The famous Russian revolutionary Zinoviev Grigory (life years 1883-1936) was also a Soviet statesman and political figure. According to some sources, his real name was Radomyslsky Ovsei-Gershon (Evsei-Gershon) Aronovich; according to other sources, his name is Hirsch (Gersh) Apfelbaum (by mother). A brief biography of Grigory Zinoviev has become the subject of our review.
Childhood and family
Zinoviev Grigory Evseevich was born (briefly about this person you will learn from the article) in 1883, September 11 (23), in the city of Elisavetgrad (modern Kropyvnytskyi), Kherson province. Since 1924, his hometown has been called Zinovievsk for a whole decade. His father, Aaron Radomyslsky, who owned a dairy farm, provided him with an elementary education.
By the age of 14, Zinoviev was forced to work as a clerk and give lessons, as his family was impoverished.
The first wife of Grigory Evseevich was a professional revolutionary Ravich SarraNaumovna, also known under the pseudonym Olga. She was a member of the RSDLP, temporarily replaced the Commissar of Internal Affairs of the Northern Region, and was repeatedly under arrest.
Zinoviev's next wife was Lilina Zlata Ionovna, also known under the pseudonym Zina Levina. She also participated in the RSDLP, worked in the Petrosoviet, collaborated with the newspapers Pravda and Zvezda. She gave birth to a son from Zinoviev - Radomyslsky Stefan Grigorievich. At the age of 29, he was arrested and sentenced to death.
The third wife of Radomyslsky was Evgenia Yakovlevna Lasman. She spent about 20 years of her life in exile and prisons.
Pre-revolutionary activities
Already at the age of 18 (1901) Zinoviev became a member of the RSDLP and began to participate in the revolutionary movement. He organized workers' strikes in Novorossia, for which he was persecuted by the police. Avoiding persecution, in 1902 Radomyslsky left for Berlin, and then moved to Paris and Bern within a year. In 1903, it was there that he met Lenin, and subsequently became very close to him and began to represent him in European socialist organizations.
In 1903, Grigory Zinoviev, whose photo you see in the article, joined the Bolsheviks, and at the II Congress of the RSDLP supported Lenin. In the same year, the revolutionary returned to Ukraine, where he actively conducted propaganda.
A year later, due to heart disease, Radomyslsky again left the country, returning to Bern. There he began to study, entering the university at the Faculty of Chemistry, but a year later he interrupted his studies to participate inrevolution (1905-1907). In Russia, he was waiting for membership in the St. Petersburg City Committee of the RSDLP. A new attack of illness forced Zinoviev to leave for Bern again, but already to study at the Faculty of Law. In the spring of 1906, he returned to St. Petersburg, became a member of the Central Committee (only Lenin received more votes) and began working as an editor in the newspapers Vperyod and Sotsial-Democrat (underground publications). For his activities, he was arrested in 1908, due to illness he was released three months later and left for Austrian Galicia with Lenin.
There Zinoviev Grigory Evseevich, whose biography is full of tragedy, received large sums of money for the Bolshevik Party through the famous adventurer Parvus. The Austrian police believed that Zinoviev was recruited by French intelligence.
Revolution
In April 1917, Zinoviev with his second wife Zlata Lilina, their son Stefan, first wife Sarra Ravich and Lenin returned to Russia in a sealed carriage. After the July days, Radomyslsky and Lenin hid on Lake Razliv from the Provisional Government (at present, a monument has been erected there and a real hut is being erected every year). They were suspected of espionage and cooperation with Austria-Hungary.
In October 1917, a closed meeting of the Bolshevik Central Committee was held, where Zinoviev and Lev Kamenev announced the premature overthrow of the Provisional Government and did not agree with Lenin's resolution. Their performance in Novaya Zhizn (Mensheviks) almost led to expulsion from the party, but they simply decided to ban themspeak on her behalf.
When the Bolsheviks and Social Revolutionaries seized power in Petrograd, Zinoviev with Lev Kamenev, Alexei Rykov and Viktor Nogin advocated negotiations with Vizhel and concession to his demand to unite the parties into one socialist government. Lenin and Trotsky stopped these negotiations, and on November 4, this foursome, with Vladimir Milyutin who joined them, left the Central Committee. Lenin, in response, declared them deserters - he even mentioned this in his political testament.
