A Child of Christian Blood: Murder and Conspiracy in Tsarist Russia: The Beilis Blood Libel (59 page)

102.
 quavering voice: Bonch-Bruevich, “Prigovor,”
Kievskaia Mysl’,
October 29, 1913; Bonch-Bruevich,
Znamenie,
pp. 188–89.

103.
 could not believe: “Osvobozhdenie Beilisa,”
Kievskaia Mysl’,
October 29, 1913.

104.
 “Beilis is not yours”: Samuel,
Blood Accusation,
p. 249; Beilis,
My Sufferings,
p. 188.

105.
 “free man”: STEN III, p. 299.

106.
 “Old people and children”: “U Beilisa,”
Kievskaia Mysl’,
October 30, 1913.

107.
 “Beilis Station”: Beilis,
My Sufferings,
p. 203.

108.
 Telegrams: “U Beilisa,”
Kievskaia Mysl’,
October 30, 1913.

109.
 “won’t say that I ran away”: “U Beilisa,”
Kievskaia Mysl’,
October 30, 1913.

110.
 “peculiarities of that act”: “G.G. Zamyslovskii o prigovore,”
Kievskaia Mysl’,
October 30, 1913; on prosecution claiming victory, see also Samuel,
Blood Accusation,
p. 253.

111.
 “comic effort”: “Beseda s pris. pov. O.O. Gruzenbergom,”
Rech’,
October 30, 1913.

112.
 
New Times
:
Samuel,
Blood Accusation,
p. 250.

113.
 “engineered”: Szajkowski, “The Impact of the Beilis Case,” pp. 215, 216.

114.
 “The muzhichki”: “Beseda s pris. pov. O.O. Gruzenbergom,”
Rech’,
October 30, 1913.

115.
 “but when the foreman”: Gruzenberg,
Yesterday
, p. 186.

116.
 “political Tsushima”: Tager, “Protsess,” p. 123.

117.
 “dangerous internal illness”: V. A. Maklakov, “Spasitel’noe predosterezhenoe,” p. 137.

118.
 victory banquet: Tager,
Tsarskaia,
pp. 281–82.

119.
 promotions, and material rewards:
Padenie,
vol. 3, p. 378;
Padenie,
vol. 4, pp. 207, 426–27; Tager,
Tsarskaia,
pp. 281-82.

120.
 “It is certain”: Hans Rogger,
Jewish Policies,
p. 48, citing, A. I. Spiridovich,
Les dernières années de la cour de Tzarskoïé-Sélo
(Paris: Payot, 1928), vol. 2, p. 447.

121.
 He often invoked: The verse is Job 3:25. The straightforward translation used here is similar in tone to the standard
Russian Orthodox translation that Nicholas would have quoted. The memoirs of the French ambassador to Russia,
Maurice Paleologue, are an oft-cited source for Nicholas’s penchant for citing Job. Paleologue used an ornate French translation of the passage that was awkwardly retranslated into English and sometimes quoted as Nicholas’s words. Paleologue’s account is reproduced in Fuhrmann,
Rasputin,
p. 16.

1.
     neatly stacked: Stepanov,
Chernaia
(2005), p. 394.

2.
     Fastov case: The story of the case is told in Tager,
Tsarskaia,
pp. 287–95.

3.
     
Chebyshev: According to Chebyshev, the decision to appoint him to succeed
Chaplinsky was made by the entire council of ministers, not just by Shcheglovitov, because the government wanted to change course. “Protsess Beilisa: Razoblachenie Bol’shevikov,”
Vozrozhdenie,
August 24, 1933, p. 3.

4.
     Goncharuk was convicted: Stepanov,
Chernaia
(2005), p. 394.

5.
     Bekhterev: Bekhterev, “The Iushchinskii Murder,” p. 68n2.

6.
     “no one had any use”: Stepanov,
Chernaia,
p. 395.

7.
     most of her role: Samuel,
Blood Accusation,
p. 35, hints at a similar point, writing, “All in all, we seem to have in Vera Cheberyak a woman born out of her time and setting. In the
Italy of Cesare Borgia and Caterina Sforza she might have found an adequate field for her talents…[but] she was fated to operate in mean circumstances with mean accomplices.”

8.
     “Café Boheme”: “Will Exonerate Beilis: Ex-Russian Police Official Says He Will Clear Up Ritual Murder Myth,”
New York Times,
April 23, 1914.

9.
     Margolin disagreed: Margolin,
The Jews of Eastern Europe,
p. 236.

10.
   Gruzenberg answered:
Gruzenberg,
Yesterday,
p. 121.

11.
   “fully in tune”: Figes,
A People’s Tragedy,
p. 270.

12.
   “ministerial leapfrog”: Figes,
A People’s Tragedy,
p. 277.

