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In the history of the revolutionary and labor movement there is almost no city other than Vitebsk where the beginning of the movement is as clearly and sharply colored by the great influence of a single personality–the personality of Abram Amsterdam. The people who knew him and took their first steps in community life under his influence have always felt grateful to him and could never free themselves from the magic that he radiated. With his speeches and his propaganda, Amsterdam ignited the spirits of the first Vitebsk socialists–the intellectuals and the workers–with a particular idealistic fervor.

Not by accident did one of the former workers for the “Bund,” Maras Katz (Zoglin), recalling his first impression of the movement in Vitebsk, say that, unlike the arid “Misnagdim” of Vilna and Minsk, the Vitebskers seemed like “Chasidim of Socialism.” When the Vilna workers soberly addressed themselves to their work and struggle, the workers of Vitebsk could not free themselves from the spirit that belonged to the revolutionary circles (Anthology “The Revolutionary Movement among Jews.” Russian. Moscow, 1930, p. 130). This probably reflects the true nature of the beginning of the revolutionary movement in Vitebsk: the first socialists who experienced Amsterdam's circle and deeply absorbed his ideas and his moral influence, were

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surely naïve, but they were trustful, fanatic, generous fighters for social justice, for a better future for the persecuted working masses.

And one can easily understand that when Amsterdam's disciples received the sudden, sad news of his death at the age of 28 and there were rumors that his death was not natural and that the gendarmes who sent him to Shklov after prison had some interest in erasing Amsterdam from the bright world and had a hand in his death, it was not to be wondered at that a legend arose in Vitebsk around the name of Amsterdam: the Prophet of Socialism became a saint. For generations that legend persisted in the depths of the Vitebsk movement. And legends sometimes have an important function in the history of a popular movement.

Avraham-Meir (Abram) Amsterdam was born in Vitebsk (or in Klin, near Vitebsk), in 1872 (or in 1871). He was registered in Shklov. Probably his father, Yisroel, came from there. He went, like almost all Jewish boys, to cheder while is parents lived in Moscow, where he studied locksmithing in the Moscow Jewish Vocational School, and he later worked in the factory of the “Brommet Brothers.” In Moscow, when he was 16, Amsterdam joined the Chovevei Tzion and was a member of the “B'nei Tzion” circle, which was led by Y. Chlenov and Menachem-Mendel Ussishkin, the later well-known Zionist. But after the great expulsion from Moscow (1891), Amsterdam and his family had to leave Moscow, and they settled in Vitebsk. There he began a new chapter of his activities. When he was first in Vitebsk, he was still a staunch Zionist. But then he met one of the first Jewish socialists from the pioneer-age–with Kramer (Arkady) from Vilna, which was became so important to him. Anna Rosenthal in her “Pages of a Life Story” (“Historical Writings” from YIVO, volume 3, Paris, 1939, page 435) writes about Kramer's acquaintanceship with Amsterdam in Vitebsk:

“Arkady, not long before his death, told about how he met Amsterdam for the first time. Once, when Arkady returned from a job that he had in Vitebsk gubernia, some people came to him in Vitebsk; his friends

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Avraham Amsterdam and his wife Liza

This was perhaps in 1893. Amsterdam's Vitebsk period lasted for a couple of years, 1893-1895, after he abandoned Zionism. But for the short time that he tried to influence the revolutionary movement of that time, his brother Volodya tells in a letter that appears in the already mentioned volume “Historical Writings,” “it is no exaggeration to consider him as the pioneer of the revolutionary workers movement in Vitebsk…I remember also that one Rubinshteyn, arriving from Germany, brought to Vitebsk Hauptmann's ‘The Weavers.’ This work [a play] was immediately translated into Yiddish, and in Yavitsch's home there took place the first illegal

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gathering where people read ‘The Weavers’…In 1894, when Alexander III died, we had in our home a serious, secret deliberation, a small group, and the result was that Abram would go at a certain time to Riga, as I now understand, in order to find alliances and organize a general-Russian demonstration…”^[a]

The character of Amsterdam's activities in the 1890s, to the extent that we can now reconstruct them, focused on organizing propagandistic circles. He involved many generous people in this work. Among them were Amsterdam's close friends: Machlin, Mendelovich, and especially Chatzkel Ussishkin, who also later on played an important role in the Vitebsk movement. Abram Ginzburg-Naumov, who was later an important figure in the Vitebsk movement, provides an interesting characterization of Ussishkin: “He was Amsterdam's close friend, but in hindsight he was different from him. He had great reserves of spiritual energy and the same fascinating idealism, but he was more realistic and logical than Amsterdam…Ussishkin was more organized than Amsterdam” (“The Revolutionary Movement among Jews”). What is relevant was Amsterdam's general world view at that time, maintains Ilya Vilensky, one of the activists of that time, which was that of a “folkist and a Zionist.” Ginzburg-Naumov, who later (in Shklov in 1899) was with Amsterdam, describes him as “a Marxist, but with a terrorist inclination.”

Ilya Vilensky provides a list of names of Amsterdam and Ussishkin's Vitebsk circle. He cites the Abramov family–two brothers and a sister–one of whom was a delegate from Vitebsk to the first conference of the “Bund”; the Gurevitsh family (3 brothers and two sisters), Romm, Greenblatt, Hoffman, and Olga Droibin, Henna-Sarah Vilenkin, and Aaron Gurevitsh, whom he describes as a “folkist.” Ilya Vilensky and his sisters Batya and Mira were then also part of Amsterdam's circle.

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Amsterdam lived for a short time in Mohilov, where he served in the army; he used that opportunity to organize there their first revolutionary and socialist circles. On returning to Vitebsk, he soon, together with two friends–Ussishkin and Mendelovitsch–went to Vilna. Their main undertaking there was to find ties with the Vilna Social-Democrats. When Amsterdam came in September of 1896 to Vilna, he was especially interested in the “jargon committees” that had grown up there and taken the first steps on the question of conducting propaganda in Yiddish for the wider folk mass and creating popular literature. As is well known, the creators of the “jargon committees” were P. Rosenthal, A. Litvak, and others. Anna Rosenthal in her memoirs (“Historical Writings,” volume III), says that Amsterdam, as soon as he came to Vilna, joined the work of the “jargon committees.” Her description is especially interesting because she gives us a picture of Amsterdam.

“Of the associates of the ‘jargon committee,’” writes Anna Rosenthal, “I especially remember Abram Amsterdam. A tall, thin young man with a pale face, dreaming eyes, and a long, dark beard, he looked the way people paint Christian saints. He spoke with a deep, chesty voice. People said about him that he was an extraordinary agitator and was a leader for all of Vitebsk's young people. He was no Marxist. That would not have fit with his whole personality; on the committee, he was more Jewish than anyone; aside, perhaps, from Ilya Rosenberg, we all spoke Russian and had little connection to Yiddish literature and language” (pp. 434-435).

In Vilna, Amsterdam could not carry out his great plans. On January 27, 1897, he was arrested. He was later taken from one prison to another: from Vilna to Vileyka, from Vileyka to Vitebsk. From prison, especially in Vitebsk, he maintained ties with the city. His brother talks about them in the cited letter, where he writes: “Abram never broke his ties with Vitebsk even when he sat as a detainee in the Vilna Antakalnis Prison…From prison he would write totally innocent books that still had certain unnoticed signs in the letters, line by line.” This

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was an arranged code for correspondence. At a meeting in the prison, Volodya gave his brother a book in a hard binding that contained reports about the movement in Vitebsk.

In July of 1898, a special trial was held for Amsterdam while he was in the Vitebsk prison, because during an arrest of conspirators on April 17, Amsterdam's proposal for a speech to the workers of Vitebsk on May 1 was found. He had sent it from prison, as well as a letter in which Amsterdam asked that his speech be translated into Yiddish. As we have seen, his spiritual energy knew no limits. Whether he was at liberty or in prison, he could not rest, but instead pursued his battle.

In 1899, Amsterdam was released and sent, under police supervision, to Shklov, Mohilov Gubernia. He was sent to Shklov because that is where he was registered. And suddenly there he died. His wife Liza Amsterdam-Greenblatt in her letter that was published in “Historical Writings, volume III”, categorically denies the legend the secret hand of the gendarmes lay behind his death. She writes: “Abram drowned in Shklov while bathing in the Dnieper right before my eyes; he wanted to swim across to the other shore, but suddenly there appeared a steamship that created a huge wave, and this was apparently the circumstance of his death…”

Thus, at age 28, he suddenly left the world, a man who, thanks to his abilities and thanks to his spiritual and moral strengths could grow to be a true leader of the working masses. It is important that the Amsterdam tradition left such traces in the Vitebsk movement, that from them generations of Vitebsk Jewish socialists derived their inspiration. His name, and the legends surrounding him, spread beyond the borders of Vitebsk. An exhaustive obituary for Amsterdam appeared after his death in the organ of the “Bund” abroad, in “The Jewish Worker” (1899, no. 7).

