Hitherto unpublished

“I was born on 8 April 1912 in the commune of Mărcăuţi, Orhei county, my parents being Ana and Ermil Dobrovolschi.
I attended primary school in my native village. In 1922 I was enrolled in the Spiritual School in Chişinău, while in 1926 I started attending the Theological Seminar in the same city, from where I graduated in 1930. In 1932 I was enrolled with the Faculty of Theology in Chişinău, graduating in 1937. In 1935 I was ordained as priest in the Bieşti parish, Orhei county, where I am still serving today.
Upon graduating the courses of this Faculty, I would like to thank all my professors for their invaluable teachings, which will guide me through the rest of my life”. This was the introduction to priest G. Dobrovolschi’s graduation paper in 1938, upon completion of his university studies. The topic chosen – the Union of Bessarabia two decades after its accomplishment.
The paper is still preserved within the Manuscript Department at the Library of the Romanian Academy. It attempts to summarize the events unfolding in the spring of 1918, at a time when the memory of those exploits was still vivid.
We have selected an excerpt referring to what happened in Chişinău at the end of 1917 and the beginning of 1918. The passage depicts the same events portrayed by Gh. Gh. Mârzescu in his memoirs, the only difference being that they are “observed” from Chişinău.
(I. L.)

The Council of General Directors [the government of the Moldavian Democratic Republic appointed in office on 2 December 1917 by the Parliamentary Assembly (Sfatul Ţării)] set to work as soon as it had been established. There was an extremely delicate situation at the time. The anarchy originating in Russia was sending ripple effects to our province as well. The city of Chişinău resembled an encampment where absolutely everyone was armed, with soldiers firing gunshots out in the streets. The Russian soldiers based in Bessarabia were the main culprits for the disturbances throughout the province. The turmoil started with the Russians devastating liquor warehouses in various towns, after which it spread to the villages as well. Ever since the outbreak of the Russian revolution and until the arrival of the Moldavian army, Bessarabia was overrun by scores of defectors and entire bands of soldiers, swarming Bolsheviks that literally wreaked havoc. Russian soldiers perpetrated most of the killings raging on in Bessarabia, such as those of S. Murafa, C. Hodorogea, M. Razu, as well as the pogroms in Bessarabian towns.
However, the truth of the matter is that – along with Bolshevik soldiers – there were crowds of locals that made a mess and ravaged particularly the boyars’ houses. There is no need to substantiate these assertions with quotes from various books, because they are too vivid in the collective memory to require any further documentation. The main driver that triggered various disorders was the revolutionary propaganda on the agrarian matter, disseminated by a range of extremist parties. To this added the official telegram dispatched by the Bolshevik government [based in Petrograd], whereby it was decreed that all plots of land, with the entire livestock, movable and immovable assets belonging to the boyars should henceforth belong to the people.
Anarchy was gradually reaching its climax in December. Not a day went by without delegates from throughout the province complaining to the Parliamentary Assembly about the deeds perpetrated by the mobs of Russian soldiers. Just a few examples: according to I. Pelivan, several landowners and farmers (Razu, Bontaş, Anuş and others) were assassinated in December 1917; almost all houses, farms and buildings belonging to boyars were set on fire in the districts of Hotin, Bălţi, Ismail, etc.; grain barns were devastated, while wine cellars, sheep and oxen herds, etc. [were destroyed].
The Council of Directors notified on several occasions the general in command of the Russian army stationed on the Romanian front, asking that disciplined troops be dispatched to Bessarabia in order to safeguard the life and welfare of the population. But these troops did not exist. General Shcerbacev, together with the General Army Staff, was guarded by Romanian soldiers against any Bolshevik attempts at his life.
The Romanian government was virtually assailed on a daily basis by wires sent by various associations of the Bessarabian population and by a range of delegations from Bessarabia asking for army support. Towards the end of December, hundreds of boyars, landowners, farmers, priests, merchants and even rich peasants were abandoning their towns and farms and were crossing the Prut River into Romania, where they could find shelter against the Bolshevik savagery.