Civil War
By the end of 1917, Zinoviev was allowed to return to politics. During the Civil War, he served as chairman of the Petrograd Soviet, the Council of People's Commissars of the Union of Communes of the Northern Region, and the Petrograd Revolutionary Defense Committee.
Access to unlimited power corrupted Zinoviev. When everyone around was starving, he arranged luxurious banquets for his close associates. On his initiative, the bourgeoisie and non-working elements were deprived of bread cards. At that time, tens of thousands of people fell into this category. They were literally doomed to starvation.
Zinoviev Grigory Evseevich (whose brief biography is presented to your attention in the article) at first abandoned the "red terror" after the assassination attempt on Lenin and the murder of Volodarsky and Uritsky, for which he was subjected to harsh criticism from Lenin. He also protested against the transfer of the capital to Moscow.
Zinoviev regained Lenin's favor by supporting the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, and was soon returned to the ranks of the Central Committee with membership in the new Politburo. They also entrusted him with the post of chairman of the Executive Committee of the Comintern, where he introduced the concept of "social fascism".
Zinoviev participated in the organization of the "Red Terror" of the intelligentsia of Petrograd, for which he was nicknamed "Grishka the Third" by them (in comparison with Otrepiev and Rasputin).
Under the leadership of Petrograd Zinoviev, the population of the city decreased by more than 4 million people. Most of them simply left the city, but a large part died due to starvation and executions. The fuel crisis also had an effect - in winter, fuel was simply not imported into the city.
It is believed that such actions by Zinoviev were a strategy to reduce "non-proletarian elements".
At that time, hundreds of people were shot, Zinoviev's repressions were the most cruel and large-scale. There is an opinion that this was dictated by despair, fear for the death of the revolution.
Since 1921, Zinoviev was a member of the Politburo and aspired to leadership positions. At that time, he promoted Lenin's heritage, printed many books - his collected works began to be printed.
Zinoviev actively participated in the persecution of the Orthodox clergy, when the Bolsheviks massively confiscated church valuables. In Petrograd, which he then ruled, a trial was taking place, where 10 clergymen were sentenced to death, including Archimandrite Sergius and Metropolitan Veniamin, who was later canonized as a holy martyr.
Zinoviev participated in the rise of Stalin, influenced his appointment as General Secretary of the Central Committee of the RCP in 1923. He did this not out of personal sympathy, but with the aim of attracting him to the fight against Trotsky.
After Lenin's death
After the death of Lenin, Trotsky and Zinoviev remained the actual contenders for power.
In those years, Zinoviev's positions were very tough. He called for the destruction of the peasantry and the complete plunder of the villages in order to force industrialization. It was he who cynically declared that it was necessary to destroy part of the Russian population, since the Bolsheviks would not be able to retrain everyone in their own way.
Zinoviev sought to arrange a world revolution. The communists tried to seize power in Hungary, Germany, Mongolia, Bulgaria, Estonia, Poland, Finland. All this led to many deaths and unrealistic financial costs.
Through the Comintern Zinoviev Grigory, a revolutionary, withdrew crazy amounts of money to Western banks.
Cult of Personality
Although Zinoviev publicly reproached Stalin, he created his personality cult earlier and inflated it much more. He renamed his hometown Zinovievsk to perpetuate his name. In many major cities, monuments and busts were erected on his orders. He published a whole collection of his works (33 volumes).
New opposition
Already 2 years later, Zinoviev and Kamenev oppose Stalin. As a result, he ceased to lead the Executive Committee of the Comintern and the Lensoviet, was removed first from the Politburo, and a year later from the Central Committee. This is followed by exclusion from the party and exile.
In 1928, Zinoviev Grigory, whose family also suffered, repented, and he was reinstated in the party, having been appointed rector to Kazan University. Four years later, literaryhis journalistic activity is again followed by arrest and exile, but this time for non-information. In this reference, he translates Mein Kampf (My Struggle) by Hitler. In 1933, a limited edition of this translation was published (studied by party workers).
Instead of four years of exile, a year later Zinoviev was again reinstated in the party and sent to the Tsentrosoyuz. At the party congress, he repents and glorifies Stalin and his comrades-in-arms. It was Zinoviev who then called Stalin "the genius of all times and peoples."