In the time of the NEP (the New Economic Policy), the Jewish section of the association for political convicts conducted

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in Moscow several meetings about the history of the Jewish labor movement in Russia. The government had already shut down the association. Everyone who took part in those meetings were either liquidated or died natural deaths. But from those meetings there still existed a little book in Russian, “The Revolutionary Movement among Jews” (Anthology 1, Moscow, 1930). This book had long been confiscated and is now a rarity. The book contains a couple of sections of memoirs about Vitebsk (which we cited earlier). These sections were by Ilya Vilensky and Avraham Ginzburg-Naumov, who played a huge role in the Vitebsk underground during the 1890s (before the first revolution in 1905). Taking part in the discussion about Vitebsk were V. Zoglin (Taras Katz) and two Vitebskers, Grigory Luria (Albert) and Pesach Mezivetzky. Aside from that, material about the revolutionary and labor movements in Vitebsk 1897-1901 was published in the foreign journal of the organization of the Russian Social-Democrats, “Rabotshaya Dielo” [Working Affairs] (numbers 2-3, 6, 9), and to number 2-3 of this journal was added a pamphlet of 16 pages called “The Battle of the Vitebsk Workers for a Better Life.” We have used all of these materials in order to provide an idea of the first era of the movement in Vitebsk. We also used the “Bio-Bibliographical Dictionary” of the revolutionary movement, where there is also information about several activists from Vitebsk who were later known beyond the borders of Vitebsk.

The idealistic tradition that Avraham Amsterdam had planted in the Vitebsk circles of revolutionary youth and in the working class left its stamp on the following generations of local leaders and doers. There were still people in the movement who remembered the enthusiasm with which Amsterdam delivered his talks and had read the writings of LaSalle. His close friends remained in the movement. Among them one must first recall Chatzkel Ussishkin–one of the most generous and energetic leaders of the revolutionaries, who thought of him as Amsterdam's direct heir. It is also important to emphasize that the propagandists of the nineties maintained the tendency of the earlier folkist movement:

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“To go to the people.” In order to be able to propagandize among the workers, the former members of Amsterdam's circle became workers: Motya Shalit, Idel Abramov, Ilya Vilensky, and others learned locksmithing. Ch. Ussishkin became a painter.

In the years 1895-1896, the center of the movement was occupied by the circles of student youth. But already in 1896 appeared the first buds of the economic war that involved the broader working masses. In 1896 there was a deliberation by the local Social-Democrats in Vitebsk that considered the issue of uniting the strengths of the Social-Democrats throughout the country. The deliberation mapped out a program and decided that the participants should go to work in other cities (see Nevsky, “Sketches in the History of the V.K.P,” p. 490). In 1897 in Vitebsk was organized the first “Group of the Revolutionary Social-Democrats.” The pioneer of the Social-Democrats was Zalmen Gurevitsch (Sacharni, later Negoyev) who came from abroad and called an assembly, where a group was organized and adopted a Social-Democrat program.^[b] Among the activists in the group were Olga Droibin, Mintz, Plagov, Isaak Mekler, Shimon Halperin, Gavriel Mayzel, and others. There was also a group of non-Jewish socialists in Vitebsk at that time: Ivan Teodorovitsch, A. Karelin, Stutshka, Rosznovsky (associated with the P.P.S.). In that same year two activists were taken into the labor movement from the youth-circles–Avraham Ginzburg (Naumov) and Boris Zeitlin (Batursky), who later played a large role in Vitebsk. They were both enlisted by Idel Abramoven, who was their teacher in conspiracy, and Ussishkin. In the Social-Democrat group at the end of 1897 were: Idel Abramov (who soon became ill and went abroad), Misha Gurevitsch, Velvel Shalit, Liza Greenblatt-Amsterdam, Alexander Tropovsky from Warsaw, and the brushmaker Chaim (Hirsch Baron) from Vilna.

Joining the group several months later were several workers: Chayaka Abromov (a seamstress), Rokhke Grava, the young locksmith Pesach Mezivetzky, the milliner Rhoda Terman, the

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carpenter Yoska Yoffa (“a very talented person,” said Avraham Ginzburg-Naumov about him–“with a very analytical mind, a good agitator”), the carpenter Moyshe-Shachna Shtam, Itzke the painter, the tailor Abramtshik, Eydele and Rokhke Gurevitsch, and others. There also existed then a special circle for propaganda that included Anna Rozenfeld, Zinayda Shevelev-Horovitz, Sofia Grand, Sender Landau, Anna and Bertha Rabinovitsch, Eydele Gurevitsch, Eizik the carpenter. The movement took on an organized form, and on the first Social-Democrat committee were: Ussishkin, Abramov, Tropovski, Avraham Ginzburg, V. Shalit, M. Gurevitsch.

It is interesting to consider the first notice that was published in the Bundist “Worker's V Voice” (number 8, from February 17, 1898): “At the end of the previous year there was a strike of sixteen locksmiths in 2 workshops for a ten-hour work day. The strike did not succeed. One of the strikers was sent to his birth city. Not long ago ended the previous year's trial of the founders of the treasury. Gurevitsch was sentenced to a year in prison and two years under police supervision, Shalit to three months in prison. Both for leading the treasury. Seven locksmiths were also sentenced.”

In 1898, the issue of ceasing propaganda and moving to mass agitation was settled. The new tactic was adopted and it quickly led to organizing the workers according to profession. A treasury was established for each profession. There was a board for each treasury and a united board for delegates from each treasury. Leading the latter was a committee. This united board got to work very energetically. It led the strike of the building workers. At the headquarters of the building workers, 300 strikers assembled, and the battle began with the police in front of the building on Zamkover Street. The battle also involved other professions, and it soon expanded from a purely economic issue into a political battle. The police did not allow the workers to take over Zamkover Street. The center of the working class was the “Dvoriansky Sadik” [the Nobleman's Gardens]. Confrontations with the police began again.

Arrests came early. A gathering of organizers for the First of May were arrested. Fallen into

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the hands of the gendarmes were: Ussishkin, Mezivetzky, Rhoda Terman, Edleh Gurwitsch Velvel Shalit, Avraham Romm, Mendel Bass, Gershon Chanin. A new committee had to be formed, consisting of: Avraham Ginzburg, Anna Rosenfeld, Sender Landau, Yoske Yoffe, Itzke the painter, Shtam, Abramtchik. There was, in Hirsch Baron's dwelling, a library that was overseen by the student Boris Zeitlin. But in August he had been arrested. Avraham Ginzburg, together with Y. Shlachter, tried to save the library and took it across the Dvina in a boat, but the agents of the secret police, led by Levitzky and Potvorotnik, arrested them in the process…

At that time, the issue of Yiddish arose. Ussishkin ordered that all work be conducted in Yiddish, not only in the treasury but also in the various circles. The order came down and people complied. Ziama Rabinovitch from Gomel brought the first pamphlets in Yiddish. Among them was a popularized version of Darwin, made by Ilya Davidson.^[c] In the name of the “Bund”, Taras (Duvid Katz) came to Vitebsk. He strengthened the Yiddishist tendencies among the leaders of the movement in Vitebsk. Avraham Ginzburg relates that when he left Vitebsk, he settled in Dvinsk, and from there he sent announcements to Vitebsk in Yiddish. The committee, led by Boris Zeitlin, G. Luria (Albert), Anna Rosenfeld, and others, ordered literature in Yiddish. It is possible that this literature was especially needed for propaganda that was being conducted among yeshiva students. Pesach Mezivetzky says that these yeshivas served as reservoirs for all the movements: for the “Bund,” for Zionists, for the SR [Social Revolutionaries]. The news from the “Jewish Worker” (August, 1899) is interesting: “In Vitebsk, for the First of May, an announcement was made in Yiddish and Russian, as well as in Loshen Kodesh [Hebrew].”

