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Today in Labor History August 11, 1882: Russian anarchist Volin (Vsevolod Mikhailovich Eikhenbaum) was born. He was forced into exile for his revolutionary activities during the 1905 Russian Revolution, for his participation in the Petersburg Soviet and the 1905 Kronstadt uprising that occurred in solidarity with the Peterburg Soviet. He returned during the 1917 revolution, where he criticized the Bolsheviks, before fleeing to Ukraine, where he became a leading figure in the autonomous, anarchist commune of Makhnovshchina. In 1920, the Cheka arrested him, with an execution order from Trotsky. Alexander Berkman, who had been deported to the USSR by the U.S., and writer Victor Serge, both appealed for his release. He was released later that year, then arrested again the following year, and deported, 1922, by Lenin. He lived the rest of his life in exile in time to France, where he died from tuberculosis, in 1945, after having successfully evaded arrest by the Nazis for his radical politics and his Jewish heritage.

#workingclass #LaborHistory #anarchism #socialism #russia #ukraine #Revolution #NestorMakhno #nazis #antisemitism #jewish #Volin #books #author #writer #fiction #VictorSerge #alexanderberkman @bookstadon

Today in Labor History July 22, 1892: Anarchist Alexander Berkman tried to assassinate industrialist Henry Clay Frick in retaliation for the 9 miners killed by Pinkerton thugs on July 6, during the Homestead Steel Strike. Frick was the manager of Homestead Steel and had hired the Pinkertons to protect the factory and the scab workers he hired to replace those who were on strike. Berkman, and his lover, Emma Goldman, planned the assassination hoping it would arouse the working class to rise up and overthrow capitalism. Berkman failed in the assassination attempt and went to prison for 14 years. He wrote a book about his experience called, “Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist” (1912). He also wrote “The Bolshevik Myth” (1925) and “The ABC of Communist Anarchism” (1929).

You can read my complete article on the Pinkertons here: https://michaeldunnauthor.com/2024/04/04/union-busting-by-the-pinkertons/

#workingclass #LaborHistory #anarchism #communism #alexanderberkman #prison #assassination #strike #steel #carnegie #massacre #emmagoldman #pinkertons #books #writing #author @bookstadon

Today in Labor History October 26, 1889: The Ukrainian anarchist general Nestor Makhno was born in Huliaipole,. Makhno led a large insurrectionary army of peasants and helped defeat the reactionary White armies. His Black Army ultimately liberated and held onto the Free Territory within Ukraine, known as Makhnovia, from 1918 to 1921. It was a stateless, anarchist society that was defended by the Black Army. Roughly 7 million people lived in the area. The peasants who lived there refused to pay rent to the landowners and seized the estates and livestock of the church, state and private landowners, setting up local committees to manage them and share them among the various villages and communes of the Free State. His uprising was eventually crushed by Trotsky. Makhno died in exile in Paris, July 25, 1934.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #NestorMakhno #anarchism #ukraine #russia #communism #trotsky #AlexanderBerkman #Makhnovia #Revolution #insurrection

Today in Labor History September 30, 1892: In the wake of the Homestead Steel Strike, union leaders were prosecuted for the crime of treason for the first time in U.S. history. Henry C. Frick, chairman of the Carnegie Steel Company, convinced the chief justice of the Pennsylvania Supreme Court to issue warrants for the arrests of every member of the advisory board of the striking steel union for treason against the state. The 29 strike leaders were ultimately charged with plotting "to incite insurrection, rebellion & war against the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania." During the strike, Pinkerton detectives killed seven workers, who were protesting wage cuts of 18-26%. Alexander Berkman tried to assassinate Frick, but failed, and spent many years in prison. He wrote about his imprisonment, and about anarchism, in his “Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist,” published by Emma Goldman’s Mother Earth Press.

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #carnegie #homestead #steel #strike #union #Pinkertons #anarchism #union #treason #rebellion #AlexanderBerkman #EmmaGoldman #prison #memoir #books #author #writer @bookstadon

Today in Labor History July 22, 1916: Someone set off a bomb during the pro-war “Preparedness Day” parade in San Francisco. As a result, 10 people died and 40 were injured. A jury convicted two labor leaders, Thomas Mooney and Warren Billings, based on false testimony. Both were pardoned in 1939. Not surprisingly, only anarchists were suspected in the bombing. A few days after the bombing, they searched and seized materials from the offices of “The Blast,” Alexander Berkman and Emma Goldman’s local paper. They also threatened to arrest Berkman.

In 1931, while they were still in prison, I. J. Golden persuaded the Provincetown Theater to produce his play, “Precedent,” about the Mooney and Billings case. Brooks Atkinson of the New York Times wrote, "By sparing the heroics and confining himself chiefly to a temperate exposition of his case [Golden] has made “Precedent” the most engrossing political drama since the Sacco-Vanzetti play entitled Gods of the Lightening... Friends of Tom Mooney will rejoice to have his case told so crisply and vividly."

#WorkingClass #LaborHistory #SanFrancisco #bombing #anarchism #union #labor #AlexanderBerkman #prison #EmmaGoldman #playwright #theater #writer #author @bookstadon