figure. The fears of the editors were partially justified: there was indeed a lull in the theater of operations, which did not contribute to the growth of world public interest in the war. Accordingly, all this led to a decrease in correspondent activity.

So, according to the dynamics of the number of foreign war correspondents considered, their testimonies may be the most informative in relation to episodes related to the battles at the Yangzelin Pass, at Tashichao, Simuchen, Liaoyang; the battles at Wafangou and Shahei are slightly behind. The smallest number of foreign war correspondents turned out to be in Manchuria during the days of the Battle of Tyurenchen and the events of the 1905 campaign. Not all correspondents who were in the theater of war at these intervals witnessed certain battles, but in many cases this circumstance was not an obstacle to the creation of entire chapters and separate paragraphs describing the fighting in varying degrees of detail. Official reports, interview materials of direct participants in the events, eyewitnesses, well-informed military attaches were involved in their compilation, although the sources of information were not always indicated by correspondents. Personal observations of reporters who find themselves in combat units far from the epicenter of events are also useful for understanding the situation in them. As an example, we can cite the notes of the reporter A. Spaich, who was in the theater of military operations during the Battle of Mukden, but did not witness active hostilities in its final days. The news of the retreat found the detachment, which the author joined, far from the places of decisive battles: "the Cossack hundreds, perhaps, could not know here in the mountains that <...> their own center had already been pushed back..." ^{[16, S. 289]}. Ignorance of the situation of other hastily retreating armies, as well as the tasks successfully completed by the Cossack detachments, caused their dissatisfaction with the order to retreat and misunderstanding of the reasons for this decision. Retired colonel of the German General Staff R. Goedke, on the pages of his memoirs, talked about how insignificant the experience gained by a lone eyewitness could be, because he witnessed only individual fragments of battles ^{[11, S. 297-298]}. He was prompted to such thoughts by the elated mood of the servicemen returning during the Shahei battle, which inspired the author with confidence in the unconditional success of the Russian army, which turned out to be an erroneous assumption. This kind of reasoning is also found in L. Nodo: "battles are clear only from afar, but in the immediate living vicinity they are dark, foggy, chaotic, especially as vast as the ocean" ^{[21, p. 317]}. Reporters were faced with the inability to draw conclusions even about the small fragment they saw. The same L. Nodo wrote about the Yantai battle, admitting that he "did not understand anything, absolutely nothing," although he was in very advanced places ^{[21, p. 251]}. All this again points to the need to rely on a whole range of sources as opposed to diving into only some of them.

Thus, the conditions of professional activity of foreign war correspondents in the theater of operations, due to their social and everyday identity, required outstanding perseverance and ingenuity, psychological stability, fearlessness, and readiness for numerous daily risks from representatives of the press. In far from all cases, reporters witnessed key events in the theater of war. Comparing the course of hostilities and the pace of involvement of correspondents in the information confrontation allows us to detect some correlation based on the fusion of several components: the openness of the military authorities to representatives of the press, embodied in the instructions to censors and the actions of the latter; feeding for the influx of military personnel — international interest in the events of the war, which affected the wishes of the editorial staff. In addition, the personal will of journalists should also be taken into account, who could both unquestioningly follow the instructions of their superiors, coordinate their steps with them, and in some cases act independently at all. The 1904 campaign, especially its summer and autumn events, received the most attention from foreign journalists, which it seems useful to take into account when selecting sources according to the principle of priority for each issue of interest to the researcher.