Antonov-Ovshchenko, Vladimir Aleksandrovich

- One of the leaders of the armed uprising and the capture of the Winter Palace

（1884—1938）

　　Born on March 9, 1884, in the family of a lieutenant of the reserve infantry regiment of Chernigov City. His father was a fallen aristocrat and died in 1902 with the rank of captain. In 1901 Antonov-Ovshinko graduated from the Voronesh Armed Secondary School and entered the Nikolai Military Engineering School. A few months later, he was imprisoned for 11 days for refusing to swear "allegiance to the emperor and the motherland" before being released on bail by his father. The reason for refusing to take the oath was "inherently aversion to militarism." In the winter of 1901, he joined the group of students of the Social Democratic Party in Warsaw (before which Antonov-Ovshenko had no revolutionary acquaintances, and the protest against militarism was motivated by "his own thinking", the impression given by the vile and degrading environment of the military school and military academy). He left his hometown in the spring of 1902 to work as a rough laborer in Alexandrov Harbor in Petersburg, and then as a coachman in the "Animal Protection Society". In the autumn of 1902, in order to fight for revolutionary work, he was admitted to the Petersburg School of Noncommissioned Officers, maintained contact with the Socialist-Revolutionary organizations, and obtained revolutionary books from there. Extensive agitation work was carried out among cadets in schools. In 1903, he was introduced to the Bolshevik organization by Comrade Stormonyakov (pseudonym Kuznetsov in the party, currently a member of the Ministry of Foreign Trade). In August 1904, he was caught carrying illegal books, detained for 10 days, and released on the personal orders of the liberal former Grand Duke Konstantin Konstantinovich. After coming out, he served as an officer of the 40th Korevan Infantry Regiment stationed in Warsaw. A strong social democratic group was left at the school. In the autumn of 1904, he was commissioned by the Petersburg Bolshevik Organization to tour Moscow, Yekaterinoslav, Odessa, Kiev, and Werna, so that a group of officers who graduated from military academies with him established contact with the party. Contacts were established with local military organizations in Vilna. In Warsaw, contacts were established with the Social Democratic Party, the Polish Socialist Party, the Proletarian Party and the "Bund". The Warsaw Military Committee of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party was established (later Comrade Suritz - our ambassador to Turkey, Comrade Bogozki - our representative in Switzerland, participated in the committee), agitation work was carried out among officers and soldiers. In the spring of 1905 he was given priority to the Far East. With the help of the Social Democratic Party and Comrade Nikolai (Filstenberg), he went underground, went to Krakow, Lviv, while maintaining contacts with the Polish Social Democrats. Two weeks later returned to Poland to lead the uprising scheduled for two infantry regiments and an artillery brigade in Novi Alexandria. The uprising was unsuccessful (Antonov-Ovshchenko wrote about it in Iskra No. 100, article signed "Stick").

