The Russian Revolution in Ukraine

Carrying out our mandates from the Peasants’ Union, we succeeded in gaining control of the Land Department which I was put in charge of. With the support of the Peasants’ Union and the Public Committee itself, as well as the approval of the A-K Group, I became for a time the de facto ideological leader of the whole Public Committee.

Our group embarked on this dangerous path thanks solely to my influence. I was driven to this course by my reading of our anarchist press during the first two months of the Revolution. Not a trace could I find of any efforts on the part of the anarchists to create a powerful organization which would master the psychology of the toiling masses and show its organizing skills in developing and defending the nascent Revolution. I saw this movement so dear to me splintered as in the past into various groupuscles. So I made up my mind to provide an impetus towards unification of the movement by setting an example with an anarcho-communist group from the downtrodden countryside. This was all the more important to me as I sensed a certain disdain for the countryside among our urban propagandists.

Chapter 7 The First of May. Relationship of the Peasants to the Land Question

1 May 1917. Ten years had passed since I last participated in this labour holiday so I made a special effort to carry out agitational work to organize its celebration among the workers, the soldiers of the artillery detachments, and the peasants.

I collected all the documents relating to the actions of the workers of the cities during the last days of April and presented them to our group, so that our members could prepare their own interpretations for agitational work among the peasants, workers, and soldiers.

The commander of the 8th Serbian regiment sent a delegation to us to sound us out on the wish of this regiment of the Serbian state to participate with the toilers of Gulyai-Pole in the workers’ holiday. Of course we had no objection, even when they proposed to take part fully armed. We relied on our own strength which was quite sufficient to disarm this regiment, if necessary.

Demonstrations began in the streets of Gulyai-Pole at 9:00 a.m. The assembly point of all the demonstrations was Market Square, now knows as Martyrs of the Revolution Square.

Without wasting any time, the anarchists delivered the news about the actions of the Petrograd proletariat of April 18–22, pressuring the government to dismiss ten capitalist ministers and transfer all power to the Soviets of Peasants’, Workers’, and Soldiers’ Deputies. The anarchists described how these actions were suppressed by force of arms. This news transformed the character of the demonstration which became hostile to the Provisional Government and all the socialists who took part in that government.

The commander of the 8th Serbian regiment made haste to lead his troops back to their quarters. Part of the artillery detachment declared their solidarity with the anarchists and joined the ranks of the demonstrators.

The demonstrators were so numerous that their procession seemed endless. After passing a resolution, “Down with the Government and all the parties responsible for inflicting this disgrace on us…”, they marched through the streets singing the March of the Anarchists. In ranks five to eight abreast it took several hours for their column to pass.

The mood was so elated and hostile to the Government and its agents, that the politicians of the Public Committee and the officers of the artillery detachment took refuge at the headquarters of the Serbian regiment. The only exceptions were two officials who were favourites of the soldiers: the anarchist sympathizer Shevchenko and the artist Bogdanovich. The Militia, which during its brief existence had yet to make a single arrest, disappeared entirely from Gulyai-Pole.

The anarchists told the mass of demonstrators about the Chicago anarchist martyrs. The demonstrators honoured their memory by kneeling with bowed heads and then asked the anarchists to lead them without delay to fight against the Government, its agents, and the bourgeoisie.

The day passed, however, without violence.

At that time the authorities of Aleksandrovsk and Ekaterinoslav were keeping a close eye on Gulyai-Pole and would have liked nothing better than to provoke us prematurely to battle.

The whole month of May was devoted to intensive work in the peasant congresses of Gulyai-Pole and Aleksandrovsk.

At the Aleksandrovsk congress I reported that the toiling peasantry of Gulyai-Pole did not trust the Public Committees to carry out the work of the Revolution and had taken control of the local committee. And I explained just how this was done.