When, for certain exiles, the legal avenues for exiting Sakhalin had closed, fate seemed to take pity on the melancholic masses in bondage and deliver another avenue for leaving.

To accelerate construction of the Ussuri Railroad, a decision was made to draft, in addition to Chinese and military detachments, exiles for the groundwork. This news flew quickly through Sakhalin and excited the whole population. “Here's the exit to the mainland!” sakhalintsy immediately realized, and they flocked to their district commanders to request the railroad. Regardless of having been warned of the difficulty of groundwork, the insalubrious conditions, and that, upon the job's conclusion, they would be returned to the island, the exiles were undeterred.

“It's all talk!” they consoled themselves. “My term’ll finish while there. There’ll be a diff’rent leadership— perhaps more merciful! … What can I get in a settlement? Our brother craftsman's much valued o’er there! … You can knock up some good money…” Etc.

With such cheerful illusions, a large party of laborers left for Vladivostok. Butakov, of course, personally chose these folks.

During that time, many did indeed finish their labor terms and work sufficiently well in the Ussuri Territory; but some who returned to Sakhalin told about life on the rail line. Notably: the work's difficulty always depended, not on local conditions, but who their managers were. A stern fellow, a sort of L— — whose cruelty proved to be astonishing, turned out to be there. His brutal acts were spoken of as something extraordinary, even on Sakhalin. The penal laborers complained greatly about their abusive treatment, and said it was as if an “island” of punishment had been created for them there, in the Ussuri Territory— like a small stone, deep in Amur Bay, not far from Vladivostok. The exile-settlers similarly complained about the restrictive measures for them on the railroad. In general, most who returned were dissatisfied by this latest “latrine,” and their stories doused the ardor of others who aspired to go into bonded labor in the Ussuri Territory.

Far more enthusiastically, sakhalintsy traveled aboard a steamer, not to Vladivostok, but along the well-traveled route to Nikolaevsk and further up the Amur.