That the activists of Vitebsk included extraordinarily generous people is shown by the following fact. When Avraham Ginzburg

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later issued a Russian Social-Democrat journal, “Yuzhny Rabotshi” [The Southern Worker], which was published by an illegal press, many people from the Vitebsk circles participated in this conspiratorial project. In addition to Ginzburg, Boris Zeitlin was an editor, and in the illegal printing operation were: Ilya Vilensky, Liza Amsterdam, Anna Rosenfeld, Sofia Grand, Eizik the carpenter. Ussishkin also helped. M. Kefali-Kamermacher assembled type for the press.

The battle for a shorter workday and for raising wages developed stormily in 1897-1898 and involved all professions. In 1898, the gendarmes wrote in their report: “The underground propaganda has penetrated deeply into the workers' environment.” They estimated that there were in Vitebsk 400 organized workers. In the report of January 18, 1899, the gendarmes wrote, “In the treasuries there is strong propaganda in jargon [Yiddish]. There are about 500 organized workers.” And later, in a report to the police department, they said, “The largest majority of the Jewish workers–up to 600–take part in the workers' circles.” In 1899, Police Chief Zubatov sent to Vitebsk a group of agents led by Menshtshikov. With their cooperation, there took place on the night of 29-30 August, 1900, more than 100 inspections in Vitebsk, and more than 40 people were arrested. On October 14, 1900, there was a clash between workers and police, and gendarmes, on Zamkov Street. Seven people were arrested. In the archives of the police department, there is a large correspondence between “big shots” of the Okhrana–Menshtshikov, Ratayev, and Zubatov–about the situation in Vitebsk.

From these official materials, we can gather some facts about the Vitebsk revolutionary and labor movements. There is a report in the archives from the factory inspector that says that in 1899 there was unrest among carpenters, locksmiths, tailors, shoemakers, construction workers, and painters: “On July 26 and 27, the workers planned to create unrest at the Smolyensk Market…Between 400 and 500 workers assembled. Aside from a few cases, everything proceeded without incident.

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The guilty were arrested. People said that there was a secret fund from which support was given.”

The first political demonstration in Vitebsk occurred in June of 1899. It was called because in a cell at the police station, people found the corpse of the locksmith Mendel Kivenson. He had been arrested in 1897 and sent to Velizh. There he was under police supervision. In June of 1899 he was confronted on the street in Vitebsk by the police agent Smalakovsky (Yoshke Podvorontik). He arrested him and tortured him for three days. Podvorontik ordered him to reveal his comrades. On June 18, people found Kivenson hanging in his cell. In the city, people said that Podvorontik had led him to his death and then hanged him. He was autopsied in the hospital. About 500 people gathered. The demonstration proceeded to Yoshke Podvorontik's apartment. Yoshke was not found at home, but the people destroyed the the place. The police buried Kivenson late at night so that no one would know. On June 25, some people put out a leaflet in Russian and Yiddish telling the tragic story. The leaflet was signed: “The Vitebsk Workers Social-Democratic Committee.” At the top of the leaflet it said, “ The Community Jewish Workers Bund in Russia and Poland.” In conjunction with the demonstration, the gendarmes made many arrests. Five were sent to Siberia, 20 were sent to nearby cities under police supervision. Among those arrested were: the folk doctor Gurevitsch (recently returned from Siberia), his brother, a dentist, Shneerson, Chanin, and others. It is curious that the Kaziona rabbi Perlshteyn helped to translate the Yiddish text of the proclamation, and the words “self-ruling government” he translated into Russian as “the government that now rules”…In the same year, 1899, in the middle of November there was a second demonstration against militarism. When people accompanied the recruits, about 200 workers gathered and people sang revolutionary songs in Russian and Yiddish, among them the Marseillaise. They also distributed a proclamation.

In the pamphlet, which came out abroad with the title

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“The Battle of the Vitebsk Workers for a Better Life,” was a detailed description of the social situation of the working class and the conditions of the workers in 1897 and 1898 in Vitebsk.

It is appropriate to cite the entirety of this pamphlet:

“The previous year marked in the life of our city a whole new development for its citizens: a whole array of strikes in small workshops and in large enterprises; especially large strikes of the construction workers, numerous demonstrations…It all made an immense impression on all levels of the people…The labor movement found there fertile ground and planted deep roots…Only our local Zionists could, consciously or unconsciously close their eyes to these developments, speak against unity of all Jews and condescend to the “philosophers” (as they called the newly aware workers). The “philosophers” say that it is long past the time when people could speak against Jewish unity in our city, even though it lacks well-developed industry. At around the time when Jews began to be driven out of Moscow…the industry in our city marked a strong revival. The old tradition of handworking had expanded and there were many small and large factories–paper factories, tobacco factories, factories for confections, soap and tile factories with 50 to 200 workers. There were also workers in eyeglasses and minerals. Small factories also appeared to make plowshares. In the garment world, the shops for ready-made clothes played a larger role, as did their manufacture–cheaper goods for the peasants and for the factory workers.”

After the description of the economic situation of the population, we read in the pamphlet: “At the end of 1897, there were cases of protest…The first began with the locksmiths…and in 1898, all the professions were drawn into a strike.” Here we find an interesting remark: “The movement appeared very favorable in the relations between the workers in different fields. Unlike earlier, when there was often conflict among the workers, now there was a consciousness of the unity of their class interest…Under the influence of their improved material conditions and from the new developments that their battle had called forth, our workers began to awaken from their intellectual

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slumber. There was a notable inquiry into books from various areas of knowledge, even among the unrelated professions.”

In the years 1894-1900, hundreds of intellectuals and hundreds of workers passed through all phases of the revolutionary and socialist movement in Vitebsk. They took an active part in the first propaganda circles, where they got their first knowledge of the socialist Torah from LaSalle and Marx. They later moved on to political agitation and became fighters for political liberation in Russia. The transfer to Yiddish as a means of agitation worked also in the sense that Yiddish had took advantage in the socialist and labor circles as well as in the consciousness of citizens of the national moment. In hindsight we can see a certain confusion between the assimilated, educated Jewish intellectuals and the working class. The working class felt bound to Jewish life and strove not to be disconnected from its national tradition, but rather to modernize it. In hindsight, we can say that the yeshiva students played a role as mediators, since their social situation and their needs put them closer to the working class than the political leaders. A special role was played by the “Bund.” In Vitebsk, the development of socialist thought probably made its own way: earlier there had been a Social-Democrat group, which later grew nearer to the “Bund” and gradually merged with it organizationally.

In the years 1897-1900, there were occasionally inspections and arrests. Hundreds and hundreds of Vitebsk pioneers, intellectuals, and workers were put in prison throughout Russia–from Vitebsk to Petropavlosk Fortress in Petersburg. Hundreds of years in prison and exile in those years were the fate of Vitebsk revolutionaries. Many of them could not hold out and died young in prison or in the far distances of Siberia. It is simply impossible to give an accounting of the victims of czarist law in those years. They are the nameless heroes of the Russian Revolution.

And just as in the section on Amsterdam we shared the role of the legendary Amsterdam, so now as we describe the second stage of the revolutionary and labor movement in

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Vitebsk, as the nineteenth century became the twentieth century, we will provide biographical information about those who were the true leaders of this stage: biographies of Avraham Ginzburg and Boris Zeitlin.

Avraham Ginzburg was born on September 8, 1878. His party pseudonyms were: Shloimke, Andrei, Grigory, Yefim, Naum; his literary pseudonyms were Naumov and Veloks. His participation in the movement stems from 1897. In 1899 he had to leave Vitebsk and take up Social-Democrat labor in other cities. From Dvinsk he went to Yekaterinoslav. In 1900-1902, he put out an illegal Social-Democrat journal, “Yuzhni Rabotshi” (The Southern Worker) and organized an illegal press that went from city to city: Yekaterinoslav, Mohilev, Smolensk, Kishinev, Nikolayev, Kherson, Krementshig, Yelisavetgrad. There in Yelisavetgrad he was arrested together with Boris Zeitlin, Anna Rosenfeld (his wife), and others. He was in prison in Odesa, Lomszhe, then in the Petropavlovsk Fortress (from August, 1902, until June, 1903). He was sent to eight years in Yakutsk, in eastern Siberia. At the beginning of 1905 he escaped from there and worked as a Menshevik in Moscow, Riga, from 1906 until 1910–in Petersburg he became legal and took on legal Menshevik duties and became a “Liquidator” [a party associated with the Bund]. After an arrest in 1910, he spent a short time in 1911 in Vitebsk. From 1912 to 1922 he lived in Kiev, at first collaborating on the newspaper “Kievskaya Misl” [Kiev Thought]. At the time of the February Revolution, he was chosen as an assistant mayor in the Kiev municipality. In October he was named as assistant minister to the labor minister Kuzma Gvozdiev. In 1922 he travelled to Moscow and took a number of important posts for the Bolsheviks–in 1928 he became the replacement for the chair of the board of economic planning and the manager of the Planning Bureau. In 1929–replacement chair of the Institute for Economic Research. A. Ginzburg-Naumov wrote several scholarly books: in 1909–“Materials about the Economic Situation and Professional Organizations of the Petersburg Metal Workers; in 1913”–“The Budgets of the Workers in Kiev”; 1923–“The History of Socialism and the Labor Movement; 1925-1927”–“The Economy of Industry”

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(lectures that he delivered at the institute named for Plekhanov); 1930–“Industrial Economics.”

