Born: 1899, Guangdong, China Nationality: Chinese Ethnicity: Occupation: Student; restaurant worker Migration: Immigrated to US 1916 Affiliation: IWW
Entered the United States in 1916 via Mexico without inspection. Worked as a restaurant worker in New York’s Chinatown while attending Columbia University as a student of John Dewey. In January 1919 he was arrested as a leader of an IWW-led strike by Chinese restaurant workers. Deported to China in March 1919 on the charge of illegal entry.
Sources: INS file 54519/2; Baltimore Sun, February 6, 1919; The Rebel Worker, May 15, 1919.
Mikhail Hirney (a.k.a. Mike Hirney; Herney)
Born: 1899, Pokrovka, Samara Oblast, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Store clerk Migration: Immigrated to US 1912 Affiliations: Communist Party of America
Joined the Socialist Party of America and later became a member and secretary of the Flint, Michigan Russian Branch of the Communist Party of America. Arrested in January 1920 and deported to Russia on February 26, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54860/738.
Mikhail Hladish (or Hladysh)
Born: c. 1885, Galicia, Austria-Hungary Nationality: Russian (formerly Austro-Hungarian) Ethnicity: Ukrainian Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliations: Communist Party of America
His wife remained in Europe when he emigrated. In 1919 he joined the Socialist Party of America and in September of that year transferred into the Communist Party of America. Served as secretary of the Communist Party branch in East Youngstown, Ohio. Deported to Russia on February 26, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54810/553.
Alfred Hoffman (a.k.a. Edward Compe; Edward Kerlap; Edwin Hoffman)
Born: 1886, Hamburg, Germany Nationality: German Ethnicity: Occupation: Sailor; laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1907 Affiliation: IWW
Entered the United States in 1907 after jumping ship in San Francisco. Joined the Industrial Workers of the World around 1913 and repeatedly arrested for strike-related activities in Seattle. During World War I he was interned as an alien enemy at Fort Douglas, Utah. While detained, he stated, “I am not a German, no. I am not patriotic for any country.” He “voluntary departed” on June 23, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54379/64.
Fritz Arthur Holm
Born: 1890, Korsberga, Sweden Nationality: Swedish Ethnicity: Occupation: Carpenter Migration: Immigrated to US 1911 Affiliation: IWW; anarchist
Joined the Industrial Workers of the World in 1912 and identified as an anarchist. Subscribed to Alexander Berkman’s The Blast and wrote “Strictly opposed to war” on his draft registration card. He also served as secretary of the Scandinavian Defense League. Arrested in Seattle in February 1918, when authorities reported discovering “a wagon load of I.W.W. and anarchist literature” in his room. Deported in July 1919.
After returning to Sweden, Holm married Ellen Hildur Margareta Molin in 1923. Died in 1975.
Sources: INS file 54379/114; Ancestry.com.
Paul Holovkin (a.k.a. Prokop Holowkin; Golowkin)
Born: 1888, Grodno, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Belarusian Occupation: Longshoreman Migration: Immigrated to US 1914 Affiliations: Union of Russian Workers
A widower, with a son in Russia. In 1919 he joined Branch No. 1 of the Union of Russian Workers in Baltimore. Deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919.
In 1921 he was reported to have been “shot by the Bolshevik authorities as an active counter-revolutionist.”
Sources: INS file 54709/318; FBI file BS 202600-2386-1.
Andrew Hostilla (a.k.a. Andrey Kastialla)
Born: 1895, Minsk, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Belarusian Occupation: Machinist Migration: Immigrated to US 1914 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Drafted into the U.S. Army in 1918 and honorably discharged in December of that year. He later became a member of the Newark branch of the Union of Russian Workers. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919 and deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/353.
Peter Hydamachuk
Born: 1893, Podolsky, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Polish Occupation: Autoworker Migration: Immigrated to Canada 1913; to US 1917 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Worked as an autoworker in Detroit and was a member of the Machinists’ Union (AFL). attended a Detroit night school run by Russian Branch No. 4 of the Communist Party and signed an application to join the party, though no evidence indicates he became a full member. Arrested in January 1920 and deported to Russia on March 18, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54859/774.
Steponas Indriunas
Born: 1893, Kovno, Russia (present-day Kaunas, Lithuania) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Lithuanian Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1912 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Became a member of Lithuanian Branch No. 74 of the Communist Party of America in Rockford, Illinois. Arrested in January 1920 and deported to Russia on February 26, 1921.
Born: 1872, Mogilev, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Jewish Occupation: Sailor; carpenter Migration: Immigrated to US 1917 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers; Workers’ International Industrial Union
Migrated to England in 1914; then to Canada and back to England in 1916. Jumped ship in the United States in 1917. Joined the Union of Russian Workers in Buffalo in July 1919 and was also a member of the Workers’ International Industrial Union. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919 and deported to Russia aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919. At the time of his deportation, his wife and four children remained in Russia.
Sources: INS file 54709/144; FBI file OG 8000-378509.
Joseph Kish
Born: 1889, Aranyosgyéres, Hungary (present-day Câmpia Turzii, Romania) Nationality: Hungarian Ethnicity: Hungarian Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1911 Affiliation: Socialist Party of America; IWW
Joined the Hungarian Federation of the Socialist Party of America around 1912 and became a member of the IWW in 1919. Arrested in Cleveland during the May Day disturbances of 1919 and sentenced to thirty days in the workhouse for disturbing the peace. Arrested again in July 1919, he spent nearly nine months confined in the overcrowded and unsanitary Cuyahoga County Jail while awaiting deportation. Deported on March 21, 1920. At the time, his three children were living in Hungary with his mother.
Sources: INS file 54616/236.
Nikolai Kizer (a.k.a. Nick; Nicholas)
Born: 1896, Grodno, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1915 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Alleged to be the secretary of the Hartford, Connecticut branch of the Union of Russian Workers. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, along with his cousin Peter Kizer. Due to an administrative error, Peter was mistakenly sent to Ellis Island while Nikolai remained in the Hartford city jail, but the mistake was later corrected. Nikolai was deported to Russia on January 22, 1921.
Sources: INS files 54709/160 and 54709/265; Bruce B. Sherbert, “The Palmer Raids in Connecticut, 1919–1920,” Connecticut Review 5, no. 1 (1971).
Nikolai Klemiatov (or Nicholas Klemiatoff; Kleminatoff)
Nikolai Klemiatov, c. 1920. National Archives.
Born: 1891, Vilna, Russia (present-day Lithuania) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Not specified Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to the US 1912 Affiliation: Socialist Party of America; Communist Party of America
Joined the Socialist Party of America in Pittsburgh and transferred to the Communist Party of America in 1919. Arrested in October 1920 and deported to Russia on February 1, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54885/48.
Efim Kochovetz (a.k.a. M. Berisoff)
Born: 1888, Minsk, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Belarusian Occupation: Laborer; organizer Migration: Immigrated to US 1907 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Joined the Union of Russian Workers in New York in 1914 and later became secretary of the New London, Connecticut branch, where he also taught arithmetic classes in its school. Arrested in Hartford during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919 and deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/161.
Efim Kolesnikov (a.k.a. John Kolesnikoff; Joachim)
Efim Kolesnikov (center, standing) with other URW members arrested in New York, November 7, 1919. National Archives.
Born: 1880, Kursk, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Ship reamer Migration: Immigrated to US 1912 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
A widower, Kolesnikov joined the Union of Russian Workers in New York in 1919. He was arrested and beaten during the first Palmer Raids on November 7, 1919, during the raid on the Russian People’s House in New York. Deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/454.
