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Nechaevshchina: An Unknown Chapter

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

Woodford Mc Clellan
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On the afternoon of August 14, 1872, Sergei Nechaev, for nearly three years the object of an intensive police search in several countries, went to a café on the outskirts of Zurich. The author of the famous “Catechism of a Revolutionary” had already broken one of his personal rules by spending several consecutive nights under the same roof; in showing himself in public during daylight hours he violated another.

Type
Notes and Comment
Information
Slavic Review , Volume 32 , Issue 3 , September 1973 , pp. 546 - 553
Copyright
Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1973

References

1. On the Zurich “trial” see Kolokol (Geneva), Apr. 1, 1868, p. 86. On the investigation conducted by Parisian émigrés (among them Jarosław Dąbrowski, future general of the Paris Commune) see “Wyrok sadu bratniego w Paryżu w sprawie Adolfa Stępkowskiego, “ in Staatsarchiv (Zurich), P 190 fasz. 1. The Poles in Paris argued that Stępkowski, though personally obnoxious, was no spy and indeed could not be one because of his perverse personality. In reality, he served both the Russian government and the Zurich police (who secured a Swiss passport for him in 1870). Ibid., P 190b, Fremdenpolizei, “Flüchtlinge aus Polen, Einvernehmen 1865—1871” (questionnaire on Jó zef Horodynski), and Bundesarchiv (Bern), Geschäfts-Controlle und Register des schweizerischen Justiz- und Polizeidepartements, 1870, Jan. 3, 15, 1870.

2. The only eyewitness account is Greulich's. See his Die Tagwacht (Zurich), Aug. 17, 1872, and his recollections in Das grüne Hüsli (Zurich, 1942), pp. 64-65. See also International Institute for Social History (IISH), Smirnov, afz. stk. IV, Valerian Smirnov to A. S. Buturlin, Aug. 14, 1872. Though he supported Marx and the General Council, Greulich was a Fourierist.

3. On February 5, 1873, the Journal de Genéve reprinted a charge in Die Zürcher- Presse that Greulich had accepted a 2, 000-franc “denier de Judas” from the Russians, but this story had no foundation, and indeed Greulich had earlier quarreled with Die Zürcher-Prcsse over another matter. See Die Tagivacht, June I5, 1872, and also IISH, Smirnov, map 59, Smirnov to Buturlin, Mar. 4 [1873].

4. See Gorchakov's October 6, 1872, letter to the Swiss president (Welti) in Staatsarchiv, Fremdenpolizei, “Auslieferung des Sergius Netschajeff,” no. 63. For Pfenninger's position see Neue Zürcher Zeitung, no. 560, Nov. 3, 1872. Stępkowski told the Third Section prior to the arrest of Nechaev that he believed Pfenninger would cooperate if promised a reward. See Tsentral'nyi gosudarstvennyi arkhiv Oktiabrskoi revoliutsii (TsGAOR), fond III otd., 3 eksp., ed. khr. no. 80/1872, “Ob obrazovavshemsia v Tsiurikhe revoliutsionnom Slavianskom sotsial'no-demokraticheskom obshchestve,” nos. 89-90, Third Section note of July 4 (16), 1872, and nos. 143-44, Nov. 6, 1872 (Oct. 25, 1872, in Russia) report of Bern agent or agents to Third Section.

5. On the extradition see Kantor, R. M., V pogone za Nechaevym (Leningrad, 1925), pp. 128–35 Google Scholar; Neue Zürcher Zeitung, nos. 555, 556, 558-61, Oct. 31-Nov. 3, 1872; Great Britain, Foreign Office, 65 (Russia), 836, Loftus in St. Petersburg to Foreign Office, Nov. 11, 1872 (N.S.); IISH, Smirnov, afz. stk. IV, Smirnov to Buturlin, Oct. 27, 1872; Die Tagwacht, Nov. 2, 1872 (quoting a German opponent of capital punishment to the effect that a Kulturstaat should never extradite anyone to a Barbarenstaat); Le Nord (the Brussels newspaper subsidized by the Russian government), Nov. 1, 7, 10, 12, 19, 1872. See in general on Nechaev in Switzerland Leonhard, Haas, “Njetschajew und die schweizer Behörden,” Schweiserische Zeitschrift für Geschkhte, 17 (1967): 309–63.Google Scholar

6. See Bundesarchiv, Protokoll des schw. Justiz- und Polizeidepartements, dr. “Netchaieff, Serge.” See also Neue Zürcher Zeitung, nos. 59, 63, 65, 94, Feb. 2-21, 1873. A copy of the 1873 Russo-Swiss extradition treaty is in Great Britain, Foreign Office, 100 (Switzerland), no. 67, Nov. 30, 1873.

7. The “Osnovnyia polozheniia” is in Staatsarchiv, “Auslieferung des Sergius Netschajeff,” nos. 56-5, 56-6. For assistance in deciphering the manuscript the author wishes to thank Professors Stephen Lukashevich, Andrew MacAndrew, and Walter Sablinsky; full responsibility, of course, rests with the author. Among the scholars who have consulted the Nechaev dossier in Zurich are Haas, , “Njetschajew und die schweizer Behörden”; Meijer, J. M., Knowledge and Revolution (Assen, 1955)Google Scholar; Arthur Lehning, ed., Michel Bakounine et ses relations avec Sergcj Ncčaev, 1870-1872: Écrits et matcriaux, vol. 4 of Archives Bakounine (Leiden, 1971).

8. The documents of the Towarzystwo Polskie Socialno-Rewolucyjne w Zurychu are in Staatsarchiv, “Auslieferung des Sergius Netschajeff,” no. 56-11. Stępkowski sent copies to the Third Section; see Maria, Wawrykowa, “Polacy a sprawa Nieczajewa,” Przcgląd Historyczny, 55, no. 4 (1964): 666 Google Scholar. Boris Nikolaevsky, citing no proof, claimed that Nechaev and Turski shared an apartment in Zurich: “Pamiati poslednego ‘iakobintsa’-semidesiatnika (Gaspar-Mikhail Turskii),” Katorga i ssylka, 1926, no. 2 (23), p. 216.

9. TsGAOR, “Ob obrazovavshemsia v Tsiurikhe … obshchestve,” nos. 22-25, Zurich agent (probably Stgpkowski) report of May 10, 1872; nos. 26-27 (the documents).

10. The mistress was a Frenchwoman named Albertine Hottin, who was apparently the only love of Nechaev's life (Vera Zasulich having rebuffed his advances). Mlle Hottin's letters to Nechaev, and drafts of his to her (he wrote them in his notebook, practicing his French), are in Staatsarchiv, “Auslieferung des Sergius Netschajeff,” nos 56 56-25, 56-42, 56-49.

11. Only one issue of this periodical, the full title of which was Obshchina (La Commune. Die Commune), appeared in September 1870. The Paris newspaper Le Monde published the program from the French-language supplement on July 14, 1871. Arthur Lehning has reproduced the Russian version in Archives Bakounine, vol. 4, pp. 435-42.