Avraham Ginzburg actually left the Mensheviks soon after the Bolshevik overthrow. But he did not join the Bolsheviks. In 1930 he was arrested and included in the so-called “Trial of the Mensheviks” that was staged in Moscow in March of 1931. Ginzburg was sentenced to 10 years in prison. He never left that prison.

Avraham Ginzburg (Naumov)		Boris Zeitlin (Baturski)

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sent for six years to Yakutsk. He returned to Vitebsk after the amnesty of 1905. At the party conference in Stockholm in 1906 (under the pseudonym Gromov) he was a delegate from Yekaterinoslav. In 1911 he graduated from the University of Moscow. He was one of the leaders of the Liquidators and participated in all the legal Menshevik journals and newspapers. Together with Solomon Schvartz he edited the journal “The Workers Declaration.” He 1912 he was chosen as a member of the organizing committee of the Menshevik party. In 1914, before the First World War, he was one of the representatives of the organizing committee at the international deliberations in Brussels. At the time of the February Revolution, he was a member of the Central Committee of the party and an editor of the “Worker's Newspaper” in Petersburg. After the October Revolution he stood apart from the central (wholly leftist) organs of the Social-Democrat party. In 1920 he was arrested by the Cheka in Vitebsk.

Of the activists in the Jewish labor movement in its first epoch, it is appropriate to give a picture of Rosa Greenblatt, as given by B. Mikhalevitsch in his book “Memories of Jewish Socialists” (volume 1, pages 46-48).

He writes, “She was a glorious young woman with a strong penchant for mysticism. Already in her younger years she frightened her parents with her crazy behavior. The daughter of rich parents, she decided in the early 90s, together with her circle, to spread education among the people. She would dress as a bookseller in a large kerchief, poorly dressed, and go through the Jewish quarter and go to houses where she would lend books for reading. Once she was recognized by a merchant who used to go to her house and who quickly informed her parents. They were sure that their daughter was not in her right mind and put her under strict supervision. The new Jewish socialist ideas also came to Vitebsk, and the whole circle in which Rosa and her sister Liza found themselves declared itself to be socialist. Her sister Liza worker for years in the secret press of the “Worker's Voice” and in the following “Technique.” Rosa went to Bialystok and learned a skill in a weaving factory. She began to live as a simple worker. With her idealism and devotion, she had a large influence on the workers, especially on the young women

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of the movement. She also had a way of painting in idealistic-romantic colors the beautiful aspects of the movement. She believed more in LaSalle's idealism than in Marx's darker erudition. In her agitation, she always called on people to become angelic.”

“At the first gathering of the ‘Bund’ (1897) she was sent as a delegate from Bialystok. Characteristic of her was the motion she made (at a time when there was almost no popular socialist literature in Yiddish) that Engels' book about Feuerbach's philosophy should be made available to Jewish workers. She also wrote for Bialystok and then for Lodz several leaflets that can now be found in the archives of the ‘Bund.’”^[d]

“Some years later she went abroad. There she became a fervent Zionist and dreamed the whole time about settling in Eretz Yisroel. In Zionism, her metaphysical nature found a greater vista than in socialism, and she became a bitter opponent of the ‘Bund.’ Shortly before the (First World) War, we met with her in Switzerland. Her mysticism was at its height. Eveery Friday night she lit Shabbos candles, fasted on Yom Kippur, and carried out a number of rituals, not out of religiosity, as she explained, but only because she wanted to be closely bound to the Jewish people. About her activities for the ‘Bund,’ she retained the fondest memories…”

The movement in 1900-1902

At the beginning of the twentieth century, the “Bund” became the acknowledged and almost solitary leader of the Jewish labor movement in Vitebsk. The organizations of the Social Revolutionaries and the Social Democrats came along a couple of years later (1903-1904). The Poalei-Tzion and other groups showed a certain influence first on the eve of the 1905 Revolution. The economic battle for a shorter work day and for higher wages increased in 1900 over previous years. The “Bund's” political activities also apparently increased.

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A detailed correspondence from Vitebsk was published about them in the Bundist “Worker's Voice” (December, 1900, number 20), giving us a picture of the economic battle in various professions in 1900 (the tailors, construction workers, furriers, shoemakers, business employees, purse makers, in Kobanovsky's tobacco factory).

From July 25 until August 5, 1900, 30 tanners were arrested for striking. The workers won the strike and within two weeks those arrested were released. At the onset of “work,” the gendarmes were unable to interfere. On the night of August 29, the streets of Vitebsk were in an uproar: up to 100 house searches were conducted and 40 people were arrested.

In the same issue of “The Worker's Voice,” we find interesting news about the activities of the “Bund” in Vitebsk in the fall of 1900:

“A short time after the police attack of August 29, gatherings of workers recommenced, often consisting of more than 500 people. They gave speeches and reported on everything that had been done recently. The spoke about the proclamation from the central committee of our “Bund,” about the military tribunal against the Warsaw workers. These gatherings encouraged the masses. On October 10, the Vitebsk committee distributed 1,000 Yiddish and 300 Russian announcements about the recent arrests. This act irritated the police…On Shabbos, October 14, the gendarmes, the town constables, and the regional police began to beat innocent passersby with sabers, knouts, and clubs. The frightened public ran away.”

In 1901, several professions went on strike, ending in partial victory. From the Bundist “Latest New” (Russian, number 21, June 21), we know that 150 tanners went on strike for 8 weeks. There was a strike in the tobacco factory of about 100 workers (“Latest News,” number 24 from July 9). About the strike in Kolbanovsky's tobacco factory and about a political workers' demonstration on November 24, 1901 in connection with this strike, a detailed letter was published from Vitebsk in the “Latest News” (number 50, from January 1, 1902), which it is appropriate to cite:

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“There was a demonstration on November 24, 1901. Last summer there was a strike at Kobanovsky's tobacco factory. According to the denunciation from a worker, Barantshuk, 2 workers were sent back to their city of birth and 6 received 4-5 years in Siberia. These were simple, unselfconscious workers who were accused of participating in the strike. The Vitebsk committee of the “Bund” released a statement (hectographed) on November 22…On November 24, the workers decided to organize a demonstration in front of the prison at 4 in the afternoon. The police, however, knew about this and took precautions. The governor called the Kaziona Rabbi and suggested that he work on the Jews not to participate in the demonstration. People say that the rabbi called together the intelligentsia and spoke to them. The workers assembled at the appointed time on the main street, but they were warned by the local police. The demonstration did not take place. A group of 50 workers tried to gather in another spot and began to sing “Vichri vraszdebnia” [Hostile Whirlwinds], but they were shoved away and seven were arrested.”

In 1902, the mood of the Vitebsk working class was not good. In March, 30 people at an illegal gathering were arrested. These arrests weakened the political battle and strike movement. On May 1, some 400 workers did not work. Army units were mobilized into the ranks of the police. There were arrests. It appeared that the police had beaten the arrested workers and tortured them (“Latest News,” numbers 64, 69, 72). In connection with this police action, the Vitebsk committee of the “Bund” released an announcement that, among other things, said, “If the police will not cease such atrocities in handling the workers, they should not be surprised when among the workers of Vitebsk will be found their Lekerts and Balmashovs [two revolutionary assassins] who will answer violence with violence” (“Latest News,” number 80 from August 9, 1902).

