Alexander
Berkman, the son of a wealthy Jewish
businessman, was born in Vilna, Russia
on 21st November, 1870. Both his parents died when he was young and
at the age of eighteen decided to emigrate to the United States.
In New York City Berkman met and lived
with Emma Goldman, a Russian immigrant
who was working in a clothing factory. Berkman and Goldman both became
involved in the campaign to free the men convicted of the Haymarket
Bombing. They were also influenced by the anarchist
writings of Johann Most.
In 1892 Berkman and Goldman started a small business in Worcester,
Massachusetts, providing lunches for local workers. Later that year
Amalgamated Iron and Steel Workers Union called out its members at
the Steel Homestead plant owned by Henry Frick
and Andrew Carnegie. Frick took the
controversial decision to employ 300 strikebreakers from the Pinkerton
Detective Agency. The men were brought in on armed barges down
the Monongahela River. The strikers were waiting for them and a day
long battle took place. Ten men were killed and 60 wounded before
the governor obtained order by placing Homestead under martial law.
Berkman was appalled by Frick's behaviour and decided to make a dramatic
gesture against capitalism. After gaining entry into his office, Berkman
shot Henry Frick three times and stabbed
him twice. However, Frick survived the attack and made a full-recovery.
Found guilty of attempted murder, Berkman spent the next fourteen
years in Pennsylvania's Western Penitentiary.
Released in 1906 Berkman and Emma Goldman
established themselves as the leaders of the anarchist
movement in the United States. They published the radical journal,
Mother Earth and books such as
Goldman's Anarchism and Other Essays
(1910) and Berkman's Prison Memoirs of an
Anarchist (1912). They also
helped organize industrial disputes such as the Lawrence
Textile Strike.
On the outbreak of the First World War both
Berkman and Emma Goldman became involved
in the campaign to keep the United States out of the conflict. Berkman
moved to San
Francisco and in January, 1916, started
a new anarchist journal, Blast.
When five months later a bomb went off killing six people in the city.
The authorities suspected that the bomb had been planted by anti-war
campaigners and Berkman was arrested but later released. Thomas
Mooney, a local trade union leader
was falsely convicted of the offence but spent the next twenty-three
years in prison before being released.
The USA declared war on the Central
Powers in 1917. When Berkman campaigned against conscription he
was arrested and charged with violating the Espionage
Act. Under this act it was an offence to publish material that
undermined the war effort. Berkman was found guilty and sentenced
to two years in prison. When released in December, 1919, both Berkman
and Emma Goldman were deported to Russia.
As an anarchist, Berkman was repelled
by the Bolshevik dictatorship and after the failed Kronstadt
Uprising decided to leave Russia. After
spending time in Sweden and Germany,
Berkman settled in France. Over the next
few years he wrote several books criticizing the communist regime
in Russia including The Bolshevik Myth
(1925). He also edited the book on political persecution under the
Bolsheviks, Letters from Russian Prisons
(1925). His main work during this period was Now
and After: The ABC of Communist Anarchism (1929).
Berkman suffered from poor health and underwent two unsuccessful operations
for a prostate condition. In constant pain and having to rely on the
financial help of friends, Alexander Berkman committed suicide on
28th June, 1936.
(1)
In March 1916 Alexander Berkman commented in Blast
on the decision by the American government to
suppress the radical journal Revolt.
We are not going to say that it is an outrage. Why should the
government not commit outrages? Invasion of personal liberty, suppression
of free speech and free press, silencing non-conformists and protestants,
shooting down rebellious workers - all this is of the very essence
of government.
We don't complain. We understand
Wilson's position. He must do hit master's bidding. This is the "sane
policy." But we want to warn the weather cock in the White House
that it may not prove safe. Suppressior of the voice of discontent
leads to assassination. Vide Russia.
(2)
Alexander Berkman, diary entries while living in Russia (March, 1921)
7th March, 1921: Distant rumbling reaches my ears as I cross the
Nevsky. It sounds again, stronger and nearer, as if rolling toward
me. All at once I realize the artillery is being fired. It is 6 p.m.
Kronstadt has been attacked! My heart is numb with despair; something
has died within me.
17th March,
1921: Kronstadt has fallen today. Thousands of sailors and workers
lie dead in its streets. Summary execution of prisoners and hostages
continues.
30th September,
1921: One by one the embers of hope have died out. Terror and despotism
have crushed the life born in October. Dictatorship is trampling the
masses under the foot. The revolution is dead; its spirit cries in
the wilderness. The Bolshevik myth must be destroyed. I have decided
to leave Russia.
(3) Alexander Berkman, The Bolshevik Myth
(1925)
One by one the embers of hope have died out. Terror and despotism
have crushed the life born in October, 1917. The slogans of the Revolution
are forsworn, its ideals stifled in the blood of the people. The breath
of yesterday is dooming millions to death: the shadow of today hangs
like a black pall over the country. Dictatorship is trampling the
masses under foot. The Revolution is dead; its spirit cries in the
wilderness.
(4)
Victor Serge,
Memoirs of a Revolutionary (1945)
The American
background of Emma Goldman and Alexander Berkman estranged them from
the Russians, and turned them into representatives of an idealistic
generation that had completely vanished in Russia. They embodied the
humanistic rebellion of the turn of the century.
Berkman
with the inward tension that sprang from his idealism in years long
past. His eighteen years in an American prison had frozen him in the
attitudes of his youth when, as an act of solidarity with a strike,
he had offered up his life by shooting at one of the steel barons.
When his tension relaxed he became dejected, and I could not help
thinking that he was often troubled by ideas of suicide. In fact,
it was only much later that he was to end his life.
Available
from Amazon Books (order below)
