'Culpam p?na premit comes.' Port Arthur has fallen....
The bare fact is now a matter of history; but at last the time has come to reckon up in detail all that happened during the blockade by land and sea. As late war correspondent in the theatre of operations in Kwantun, as a close witness of all that took place, and as one who voluntarily went through that terrible time, I look upon it as my sacred duty to narrate what this defence cost the garrison and inhabitants of the unhappy town—to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
All who went through that heartrending siege, and who reflected at all on what was passing before their eyes, became gradually aware of—and finally, I might almost say, resigned to—two great facts. First, that the Fortress Commandant, Lieutenant-General Smirnoff, had two enemies to fight—one inside the Fortress and one out; second, that it was the internal enemy which proved too strong. The immense efforts of General Smirnoff and of his immediate assistants—the late General Kondratenko, Admirals Grigorovitch, Loschinsky, and Wiren, and Generals Biely and Gorbatovsky—were in vain.
[Pg 2]
Why?
To this question the following pages will, I hope, supply the answer; but, before commencing my narrative, I should explain that I shall only recount facts either confirmed by documentary evidence or witnessed by myself.