The Bolsheviks chased away from Iaşi, on the Romanian frontline, started settling in Chişinău. While encouraging all soldiers to abandon the front, on their way home they started plundering the wealth and assets of the inhabitants. Numerous villages in Bessarabia were set on fire and looted. However, plunderers went even further, in the sense of trying to seize power. From Socola they moved on to Ungheni and then to Chişinău, where they placed all foreign officers under arrest, making a mockery of them and even ransacking the commission which was buying bread for the troops on the frontline. Their general staff settled in Chişinău and refrained from no means to hamper supplies to the front and wreck the railways.
Both the Parliamentary Assembly and nationalist politicians were in a state of upheaval. Several members of the Parliamentary Assembly tended to embrace the Bolshevik propaganda. The sick seed of communism had been planted to a significant degree even amid the Moldavian regiments stationed in Bessarabia. The War and Navy General Directorate, initially led by captain T. Cojocaru, then by Gherman Pântea as of 13 December, failed to take appropriate measures to preserve public order.
The military parade of the army of the Moldavian Republic on Christmas day [in 1917] contributed somewhat to developing a sense of order amid Moldavian soldiers. 1 January 1918 saw the establishment in Chişinău of an anarchy and Bolshevik organization known as Front-Otdel [a section of the Bolshevik front settled in Chişinău]. The organization was headquartered in the Dadiani lodging and ignored the authority of the Parliamentary Assembly.
Due to the activity deployed by this communist “nest”, the people treated the Moldavian national movement as counterrevolutionary and as its enemy.
A squad of Transylvanian soldiers [volunteers from Iaşi] arrived in the Chişinău train station on the morning of 6 January. The Bolsheviks, who had gathered in large numbers at the station, ordered the Transylvanian soldiers to surrender their weapons. Upon their refusal, the Bolsheviks opened fire and several gunshots were heard. Since the Romanians were outnumbered, they had no choice but to finally surrender, after some brave officers had been killed in the skirmish. The Bolsheviks’ intention was to place under arrest all deputies of the Parliamentary Assembly. Ever since 6-13 January 1918, when the Romanian army rushed to help, the Front-Otdel chased all general directors, the separatist Moldavian deputies (presumed supporters of the union with Romania), commanders of Moldavian units, boyars, priests and intellectuals of the former regime, in order to be arrested and rendered inoffensive.
Meanwhile, a revolutionary tribunal was set up in Chişinău, consisting of representatives of the Front-Otdel, “Soviet deputies, soldiers and workers”, as well as representatives of other revolutionary organizations. The tribunal’s mission was to put on trial without delay all members of the republican government, either confirmed or presumed as separatists, and especially the chairman of the Parliamentary Assembly and the president of the Council of General Directors, guilty of having insisted that the Romanian army enter the territory of Bessarabia.
Under these circumstances, with anarchy reigning everywhere, with the impending doom facing the Parliamentary Assembly, there was no other alternative but to ask for the help of a foreign army. As a matter of fact, Moldavian deputies were debating this issue ever since December. Hence, on 22 December, pursuant to a decision taken by the Council of General Directors of the Moldavian Republic, a formal request was sent to Romania’s Ministry of War asking that a Transylvanian regiment be deployed to Chişinău, while the matter should be treated as urgent.
The Council of Ministers gave the nod and ordered that one thousand Transylvanian soldiers armed with rifles and machine guns stop on their way from Kyiv at the nearest station to Chişinău, from where they would be deployed to secure the storage places of food supplies.
Therefore, the Transylvanian regiment arriving on 6 January at the Chişinău station was probably the result of the aforementioned decision taken by the Council of Ministers. A few days afterwards, the Kyiv-based Moldavian committee dispatched a telegram to I.I.C. Brătianu: “Upon being informed by the representative of the Parliamentary Assembly about the critical situation in Bessarabia, generated by the withdrawal of the Russian army, please deploy immediately the Romanian army into Bessarabia in order to rescue the country”.
Finding out that the Romanian army was ready to cross the Prut to Bessarabia, the Bolsheviks invited I. Inculeţ and P. Erhan at the Palace of Liberty on 6 January, calling upon them to request the resignations of the separatist members of the government. The two dignitaries said that such members had already resigned and the resignations had already been published. On that same day, a telegram signed by I. Inculeţ and P. Erhan was dispatched to the Romanian government in Iaşi, protesting against the Romanian army entering the territory of the Moldavian Republic. Furthermore, the wire called for the immediate halt of all military proceedings and that the army be reconvened to Romania. The telegram mentioned: “Sending the Romanian army to Bessarabia is likely to trigger the horrors of a civil war, which has already broken out”.