Jim Komar (or Jonar)
Born: 1879, Chernihiv, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Ukrainian Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Joined the Union of Russian Workers in 1919. He was arrested in Youngstown, Ohio during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919 and deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919. His wife and two children remained in Russia.
Sources: INS file 54709/544; FBI file OG 378979.
Pavel Konavalchuk (a.k.a. Paul)
Born: 1894, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Machinist Migration: Immigrated to US 1911 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
A member of the Union of Russian Workers in Newark until the organization was broken up in November 1919. Arrested in Newark on January 3, 1920, he openly identified as an anarchist but stated his opposition to violence. Despite having a wife and American-born child in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, he was deported to Russia on February 26, 1921.
Born: Grodnia, Russia (present-day Poland) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Joined the Union of Russian Workers in Youngstown, Ohio in 1919. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919 and deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919.
After his return to Russia, he was sentenced around 1925 to five years in the Solovki prison camp as an anarchist. In 1930, reportedly “entirely in broken health,” he was sentenced to an additional three years of internal exile in Arkhangelsk.
Sources: INS file 54709/545; FBI file OG 378976; Bulletin of the Relief Fund of the International Working Men’s Association for Anarchists and Anarcho-Syndicalists Imprisoned or Exiled in Russia, November–December 1930.
Aleksandr Konon (or Kornen; Konol)
Born: 1894, Grodno, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Belarusian Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
A member of the Newark branch of the Union of Russian Workers. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919 and deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/352.
Pavel Konon (or Konen; a.k.a. Paul)
Born: Minsk, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Belarusian Occupation: Miner Migration: Immigrated to US 1914 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
A member of the Communist Party of America arrested in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, and deported to Russia on February 1, 1921. His wife and four children remained in Russia.
Sources: FBI file OG 389419.
John Konopatsky (a.k.a. Anton Konopatsky)
Born: 1895, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Migration: Immigrated to US 1914 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Initially a member of the Left Wing of the Socialist Party of America and later joined the Russian Branch of the Communist Party in Bayonne, New Jersey. Arrested in Newark during the second Palmer Raids in January 1920 and deported on January 22, 1921. Had a wife and three children in the United States.
Sources: INS file 54860/163; FBI file OG 384085.
Ignatz Konoval (or Ignance Konowal)
Born: 1894, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Polish Occupation: Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
A member of the Polish Branch of the Communist Party of America in Elizabeth, New Jersey. Arrested during the second Palmer Raids in January 1920 and deported on December 23, 1920.
Sources:The Courier-News (Bridgewater, New Jersey), December 22, 1920.
Benjamin Kontrowitz (or Kontorovich; a.k.a. Berl Kanterowicz; B. Kanter)
Born: 1882, Ekaterinoslav, Russia (present-day Dnipro, Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Jewish Occupation: Silk weaver Migration: Immigrated to US 1916 Affiliation: Communist Party of America; IWW
A former member of the Left Wing of the Socialist Party of America and joined the Russian Federation of the Communist Party of America in 1919. He served as recording secretary, an executive board member, and a lecturer for its Paterson, New Jersey branch, and was a delegate to the First Convention of the Jewish Communist Federation in October 1919. Also a member of the IWW’s Textile Workers’ Industrial Union. Arrested during the second Palmer Raids in January 1920, he was deported on November 23, 1920. He was married and had a son living in Paterson.
Born: 1873, Saratov, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Rubber worker Migration: Immigrated to US 1912 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Joined the Union of Russian Workers in 1917 and became an officer in its Akron, Ohio branch. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919 and deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Born: c. 1888, Chernihiv, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Served as financial secretary of Russian Branch No. 2 of the Communist Party in Philadelphia under the pseudonym “Butzki.” Arrested in January 1920, he denied the identity, but multiple witnesses identified him as such. An immigration inspector characterized his testimony as “shifting, evasive, and evidently untruthful in material particulars.” He was deported to Russia on February 26, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54809/873.
Zys Korostyshevsky (or Zusil; a.k.a. Joe Kraus)
Born: 1897, Radomyshl, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Jewish Occupation: Garment worker Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Anarchist
Became a Tolstoyan anarchist in the US, embracing pacifism and agrarian ideals. Arrested in Chicago in June 1917, but the deportation warrant was canceled for lack of evidence. Arrested again in January 1919, he was ultimately deported on March 12, 1921.
Unidentified newspaper clipping, Paul Avrich Collection, Library of Congress.
Born: 1894, Minsk, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Jewish Occupation: Bookbinder Migration: Immigrated to US 1907 Affiliation: Anarchist
In 1917 Lachowsky joined New York’s militant Jewish anarchist Shturem Group, which became the Frayhayt Group in 1918. On August 23, 1918, he was arrested with Molly Steimer while distributing leaflets protesting US intervention in the Russian Civil War. Beaten during interrogation, he was convicted with other group members under the Espionage Act and sentenced to twenty years in prison and a $1,000 fine. In October 1919 he declared to immigration agents, “I am an alien and an anarchist…I am opposed to all organized government. Not only the Government of the United States but any government…I’m an anarchist and proud of it.” By 1921, however, he had become disillusioned and renounced anarchism. After losing the Supreme Court free-speech case Abrams v. United States, he was deported November 23, 1921.
Disillusioned with radicalism, he returned to Minsk, started a family, and stayed out of politics. He reportedly died of natural causes sometime before the Second World War.
Sources: INS file 54517/74; Richard Polenberg, Fighting Faiths: The Abrams Case, the Supreme Court, and Free Speech; Paul Avrich, Anarchist Voices: An Oral History of Anarchism in America.
Charles Lindsay Lambert
Charles Lambert, 1918. National Archives.
Born: 1881, Arbroath, Scotland Nationality: British Ethnicity: Scottish Occupation: Baker; oil worker; labor organizer Migration: Immigrated to US 1901 or 1902 Affiliation: IWW
Joined the IWW in 1911 and served as secretary of Local No. 453 of the Oil Workers’ Industrial Union in Taft, California, in 1913, and later as secretary of mixed IWW locals in Sacramento from 1914 to 1917. As Secretary-Treasurer of the Wheatland Defense Committee (1914–1915), he advocated sabotage on behalf of the campaign to free the Wheatland prisoners. Elected to the IWW’s General Executive Board in 1916, he played a key role in the controversial decertification of the IWW’s Domestic Workers’ Industrial Union in Denver. A defendant in the federal IWW trial of 1917–1918, where his writings were used against the union by the prosecution, and sentenced to twenty years’ imprisonment. In 1922 his sentence was commuted in exchange for “voluntary departure” to Britain, and he sailed March 31, 1923.
In Britain he attended trade-union meetings and encouraged protests against the imprisonment of IWW members in the United States. He may have worked in the Tampico oil fields during the 1920s, appears to have illegally reentered the US, then returned to Scotland via New York in 1926. During the 1930s he worked as an oil worker in the Caribbean, returned to the UK in 1933, and later left radical politics, becoming a diamond prospector in British Guiana and then a bookie’s runner (i.e. enforcer) in London, where he died circa 1961.
Sources: INS file 54616/59; FBI file OG 8000-160053; Industrial Workers of the World Collection, Walter P. Reuther Library, Wayne State University; Jane Little Botkin, The Girl Who Dared to Defy: Jane Street and the Rebel Maids of Denver; Richard Brazier, “The Mass I.W.W. Trial of 1918: A Retrospect,” Labor History 7, no. 2 (1966); Eric Thomas Chester, The Wobblies in Their Heyday: The Rise and Destruction of the Industrial Workers of the World during the World War I Era; Eric Thomas Chester, Yours for Industrial Freedom: The Industrial Workers of the World from the Inside; Ancestry.com.