13.
   “The most striking”: Figes,
A People’s Tragedy,
p. 351.

14.
   “pallid, unshaven”: Utevskii,
Vospominaniia,
p. 33.

15.
   Shcheglovitov stood: Zviagintsev,
Rokovaia femida,
pp. 211–12; N. N. Sukhanov,
The Russian Revolution, 1917:
Eyewitness Account,
vol. 1, ed. and tr. Joel Carmichael (New York: Harper, 1962), p. 52.

16.
   soldiers led him off: Zenzinov, “Fevral’skie Dni,” p. 238.

17.
   “enraged crowd”: Andrei A. Ivanov and Anatolii D. Stepanov, eds.,
Chernaia sotnia: istoricheskaia entsiklopediia
(Moscow: Institut Russkoi Tvivilizatsii, 2008), p. 308.

18.
   “mental breakdown”: Figes,
A People’s Tragedy,
p. 339.

19.
   “born for misfortune”: Pipes,
The Russian Revolution,
p. 312.

20.
   tsar’s signed abdication: Figes,
A People’s Tragedy,
pp. 339–44; Pipes,
The Russian Revolution,
pp. 310–17.

21.
   school desk, surrounded by toys: Figes,
A People’s Tragedy,
p. 345; Nabokov,
V. D. Nabokov and the Russian Provisional Government,
p. 53; Vasily Shulgin,
Dni,
p. 277.

22.
   “I seized the materials”: Gruzenberg,
Yesterday,
pp. 121–24.

23.
   “My conscience”:
Padenie,
vol. 3, pp. 347, 358.

24.
   Once pure red: Nabokov,
V. D. Nabokov and the Russian Provisional Government,
p. 34.

25.
   “one continual process”: Nabokov,
V. D. Nabokov and the Russian Provisional Government,
p. 35.

26.
   Pranaitis: Tager,
Tsarskaia,
pp. 272–73.

27.
   Vipper: Krylenko,
Sudebnye,
p. 58; Tager,
Decay of Czarism,
p. 249.

28.
   Makhalin: Reznik,
Skvoz’ chad,
p. 177.

29.
   Cheberyak was convicted: GAKO, f. 864, op. 10, d. 11.

30.
   According to an agent: Reznik,
Skvoz’ chad,
p. 177.

31.
   Cheberyak was shot: Tager,
Decay of Czarism,
p. 249.

32.
   Shoshkess: Chaim Shoshkess, “My Meeting with Mendel Beilis,”
Der Tog–Morgn Zshurnal,
December 1, 1963, p. 6.

33.
   Nabokov was shot: Nabokov,
Speak Memory,
p. 193; Boyd,
Vladimir Nabokov:
The Russian Years,
pp. 190–93.

34.
   “Well, how can anyone”: Kucherov,
Courts,
p. 268; Gruzenberg,
Ocherki,
p. 56.

35.
   Brazul-Brushkovsky: Reznik,
Skvoz’ chad,
p. 176; Samuel,
Blood Accusation,
p. 255. The Jewish Telegraph agency published an obituary for Brazul in January 1924, but apparently in error.

36.
   Rovno: Melamed, “Krasovskii,” p. 164.

37.
   “did not deserve”: Melamed, “Krasovskii,” p. 165.

38.
   Margolin: On his life after the revolution, see Khiterer, “Arnold Davidovich Margolin,” pp. 145–67.

39.
   Fulbright-Margolin Prize:
Khiterer, “Arnold Davidovich Margolin,” p. 163.

40.
   strangest fate: Shulgin,
The Years,
p. xiv.

41.
   documentary: The documentary is on Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKPUoLAc2G4
.

42.
   “invigorating effect”: Beilis,
My Sufferings,
p. 221.

43.
   “uncringing Jews”: Beilis,
My Sufferings,
p. 225.

44.
   destroyed their home: Beilis,
My Sufferings,
p. 234.

45.
   committed
suicide: Beilis,
Blood Libel,
p. 218. Beilis tells of Pinchas’s suicide in the last chapter of his
memoirs, which was not included in the original English edition but is translated for the first time in the valuable new edition coedited by Beilis’s grandson.

46.
   Addams: Beilis,
Blood Libel,
p. 220.

47.
   “exploiting myself”: Beilis,
Blood Libel,
p. 227.

48.
   “not yet sixty”: Chaim Shoshkess, “My Meeting with Mendel Beilis,”
Der Tog–Morgn Zshurnal,
December 1, 1963, p. 6.

49.
   derogatory epithet: S. Ansky,
The Enemy at His Pleasure,
pp. 28–29, 4.