Sentence and trial
In December 1934, Zinoviev was once again arrested, sentenced to 10 years in prison. The accusation was assistance in the assassination of Kirov, according to many historians, this fact was rigged by Stalin. While in the Verkhneuralsk political isolator, he takes notes, turning to Stalin with assurances that he is no longer his enemy and is ready to fulfill any requirements.
Stalin and his supporters actively used the origins of Zinoviev and Kamenev, spread rumors that the opposition were Jews and intellectuals.
This time, Zinoviev's rehabilitation did not follow, and in 1936 the "trial of the sixteen" took place, where former party leaders were tried. On August 24, they decided to carry out execution - the highest pen alty. A day later, the sentence was executed.
It is noteworthy that in 1988 this sentence was canceled, recognizing the absence of corpus delicti in action.
There is evidence that during the investigation, Zinoviev was asked to return the moneyComintern. He returned part of the amount that he personally stole and did not have time to spend or invest. After that, Stalin did not need him alive.
Having learned about Zinoviev's behavior before the execution, Stalin contemptuously spat on the floor, saying that he was much more comfortable putting others against the wall.
During the arrest, Zinoviev was kept in terrible conditions. In the heat in the cell, the heating was turned on to the maximum. Problems with the kidneys and liver and such conditions brought the prisoner to severe attacks - from pain he rolled on the floor and begged to be transferred to the hospital. Instead of the necessary help, the doctors gave him drugs that further aggravated the disease.
In terrible prison conditions, after a comfortable and prosperous life, Grigory Evseevich Zinoviev broke down and begged Stalin with tears to cancel the trial.
Stalin promised Zinoviev and Kamenev to keep them alive with their families if they agreed in court with all the accusations and slandered some old Bolsheviks. This farce took place at the trial, but did not save the lives of the convicts.
Death
Zinoviev was shot on the night of August 26, 1936. It happened in the VKVS building (Moscow). Witnesses to the execution recalled that Zinoviev humiliated himself and asked for mercy, kissed the boots of the executors of the sentence, and in the end he could not even walk himself, so the last meters simply dragged him. Before being shot, he began to read prayers in his native Hebrew. Kamenev, sentenced along with him, urged him to stop humiliating himself and die with dignity. There is another version, according to which Zinoviev had to be carried to the executionstretcher.
After the rehabilitation of Zinoviev in 1988, for several years he was praised as a victim of Stalinist repressions without guilt.
Repression of relatives
All three wives of Zinoviev were repressed. The first wife, Sarah Ravich, was arrested three times, finally rehabilitated and released due to a serious illness only three years before her death, in 1954.
The second wife, Zlata Lilina, was arrested twice and sent into exile, but unlike her son, she escaped death. Zinoviev's son died the following year after him. After the execution of Gregory, all Lilina's works (mostly works on social and labor education) were confiscated from the libraries.
Zinoviev's third wife Yevgenia Lyasman was arrested for almost two decades. She was released only in 1954, and rehabilitated in the next century - in 2006. She wrote memoirs about her husband, but relatives forbade them to publish them.
Cinema
The significance of Zinoviev in historical and political events has been repeatedly reflected in films. The first film was "October" - a silent creation of Eisenstein. It is noteworthy that Zinoviev was played by Apfelbaum, his brother. Among other films known are "Blue Notebook", "In the days of October", "Red", "Red Bells", "Lenin. Train”, “Stalin”, “Under the Sign of the Scorpion” and the TV series “Yesenin”.
Opinion of contemporaries
A brief biography of Grigory Zinoviev, one way or another, is interesting to many contemporaries. What is the opinion of the public about this person? In general, contemporaries were not very well disposed towardsZinoviev. They recognized his intelligence and culture, but also noted that he was a decent coward and schemer.
People close to Zinoviev spoke about his lack of restraint, excessive vanity and ambition, and noted lordly manners.
Party comrades criticized Zinoviev for rudeness in polemics and unprincipled choice of means to achieve personal and political success.
During the famine in Petrograd, various delicacies were brought to Zinoviev's table. It was said that the thinness and modest manners of the pre-revolutionary Gregory grew into the importance and impudence of the "obese rascal" who squeezed money from the hungry people.
In the memoirs of Zinoviev's contemporaries there are words about the existence of a cult of his personality in Leningrad.