Manya Lansky
Born: 1898, Pieski, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Jewish Occupation: Garment worker Migration: Immigrated to US 1915 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Migrated to the United States for work and soon became an anarchist in New York. She distributed the Union of Russian Workers’ paper Golos Truda. Arrested July 4, 1920 en route to a radical picnic in Cleveland, she was described by an immigration inspector as “the most typical of the usual conception of the anarchistic type that one may have occasion to observe.” She stated, “I am not in sympathy with the leaders of the Soviets, but am in sympathy with the Russian people.” Deported to Russia on February 1, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54885/2.
Ivan Lapitsky (a.k.a. John; Lapinsky; Lapitzky)
Born: 1893, Mogilev, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Belarusian Occupation: Dye worker Migration: Immigrated to Canada 1913; then to US 1917 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Belonged to Buffalo’s Russian Branch of the Communist Party. Arrested January 2, 1920, he initially denied Communist Party membership but admitted it after authorities produced documentary proof. Deported March 18, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54809/491.
Ivan Laposanko (or Lapczanko; a.k.a. John Lapko)
Born: 1890, Chernihiv, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer; coal miner; steel worker Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Joined the Union of Russian Workers in Pittsburgh in 1914 and served as a delegate to its New York convention in January 1919. Arrested in Erie, Pennsylvania during May Day disturbances on May 1, 1919, and again on December 12, 1919, he testified: “Yes, I am an anarchist; but I am not the violent anarchist that is pictured… I am studying the question of Anarchy.” Deported January 22, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54709/642.
James Larkin (a.k.a. Jim; “Big Jim”)
James Larkin, 1919. Wikimedia Commons.
Born: 1876, Liverpool, England Nationality: British Ethnicity: Irish Occupation: Laborer; lecturer Migration: Immigrated to US 1914 Affiliation: Communist Labor Party
Raised in poverty in Ireland, Larkin joined the Independent Labour Party in 1893 and became a full-time organizer for the National Union of Dock Labourers in 1905 before being expelled in 1908. He founded the Irish Transport and General Workers’ Union, cofounded the Irish Labour Party in 1912, and helped lead the 1913 Dublin Lockout with James Connolly while also founding the Irish Citizen Army.
In the United States he joined the Socialist Party of America, aligned with its pro-Bolshevik Left Wing, and lectured widely, often in conjunction with the IWW. Expelled from the SPA in 1919, he cofounded the Communist Labor Party. Arrested under New York’s criminal anarchy law, sentenced to five to ten years, pardoned by Governor Al Smith in 1923, and deported to England in April 1923, after repeated passport denials by British authorities.
Returning to Ireland he founded the Irish Worker League as the country’s official Communist Party and became head of the Communist-aligned Worker’s Union of Ireland. Attended the Fifth Congress of the Comintern in 1924 and appointed to the Comintern’s Executive Committee.In 1927 he was elected to the Irish parliament (Dáil Éireann) on behalf of the IWL , but unable to take his seat due to an unpaid award for libel against him. He resigned from the Comintern in 1929 and broke with Communism completely in 1932. In 1936 he was elected to the Dublin city government; 1937 elected to the Dáil Éireann as an independent candidate, but lost reelection the following year. In 1941 he rejoined the Irish Labour Party and served in the Dáil Éireann from 1943 to 1944. He died in 1947.
Sources: Emmet O’Connor, “James Larkin in the United States, 1914-23,” Journal of Contemporary History 37, no. 2 (April 2002); Emmet O’Connor, Big Jim Larkin: Hero or Wrecker?
Carl Larson (born Carl Johan Fredrik Larson)
Born: 1885, Upsala, Sweden Nationality: Swedish Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer; shoemaker Migration: Migrated to US via Canada 1911 Affiliation: IWW; Communist Labor Party
Joined the IWW in 1912 and the Scandinavian section of the Socialist Party of America in 1917. Arrested May 3, 1918 after denouncing the US government, he was convicted under the Espionage Act in February 1919 and sentenced to one year and a day in Leavenworth. While imprisoned he joined the Communist Labor Party. After his release he served as literature agent for Salt Lake City’s Scandinavian Socialist Club. Arrested again in August 1920, he was deported June 9, 1921.
He reportedly left Sweden in 1924 as a seaman and jumped ship in Canada, returning to the US. On January 7, 1925, the Swedish Communist paper Folkets Dagblad Politiken printed a letter from him about Communist activity in America. In 1932 he was believed to be living in Seattle, and in 1933 authorities received confidential reports that he was in San Francisco under an assumed name and active in the Communist Party.
Sources: INS file 54861/408; FBI file OG 196909; The Toiler, April 2, 1920; One Big Union Monthly, May 1920.
Ludwig Lau
Born: Nationality: Polish Ethnicity: Occupation: Migration: Immigrated to US year unknown Affiliation:
Deported as a radical to Poland on September 1, 1920. No further information has been located.
Sources: INS file 54325/36G.
Stefan Lavrichuk (a.k.a. Lawrichuk; Steve Liunsky)
Born: 1893, Grodno, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Belarusian Occupation: Mechanic Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Joined the Socialist Party in Rockford, Illinois, later transferring into the Communist Party. Arrested January 1920, he “voluntarily departed” to Russia via Canada on October 20, 1920.
Sources: INS file 54860/671.
Mikail Lavrinuk (a.k.a. Michael Lawrinuk)
Born: 1891, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Hotel worker Migration: Immigrated to US 1914 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers; IWW
Joined the Union of Russian Workers in New York around 1918 and the IWW in 1919. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, he was deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/489.
Giacomo Lavrio (a.k.a. James Lavrio)
Giacomo Lavrio, c. 1919. National Archives.
Born: 1884, Turin, Italy Nationality: Italian Ethnicity: Occupation: Miner Migration: Immigrated to US 1901 Affiliation: Anarchist
Worked in mines across the United States and became an anarchist there, supporting Cronaca Sovversiva and corresponding extensively with Italian-American anarchists. Briefly returned to Italy from 1905 to 1907. Arrested in St. Charles, Michigan, in May 1919 while participating in a miners’ strike. He married widow Maria Perocchetti while out on bail and promised to abandon radicalism for her. Deported December 20, 1919.
Upon arrival in Italy he was detained for possible draft evasion, after which authorities lost track of him. He died on October 17, 1923 in Turin of unknown causes.
Sources: INS file 54616/206; CPC busta 2781.
William Lawna (or Launa; Lauva; a.k.a. Alfred Schmidt)
Born: 1886, Libau, Russia (present-day Latvia) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Locksmith Migration: Immigrated to US 1906 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Joined the Union of Russian Workers in 1919 and was alleged to have served as secretary of its Elizabeth, New Jersey branch and to have hosted Leon Trotsky in his home, though he denied this claim. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, he was deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919. His wife remained in the United States.
Sources: INS file 54709/103.
Andrey Lazarevich (a.k.a. Andrew Lazarewich or Lazarowitz)
Born: 1895, Minsk, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
A member of the Union of Russian Workers in Newark, though the only evidence authorities had against him was a membership card for the Executive Committee of the Second Russian All-Colonial Convention of the United States and Canada (a meeting of various leftwing Russian groups held in New York in January 1919). Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, he was deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919. His wife Maria and their newborn child were left behind in the US.
Sources: INS file 54709/347.
Maria Lazarevich (née Kott; a.k.a. Mary Lazarewich)
Born: 1896, Minsk, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Housewife Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
An anarchist since 1917 and member of the URW, Maria Lazarevich was the wife of Buford deportee Andrey Lazarevich. After actively campaigning to be expelled to rejoin her husband, she was deported to Russia on February 26, 1921 along with the couple’s fourteen-month-old child.
