The Bagmen
Activities of the Bagmen. January 1918
These January-February 1918 newspaper accounts portray the "bagmen" — peasants and traders who hauled grain from countryside to city in defiance of the Soviet bread monopoly. Some were starving family heads, others were professional speculators, others ordinary passengers carrying a sack home. At Grafskii, guards turned machine guns on the trains.
Original Source: Novaia Zhizn, No. 9, January 26, 1918, p. 4.
The Congress in Omsk is discussing whether or not to have a bread monopoly [in Siberia] ...
The delegates from Tobolsk, Cheliabinsk ... tell of the waves of bagmen against whom "stringent" measures are being taken ... As a whole the Congress is opposed to the harsh measures that are being taken against them such as confiscating the grain they have bought, etc ...
The Congress asked one of these bagmen, a peasant of Kostroma, to say a few words.
I am a bagman,'' said he, "but I do not understand why we are being called bad names ... I never would have come two thousand versts if the land committees had given us what we need ... We are hungry ... You have no idea how we suffer. Famine is no respecter of paper laws ... give us bread!
Original Source: Delo Naroda, No. 19, February 8, 1918, p. 4.
Bagmen may be divided into several classes. In the first class are peasants from the famine areas, particularly Riazan and Vladimir, who are in search of food for their hungry families. Unless they have an experienced hand with them they are easily caught ... If they get away with their lives they are lucky. In the second class are profiteers who are always on the go, buying where it is cheap and selling where it is clear. They know all the tricks of the trade-where a search is likely to be made, etc. They are always on guard. The third and most pitiful class is made up of passengers who pick tip a sack of flour or a few pounds of meat to take home to their families. They suspect everyone; they are always watching and never rest ...
Some stations on the Southeastern Railroad, such as Griazi and Grafskii, have a bad reputation Voronezh and Tambov guberniias are fighting the bagmen, treating all alike. At Grafskii there is a machine gun which is turned on the train. After the gun has rained bullets on the roofs of the cars, guards enter the train and throw out the filled sacks. The bagmen look on weeping and cursing. Experienced bagmen plan to pass this station at night. This trick does not always save them, for they are likely to receive as warm a reception at Griazi or Kozlov or some other station ...
It happens sometimes that a train with bagmen is sidetracked. just the other day twenty-five freight cars filled with bagmen were sent to Voronezh ... To add insult to injury the bagmen were compelled to carry their heavy sacks to the warehouses ... After going through these hardships and taking these risks we can understand why the bagmen ask such high prices for their goods."
Source: James Bunyan and H.H. Fisher, ed., Bolshevik Revolution, 1917-1918; Documents and Materials (Stanford: Stanford University Press; H. Milford, Oxford University Press, 1934), pp. 658-659.