50.
   Vipper had complained: STEN III, p. 52.

51.
   Between the early 1880s: Biale,
Blood and Belief,
p. 126.

52.
   Konitz: The definitive work on the Konitz case is Michael Walser Smith’s
The Butcher’s Tale
.

53.
   “folkloric belief”: Biale,
Blood and Belief,
p. 130.

54.
   
Volkischer Beobachter:
Rogger,
Jewish Policies,
pp. 55 and 243n44.

55.
   “Everywhere murder”: Raul Hilberg,
The Destruction of the European Jews,
3rd ed., vol. 3 (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003), p. 1095.

56.
   “lurked in the background”: Biale,
Blood and Belief,
p. 137.

57.
   Himmler explained: Hilberg,
The Destruction of the European Jews,
vol. 3, pp. 1095–96.

58.
   “Beilis Soap”: Weinreich,
Hitler’s Professors,
p. 200.

59.
   Rzeszow: Gross,
Fear: Anti-Semitism in Poland After Auschwitz,
p. 74.

60.
   Wyszinski declined: Gross,
Fear,
pp. 149–50.

61.
   The excavation: Slater,
The Many Deaths of Tsar Nicholas II,
p. 26.

62.
   created a commission: Slater,
The Many Deaths,
p. 28.

63.
   The Church asked: Slater,
The Many Deaths,
pp. 30–32.

64.
   Jewish ritual: Slater,
The Many Deaths,
pp. 71–80.

65.
   “The motives”: Reznik,
Rastlenie nenavist’iu,
p. 114, citing
Moskovskie Novosti,
March 1–8, 1998, p. 2; Solovev rendered his official opinion on the ritual question in January 1998. Slater,
The Many Deaths,
p. 31.

66.
   Church officials refused: Slater,
The Many Deaths,
p. 155.

67.
   In the post-Soviet era: Slater,
The Many Deaths,
p. 74.

68.
   “How was it possible”: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn,
Dvesti let vmeste,
p. 446.

69.
   “tries in every way”: Semyon Reznik, “Vmeste ili Vroz’: Zametki o knige A.I. Solzhenitsyna, ’Dvesti let vmeste,”
Zhurnal Vestnik Online,
May 15, 2002,
http://www.vestnik.com/issues/2002/0515/win/reznik.htm
.

70.
   group of about fifteen men:
“Antisemitizm na Kievskom Kladbishche,”
Segodnia,
February 21, 2004.
http://www.segodnya.ua/oldarchive/c2256713004f33f5c2256e40004f79d9.html
.

71.
   “in his thirteenth year”: This is incorrect. Andrei was thirteen years old when he died. “In his thirteenth year” would mean he was twelve.

72.
   someone had made off: Eduard Doks, “Kto Khochet Vozrodit’ Krovavyi Navet,”
Evreiskii obozrevatel’,
March 2004,
http://www.jewukr.org/observer/eo2003/page_show_ru.php?id=531
.

73.
   grave was renovated: “Pam’iati nevinno ubiennogo,”
Personal Plus,
no. 8 (159) February 22–28, 2006,
http://www.personal-plus.net/159/471.html

74.
   State Department:
Contemporary Global Anti-Semitism: A Report Provided the United States Congress
(2008), pp. 5, 32,
http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/102301.pdf
.

75.
   Anti-Defamation League: “
Ukraine University of Hate: A Backgrounder on MAUP (Interregional Academy of Personnel Management),” ADL, November 3, 2006,
http://www.adl.org/main_anti_semitism_international/maup_ukraine.htm
.

76.
   no legal basis: Anshel Pfeffer, “A Grave with a Particularly Sad Story,”
Haaretz,
February 8, 2008.
http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/a-grave-with-a-particularly-sad-story-1.238892
.

77.
   anti-Semitism
in Ukraine: In the Ukrainian parliamentary elections in October 2012, the ultranationalist Svoboda (Freedom) Party, widely regarded as xenophobic and anti-Semitic, shocked observers by winning 12 percent of the vote and representation in parliament. In the 2007 elections, it had won less than 1 percent of the vote. The party’s leader,
Oleg Tyagnibok, denies charges that he hates foreigners and Jews, though he had previously been expelled from parliament for using ethnic slurs, has referred to the “Jewish-Russian mafia” that supposedly runs the country, and has called for an end to “the criminal activities of organized Jewry” in his country. David M. Herszenhorn, “Ukraine’s Ultranationalists Show Surprising Strength at Polls,”
New York Times,
November 8, 2012.

78.
   fresh flowers: Pfeffer, “A Grave,”
Haaretz,
February 8, 2008; Paul Berger, “Was Kiev Beating Anti-Semitic Act?: Some See Return of Old Hatreds, But Others Have Doubts,”
Jewish Daily Forward,
June 8, 2012; Weinberg, “The Blood Libel in Eastern Europe,” p. 283; author’s visit to grave, spring 2011.