Sources: INS file 55009/14.
Simeon Lebed (a.k.a. Sam Lebed)
Born: 1893, Novovolynsk, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Ukrainian Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1912 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Joined the Socialist Party and later Detroit’s Communist Party Branch No. 22. Arrested January 1920, he was deported March 18, 1921.
Born: 1881, Volyn, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Ukrainian Occupation: Miner Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Lived in Fairmont, West Virginia, and was arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919. He was deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Deported as a radical to Austria on May 8, 1920. No additional information has been located.
Sources: INS file 54325/36G.
Anton Lichkevich (or Lishkevitch; Litshkevitch; a.k.a. Anton Cotie)
Born: 1887, Kamieniec, Russia (present-day Poland) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Migrated to Canada 1912; then to US April 1919 Affiliation: Anarchist
Declared, “I have been an Anarchist since 1905.” Arrested in Detroit in January 1920 while traveling to distribute anarchist newspapers, he openly affirmed his anarchism at his immigration hearing and “voluntarily departed” to Russia February 26, 1921.
Russian authorities at Libau refused him and several others entry because of their anarchism. He and other deportees coauthored “An Open Letter to the Russian Premier Lenin” in response.
Sources: INS file 54861/375; FBI file OG 367316; Free Society, October–November 1921.
Tito Ligi (a.k.a. Augusto Vitaletti)
Tito Ligi, c. 1922. Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Italy.
Born: 1894, Sassoferrato, Italy Nationality: Italian Ethnicity: Occupation: Miner Migration: Immigrated to US 1912 Affiliation: Anarchist
Ligi and his brother Adolfo were already anarchists before emigrating together. In the United States he associated with Luigi Galleani’s circle. In November 1920 he was arrested in Scranton, Pennsylvania, for evading the draft after filing a declaration of intent to naturalize, and he briefly became a leading suspect—almost certainly falsely—in the 1920 Wall Street bombing. Deported on August 3, 1922.
In 1925 he moved to Rome with his wife, Bianchi Angela, where they opened a small shop. He remained under government surveillance until 1940; although he retained anarchist beliefs, authorities recorded no significant political activity. Meanwhile his brother Angelo, living in Jessup, Pennsylvania, adopted Tito’s name and married anarchist Maria Giaconi, who later fought in the Spanish Civil War.
Sources: FBI file BS 25-63-12-1; CPC busta 2786; The Nation, May 18, 1921; Beverly Gage, The Day Wall Street Exploded: A Story of America in Its First Age of Terror; Charles H. McCormick, Hopeless Cases: The Hunt for the Red Scare Terrorist Bombers; Kenyon Zimmer, “The Other Volunteers: American Anarchists and the Spanish Civil War, 1936-1939,” Journal for the Study of Radicalism 10, no. 2 (2016).
Amedeo Lilli
Born: 1894, Acqualagna, Italy Nationality: Italian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer; tailor Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Anarchist
Arrested in September 1917 after an Italian anarchist “riot” during which he was shot in the shoulder by an undercover policeman. Convicted of assault, he was sentenced to twenty-five years in Wisconsin State Prison. Pardoned in 1922 on condition of deportation, he was deported February 16, 1922.
After returning to Italy he became a tailor and, according to police surveillance extending to 1932, did not resume radical political activity.
Sources: INS file 54235/67; CPC busta 2787; Robert Tanzilo, The Milwaukee Police Station Bomb of 1917; Dean A. Strang, Worse than the Devil: Anarchists, Clarence Darrow, and Justice in a Time of Terror.
Peter Linecky (a.k.a. Pete; Linieski)
Born: 1885, Kyiv, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1916 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Linecky had a wife and two children in Russia. While living in Detroit he joined the Communist Party of America. Arrested in January 1920, he was deported March 18, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54859/713.
Dora Lipkin
Dora Lipkin, 1919. National Archives.
Born: 1894, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Jewish Occupation: Migration: Immigrated to US 1910 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
An anarchist and the common-law wife of URW leader and fellow deportee Hyman Perkus. She lived in New York with the family of fellow URW member Boris Shatz. Arrested in October 1919 for “disturbing the peace,” she was arrested again during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919 and refused to answer questions while detained. She helped lead a hunger strike on Ellis Island protesting detention conditions and was deported with Perkus aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919.
After plans to leave Russia in 1924 fell through, she married Hyman Perkus and by 1930 both had joined the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
Sources: INS file 54709/275; New York Tribune, November 30, 1919; Elaine Leeder Collection of Rose Pesotta Papers, 1912–1961, Cornell University Library; Paul Avrich, Anarchist Voices: An Oral History of Anarchism in America.
Samuel Lipman (a.k.a. Schaie Lipzcuk)
Samuel Lipman, 1921. Paul Avrich Collection, Library of Congress.
Born: 1888, Pinsk, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Jewish Occupation: Furrier Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Socialist Party of America
Lipman belonged to the Socialist Party of America as well as New York’s anarchist Frayhayt Group, and identified as a leftwing socialist and Marxist rather than an anarchist. A pacifist and vegetarian strongly influenced by Leo Tolstoy, he lived with anarchist Ethel Bernstein, his common-law wife. In 1918 he was arrested with others for distributing leaflets opposing US intervention in the Russian Civil War and sentenced to twenty years under the Espionage Act. While imprisoned he became disillusioned with Tolstoy and falsely claimed anarchist beliefs in hopes of deportation. After losing the landmark Supreme Court free-speech case Abrams v. United States, he was deported November 23, 1921.
In Russia he married Bernstein, studied agronomy, and became chairman of the Department of Economic Geography at the University of the Toilers of the East. In 1928 he applied to join the Communist Party. During Stalin’s purges in the 1930s he was executed.
Sources: INS file 54517/72; Richard Polenberg, Fighting Faiths: The Abrams Case, the Supreme Court, and Free Speech; Paul Avrich, Anarchist Voices: An Oral History of Anarchism in America; Senya Fléchine Papers, International Institute for Social History, The Netherlands.
Anton Lipsky
Born: 1895, Grodno, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Presser Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Lipsky stated that he came to the United States “to learn some profession.” Living in New York, he joined the Union of Russian Workers in 1919. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, he was deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/456.
Demian Lisiuk (a.k.a. Jim; Lisuk)
Born: 1894, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Migrated to Canada 1913; then to US 1914 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Joined the Socialist Party of America in 1919 and later transferred into Detroit’s Russian Branch No. 1 of the Communist Party of America. Arrested in January 1920, he was deported to Russia February 26, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54859/772.
Nikolai Lisiuk (a.k.a. Nicholas; Nick)
Born: 1887, Grodno, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to Canada 1911; then to US 1917 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Lisiuk had a wife and two children in Russia. Arrested in Pittsburgh on November 17, 1920, federal agents accused him of owning a trunk full of Communist Party literature. Indicted under the Sedition Act and jailed in Allegheny County, he denied radical affiliations, though a confidential informant identified him as a Communist Party literature agent. He was deported to Russia February 26, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54885/71.
Aftanasy Litvakoff
Born: c. 1884, Lopatni, Chernihiv, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Lived in Homestead, Pennsylvania for six years and joined the URW there in 1917. Arrested for distributing radical handbills, he served twenty days in jail. After moving to Cleveland he was arrested again February 21, 1921. He stated, “I do recognize Anarchism, but I feel that I am not worthy enough to be called such, owing to the fat that I do not understand Anarchy enough to be honored by being called an Anarchist.” Deported to Russia March 18, 1921.