In “The Worker's Voice” (number 31, from January, 1903) was published a detailed letter from Vitebsk that describes the whole situation and the mood of the working class in 1902. This letter is full of pessimistic indications:

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“After the police forced the assembled out of the woods on Shavuos, they bloodied and beat and put under police supervision about 150 people. The gendarmes began to seek out educated people. They prowled through the whole city and finally thought they had made a “case” against a circle of educated revolutionaries…The city was flooded with spies who searched and probed into every corner. But this reminded the workers that they had to be extra careful and conspiratorial…Aside from the general Bundist proclamations, the committee put out and distributed proclamations about the latest arrests, a call to Christian workers for the First of May, from the Red Cross to the community, to the business employees and to the Christian workers from Kimmel's paper factory. The distribution of these proclamations went very well.”

“Life in the Vitebsk organization,” concludes the writer, “was not full of happy experiences. Truly, work went on; people distributed proclamations, people split up and people read literature, people held discussions and lectures, and they went on strike. The workers were unsatisfied with their work and waited proudly for better times. But just like the work, the unhappiness was not tied to an active revolutionary spirit that would have anticipated a politically active worker mass. This is not the place to clarify the reasons that brought the organization to such a condition. We can only show that it went through a severe crisis. The organization had to throw off the old forms of its work and shape new pones, more revolutionary, and conduct them with more strength, understanding, and life. The Vitebsk workers had long since rejected their professional treasuries, but they had created no new forms of political organization to unite them and to fill their lives with revolutionary content.”

In 1903, there was a much more favorable atmosphere for the work of the “Bund” in Vitebsk. In January, the committee put out the first issue of the “Vitebsk Flier.” In March, the work of the organization began to increase. On March 21, at a production in the city theater of Maxim Gorky's “Na Dne” [The Lower Depths] a demonstration was organized. In the middle of the second act,

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from the gallery there was a flurry of leaflets with the slogans “Down with the autocracy!” and “Long live political freedom!” and “Long live the overseer Gorky!” The police, gendarmes, and spies tried to seize the fliers from everyone and arrested several people. About three days later there was a political gathering of about 150 people. At the stock exchange, which was then on Zamkover Street, people on Shabbos gave out the “Flier.” Soon after that, there were two gatherings that attracted 50 and 40 people (“Latest News,” number 118, April, 1903). It is interesting to recall that at one of these gatherings the question was considered of what was required by the “supervised,” that is, by those who found themselves under police supervision, in order to follow the rules and regulations imposed by the police. This was question was very appropriate, since in Vitebsk there were about 400 such “supervised” people…

It is understandable that the shocking news of the Kishinev pogrom disturbed the Jewish population of the city. A self-defense organization was quickly organized. It was called “The Youth Group.” The police made more arrests and sent to court several members of the group. The Bund committee also organized a “battle group,” which soon published a greeting to comrades in other cities–Baku, Odesa, Kiev, Yekaterinoslav–which also created self-defense groups. On the High Holidays, a rumor spread that a pogrom was being planned. The Bundist “battle group” was prepared. As “The Latest News” informs us (number 125, November 7, 1903), “A delegation of bourgeois citizens visited Police Chief Braun. He ordered 1200 rubles to reinforce the police. They gladly gave him that sum.”

In 1903, the “Bund” developed a larger economic project. In August the “Bund” issued a leaflet to all Vitebsk shoemakers. The brochure made both political and economic demands–raise wages, shorten the work day, abolish piecework, and create better treatment.

As is known, the “Bund” at the end of 1903, at the second conference of the R.S.D.A.P., separated from the party and became independent. This step darkened the mood. The Vitebsk Bundists were also involved in the tangle of questions and conflicts that embroiled the

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whole Social-Democrat world. How did the Vitebsk Bundists vote in the conflict between the Social Democrats and the “Bund”? “Iskar,” which was already a Menshevik organ, wrote (in number 74) that in Vitebsk “many of the organized ‘Bund’ workers were not happy with the position of the ‘Bund’ at the second conference, and especially with the fact the ‘Bund’ had left the party.” It is just common sense that there were unhappy Bundists. But we also have the text of a resolution that was adopted after the split both in Vitebsk and in other cities in Vitebsk Gubernia. The resolution shows that the mood was firm and unified. “The Worker's Voice” (of February, 1904, number 36) gives the text of the resolution:

“1. The duty of the Russian Social-Democratic Workers Party was to develop class-consciousness and lead the class war of the proletariat of all Russia; 2. To develop the class consciousness, to lead to active battle for the liberation of the Jewish proletariat (and for the liberation of the Russian proletariat in general). Successfully to combat every movement in Jewry that strives to eclipse the class-consciousness of the proletariat; to fight successfully against antisemitism (of the Russian mob) in general and against pogroms in particular, the Jewish proletariat can only be organized in a self-defense S.D. organization, which must be aided by the organized proletariat of other nations; 3. Since the conditions that the second conference imposed on the ‘Bund’ must lead to its eradication, this meeting finds that the ‘Bund's’ exit from the party was the only thing it could do. This meeting also asserts its conviction that life will show our Russian comrades their guild in the splitting of the party; 4. This meeting asserts its solidarity with the conduct of the Bundist delegation at the party conference.”

This resolution was adopted at two gatherings in Vitebsk that were attended by 62 and 83 people. Of those 145 people, 134 voted for the resolution. One person was opposed and 10 abstained. The same resolution with only slight changes was also adopted in Polotzk (60), Byenshenkovitsch (50), and Nevel (140). After the “Bund” had left the Social-Democratic

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Party, it created organizations in cities where they had not previously existed. In March of 1904, there formed the Northwest Committee of the R.S.D.A.P (in which were both Bolsheviks and Mensheviks). Also belonging to this committee were Social-Democrat groups from Vitebsk and from several cities from the Vitebsk Gubernia (Nevel, Velisz, Dvinsk, Polotzk). The S.D. groups were not large. They consisted mostly of Jews. It is not surprise that a competition began between the S.D. and the “Bund.” The competition was quite open, because the Northwest Committee began its activities with a “victory declaration” that accused the “Bund” of nationalism, separatism, and other sins and deviations.

The Vitebsk and Dvinsk committees of the “Bund” in a joint declaration that was issued in conjunction with the publication by the Northwest Committee declared:

“The new Northwest Committee of the R.S.D.A.P., as is clear from its announcement, has set as its goal not the development of class-consciousness of the thousands of Russian workers who live in the northwest areas and whose lack of organization hampers the activities of the Jewish and Polish Social-Democrats. The committee holds as a second-tier importance the inclusion of a new member in the family of the fighting proletariat and seeks thus to strengthen itself. For itself it has a more grandiose duty: to reveal before the eyes of the proletariat, with the help of S.D. critic, the foreign nationalistic tendencies and through them to “cleanse” the labor organization of outside elements that have latched onto it.” Put in simple language, this means that the Northwest Committee intended to fight with the “Bund” (“Latest News,” August 28 1904, number 192).”

The battle between the Social-Democrats and the “Bund” developed even more forcefully in the northwest area. In Vitebsk itself the battle was milder. This was because the party members (the “Iskravtzes”) were mostly Mensheviks. This was in 1904, before the revolution, when many ideological and organizational differences of opinion had lost their significance.

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The activities of the “Bund” in Vitebsk during 1904 were generally pallid, especially in the first half of the year. As usual, they distributed announcements from the “Bund” central committee. There were also several local announcements, but the mood was tense. The First of May was celebrated in a small circle. There was no strike. The police made innumerable arrests. The arrested workers tried to stage a demonstration in prison in honor of the workers' holiday. The result was–several were put in dungeons.

The chief reason for the arrests and the tense mood among the Bundists can be explained by a provocation that did great harm to the movement. About this provocation in Vitebsk, two pamphlets were issued in two thousand copies in Russian and Yiddish by the city committee of the “Bund.” In the illegal journal of the “Bund,” there was an announcement (“Der Bund,” April, 1904, number 3). The provocateur was named Nachum Isaakson (or Nachke). He was described in this way: “Middle height, heavy, with red cheeks, a fat face, a yellow mustache.” Another description of him was published in the city: “Nachum Isaakson betrayed our whole organization in Vitebsk. Nachum Isaakson was born in Mohilov. He served in the army in Vitebsk. He lived last winter in Vitebsk. He was known by the name Yakov. Nachum Isaakson is a very dangerous provocateur, and we warn all of comrades the pay special attention to him.” The Bundist announcement also said that Isaakson had betrayed scores of comrades. Thanks to him, the father of Ch. Tzatkin, who was caught in the train station with illegal writings, was not in prison.

