n. This made it necessary for the
Battalion of Death to make a headlong retreat, for while they waited
for support they had nearly been surrounded by the Germans.

Then the army, incited by the Bolshevist agitators, became completely
unmanageable. When Yashka herself opened fire on some Germans who were
walking openly through No Man's Land, the Russians on her flanks turned
their machine guns against the women and prepared to mow them down. The
usefulness of the Battalion was at an end and the lives of the girls
were in danger from the Russian soldiers. It became necessary to take
them to the rear. Even there, however, when quartered in reserve
barracks, they were not safe from interference. With vile threats and
taunts deserters and Bolshevists crowded about their quarters and were
finally driven away by a volley fired by the girls from the windows of
their barracks.

Knowing that this action would result in an attack by the Russians,
Yashka hastily assembled her Battalion and marched them away with all
their equipment, taking concealment in a nearby wood from which the
girls were hurried to the rear and discharged in a score of stations,
making their way to their homes as best they might. Revolution now had
the upper hand, the army was completely destroyed by the revolutionary
doctrine and there was no longer any use in continuing the Battalion,
which had become a center for the attacks of friends and foes alike.

Yashka herself returned to Petrograd where she was arrested by the
Bolsheviki, but, after a searching examination, she was allowed to
proceed to her home. She determined, however, to use all her remaining
energy in helping the few loyal Russians who were grouped under a
general named Kornilov and were now at open war with the Bolsheviki,
so, after procuring a disguise, she made her way through the Bolshevik
lines to the loyal forces. Kornilov desired her to return with word
from him for the loyalists who were hiding in many places in Russia,
but in trying to cross the lines again Yashka found herself entrapped
by her enemies. Throwing off her disguise she boldly disclosed herself
to them, saying she was on her way to undergo treatment at a hospital
for a severe wound she had received while in the Russian army.

And then this courageous girl underwent dangers far more deadly than
any she had suffered at the front. She was tried by the Bolsheviki and
sentenced to be shot, although she had destroyed all the