Sources: INS file 55009/22.
Anna Loban
Born: c. 1893, Minsk, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Housewife Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Married fellow anarchist Konstantin Loban in Akron in 1916 and became a member of the Union of Russian Workers. Deported to Russia with her husband on March 18, 1921.
Sources: INS file 55009/24.
Konstantin Loban (a.k.a. Peter Dedka or Dutka)
Born: 1893, Slutsk, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Rubber worker Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Worked at the BF Goodrich plant in Akron and married Anna Loban there in 1916. Joined the Union of Russian Workers in 1915 and became secretary of its Lansing, Michigan branch in 1919. Asked why he had become antagonistic to the US government, he replied “Because I have been working here for eight years and am still doing hard laboring work and have not enough money to return to Russia, whereas the Americans all have much better jobs, have money and have privileges that I do not have and this country does not belong to Americans any more than it belongs to any one…as it was originally owned by the Indians.” Deported to Russia with his wife on March 18, 1921.
Sources: INS file 55009/24.
Michael Lojan
Born: 1897, Austria-Hungary Nationality: Yugoslavian Ethnicity: N Occupation: Barber Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Joined the Communist Party while living in Milwaukee. Arrested there and deported to Yugoslavia in 1923.
Francisco López García (a.k.a. Frank R. Lopez; José Marinero; Jesus Legendario; Alberto Martín; Albert Martin)
Francisco López c. 1923. Boston Public Library.
Born: 1885, A Coruña, Spain Nationality: Spanish Ethnicity: Galician Occupation: Sailor; carpenter Migration: Immigrated to US 1904 Affiliation: Anarchist
Became one of the most prominent Spanish-speaking anarchists in the United States, contributing to Spanish-language radical newspapers internationally. He collaborated on Cultura Obrera (1911–1925) and helped launch its successor Cultura Proletaria (1927–1953). A photograph seized during his 1918 arrest suggested that he also participated in the Mexican Revolution with the anarchist Partido Liberal Mexicano. In Boston he belonged to the Grupo Rebelión and helped found the Grupo Fraternidad, which corresponded with anarchist groups across Europe and the Americas. In 1912 he married Italian widow Rosa [Rose] De Matteis. Though close to Luigi Galleani’s circle, he rejected advocacy of violence. Arrested February 1918 in a federal raid, agents described him as “practically the only real Spanish anarchist leader in the eastern part of the United States.” Ordered deported in November 1918, he was released on bond while appealing on the grounds that he was a nonviolent “philosophical anarchist.” Joined Boston’s new International Revolutionary Group, which published the Spanish-language single-issue anarchist magazines El Azote (1921) and America (1922). Became secretary of the Sacco-Vanzetti Defense Committee in 1920 and coordinated extensive international propaganda. Separated from his wife around this time. After the Supreme Court ruled against him in 1924, he was deported to Spain on May 25, 1925.
According to different accounts, he either jumped ship and swam ashore with help from anarchist sailors, or returned to North America later in 1925 after arriving in Spain. He lived for several years in Canada with his companion Mary Berkowitz, later returning to New York under the name Alberto Martín. In 1953 he married anarchist organizer Rose Pesotta (as “Albert Martin”); they divorced after two years. He coauthored the book Breve historia del movimiento anarquista en Estados Unidos de América del Norte and died in 1967, leaving $500 in his will to the Mexican anarchist newspaper Tierra y Libertad.
Sources: INS file 54379/511; Bieito Alonso, Inimigos ás portas: Frank López e o anarquismo global; Francis Russell, Tragedy in Dedham: The Story of the Sacco-Vanzetti Case; Elaine J. Leeder, The Gentle General: Rose Pesotta, Anarchist and Labor Organizer; Alberto Martin, Vladimiro Muñoz, and Federica Montseny, Breve historia del movimiento anarquista en Estados Unidos de América del Norte; Tierra y Libertad, June 1967.
Andrew Lopitsky
Born: 1894, Mogilev, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Miner Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Explained his immigration by saying Russians were “oppressed” and “had heard of better wages and freedom in America”heard of good wages and freedom in America.” He joined the Union of Russian Workers in Downs, West Virginia. Arrested December 2, 1919, in connection with a URW-organized miners’ strike at a Consumers Fuel Company mine, he was deported aboard the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/591; FBI file OG 380920; Charles H. McCormick, Seeing Reds: Federal Surveillance of Radicals in the Pittsburgh Mill District.
Adolfo Lorenzini (a.k.a. John Lorenzini)
Adolgo Lorenzini, c. 1921. Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Italy.
Born: 1887, Modena, Italy Nationality: Italian Ethnicity: Occupation: Miner Migration: Immigrated to US 1911 Affiliation: Anarchist
Became an anarchist around 1914 or 1915 while living in Spring Valley, Illinois, and subscribed to the Italian anarchist paper Umanità Nova. Deported March 1, 1921.
Emigrated to Nice, France in 1922 and joined the French Communist Party, though Italian consular surveillance recorded no political activity on his pary.
Sources: INS file 54885/16; CPC busta 2839.
Ivan Loshakov (a.k.a. John Loshakoff)
Born: 1891, Kyiv, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Lumber worker Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Around 1917 Loshakov became an anarchist and joined the URW in Granite Falls, Washington, later serving as secretary of its Seattle branch. Arrested in Seattle in January 1920, he was deported January 22, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54860/398; FBI file OG 387801.
Prokopy Losiov (or Losioff; Lasioff)
Born: 1891, Chernigov, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer; miner Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
His wife and child remained in Russia. After collapsing from heat while working in a Pittsburgh steel mill, he was confined for nine months in the Woodville Asylum in Allegheny County in 1917. He later moved to Fairmont, West Virginia, joined the United Mine Workers and URW, and participated in the 1919 miners’ strike. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, he was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/600.
Anthony Lovenetsky (a.k.a. H. Levinensky)
Born: 1894, Mogilev, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Polish Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: IWW; Union of Russian Workers
Joined the IWW and in early 1919 became secretary of the URW branch in Monessen, Pennsylvania, where he chaired meetings. Immigration officials described him as “far above the average in intelligence.” Arrested in Pittsburgh in May 1919 and released after four days, he was arrested again during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919 while on strike at Page Wire Works. He was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/474; One Big Union Monthly, May 1920.
Vasily Lukashuk (a.k.a. Wiliam Lukov; Lukow)
Born: 1896, Brest-Litovsk, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Lost three fingers and the use of his left arm in an accident at the Youngstown Sheet & Tube Company. He briefly joined the Socialist Party around 1915 and became a member of the URW branch in Youngstown in 1916. Arrested while on strike in November 1919, he was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/539; FBI file OG 375161a.
Andrew Lukianow (a.k.a. John Wilichko)
Andrew Lukianow, c. 1919. National Archives.
Born: 1885, Mogilev, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1914 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Worked at the Arctic Ice Cream Company in Detroit and had a wife and child in Russia. Arrested November 7, 1919, authorities seized anarchist literature and correspondence with a URW secretary. Detained more than six months before being granted bail, he claimed his name was John Wilichko and Andrew Lukianow was a friend of his, but multiple witnesses identified him as Lukianow. Deported March 18, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54709/314; FBI file OG 380910.
Chaim Lurie (a.k.a. Michael Loorie)
Born: Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Cabinetmaker Migration: Affiliation:
Deported as a radical to Russia February 26, 1921. No further information has been found.
Political cartoon about Mansevich’s case, 1926. Agnes Inglis Papers, Joseph A. Labadie Collection, University of Michigan.
