Lev Chernyi Assassinated (1921)

Wed Sep 21, 1921

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Lev Chernyi was a Russian individualist anarchist theorist, poet, and leading figure of anti-Bolshevik rebellions who was executed without trial on this day in 1921. He had been detained after anarchists bombed Bolshevik headquarters in 1919.

Chernyi advocated a Nietzschean overthrow of the values of bourgeois Russian society and rejected the voluntary communes of anarcho-communist Peter Kropotkin as a threat to the freedom of the individual.

After he published anarchist literature, Chernyi was imprisoned in Siberia under the Russian Czarist regime for revolutionary activities. In 1917, Chernyi was released from prison by the Imperial Russian regime and became a leading anarchist figure in Russia.

Chernyi strongly denounced the Bolshevik government and joined the underground anarchist resistance movements against it. On September 25th, 1919, the “Underground Anarchists” bombed the headquarters of the Moscow Committee of the Communist Party during a plenary meeting, causing 67 casualties.

Following this bombing, a wave of repression against the anarchist movement took place. Chernyi was among those detained, charged with counterfeiting, although, according to anarchist historian Paul Avrich, there is no evidence he personally played a role in the bombing.

On September 21st, 1921, the Cheka executed Lev Chernyi without trial.