It is clear that in collaboration with this provocateur, the police could conduct a total pogrom in the Bundist organization. The police and gendarmes thought that they could completely stymie the revolution in Vitebsk. In a letter from Vitebsk (“The Bund,” number 2, 1904) there was a description of the means that the police used on the Christian population. They spread a rumor that “in the gatherings and the arrests, they had found letters to the Japanese and money for them,” which meant that the Jews and the Jewish revolutionaries were helping in the war with the enemy, the Japanese…

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Despite the arrests, the “Bund” in Vitebsk in the second half of 1904 devoted themselves to developing broad revolutionary activities and to strengthening their organization. In connection with the massacre in Bialystok in that same year, in the state theater of Vitebsk, as in many other cities in the area, there was a demonstration on October 1. When it became known in Vitebsk the “Romanovists” had been sentenced to long prison terms, the “Bund” immediately organized a protest demonstration. As is well known, among the “Romanovists” there were several activists from Vitebsk.

The city committee had called on the most important people in political life. Also printed and distributed was Leon Goldman's speech that he gave at the Kishinev trial of the publishers of “Iskra,” addressing the soldiers, and also published and distributed were important articles from the “Worker's Voice.”

In the published materials, most of them illegal, not missing are the names of the activists of that time, of the “professional revolutionaries” and of the active participants in the movement, who numbered in the scores, if not in the hundreds. Not lacking either were ideological atmosphere, news about the battle over political issues and about the Jewish question in particular. In the years on the eve of the 1905 Revolution, in the battle between the “Iskra” and the “Bund,” a much broader circle was involved in the ideological conflicts, especially in the nationalistic question. In those years in Vitebsk also appeared the first Zionist-socialists of various hues. Cases were known in which Zionists joined the ranks of the “Bund,” and there were cases when Bundists joined up with other parties (Social-Democrats, Social-Revolutionaries, and Poalei-Tzion). But on the basis of our materials, it is impossible to establish an actual living, colorful picture of the movement that grew so robustly in the revolutionary era of 1905-1907.

On January 9, 1905, “Bloody Sunday,” throughout the area the revolution began. It was as if an electric shock had gone through the large mass of workers and

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caused an upswing in the labor movement. In Vitebsk, Nevel, Dvinsk, Polotz, Kreslavka, Liutzin–in all the cities and towns, the events in Petersburg resonated loudly. “In the first two days,” writes V. Nevsky in the “Krasnaya Letopis” [Red Chronicle] (1922, number 4), “thousands of workers, mostly Jews, went on strike.” In January, a community strike committee was formed by the “Bund” and the R.S.D.A.P. The strike movement recurred in February in connection with events on the war front. The Vitebsk working class reacted strongly to everything that happened in the country. In March of 1905, a larger strike movement began which seemed to include the more backward classes as well. It marked a significant upswing among the business employees. At that time, the “Bund” and the Poalei Tzion had a great influence (“Latest News, number 228”).

It is interesting that of all the cities in the northwest area, only in Vitebsk was there a reaction against the idea of creating a governmental commission on the labor question. As is known, in Petersburg on February 18 such a commission was formed under the leadership of Senator Shidlovsky. The committee consisted of representatives, entrepreneurs and workers. In Vitebsk, on March 30, a similar commission was called together under the leadership of the governor. The Vitebsk and Dvinsk committee of the “Bund” issued a special announcement called “The Police Focus,” which presented a detailed evaluation of such commissions and also presented the conditions under which the workers were prepared to participate in them.

The enthusiasm of the revolutionary mood in the city did not stimulate a growth of antisemitism. There was not even an effort in Vitebsk, as there was in other cities, to fashion an antisemitic organization. In fact, among the Old Believers [a sect within the Russian Orthodox Church], a suspicious movement began in April of 1905. The “Bund” reacted immediately with an announcement “to the entire Christian population of Vitebsk.” This announcement declared in a very popular fashion the goals of the czarist autocracy, how the czarist government used pogroms against Jews and why the working classes of all peoples should go hand in hand in the battle against czarism. The strike on the First of May involved the majority of workers. In

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June, nothing special happened in the city. The whole working class, like the whole population, paid attention to the sensational news about the barricade battle in Lodz and about the battle against the Potemkin armored vehicles in Odesa.

In July, the “Bund” in Vitebsk and in Vitebsk Gubernia, following the directive from the central committee, conducted a protest campaign against the plan of the so-called Bulygin Duma. With this plan, the Petersburg government wanted to weaken the general demands for a Russian constitution. The boycott of this Duma won the sympathy of the widest circles. In Vitebsk there were large gatherings of workers and of people in general. The chronicle of the boycott campaign shows that there were strikes and protest meetings not only Vitebsk but also in all the cities and towns in Vitebsk Gubernia. There were meetings in Nevel on July 7, 24, and 28. One meeting, attended by 600 people, took place in the local cemetery. A second meeting attracted 400 people. On July 23 in Kreslavka there was a meeting of 350 people. In Velisz there was a gathering of Jewish and Christian workers. In Polotzk the police shot during a demonstration and three people were wounded. In Liazna and in Tshashnik there were meetings in the cemetery. In Tshashnik there was also a one-day strike.

The economic battle during 1905 was conducted energetically. All professions began to organize. The “Bund,” which operated on the principle of “party” unity, took an active part in the turnout of the workers and helped to work out and formulate their economic demands.

The bosses were certainly not too happy with those demands and also certainly not with the fact that the “Bund” had so actively gotten involved with the economic battle. But the general atmosphere in that year of revolution was favorable to the workers, and the bosses had to give in.

What happened in Vitebsk in the October days of 1905 is described in detail in the articles that were published in the periodical “The Bund” (November, 1905, number 10). The railway strike had already begun in Petersburg and Moscow on September 12, and the general strike, which took place in all the industrial centers of the country with their

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millions of workers and the democratic intelligentsia from the largest cities, led by the “Union of Unions,” when news of all this arrived late in Vitebsk. It is sufficient to say that in Vitebsk, a strike was called on October 17. As. Is well known, on that day was issued the manifesto that guaranteed all freedoms and promised a constitution for the country. On October 17 and 18 there were shocking conflicts between the working class and the police and Cossacks. They shot into the crowd. The dead and wounded fell. It is possible that the city administration did this in order to gain time. Perhaps the governor received secret orders from Petersburg, not knowing what to make of the manifesto and how to maintain order in the city. Even after the publication of the manifesto in Vitebsk, for a certain time there were mixed messages. On the one hand, some scores people were released from prison. On the other hand, people were still beaten in the streets. There were meetings attended by thousands where people spoke about an armed rebellion, about a democratic republic, and so on.^[e]

Rumors spread that that the police and the main “patriots” were preparing a pogrom. Luckily, there was no pogrom. In about 150 cities and towns, for three weeks after the manifesto there were pogroms against Jews, organized by the Black Hundreds with the help or advice from the police department in Petersburg. This time Vitebsk was lucky.

After the tragic days of October 17-18, “freedom days” began in Vitebsk–the days of the short political spring. These days were used for meetings and gatherings. There was widespread agitation for the goals and duties of the “Bund.” All of the socialist and revolutionary organizations appeared in the arena–the Social-Democrats, the Social-Revolutionaries, and the Poalei Tzion. Things were lively in town. Workers from different professions rushed to use this opportunity to organize. The political

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mood of the “Bund,” as we see from its announcements at that time, was quite radical.

People no longer believed in the manifesto, especially after the pogroms against Jews and revolutionaries. People held that the revolution must be broader and deeper. It was clear that there would be additional and more determined battles. From the general strike in October people would have to go on to a new broader, more political strike that would turn into a general armed uprising that would ultimately overthrow the despotic monarchy and create a democratic republic in Russia. This attitude dominated the Petersburg council of the labor deputies, to whose “orders” people paid close attention. (As is known, in other areas, especially in the northwest area, there were no councils of labor deputies.)

The central committee of the “Bund” had also seized upon these radical-revolutionary attitudes and directed its local organizations towards them.

We have few materials about life in Vitebsk during these “freedom days.” It is known that the Vitebsk liberals, cadets, used this period to put out a newspaper in Russian–“Vitebsky Golos” [The Voice of Vitebsk]. Their intention was to prepare an election campaign for the first State Duma. The “Bundists,” however, favored a boycott. In general, no socialist organization had the goal of putting out its own newspaper.