Born: 1886, Biaroza, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Polish Ethnicity: Occupation: Autoworker Migration: Immigrated to US circa 1911 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
An employee of the Ford Motor Company, Mansevich lived in Hamtramck, Michigan with his wife and four American-born daughters. A member of Detroit’s URW Branch No. 3 and distributor of the paper Volna, he was arrested in September 1921. Despite a large national defense campaign and press coverage, he was deported June 7, 1924 to Poland.
Letters he sent his wife in 1926 described “intense suffering,” including frostbitten feet while working in a lumber camp. His wife, meanwhile, was ill and dependent on welfare assistance. At an unknown date (one source suggests around 1940) he migrated to Canada and worked as a farmer. It appears he never reunited with his wife and children, who remained in Detroit. He died in Windsor, Ontario, in 1960.
Sources: INS file 55119/18; Agnes Inglis Papers, Joseph A. Labadie Collection, University of Michigan; The New Republic, September 17, 1924; The Windsor Star, March 10, 1960; Ancestry.com.
Vito Mariani
Vito Mariani, c. 1920. National Archives.Vito Mariani, c. 1950s. Francesco de Rogatis et al., eds., Morra de Sanctis: Tra cronaca e storia ad un anno del terremoto.
Born: 1882, Morra Irpina (present-day Morra De Sanctis), Italy Nationality: Italian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US c. 1910 Affiliation: Anarchist
An anarchist from his youth, Mariani became a prominent activist in Lynn, Massachusetts, and later Bridgeport, Connecticut, closely associated with Luigi Galleani’s Cronaca Sovversiva. Arrested May 30, 1914 in El Paso for a radical speech during a lecture tour, he was held for deportation but released. Between about 1917 and 1919 he moved to New York and became editor of Il Refrattario and coeditor of Il Diritto with Raffaele Schiavina. Arrested February 1920 under New York’s criminal anarchy law, he was deported June 29, 1920.
In Italy in 1921 he was sentenced to two years for avoiding the draft. In 1924 he was a subscriber to Errico Malatesta’s anarchist journal Pensiero e Voluntá, and two years later he married. Italian government reports noted “good conduct” and no political activity on his part, and he was removed from the list of subversives in 1932, but in 1936 authorities preventatively detained him while Mussolini visited Morra De Sanctis. Locally, Mariani was remembered as a militant antifascist who lectured peasants outside church and became “unanimously considered the civil and moral point of reference for an entire generation.” In 1946 he was elected to local government and led the creation of the town’s first middle school. He died in 1964.
Sources: INS file 54861/318; FBI file OG 8000-385978; CPC busta 3061; Un trentennio di attività anarchica (1915-1945); Harry Weinberger Papers, Yale University; Francesco de Rogatis et al., eds., Morra de Sanctis: Tra cronaca e storia ad un anno del terremoto.
Vakula Markovets
Born: Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Migration: Affiliation:
Deported (“voluntarily departed”) to Russia as a radical in September 26, 1920. No further information has been located.
Sources: INS file 54325/36G.
Sam Markowich
Born: 1899, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: wire puncher Migration: Immigrated to US year unknown Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
An employee of the Spring Wire Company in Albion, Michigan, and member of the local branch of the Union of Russian Workers. Arrested November 7, 1919, in a local raid on the URW. Deported to Russia January 22, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54663/276; Jackson Evening News (Jackson MI), November 10, 1919; Detroit Free Press, January 11, 1920.
Ludwig Martens (born Ludwig Christian Alexander Karl Martens; a.k.a. Ludwig Karlovich Martens)
Ludwig Martens, 1920. Wikimedia Commons.
Born: 1874, Bachmut, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: German Occupation: Engineer; diplomat Migration: Immigrated to US 1916 Affiliation: Russian Soviet Government Bureau
The son of a German factory owner, he joined the League of Struggle for the Emancipation of the Working Class while a university student in Saint Petersburg. Arrested in 1896 and deported to Germany in 1899, he joined the German Social Democratic Party, the emigrated to England.
In the United States he became vice president of a New York engineering firm and joined the editorial board of the Socialist Party’s Russian-language newspaper Novy Mir. 1919 transferred into the Communist Party of America. Returned to Russia in 1917. In January 1919 he was appointed the official representative of the Soviet government in the US and returned to New York, though the United States refused him recognition. That March he established the Russian Soviet Government Bureau to negotiate contracts with American firms. Ordered deported in 1920, he left by “voluntary departure” January 22, 1921.
In the Soviet Union he served in the Supreme Soviet of the National Economy and later headed diesel-engine research and development. He retired with honors in 1941 and died in 1948.
Sources: FBI file OG 8000-377098; Frederick C. Giffin, “The Martens Mission,” International Social Science Review 73, no. 3/4 (1998); Todd J. Pfannestiel, Rethinking the Red Scare: The Lusk Committee and New York’s Crusade Against Radicalism, 1919-1923; G. Evgenev and B. Shapik, Revoliutsioner, diplomat, uchenyi (o L.K. Martens); https://web.archive.org/web/20220808190823/http:/deadlypass.com/wp/martens-ludwig-karlovich/; New York Times, October 22, 1948.
John Martin
John Martin, 1918. National Archives.
Born: 1885, Hørsholm, Denmark Nationality: Danish Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer; lumber worker Migration: Immigrated to US 1910 Affiliation: Industrial Workers of the World
Joined the IWW in Seattle in 1916, later becoming branch secretary in Raymond, Washington and district secretary for the Lumber Workers’ Industrial Union No. 500. He helped lead the major 1917 lumber strike in the Northwest. A defendant in the federal IWW trial of 1917–1918, he was sentenced to ten years and a $30,000 fine. His sentence was later commuted on condition of deportation, and he was deported December 7, 1922.
Sources: INS file 54616/57; Industrial Workers of the World Collection, Walter P. Reuther Library, Wayne State University; Stephen M. Kohn, American Political Prisoners: Prosecutions under the Espionage and Sedition Acts.
Tomás Martínez (a.k.a. Thomas Martinez)
Tomás Martínez, 1918. National Archives.Martínez shortly before his death in Mexico, 1921. America: Numero Unico, January 1922.
Born: 1893, Mexico Nationality: Mexican Ethnicity: Occupation: Miner Migration: Migrated to US c. 1915 Affiliation: IWW
Martínez participated in the Mexican Revolution beginning in 1910, then joined the IWW in Sonora and organized miners in Cananea. In 1914 he was expelled from Sonora as a supposed Huerta supporter, prompting a strike of 2,500–3,000 miners until he was allowed to return.
From 1915 to 1918 he was active in IWW and Partido Liberal Mexicano circles in Arizona and Los Angeles and wrote extensively for the IWW paper El Rebelde. Arrested in Miami, Arizona, in March 1918, he was sentenced under the Espionage Act to two years in Leavenworth and a $500 fine. He contracted tuberculosis in prison, and a botched appendicitis operation caused septicemia. After release he requested permission to depart for a country other than Mexico, fearing execution for his revolutionary past, but the request was denied. Deported in 1921, he was reportedly near death when sent across the border.
He never recovered and died in Guadalajara October 23, 1921. Fellow activists buried him beneath a headstone reading: ¡Nunca olvidamos! (“We never forget!”)
Sources: INS file 54412/47 (missing); FBI file OG 240868; Tucson Citizen, April 15, 1914; Harry Weinberger Papers, Yale University; Elizabeth Gurley Flynn Papers, Wisconsin Historical Society; Erie Labor Press, December 3, 1921; America: Numero Unico (Boston), January 1922.