　　Antonov-Ovshchenko went to Austria, arrived in Vienna, joined the so-called "General Council of the Party" (of the Mensheviks), and was ordered to go to Petersburg, arriving at the end of May. Worked in the military councils and agitation groups of the Mensheviks. Arrested at the end of June at a meeting of the Kronstadt Sailors and Soldiers Group (the result of a treacherous informant named "Nikolaikin Glasses", Dobroskek). He was released in an October amnesty in his name. Participated in the Joint Military Commission headed by Nogan ("Makar"). Elected by the Military Council to the Petersburg Commission (joint). Editor of the underground "Barracks Newspaper", which has achieved a lot. In early April 1906, he was arrested together with Yemelyan Yaroslavsky, Temlyachka and others at the Congress of Military Organizations held in Moscow. Five days later, Antonov-Ovshchenko, Comrade Yemelyan and three other comrades escaped from the Susevo police station by digging holes in the wall. A few months later, on the instructions of the Central Committee, Antonov-Ovshchenko went to Sevastopol to prepare for an armed uprising. The uprising erupted suddenly in June. Antonov-Ovshchenko was arrested in the streets as he emerged from a house where a meeting of representatives of combat teams was held blocked by police and patrols. Fighting back is ineffective. After one year in prison, unidentified, he was sentenced to death as an unidentified person claiming to be Kabanov, and after eight months was sentenced to 20 years of hard labour. A month later, in June 1907, on the eve of sending hard labor from Sevastopol, he and 20 others escaped by blowing up the courtyard walls and shooting at jailers and sentries while releasing wind. The escape was organized by Comrade Konstantin the Bolshevik from Moscow. Spent a week in the mountains, then went to Moscow. On the way, he jumped off the train to avoid secret agents, and after a difficult journey to Moscow, he found the secret junction of the Russian Bureau of the Central Committee. The Central Russian Bureau sent Antonov Ofshenko to Finland, and two months later came to Petersburg with the help of a "particularly reliable" passport, where he began to work as a sailor on the speedboat "Banner", but had to leave for Moscow due to close surveillance. In Moscow, he began working in the workers' Bolshevik group in the Susevo-Marimo district, but soon moved to work in open organizations, establishing contacts with the "cancelists". In the winter of 1908 workers' cooperatives were organized: "subsistence" cooperatives in the Lefortov district, "labor" cooperatives (in Presnia), "Union" cooperatives (in the Likorinich district). At the same time worked in the printing union (edited weekly with Comrade Bolshevik Lyubimov). Assisted the Bolshevik workers in seizing the Lemetov "Alcohol Rehabilitation Society" and established the "Rational Recreation Club", which carried out extensive revolutionary work, but was soon closed. This work was done with the Bolshevik workers. In the spring of 1909, he participated in a meeting of secret representatives in Nizhny Novgorod (attended by representatives of the secret societies of the Social Democratic Party in Nizhny Novgorod, Solmovo, Moscow and Bogorodsk), at which it was decided to publish in Moscow a secret newspaper of Plekhanov tendencies, edited by Antonov-Ovshenko. While attending the Moscow Factory Doctors' Congress (selected by workers' cooperatives), Antonov-Ovshchenko and others (due to Malinowski's informing) were arrested at a meeting of the Social Democrats, released three days later, and left for Kiev, but returned to Moscow due to the destruction of the organization, where they were arrested again. Spent six months in prison. After the "identification" of the Devinsk district (400 roubles collected by most workers' organizations was delivered for the "identification"), he was released in February 1910 under the name Anton Gouk. The destruction of the Moscow organization, the inability to find reliable passports, constant surveillance, forced Antonov-Ofshenko to cross the border (July 1910). He was arrested by the Prussian gendarmes while crossing the border, but was not extradited to Russia due to the intervention of the German Social Democratic Party. Until the war of 1914 he joined the Menshevik clique in Paris , while working with the Bolsheviks (Vladimirov, Lozovsky, Sokolinikov) in assisting the Social Democratic Duma caucus and in various publishing matters. He was secretary of the Paris Labour Bureau, composed of representatives of the Russian branch of the syndica. In September 1914, Tongde Manuelski (then a member of the Forward Faction) edited and published the internationalist daily Voice. The newspaper was quickly consolidated, and many well-known internationalists Martov, Trotsky, Lunacharsky, M. Pokrovsky, Vorontyr, Lozovsky, Vladimirov and others took part in its work. With the active participation of Antonov-Ovshchenko, the newspaper was published under different names until April 1917. At the end of 1914, Antonov-Ofshenko quit the Menshevik clique because of its compromise with social-patriots, worked in the "Our Rhetorical School" clique, joined the club of social-democratic internationalists with the Bolsheviks (Grisha Belenki, etc.), took the position of the left wing such as the editorial office of the newspaper "Our Speech", and followed the Bolsheviks on all fundamental issues. He was pardoned and returned to Russia in May 1917. Immediately after returning home, he went to the Central Committee of the Bolsheviks and formally joined the party, publicly declaring a break with the "regional unionists". Worked in Helsingfors, edited the newspaper "The Wave", also worked in Petrograd (drum mobilization) due to participation in the party committee and the city soviet. He was arrested in Helsingfors on 15 July 1917 and spent a month in the "Cross Prison". He was a member of the Finnish Regional Committee, elected to the Constituent Assembly by the Northern Front on the nomination of the party, and served as secretary of the Northern Soviet Committee and secretary of the Petrograd Military Revolutionary Committee. On October 25, 1917, he led the capture of the Winter Palace and the arrest of officials of the Provisional Government. Elected to the People's Commissariat - People's Commissariat of the Army. Commander-in-Chief of the Petrograd Military District. On December 6, 1917, he went to Ukraine and became commander-in-chief in the struggle against Kaledin and his accomplices. Led the struggle against the Kaleginists, Kornilovs, Radaists. From March to May 1918, he was Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces of the Soviet Republics of the South. He was a member of the Military Council of the Republic and the Revolutionary Military Council, and a member of the People's Commissariat of the Army. From September to October 1918 he commanded the Second and Third Armies, from November 11 he commanded Army Group Kur, and from January to June 1919 he commanded the Ukrainian Front. In August and September 1919 he was appointed special commissioner of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee in the Vychebusk Province. From November 1919 to April 1920 he was Commissioner of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee in Tambov Province, Chairman of the Provincial Committee and Chairman of the Provincial Executive Committee, and in April 1920 Deputy Chairman of the General Committee for the Implementation of Universal Labour Obligations and Member of the Ministry of the People's Commissariat of Labour. From November to January 1920 he was a member of the NKVD and deputy chairman of the Small People's Commissariat. From mid-January to early February 1921 he was Commissioner of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee in Perm Voeuvre (Chairman of the Soviet, Committee for Organization and Assistance of Sowing, Provincial Committee, Provincial Committee for Political Education). From mid-February to mid-July 1921 he was Chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee for the Purge of Bandits in Tambov Province. From October 1921 he was Chairman of the Executive Committee of Samara Province and led the struggle against famine. From the autumn of 1922 to February 1924, he was director of the Political Department of the Red Army of the Republic and a member of the Revolutionary Military Council. From February 1924 he served in the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs.

