Colonel V. A. Pashkov and the Late Nineteenth-Century Protestant Movement in Russia, Jan M. Surer, 1999

protracted stalemate took place between Pashkov and the Peasant Bank regarding the sale of land to the peasants which Pashkov wished to effect. In December of 1887 he had applied to the Peasant Bank for a loan to enable the peasants of three villages (Troitsky, Kamenka, and Makaleika) to purchase land. 35 The amount of the loan he was requesting was greater than an earlier request because he had added the peasants 7 debt (nedoimka) to it, an arrangement Which would make the debt easier to pay. He stated that he was still selling the land at a price well below its value. 36 The Bank's refusal to grant the loan mystified Pashkov, who wished to decrease the amount the peasants had to pay by as much as possible, he wrote to one employee. Yet he was not willing to lower his own prices any further. 37 In February he wrote to Alick of his concern at this delay of the loan necessary to the peasants. The delay meant that Pashkov would have to borrow on his capital to support the establishments that winter ( " podderzhat ’ krest'yanskoe khozyaistvo "1. As he put it, the Bank was thereby depriving him of the means to help those in need. In no case was Mr. Owen to permit delays in the payment of salaries and wages. 35 At least one of these villages, Troitsky, was in Simbirsk province. 36 Application to the Peasant Land Bank, 1/13 December 1887, PP 2/l/d/89. 37 Letter to Belikov, 6 January 1888, PP 2/l/d/94. 57 however. If a halt (whether of work or of the payment of salaries is not clear) threatened, Owen was to inform Pashkov of the sum necessary to cover the deficit. He added, "What we shall do to help the peasants I really do not know." 38 In March of 1888 he instructed Owen: The Kamenka peasants who do not pay their debts must have no land given them till they have paid their due. Please write to Rollofs [an employee] to warn them that on no account shall we depart from such a rule in future[;] also if it is for wood they owe money, no wood is to be given till the debt is covered. Certainly those who are really poor and cannot pay must be excepted of [sic] the rule laid down. Much better as you Say to let the wood grow on the land you take back from the peasants. Make them pay the rent in advance[—]that may be the best. The fear of being deprived of the land they rent may induce them to pay so that we need not go to law at all. 39 Two months later, concerning the peasants in the village of Troitsky, he wrote: I think you have acted very wisely with the peasants by making them understand their duty to keep their engagements and bringing them to do it. Now if the year is really bad and the times hard for them, I am willing to come to their help in reducing the rent for this year when they have effected the payment of a part and if really necessary [emphasis in the original] to refund to them ... the part they will have paid but not till the Bank has agreed to our conditions. 40 A ye