Sholom Schwartzbard

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Sholom Schwartzbard (1886, Izmail, Bessarabia - 1938, Cape Town), known in Russia as Samuil Isaakovich Shvartsburd, or Shulem Shmil Shvartsburd, was an anarchist, political assassin, and Yiddish author, who was acquitted by a French jury of the assassination of Symon Petlura.

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[edit] Early life

Schwarzbard was born in the town of Izmail, Russia, (currently in Southern Ukraine) to a Jewish family. He grew up in the town of Balta, Ukraine. Schwartzbard claimed to have had fifteen family members killed in Jewish pogroms instigated by the Black Hundreds, and he himself had survived one such attack during the Russian Revolution of 1905. Since 1905 he lived in Austria-Hungary, where he took part in the anarchist "expropriation" (armed robbery) of a bank in Vienna, for which he was sentenced to a time in hard-labor prison. In 1910, at age 24, he settled in Paris and found work in a watch factory, repairing clocks and watches, while keeping his anarchist views. During World War I he served in the French Foreign Legion (1914 - 1917) and was wounded at the Front. In 1917 he returned to Russia, and served in the Soviet Red Army in Ukraine (1918 - 1920). According to some evidence, he served in the cavalry brigade under the command of Grigoriy Kotovskiy, a famous Red Army commander during the Russian Civil war.

Sholom Schwartzbard's brother was expelled from France in 1919 for communist propaganda. But Sholom himself managed to move to Paris in 1920, became a citizen of France, opened a clock-and-watch repairshop, and joined an anarchist group. In Paris he got acquainted with prominent anarchists who came to France from Russia and Ukraine, including such figures as Voline, Alexander Berkman, Emma Goldman, as well as Nestor Makhno and his follower Peter Arshinov.

[edit] The assassination

In 1917, while travelling to Odessa to join the Red Guards, Schwartzbard reportedly was told of Petlura's responsibility for pogroms in the Ukraine. In 1926 Schwartzbard assassinated Symon Petlura, the head of the government-in-exile of Ukrainian People's Republic in Paris. On 25 May 1926, he approached Petlura, who was window shopping along a Paris boulevard, and asked in Ukrainian, "Are you Mr. Petlura?" When Petlura responded in the affirmative, Schwartzbard shouted (according to his later deposition) "Defend yourself, you bandit!" Petlura raised his cane and Schwartzbard pulled out a gun, shooting him three times, while exclaiming "This, for the pogroms; this for the massacres; this for the victims." When police rushed to him to make their arrest, he reportedly calmly handed over his weapon, saying, "You can arrest me, I've killed a murderer."

He was accused by Ukrainian emigrants of being a Soviet spy. According to Ukrainian historian Michael Palij, a GPU (Soviet secret police) agent named Mikhail Volodin came to Paris that August, they met, and Schwartzbard began stalking Petlura. This account has not been substantiated by other sources.

Schwartzbard was arrested and his trial began on October 18, 1927. His defence was led by Henri Torres, a renowned French jurist and the same lawyer who also represented the Soviet consul in France. The core of the defence was that he was avenging the deaths of victims of the pogroms. After a trial lasting eight days, the jury acquitted him. Petlura Trial - Time's coverage

[edit] After the trial

After 1928 Sholom Schwartzbard wanted to emigrate to Palestine but British authorities refused him a visa. He moved to the United States with his family.

In 1937 Schwartzbard traveled to South Africa to collect material for German-language Encyclopaedia Judaica. He died in Cape Town on March 3, 1938. 29 years later, in accordance with his will, his remains were transported to Israel and buried in Moshav Avihayil.

He is the author of the books in Yiddish published under the pseudonym Ba'al Halomos: "Troymen un virklekhkeyt" (Dreams and Reality, Paris, 1920), "In krig mit zikh aleyn" (At War with Myself, Chicago, 1933), "Inem loyf fun yor" (Over the Year, Chicago, 1934).

[edit] References

[edit] External links

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