Outrage

Russian Revolutionary Outrage in Paris: International Incident

In the book “International Incidents for Discussion in Conversation Classes”, in relation to this subject, L. Oppenheim wrote in 1909: The following appeared in the Times of May 10th, 1909:

“A Russian, who described himself as Colonel von Kotten, chief of the Moscow secret police, was shot at yesterday by an escaped Russian convict, Michael Vitkoff, at an hotel in the Rue Bolivar, where the two men met by appointment. According to the police officer’s story, Vitkoff was a Polish revolutionary who had been sentenced to deportation to Siberia, but who had been reprieved upon volunteering to act as a police spy on the movements of his revolutionary comrades. Vitkoff subsequently came to Paris, and upon the arrival of the police officer in the French capital a few days ago he induced Colonel von Kotten to visit him upon the pretext that he had important information to communicate. No sooner had the officer entered Vitkoff’s room than the latter fired several shots at him with a revolver, none of which, however, took effect. A hand-to-hand struggle followed, in which Vitkoff was worsted. The man succeeded in making his escape, but gave himself up at the nearest police station, where he told his story, which was confirmed by Colonel von Kotten, who arrived shortly afterwards little the worse for his experience. Vitkoff was taken into custody and will be charged with attempted murder.

“Minute details of the attack upon Colonel von Kotten are published, but they shed little or no light upon the motives of the aggression. In some quarters it is suggested that, unless Vitkoff’s action was purely personal, it may have been dictated by a desire on the part of the Russian revolutionaries to secure by means of a judicial trial in France the publicity which even the Azeff and Feodoroff cases have failed to gain for their efforts to expose the activity of the Russian secret police.”