7 October 1925
I, Deputy Head of KRO OGPU, Styrne, questioned the accused citizen Reilly, Sidney George, born 1874, Clonmel (Ireland), British subject, father, captain in the navy. Permanent residence, London and more recently New York. Captain in the British Army. Wife abroad. Education: university; studied at Heidelberg in the faculty of philosophy; in London, the Royal Institute of Mines, specialising in chemistry. Party: active Conservative. Was tried in November 1918 by the supreme tribunal of the RSFSR, the Lockhart case (in absentia).2
The following is the full, unedited version of the statement which Reilly made to Styrne, taken from his OGPU file:
During the 1914 war, I joined the army as a volunteer in 1916, until 1915 I lived in New York where I was engaged in military supplies, including supplies to the Russian government. After joining the British Army as a volunteer, I was appointed to serve in the Royal Flying Corps (from 1910 I was engaged in aviation and can regard myself as one of the aviation pioneers in Russia; I was one of the founders of ‘Krylia’, the first aviation society in Russia), where I worked until January 1918. In January 1918 I joined a secret political service, where I worked until 1921, after which I set up a private business of a financial nature (loans, stock companies and so on). During my service in the Royal Flying Corps I had no occasion to come to Russia… In March 1918, being on ‘Secret Service’, I was sent to Russia as a member of the British mission as an expert to report on the current situation (I held the rank of lieutenant at the time). I arrived in Petrograd through Murmansk, then proceeded to Vologda, and subsequently came to Moscow, where I stayed until 11 September 1918, spending most of my time on numerous trips between Moscow, Petrograd and Vologda.
From passive intelligence work, I, like other members of the British mission, gradually switched to a more-or-less active fight against Soviet power, which I did for the following reasons:
The signing of the Brest-Litovsk peace treaty on terms very profitable to Germany naturally aroused concerns about joint actions the Soviet powers and the Germans would take against the Allied powers, to which I should add the existence of numerous reports (which ultimately proved to be mendacious) on the movement of German prisoners from Russia back to Germany, and finally, the anger caused by the oppression of the Allied missions by the Soviet power. I believe that the Soviet government at that time pursued the wrong policy towards at least the British mission, for Lockhart, up to the end of June, in his reports to the British government, recommended that it should pursue a soft line towards the Soviet power. At that time, as far as I remember, the Soviet Government was especially concerned about establishing a regular army, and Trotsky many times discussed this issue with Lockhart, stressing the importance of sympathies for this cause on the part of the Allied governments. The situation radically changed after Mirback’s arrival and the continuous concessions of the Soviet power to his demands (the demands of the German government).
Mirbach’s death triggered an immediate repression against us. We had anticipated that the Germans, apart from other claims, would demand the expulsion of all Allied missions, which did actually happen. Right after that, searches were made of the consulates and some mission members were arrested, but soon released. Also, the order was made banning all Allied officers to travel. From this very moment, I started my fight against Soviet power, which manifested itself mostly in military and political intelligence and in identification of the active elements that could be used in the fight against the Soviet government. For this purpose, I went underground and obtained documents from various persons; for some period of time, for example, I was a commissar in charge of transporting spare vehicle parts during the evacuation from Petrograd, which provided me with a good opportunity to travel between Moscow and Petrograd without any restrictions, even in the commissar’s coach. At this time, I resided mostly in Moscow, changing flats nearly every day. The culmination of my work was my talks with Colonel Burzin, whom I met at Lockhart’s. The essence of the matter you would know from the proceedings records. At the time I passed on to the patriarch a considerable amount of money allocated for the needs of the clergy which was in distressful circumstances then. I want to stress that I never discussed with the patriarch or his entourage any counter-revolutionary affairs, and my intentions were unknown to the patriarch and to his inner circle. The money was allocated from the funds I had received; I had in my possession considerable amounts of money, which, in view of my special status (total financial independence and exclusive confidence due to my ties with highly placed persons) were provided me unaccountably. These very funds I spent on my fight against Soviet power.
I believe that the persons that were brought to the Lockhart trial had nothing to do with me, or in some cases, had a very remote relation to me; as for those who were closely associated with me, they fled to the Ukraine after the discovery of the plot. Meanwhile, I had a very vast net of informers, which I also immediately dissolved right after the discovery of the Lockhart case. I financed their flee to the Ukraine.
Reilly then related the story of his escape from Petrograd (reproduced in Chapter Ten), before moving on to recount:
I was then appointed a political officer in the south of Russia and left for Denikin’s headquarters in the Crimea, in the south-east and in Odessa. In Odessa I stayed until the end of March 1919, and by the order of the British High Commissioner in Constantinople, I was dispatched to make a report on the current situation on the Denikin front and the political situation in the south to officials in London and to Britain’s representatives at the Peace Conference in Paris. In the course of the Peace Conference, I was a liaison in charge of Russian affairs with different departments in London and Paris; during that time, I met B.V. Savinkov. Through 1919 and 1920, I had close relations with different representatives of the Russian émigré parties (the SRs in Prague, the Savinkov organisation, commercial and industrial circles and so on). At that time, I was pressing my comprehensive plan through the British Government concerning support of Russian commercial and industrial circles, headed by Yaroshinsky, Bark and others. All this time, I served the secret service, my main responsibility being to make reports on Russian affairs for Britain’s higher echelon.
At the end of 1920, having become a rather close intimate of Savinkov’s, I went to Warsaw, where Savinkov was then organising a foray into Belorussia. I personally took part in the operation and was inside Soviet Russia. Ordered to return, I went back to London. In 1921 I continued to provide active support to Savinkov, took him to London and introduced him to government circles. The same year I took him to Prague, where I introduced him to government contacts. I also arranged his secret flight to Warsaw.
In 1922 my strategy changed. I was disappointed with intervention. I became increasingly inclined to the opinion that the most appropriate way of struggle would be to reach an agreement with the Soviet power such that would throw open the gates of British commerce and business to Russia. At that time I proposed a project for the establishment of an enormous international consortuim for the restoration of Russian currency and industry, this project was accepted by some in government circles. In charge of this project were the Marconi Company or, to be exact, Godfrey Isaacs, the company’s chairman and the brother of the Viceroy of India. This project was discussed with Krasin and eventually dropped, yet nearly all the elements of this project were taken as a base for the proposed international consortium that was established at the time the Genoa conference was held.