It is not known for sure whether the telegram was sent by Inculeţ and Erhan themselves.
In his work Albumul Basarabiei (“The Album of Bessarabia”), D.G. Andronachi claims that, on that same day, around 6 o’clock in the evening, he met lieutenant colonel Cricopol of the Republic’s army, who confessed having been entrusted with a confidential letter from Erhan to General Prezan, stationed in Iaşi. Asked for details about the letter, colonel Cricopol admitted that it referred to urgent assistance from the Romanian army. This means that Moldavian dignitaries sent during the same day a telegram opposing the arrival of the Romanian army in Bessarabia and a letter calling out for help.
No one knows for sure where the truth lies. The directors of the “Moldavian Block” decided to send another telegram to the Romanian government, asking for army support. Yet their endeavor ended in failure because they were traced by Bolshevik soldiers. Realizing they were not allowed to dispatch the wire, I. Pelivan, N. Suruceanu, I. Buzdugan and sailor Getenco left for Iaşi on the night of 7/8 January, asking the Romanian government to send the army over. According to professor Ştefan Ciobanu, “the intervention of a delegation of the Moldavian Block, headed by Mr. Pelivan, convinced the Romanian government to deploy the army to Bessarabia. To this added military reasons, such as defending warehouses and the railroad system, secondary reasons in relation to the national revolution in Bessarabia”.
After empowering the aforementioned delegation to go to Iaşi, the Parliamentary Assembly saw some heated debates. Out in the streets, everyone was saying that the members of the Parliamentary Assembly should be hanged. A blacklist of traitors had been drawn up, while the newspapers published a notification remitted by Erhan, the president of the Council of General Directors, according to which directors Cristi, Pelivan, Secară and Codreanu were dismissed from the government. Their dismissal is believed to have been due to the fact that they called for Romanian army support in Bessarabia.
The Romanian army was accused of coming to Bessarabia to rush to the help of boyars, to seize the peasants’ plots of land and restrict the liberties gained after the revolution. Of course, these accusations came from the Bolsheviks, and they needed to be proven wrong. On 12 January, I. Inculeţ and several delegates of the revolutionary committees left for the Călăraşi train station, where they met General Broşteanu, commander of the 11th Division.
The historical records of the 11th Division indicate that the delegation, headed by Inculeţ, asked General Broşteanu to disclose the actual reason for the Romanian troops’ arrival in Bessarabia, their purpose and whether they intended to enter Chişinău. The general replied that entering Chişinău was a must. Moreover, if the Bolshevik troops were to put up any resistance, the city would not be spared the horrors of the war, due to bombardments and gunshots. At the same time, the general set the day of 13 January 1918, 12:00 hours, as the deadline for a clear answer.
The delegation went back to Chişinău and informed the authorities that General Broşteanu had made a firm commitment that the army would not interfere in the domestic affairs of the Moldavian Republic.
A meeting was held on the evening of 12 January, deciding that the Romanian troops should not get in any way involved in the republic’s domestic affairs and should not set up any war tribunals.
On 13 January, both P. Erhan and G. Pântea left for Străşeni to communicate the decision to General Broşteanu. The general retorted that, since he got no clear answer by 12:00 hours, he had given the order for Chişinău to be bombarded. The delegation insisted against this order, so that the commander of the 11th Division gave a written order to colonel Anastasiu, who was in Cojuşna. The order was handed over to the colonel by Gherman Pântea himself, and that is how Chişină was spared the pounding.
The Romanian army marched into Chişinău on that same evening, around 6:30 in the evening, going through Sculeni outskirts. The troops were welcomed and greeted by several Moldavian squads with national flags, headed by first-director Erhan and war minister G. Pântea. The population of the city gave a heartfelt welcome to the Romanian army. Colonel Rădulescu, general chief of staff, marched in front of the army, while general Broşteanu arrived on 14 January, when the Romanian and the Moldavian armies organized a joint parade.