Ivan Martinovsky (a.k.a. John Martinowski)
Born: 1887, Cherga, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1909 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Joined the URW branch in Rockville, Connecticut, September 1919 and became its secretary. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, he was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Born: c. 1898, Minsk, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Housewife Migration: Immigrated to US year unknown Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
An anarchist and URW member since 1918, Martzin was the wife of fellow deportee Vincent Martzin. She had two children—one aged two years and one six months old—when detained. She was deported to Russia February 26, 1921, taking the children with her.
Sources: INS file 55009/16.
Vincent Martzin
Born: 1893, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1914 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Martzin joined the URW in New York in 1916. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, he was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919. His pregnant common-law wife Mary and their infant child remained in the United States until Mary’s deportation in 1921.
Sources: INS file 54709/276; FBI file OG 378318.
Pietro Marucco
Pietro Marucco, c. 1918. Il Domani, April 1919.
Born: c. 1885, Maggiora, Italy Nationality: Italian Ethnicity: Occupation: Miner Migration: Immigrated to US 1905 Affiliation: Anarchist
Joined a brother in Pennsylvania’s coal mines. Both brothers joined the anarchist Demolizione Group in Latrobe, Pennsylvania and supported Luigi Galleani’s Cronaca Sovversiva. Pietro was arrested May 20, 1918, and deported February 22, 1919.
Though reportedly in perfect health at departure, he died at sea March 8, 1919. The official cause was “pneumonia following influenza,” and he was buried at sea, though comrades believed he had been killed and vowed revenge.
Sources: INS file 54379/378; Elizabeth Gurley Flynn Papers, Tamiment Library and Robert F. Wagner Labor Archives; Il Diritto, April 1919; Paul Avrich, Sacco and Vanzetti: The Anarchist Background; Antonio Senta, Luigi Galleani: The Most Dangerous Anarchist in America.
Born: 1894, Kovno, Russia (present-day Kaunas, Lithuania) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Lithuanian Occupation: Lumber worker Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers; IWW
Maskalunas joined the URW in 1916 and the IWW in 1917. Arrested January 1918 in Seattle while inquiring at a US immigration office about a detained friend, he was held without hearing for three months and then transferred to jail in Ellensburg, Washington, where he was finally examined. He was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54379/101.
Bartolomeo Massullo
Bartolomeo Massullo, 1917. Knoxville Sentinel, December 12, 1917.
Born: 1881, Bagnoli, Italy Nationality: Italian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Anarchist
Already an anarchist before emigrating, Massullo had a wife and three children in Italy. In Seattle he joined the Circolo di Studi Sociali, distributed Luigi Galleani’s Cronaca Sovversiva, and corresponded with the movement’s leading figures. Arrested November 1917, he provided names and addresses of Circolo members under interrogation. Deported July 10, 1919.
Italian authorities later reported no radical activity, though he secretly continued reading and fundraising for anarchist publications. In 1923 he emigrated to Canada, then illegally reentered the United States in 1929 and settled in Hayward, California, where he was no longer politically active.
Sources: INS file 54616/19; CPC busta 3143; Gianfranco Cresciani, “Exploitation, Emigration and Anarchism: the Case of Isidoro Alessandro Bertazzon,” Altreitalie no. 46 (January-June 2013); Giuseppe Galzerano, Andrea Salsedo: vita, galera e morte dell’editore anarchico “suicidato” dalla polizia americana; La Frusta, July 1, 1922; Ancestry.com.
Filimon Matera (a.k.a. William; Molorik)
Born: 1881, Chernihiv Oblast, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Ukrainian Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers; IWW
Active in revolutionary movements in Russia since 1905.
In the United States he joined both the URW and IWW in Seattle. His wife and children remained in Russia. Arrested January 1920, he was deported to Russia February 2, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54860/420.
Pavel Matesky (a.k.a. Paul)
Born: c. 1889, Mogiliev, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Weaver Migration: Immigrated to US 1914 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers; IWW
Joined the URW in Waterbury, Connecticut in October 1917 and later became secretary of the Montville branch. Also an IWW member. He admitted being an anarchist and advocating the overthrow of governments by force and violence. Arrested January 19, 1920, he was deported to Russia February 26, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54861/11.
Elia Matuska
Born: 1894, Grodno, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Machinist Migration: Immigrated to US 1912 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Matuska joined the Socialist Party and later became a charter member of Chicago’s Karl Marx Branch No. 4 of the Communist Party, serving as branch librarian. He was deported March 18, 1921.
Sources: INS file 54859/4.
James Maundeloe
Born: 1895, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer; butcher Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Joined the Greensburg, Pennsylvania URW branch in 1919 but claimed he was expelled after briefly becoming a butcher-shop owner. He participated in the 1919 strike at the American Sheet and Tinplate Company. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, he was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Sources: INS file 54709/431.
Donald McPherson (a.k.a. Edgar Dunn)
Born: 1898, Leeds, England Nationality: British Ethnicity: Scottish Occupation: Sailor Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: IWW
McPherson joined the IWW around 1915. Arrested September 9, 1918 in Seattle, he stated when asked about the Soviet government: “It is all right.” At a later immigration hearing he refused to answer questions. He was deported July 12, 1919.
Born: 1893, Leeds, England Nationality: British Ethnicity: Englsih Occupation: Laborer Migration: Migrated to US 1906 Affiliation: IWW
Migrated to U.S. with his family in 1906, at age thirteen. Became a “hobo” laborer, telling authorities, “I had a thousand different jobs” in the US and Canada. Joined the Industrial Workers of the World in 1916 in Salina, Kansas. He served a year in Pierce County Jail for refusing draft registration, which he described as “an employers’ edict.” Arrested in Tacoma in February 1919 while posting IWW stickers, he was deported June 21, 1919.
After arrival in England he said he would continue IWW propaganda if conditions were similar to America’s, but later observed there was little outlet for such activity. He became an admirer of George Lansbury and worked as a docker in Liverpool.
Sources: INS file 54517/88; FBI file OG 8000-382412.
Nicholas Michels
Born: Austria-Hungary, year unknown Nationality: Hungarian Ethnicity: Occupation: Migration: Affiliation: Communist Labor Party
A member of the Communist Labor Party deported to Hungary in 1921. No further information has been found.
Sources: FBI file OG 381688.
Feodor Michkov (a.k.a. Fred Mechcoff; Michcov; Mihaitch)
Born: c. 1888, Moscow, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1914 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Previously arrested in Russia for a political offense, Michkov joined the Union of Russian Workers in New York. Arrested February 1920, he admitted anarchist beliefs and opposition to organized government. Deported to Russia January 22, 1921.
Source: INS file 54861/131.
Kalenik Migura (a.k.a. Kalymnyk)
Born: 1885, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Joined the URW branch in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, became its secretary, and was arrested February 1920. Deported January 22, 1921. His wife and child remained in Russia.
Sources: INS file 54861/75; FBI file OG 381865.
Nikolai Mikhaelov (a.k.a. Nicholas Mihaeloff; Mikeloff; Michaelov; Peter Lund; Fritiak)
Born: 1893, Petrograd, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Sailor; machinist Migration: Immigrated to US 1917 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers; IWW
After fighting in France for the British and Russian armies during the First World War, Mikhaelov migrated across several countries before reaching the US in 1917. (According to another source, however, he was leader of an anarchist gang that took part in “expropriations” in Petrograd in 1916 and fled to the U.S. after two members were killed and he was injured in the hand.) He joined the URW in Newark and also the IWW. Arrested March 1919 and released on bail, he was expelled from the URW after his partner allegedly approached police as an informant. He nonetheless declared his desire to return to Russia to overthrow Lenin and establish “pure anarchy.” Deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919. His wife and child remained in the US.