It is interesting to recall the battle and party competition that went on in Vitebsk around the professional unions. The Petersburg Menshevik newspaper “Natchalo” [The Beginning] contains a letter from Vitebsk (number 8, 1905) that tells about the atmosphere in the professional unions in those “freedom days”. “The professional unions tend toward the Social-Democrats and other revolutionary organizations and await their definite instructions. And since we have four revolutionary organizations–R.S.D.A.P., the “Bund,” the Social-Revolutionaries, and Poalei Tzion–it is understandable that there is friction among them that interferes with their efforts. The chief responsibility, in our opinion, lies with the “Bund,” which says that all professional unions should belong to a party, that is–to the “Bund”…These politics call for resistance from other parties–whether the Social-Revolutionaries or the Poalei Tzion. The opening skirmish was made by the “Bund” at a

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meeting of the business employees where there were about 700 people. About 300 were enrolled in the “Bund.” The others, who belonged to other parties or who preferred not to belong to a party, were inclined to create a special non-aligned party.”

People should be aware that after the October strike, the Jewish revolutionary movement generally learned its significance over the preceding months. It became clear to everyone that the fate of the revolution depended on the development of events in the large industrial centers and in the political nerve centers of the country: Petersburg, Moscow, Kiev, Kharkov, Warsaw, Odesa, Riga, Tiflis, Niszny-Novgorod, and so on. Other areas, especially the northwest area, the Jewish province with the greatest loyalty to the demands of the revolution, in those historic days of November and December, 1905, did not play such an important role.

A second political strike was called in November. The Petersburg labor council called on the working class to help the post office and telegraph clerks, to support the rebellion of the seamen in Kronstadt. The “Bund” used its small resources to encourage the movement. But one must acknowledge that the part played in these events by Vitebsk's working class was quite weak. The coalition committee of the “Bund” and Social-Democrats at the end of November issued an appeal to all citizens to prepare for a general armed rebellion: “Listen!” we read there. “The trumpets are giving the signal. And you, the old, experienced fighters, you must boldly begin…You must go out into the streets and boldly throw yourselves into the battle against the enemy–against the czarist autocracy”…When, after the arrest of the Petersburg labor council, a general strike was called in December, the appeal in Vitebsk was so weak.

After the arrest of the Petersburg labor council, after the failure of the December strike and the rebellion in Moscow, which underscored the isolation of the labor movement and of the socialist parties, the disappointment in the ranks of the revolutionaries

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grew. This mood was even sharper in the Jewish province. In 1906-1907 one could see the same picture almost everywhere: the intelligentsia left the parties and the workers felt abandoned. Among the young, who had not long before been seized by romantic-revolutionary hopes and illusions, a mood of despair and demoralization ruled. In the cities and towns the mood was partly anarchist, partly maximalist, and partly amoral. Young people were caught up in the impulse of expropriation. The local government organ, seeking revenge for the revolution, showed its atrocities. The remaining revolutionaries had no other recourse than to terrorize the police and the gendarmes. For them, the result of the revolution was this: instead of acting openly and carrying out their wider political efforts, their only choice was again to go underground, in difficult conditions, and carry on with their battle. They had illusions about a new round of revolution that would begin soon.

In such an atmosphere, their slogan to boycott the elections for the First State Duma which was adopted by all of the socialist parties in the country, is understandable. (Later on, even Latin acknowledged that this boycott was a political mistake.) Therefore it became possible that in Vitebsk were elected “cadets” [slang for undesirable candidates] as Dr. Bruk, A. Volkovitsch, and others, while the “Bund” and the Social-Democrats confined themselves to passive tactics.

At the same time, as political war seemed to weaken, the economic war heightened. In May-June of 1905, there was an outburst of economic conflicts and strikes in Vitebsk. In particular the conflicts between the business employees and their bosses became sharper./

In the fall of 1906, the “Bund” and the Social-Democrats took an active part in the election campaign for the Second State Duma in Vitebsk. On November 30, 1906, a committee from the “Bund” was named before the day when an election fund had to be established. The workers, comrades, and sympathizers had to contribute to the fund. On December 5-8, a gubernia-wide conference of election offices,

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which existed in almost all cities, was called in Vitebsk. Everywhere the “Bund” united with the Social-Democrats, and community election offices were created. Agitation in the village was intensive and well-organized, both by the Social-Revolutionaries and the Social-Democrats. “Our Tribune” (number 4, January 3, 1907) reports, “The Zionists had no influence, but in Vitebsk, Dvinsk, and Velisz they had a good chance of success, that is, of electing deputies.” Even earlier, on December 20, the same periodical (number 2) reported that in Vitebsk aside from the Zionist election committee there was an election committee for the Sejmists. It started with 30 men. At a meeting, Zhitlovsky read a lecture and defended the platform of the Sejmists. In number 3, from December 27, there was a denial that the Bundists had joined with the Sejmists in a bloc and together supported the candidacy of the lawyer Hillerson. In “Our Tribune” (number 9 from February 8, 1907) and in the “Folkstzeitung” [People's Newspaper] (number 275-276 from February 2 and 4), letters were published from Vitebsk concerning the course of the election campaign. In short, this was the situation: On January 14 and 15, for the second time there was a conference of all the Jewish election committees in the gubernia. Mark Ratner, the representative of the Sejmists, also attended. This gathering expressed a desire to create a bloc in the gubernia's election assembly and for an agreement among all the parties and factions who were to the left of the “cadets.” Unity was established between the Jewish election committees (Zionists and the like) and the Sejmists, and they proposed a slate of five candidates–four from the committee and one from the Sejmists (Dr. Ch. Zhitlovsky). On January 20, the representatives of the Jewish election committees came to the meeting of the Social-Democrat Committee to discuss a common slate. The discussions resulted in no agreement. The conditions proposed by the Jewish election committee were the following: 1. In the second stage of the election to support only the faction to the left of the “cadets” and the peasants; 2. If it was impossible to succeed with their own candidate, to support the candidacy of a progressive; 3. If neither of the foregoing was possible, people would follow the vote of two-thirds of the city bloc.

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The Sejmists accepted these conditions. The “Bund” rejected the third point, motivated by the fact that the third point opened the possibility of union with reactionary candidates. Taking part in the negotiations in the name of the election committee were Dr. Bruk, Neufach, Shalit, and others.

The “Bund” and the Social-Democrats then put up their own candidate–Dr. Ben-Zion Sheinen. The “Bund” conducted his campaign propaganda together with the Social-Democrats. There were days when people went out for 12-hour days. The result was that the candidates from the Jewish election committee received more than 3,000 votes, the candidates from the “Bund” and the Social-Democrats 1,080. The police also “assisted” in the election campaign. They would tear down the “Bund's” posters and those of the “Democratic Voters,” and they arrested about 20 people…

In 2907, the economic situation of the Vitebsk working class again worsened. So beginning in January there were strikes. The syndicate that had united all of the tanneries of the northwest area had a lockout in Vitebsk. The tailors had a sharp conflict with the boss Palovitsky from Vokzalner Street. He had fired a worker, so the workers called a strike. In their place, Palovitsky hired “real Russian strike-breakers.” The Vitebsk committee of the “Bund,” issued a proclamation (in August of 1907) with a call to all citizens and comrades not to employ Palovitsky and not to buy any of his merchandise.

We have official information about the situation of the professional unions in Vitebsk Gubernia until the end of 1907 according to reports from the Ministry of Internal Affairs. As is known, m 1906 the professional labor unions were legalized. According to official reports, by December 18, 1907, 45 professional unions had registered. Fourteen of them were shut down, and another three were nearly shut down “because of their harmful tendencies.” The work of the labor unions was conducted in close collaboration with the revolutionary organizations. They led strikes, declared boycotts, and so on. Illegal literature was found in the unions, and in the union of business employees, a bomb was found.^[f] At the meetings of the professional unions, party activists appeared to make revolutionary speeches. The gendarmes found it necessary to shut down all of the unions. The tailors union had already been declared illegal.

The political activities of the “Bund” slackened in 1907. For the First of May, the “Bund” together with the group from the R.S.D.A.P. issued an announcement. In November, both committees issued an announcement: “The judgment of the Social-Democratic faction” of the Second State Duma, which the czarist government dispersed. It commented on the disappointment in politics and in the broader labor circles. A strong wave of emigration to America began. This wave–whether of members of the intelligentsia of workers from the movement–had, you understand, a bad impact on the ongoing work. In 1908, the “Bund” and the Social-Democrat group issued a leaflet in Russian–for the First of May (April 18, Old Style)–that called for a general strike. “In our turbid days,” we read in this leaflet, “when a wave of quiet and apathy has surrounded us, after the recent bright times, this day should be a lighthouse, a gathering point, that should serve all of our spread out comrades.” But we did n not know if this leaflet actually served the needs of the movement. Perhaps not, because we find no references to it.

