Makhno Released From Prison (1917)

Sat Mar 17, 1917

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On this day in 1917, Ukrainian anarchist revolutionary Nestor Makhno was released from prison as a result of the February Revolution, going on to play a leading role in the revolutionary anarchist movement in Ukraine.

In 1908, due to a police spy within the anarchist group Hulyai Pole, Makhno was arrested and put in jail. Makhno and thirteen others were sentenced to death by hanging, however Makhno’s sentence was commuted to life in prison due to his prior military service.

After returning to Ukraine, he became a key figure in the organization of the Revolutionary Insurrectionary Army of Ukraine (also known as the Black Army), which helped organize and protect an anarcho-communist movement in Ukraine known as the Free Territory or Makhnovschina. This movement was established in the context of the Russian Civil War a complex power struggle following the Bolshevik-led October Revolution of 1917.

The anarchist revolution was defeated by the Bolsheviks in 1921, who would go on to win the civil war and establish the Soviet Union. Makhno fled, living the rest of his life exiled in Western Europe. After settling in Paris, Makhno contributed writings to anarchist journals and met anarchists of note, including Buenaventura Durruti and Francisco Ascaso.

“I would still call on you, reader and brother, to take up the struggle for the ideal anarchism, for only if you fight for this ideal and uphold it will you understand it properly.”

- Nestor Makhno