Translated by Zheng Yifan

Antonov-Ovshchenko continued

　　Antonov-Ovshenko played an important role in the October armed uprising, being one of the military leaders who captured the Hermitage and arrested provisional government officials. He was head of the Political Department of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic from 1922 to 1924, supporting Trotsky in the party debate of 1923. Trotsky issued the New Policy in December 1923, echoed by Antonov in December 24 with the Political Department Circular No. 200. The Politburo asked him to withdraw the notice, to which Antonov responded: "If you dare to move Trotsky, the entire Red Army will rise up to defend the Soviet Kano." The military will keep the bold leaders honest. On January 17, 1924, Antonov was dismissed from the post of head of the Political Department and replaced by Bubnov. After that, Antonov was sent to the countries of Eastern Europe as a plenipotentiary representative of the Soviet Union. Sending opposition elements abroad to work to cut off their influence at home was a tactic of dealing with the opposition at the time. In 1928 he declared his departure from the "Left Opposition". From 1934 he was the Procurator General of the Russian Federation and from 1937 the People's Commissar of the Judiciary of the Russian Federation. During the Spanish Civil War, he served as the Soviet Consul General in Barcelona, through which the Soviet Union transported a large amount of arms into Spain, and Antonov was of great help to the Republican army as a military adviser.

　　Antonov was recalled to Moscow at the end of 1937 and immediately arrested. On February 8, 1938, he was sentenced to death for participating in the "Trotsky terrorist espionage organization" and executed by shooting on the 10th. His wife was also shot. Before his execution, Antonov bid farewell to his friends, took off his shirt and leather boots and left them with them, saying, "I ask those who live to be free to tell the people that I, Antonov-Ovshchenko, was a Bolshevik and will remain a Bolshevik until my death."

　　He was rehabilitated on 25 February 1956.