In the economic realm, strikes continued, both in 1908 and 1909 and in later years. In 1909 there was a large strike at the “Dvina” factory, where about 1,000 people worked, mostly Christians. The workers demanded that the technical director should be fired and wages should be raised. The strike was unsuccessful. In 1912, an announcement was issued for the First of May. This can be counted as the last publication of the illegal activities of the socialist groups in the city. Occasionally there were workers circles. The “Bund” collective still existed in the city. It held regular meetings and considered political and general issues. In 1913,

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there were more economic conflicts and strikes. We know about those in the “Dvina” textile factory and in the glass workshop.

In the professional journal “The Tailor” (Vilna, 1913) there was a precise description of the difficult situation of the tailors in Vitebsk. There was no professional union. The mood was tense. Relationships among the workers were also bad. The bosses took advantage of this situation at the time of a strike. Wages went down. The bosses, the owners of the larger businesses, especially Katzenellenboign, paid 50-60% less than they had five years earlier. The demands of the workers, who had called a strike, were, in total: to raise wages by 25%. The bosses were not so inclined, and they prepared for a lockout…

The activities of the more active elements in the “Bund” and other social-conscious workers and educated people in the last years before the World War took on new legal forms of community work that were shaped for the times. The isolation of the Bundists and socialists in broader community cultural work, which was characteristic of those earlier years, was not felt in those pre-war years. In 1908-1910, when the literary society was organized in Vitebsk and the position of the democratic Yiddishist element was strengthened, progressive, community-minded men were attracted to the society. People could not stand on the side in the community, which in those years developed an important cultural labor–the community “Spreaders of the Haskalah,” with its schools and its battle for Yiddish as a language of study, and the community AZO, which worked on important plans for social hygiene and hygienic living conditions, the community “Aid through Work,” and so on.

On the working street there existed until 1914 only two legal professional unions, that of the business employees and the printers. Together with new rules for work security, there was in Vitebsk a city-wide sick bank that united the whole working class–almost 6,000 workers, both Jews and Christians Working life, the political and spiritual strivings of the working class, found their expression in the sick bank.

This was the situation in Vitebsk until the summer of 1914, when the First World War began, which opened a new chapter in the history of the socialist and labor movement.

(According to official materials from the police department and other sources)

Amsterdam, Volf-Ber (Vladimir), born 1882, Avraham Amsterdam's younger brother. Arrested in 1900 in connection with transporting illegal publications from abroad. A year later, in 1901, again arrested in Riga for belonging to the “Bund.”

Ginzburg, Aharon (party names: Alpha, Sergei, Leonid), born December 3, 1878 in Vitebsk. Was a student in the Kozoner University. Arrested August 30, 1900, in Vitebsk. In May, 1901, released on 5,000 rubles bail. In February, 1903, sent to eastern Siberia for 4 years and again released on bail (15,000 rubles). In April, 1903, and arrested and sent to Yakutsk. For taking part in the rebellion of the “Romanovists” (1904) he received 12 years of hard labor. In 1905, freed in the amnesty. In 1905-1906 worked in Vitebsk. While in prison, translated L. Eritia's “The History of the French Revolution of 1848” and Edward Bernshteyn's autobiography. In 1917 belonged to the Plekhanovists, lived in Vitebsk. Died on November 30, 1927, in Moscow.

Isuav, Yosef, born 1878 in Vitebsk. First arrested for agitating among the tanners in Smorgon. In his later years he was one of the leading personalities of the Mensheviks. Together with Garvin and Yermolayev, Isuav was chosen for the central committee of the party in London (May, 1907), absolutely refused to serve with the Bolsheviks. Isuav belonged to the “liquidator” movement, listed in Menshevik publications under the pseudonym Mikhailov. In 1917 was a member of the labor council in Moscow and one of the leaders of the Mensheviks, Died in 1920.

Kamermacher, Mordechai (Kefali). A publisher, born 1882. Arrested for the first time in 1900 for belonging to the “Bund,” and then–in Minsk. For taking part in the Social-Democrat labor circles sent to eastern Siberia for four years. Twice escaped from Siberia (December,

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1902 and February 1903), captured both times. In 1904 took part in the uprising of the “Romanovists.” Received 12 years hard labor. After the amnesty in 1905 was in Petersburg one of the leaders of the printers union, edited the union journal, again arrested and exiled, then escaped to Paris, France, where he lived until 1917. In the February revolution was one of the leaders of the professional movement, jailed with the Bolsheviks. Chosen for the foreign delegation of the Mensheviks, lived in Berlin, Paris, and New York. Wrote for the “Socialist Messenger.” Died October, 1943, in New York.

Luria, Hirsch. Born 1878 (party name: Albert). First arrested in 1900. Later sent to Yakutsk, eastern Siberia. In 1904 participated in the uprising of the “Romanovists.” Sentenced to 12 years hard labor. Active in the “Bund” for many years. At the central conference of the “Bund” after the February revolution chosen for the central committee. Published many books, was secretary of the Yiddish section of the Society for Political Convicts in Moscow.

On August 30, 1900, gendarmes made a search at the home of Aharon Ginzburg and his sister Sheyna. In the search they found 3,693 copies of various illegal publications. This was a transport of literature that the Bundist center abroad had sent. This transport was supposed to be distributed to various cities. In connection with this transport, mass arrests occurred in Vitebsk. In addition to Aharon Ginzburg, the following people were arrested: Chaya Bramov, (arrested for the second time in 1902), Leib-Aharon Gurevitsch, Rochel Szelezniak, Kreyna Yaffe, Malkah-Reyze Kahan (who studied in a Swiss university), Avraham Labass, Chanah Rosenfeld, Yitzchak-Abel Soskin.

Rosengoltz, Arkady. Born 1889, worked in Vitebsk 1905-1909, belonged to the Revcom in Moscow at the time of the October Revolution, 1917. Held different important posts in the Commissariat for

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Foreign Affairs, Foreign Commerce, and so on. Also held party positions, was a member of the Tz.K.K and others. In 1937, tried in Moscow court for opposition together with Piatakov, Radek, and others. He was sentenced to death and, after the trial, he was shot.

Breslov, Boris (party name, Zachar), born 1882 in Horodok, a shoemaker. In the “Bund” in Viktebsk in 1899. In June, 1901, arrested for a strike and sent to eastern Siberia for four years. Escaped. A Bolshevik in 1904. In 1909 lived in Paris, in Lenin's neighborhood visited the Bolshevik Party school in Lonszuma. In 1911-1912, was an agent in Russia for the Bolshevik Center. Arrested in December, 1912, sentenced to hard labor, which he did in the Moscow Butirka Prison. After the October Revolution in 1917, took the post of chair of the Vitebsk Council of Labor Deputies. In 1918-1919 was the chair of the Moscow Cheka. In 1930 served as a substitute in France and took other labor and party posts.

Gruzenberg, Mikhail, born 1884 in Yanovitsch, Vitebsk Gubernia. Emigrated 1904–from 1907 until 1918 lived in the United States, published a journal in Russian, “The American Worker”. In 1923-1927 and agent for the Comintern, played a large but secret role in the revolutionary events in China, known by the name “Borodin.”

Original footnotes:

1. The letters from Amsterdam's wife and from his brother who lived in Moscow was received by the historian and activist from YIVO A. Tcherikower through the intercession of Amsterdam's brother-in-law, the writer Reuven Breinen, 1935. These letters were published in volume III of “Historical Writings.” Return
2. It is appropriate to note that in 1905 Zalmen Gurevitsch, according to the records of the northwestern committee of the R.S.D.A.P., translated the program of the R.S.D.A.P. for the first time into Yiddish Return
3. Ilya Davidson's political biography is interesting. Earlier he was a Zionist, then a Bundist, but later, during the war between the “Iskra” [a newspaper published by the Social Democrats] and the “Bund,” he was the theorist of the “Iskra” with articles under the pseudonym K.K. In Bundist literature he was called “the Jewish apprentice of the Iskra.” He died in Kiev in his early twenties. Politically he belonged to the Mensheviks. Return
4. The “Bund” archives can now be found in New York. Return
5. About this, see the memoirs of Sam Ageloff, “The October-Days of 1905 in Vitebsk.” He was then an active member of the Social-Democrat organization. He wrote his memoirs immediately after he arrived in America in 1907. Return
6. The bomb was put there by a provocateur on the direct orders of the gendarmes. Return

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