Trofin Mechuk (or Nacsuk)
Born: Russia
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity:
Occupation:
Migration:
Affiliation: Communist Party of America
A member of Russian Branch No. 3 of the Communist Party of America in Detroit. Arrested during the second Palmer Raids in January 1920 and “voluntary departed” to Russia via Canada on October 16, 1920.
Sources: FBI file BS 202600-1378-1.
John Meehan (a.k.a. Jack)
Born: 1878, Ireland
Nationality: British
Ethnicity: Irish
Occupation: Laborer
Migration: Immigrated to US 1893
Affiliation: IWW
An IWW member arrested in Everett, Washington, and deported December 6, 1918.
Joined the Merseyside branch of the IWW in Liverpool, then in the 1920s became active in Liverpool in the Communist Party of Great Britain, the Seamen’s Vigilance Committee, and the National Unemployed Workers’ Committee Movement.
Sources: Evening Express (Liverpool), September 14, 1921 and October 10, 1923; Liverpool Echo, September 29, 1921.
Peter Melcishik
Born: Russia
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity:
Occupation:
Migration:
Affiliation:
Deported to Russia as a radical on January 22, 1921. No further information has been found.
Sources: INS file 54325/36G.
Gregory Melnikov (or Melikov; a.k.a. Kushneroff; Oleinik)
Born: 1896, Volhynia, Russia (present-day Ukraine)
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity:
Occupation: Janitor
Migration: Immigrated to US 1917
Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Melnikov was arrested and beaten at the URW’s People’s House in New York City on November 11, 1919. He denied URW membership, but a confidential Department of Justice informant testified that he belonged to the organization. Deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/522.
Nikolai Melikov (a.k.a. Nick Melikoff; Melincoff; Melnikov)
Born: c. 1886, Odessa, Russia (present-day Ukraine)
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity:
Occupation: Painter
Migration: Migrated to US 1917 (via Canada)
Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Belonged to URW branches in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Vancouver, and New York, and had previously been fined and imprisoned in Vancouver for serving as an officer of the organization. His wife Olga lived with him in New York. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, he testified that he advocated overthrowing government “by mind, never by force…I am against every kind of government…I am opposed to every Government that is based on exploitation of one man by another.” Deported January 22, 1921 aboard the SS Stockholm.
By 1924 he was, like many Russian anarchists, a political prisoner in the Solovetsky Special Purpose Camp.
Sources: INS file 54861/306; ational Popular Government League, To the American People: Report Upon the Illegal Practices of the United States Department of Justice; Der Syndikalist (Berlin), no. 17 [May] 1924.
Pavel Melnikov (a.k.a. Paul Melnicoff; Pawel Melnik)
Born: 1886, Kiev, Russia (present-day Ukraine)
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity: Slovenian
Occupation: Laborer
Migration: Immigrated to US 1913
Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Attended gymnasium until age eighteen and worked as a clerk before emigrating.
Around 1918 he joined the URW and became a national organizer and lecturer based in Seattle and San Francisco; he also taught English in the URW school in San Francisco. He was accused, without evidence, of involvement in bomb and assassination plots. Arrested April 23, 1917 in Trenton, New Jersey for allegedly making seditious remarks and again in March 1919 in San Francisco for vagrancy, he was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54616/123; Lazar Lipotkin, The Russian Anarchist Movement in North America.
Peter Williamson Merta (a.k.a. Peter Williamson)
Born: 1885, Finland
Nationality: Finnish
Ethnicity:
Occupation: Lumber worker; newspaper editor
Migration: Immigrated to US 1908 via Canada
Affiliation: IWW
Served as secretary-treasurer of the IWW’s Lumber Workers’ Union No. 500 in Raymond, Washington. His 1916 citizenship application was denied because of his IWW membership. Arrested February 1918 while posting IWW stickers, he served fifteen days and was then detained for deportation but released on bail. After relocating to Duluth he became an editor of the Finnish-language IWW paper Industrialisti. Arrested again in December 1918, his lawyer successfully argued he should be deported to Sweden rather than Finland, where anti-socialist Whites had recently won a civil war. His wife Elsie, also an IWW member, initially requested deportation with him but ultimately remained in the United States.
Sources: INS file 54397/134; FBI file OG 8000-382409; Committee on Immigration and Naturalization, House of Representatives, Communist and Anarchist Deportation Cases; Frances H. Early, A World Without War: How U.S. Feminists and Pacifists Resisted World War I.
Sam Meskov (a.k.a. Serpion; Meshkov; Miskoff; Meshoff; Moshoff)
Born: 1889, Saratov, Russia
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity:
Occupation: Miner
Migration: Immigrated to US 1912
Affiliation: InWW
Joined the IWW in March 1919 and distributed its literature. Arrested in Van Voorhis, Pennsylvania, he was described by Commissioner-General of Immigration A. Caminetti as “apparently an ignorant harmless fellow, [but] the Bureau [of Immigration] is of the opinion that this type of man is often dangerous because of his ignorance and the fact that he can be easily imposed upon by the shrewder type of radical.” Deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/34; FBI file OG 284810.
















