Reginald Urch

Biography

He was born at Mark, near Highbridge, Somerset. Graduating in Slavonic studies from London University, he expanded his education in Germany and Russia. He took up teaching in the Continent and established a language school in Riga.

Urch eventually lectured at Riga Polytechnic prior to the First World War. In 1915, fleeing the advancing German army, Urch and his family arrived at Moscow where he witnessed the Bolshevik Revolution. In 1936 he published a book: We Generally Shoot Englishmen, An English Schoolmaster's five years of mild adventure in Moscow, 1915–20, where he described what he saw and experienced there.

In this book Urch told the story of a rather ordinary English family not connected with any official missions, consulates, or services, in the years before, during and after the Russian revolution. The family, a husband, a wife, a son born in 1911, and a daughter born in 1914, fled Latvia before the arrival of the advancing German troops and eventually made it to Moscow, with little besides their hand-luggage and a trusty maid to help with the tiny children. There they made living by teaching English. While living in Moscow they witnessed the changes from Tsarist-autocratic to Bolshevist-autocratic rule.

In 1918 Urch was arrested by the Cheka, the Soviet state security organisation. No explanation of his arrest and imprisonment had been given. After two months in prison he was released but not allowed to leave Russia. Only later it became clear to him why he was arrested. He had found out it was due to a denunciation. A fellow member of the House Committee accused him of swindling the House Committee, pocketing the money subscribed for the purchase of products, and stealing the Committee's milk. The accuser died a few months later in a lunatic asylum.

In 1919 Edith, his wife, and children were allowed to leave Russia. In 1920 the man himself was sent by train across the border to Finland, together with other English citizens. They were exchanged for Bolshevists held by Britain; for each English citizen Britain released 42½ Bolshevists.

Owing to poor economic circumstances in England after the war, Urch returned to Riga, where he took up employment in 1920 as editor of the Latvian government's English-language commerce publication, The Latvian Economist. Shortly thereafter, in 1922, Urch also took up duties as the Russian affairs correspondence for the The Times; he left his Latvian employ in 1926 to become their full-time correspondent.

In his article "Bolshevism and religion in Russia" (1923) Urch told the story of the struggle between the Bolshevik regime and the Russian Orthodox Church. Russia's great millions were suffering immensely and being slaughtered in their thousands, yet they were still clinging to their religion. The Bolsheviki moved cautiously against the church. They began by placarding public places with the legend: 'Religion is a narcotic for the people,' and removing ikons from public places. Later, these ikons were, in some cases, allowed to be put back; Urch remembered seeing some of them in their usual places as late as 1920. The Bolsheviki seemed to recognise that the temper of the people was not yet sufficiently under control for drastic measures against the Church.

Gradually it all changed. Private property was abolished and people were divided into categories for the distribution of food by the state, some categories receiving more, other less. Priests were not included in any categories: they had no food-cards, and “by living they were actually committing a crime, for they were forbidden to buy food or anything – they were left to starve.” The next step was the dismissals of bishops and priests, followed by trials by the Soviet tribunal for counter-revolution, that resulted in them being shot, or being banished to remote parts of Russia, or being sentenced to long terms of imprisonment with hard labour. With the rising generations the Bolsheviki hoped for better results, and that “the total disappearance of religion from Russia is only a matter of time.”

In 1927 he and Edith published a book English, a manual for studying English. Another book Latvia, Country and people, was first published in 1935 in Riga and later in 1938 in London. In this book Urch told the story of Latvia, its history, struggle for independence, economy, education, art, music, and so on. The book is not a travel guide in the Baedeker sense, that is, a book of comprehensive information about places designed for the use of visitors or tourists, but rather a presentation of sites of interest to the occasional visitor through their historical context. However, it includes also practical tips.

In 1939 he published The Rabbit King of Russia. In this book Urch told the stories of several mind-boggling absurd Soviet projects. The narrative is accompanied with footnotes and the reader must believe it all was true. One such project, that seems to have been quite successful, involved arresting foreign nationals and freeing them for ransom paid by relatives living abroad. This scheme was run by the Cheká and the foreign currency gained helped maintaining the regime. Other projects involved attempts to supersede the cow by producing milk supplies from soya bean, the creation of a dog-wool industry by shearing the dogs of Russia, the scheme to produce motor-oil from the bodies of Russia's untold millions of locusts to lubricate her thousands of agricultural tractors, the rounding up the bugs and beetles of Russia to found a State Beetle-soap industry, using tadpoles as excellent swine-fodder, and the "immense rabbit-farms designed to feed and rescue Russia's millions from enforced vegetarianism due to the depletion of ordinary flocks of herds." Urch wrote that "if a plan was large, new and startling, it was always practically sure of adoption though some were so inherently bizarre that even with the highest patronage they could not have a long innings". One major figure behind several of those projects was Gregóriy (Grisha) Antónovich Philíppoff, aka 'the Rabbit King of Russia'. By exposing these projects, which persistently remained concealed, Urch aimed at warning the Western countries from making fair deals with Soviet Russia.

Urch transferred to Warsaw in 1938, where he lived through the German invasion in 1939 and then escaped to Stockholm. When the Winter War between Russia and Finland broke, he was sent as a special correspondent to Finland. He spent time with the troops, getting a firsthand experience of the fighting, which was reflected in his reporting.

In June 1941, came German attack on Russia. His dispatches were read with interest not only by the general reader but also by professional soldiers.

Urch died suddenly on 15 May 1945, in Stockholm. In an obituary published by The Times on 12 June 1945, pg. 7, Mr. Peter Tennant wrote:

The Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter published an obituary already the day after his death (in Swedish, here translated into English):

Personal life

Urch married in 1909 and had a son and daughter. His daughter Edith Urch founded the Ladyeholme Housing Association, a charity for homeless people in London.

Publications