Born: Russia, year unknown Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Migration: Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Member of Russian Branch No. 6 of the Communist Party of America in New York. Deported December 23, 1920. No further information has been found.
Source: INS file 54859/199.
Gavril Mikhnevich (a.k.a. Hawril Michnewitz; Michniewich; Harry Grigory)
Mikhnevich’s URW membership card. National Archives.
Gavril Mikhnevich, c. 1920s. B. Ratner, Istoriia Moskovskogo instrumental’nogo zavoda.
Born: 1886, Kremno, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Factory worker Migration: Immigrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
His wife remained in Russia while he emigrated. Joined the URW in Hartford in August 1919 and was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
After arrival in Soviet Russia he was one of six deportees who met Lenin seeking financial support. He later worked at the Russian-American Tool Plant and helped form a factory committee there, and appears to have joined the Russian Communist Party.
Source: INS file 54709/421; B. Ratner, Istoriia Moskovskogo instrumental’nogo zavoda.
Julius Miller
Julius Miller, c. 1920. National Archives.
Born: 1894, Dvinsk, Russia (present-day Latvia) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1915 Affiliation: IWW
An IWW member and delegate, Miller was arrested in Detroit in January 1920. After his release on bail he was arrested again in Cleveland for distributing IWW literature and held for over a year in the county jail, where an immigration inspector reported his health was deteriorating badly. Deported to Russia February 26, 1921.
Source: INS file 54860/32.
Samuel Miller (a.k.a. Sholem Melamed; Schulim)
Born: 1897, Kiev, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Jewish Occupation: Laborer Migration: Immigrated to US 1914 Affiliation: IWW; anarchist
An employee of Sears, Roebuck and Company in Chicago, as well as an IWW member and anarchist, Miller was arrested in July 1917. When asked his nationality, he replied: “I am international.” His attorney, Clarence Darrow, unsuccessfully argued that as a pacifist “philosophical anarchist” Miller should not fall under the anarchist exclusion laws. Deported December 23, 1920.
Born: 1886, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Steelworker Migration: Migrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Had a wife living in Russia. He joined the URW in Youngstown, Ohio. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, he was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Source: INS file 54709/187.
Giuseppe Montagni
Giuseppe Montagni, c. 1920. Archivio Centrale dello Stato, Italy.
Born: 1890, Riva di Trento, Austria-Hungary (present-day Italy) Nationality: Italian Ethnicity: Italian Occupation: Electrician Migration: Migrated to US 1911 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Lived in Buffalo, Philadelphia, and Pittsburgh and joined the Communist Party of America. Deported June 19, 1920.
He apparently did not join the Italian Communist Party, but in late 1922 he illegally emigrated to Hungary hoping to reach Russia. Arrested in Budapest en route, he was interned for ten months at Zalaegerszeg before being expelled back to Italy in June 1924. After several years of itinerant work, he settled in his hometown as a farmer. Italian authorities continued surveillance of him as a radical until 1941.
Sources: FBI file OG 204622; CPC busta 3359.
Tugardo Montanari
Born: 1886, Orciano di Pesaro, Italy Nationality: Italian Ethnicity: Occupation: Metalworker; iron molder Migration: Migrated to US 1903 Affiliation: Anarchist
Not politically radical before immigrating, he became an anarchist and distributed Luigi Galleani’s Cronaca Sovversiva throughout New England by motorcycle. In 1913 he was arrested in Worcester, Massachusetts, for “lewd and lascivious cohabitation” with his companion Lucia Mancini and served six months. Arrested again May 17, 1918, in Mansfield, Massachusetts, he was deported June 24, 1919, while Mancini and their daughter remained in the US.
In 1923 he emigrated to France, where he continued anarchist and antifascist activity. He was still living there in 1977 and contributing funds to the Italian anarchist magazine Volontà.
Sources: INS file 54379/374; CPC busta 3366; Paul Avrich, Anarchist Voices: An Oral History of Anarchism in America; Volontà, January–February 1977.
Ivan Morgolenkow (a.k.a. John Novak)
Born: 1891, Russia Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Longshoreman Migration: Migrated to US 1911 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Belonged to the URW in Baltimore. Arrested December 3, 1919, he was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Source: INS file 54709/622.
Harry Morozoff (a.k.a. Morogoff)
Born: c. 1894, Vilnius, Russia (present-day Lithuania) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Migrated to US 1912 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Joined the Socialist Party in 1917 and attended meetings of Russian Branch No. 3 of the Communist Party in Detroit in 1919, though he denied formal membership. Arrested January 1920 and held at Fort Wayne, he was deported to Russia March 18, 1921.
Source: INS file 54860/54.
Grigori Moroz (a.k.a. Gregory; Mike Moroz)
Born: 1893, Grodno, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Migrated to Canada 1913; then to US 1916 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Joined URW Branch No. 1 in Baltimore in April 1919. He worked at the Bethlehem Shipbuilding Plant, where in October 1919 a company officer reported him for wearing a black button bearing the name of the URW newspaper Khleb i Volia. Arrested November 1919, he was deported to Russia February 1, 1921.
Source: INS file 54709/108.
Roman Mosichuk (or Mosichok; Mosicshok; Mosithuk)
Born: 1890, Volyn, Russia (present-day Ukraine) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Ukrainian Occupation: Blacksmith’s helper Migration: Migrated to US 1913 Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers
Joined the URW in Newark in 1915 and became secretary of its school in Trenton, New Jersey, where he distributed URW literature. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, he was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.
Source: INS file 54709/220.
Pavel Mozuris (a.k.a. Paul; Mozures)
Born: 1885, Suwałki, Russia (present-day Poland) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Lithuanian Occupation: Laborer Migration: Migrated to US 1907 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Joined the Communist Party in New York in 1919. On January 20, 1920, he voluntarily reported himself to the Department of Justice as a party member because he had been blacklisted and wanted to return to Russia. After more than six months’ detention on Ellis Island, he escaped July 12, 1920, by leaping from a third-floor window into the water below. Later located in Kalamazoo, Michigan, he was arrested and deported February 26, 1921.
Deported to Yugoslavia as a radical June 19, 1920. No additional information has been located.
Source: INS file 54325/36G.
Camillo Muñoz
Born: 1880, Nochistlán, Mexico Nationality: Mexican Ethnicity: Occupation: Laborer Migration: Migrated to US 1915 Affiliation: Anarchist
Muñoz belonged to the anarchist group Los Errantes in Morenci, Arizona, affiliated with the Partido Liberal Mexicano. Arrested September 19, 1919, in Tucson, his wife and three Mexican-born children traveled there intending to accompany him if deported. He was deported December 3, 1919.
Source: INS file 54709/70.
José Maria Murias
Born: 1889, Rosario de Santa Fe, Argentina Nationality: Disputed Ethnicity: Spanish (father); Italian (mother) Occupation: Sailor; miner Migration: Migrated to US 1914 Affiliation: IWW
Joined the IWW in San Francisco in 1914 and became a delegate and organizer in Arizona. Arrested in Globe, Arizona, in September 1918, immigration officials faced a diplomatic impasse when Argentina claimed he was a Spanish citizen and Spain claimed he was an Argentine citizen. He was ultimately allowed to “reship as a foreign seaman” to Costa Rica July 11, 1919.
A 1920 report stated he later made several voyages to New York as a seaman and expected to return again.
Source: INS file 54648/32.
Vasily Murza (a.k.a. Sam Drozda; Sam Murza; Sam Murgu)
Born: c. 1897, Grodno, Russia (present-day Belarus) Nationality: Russian Ethnicity: Occupation: Steelworker Migration: Migrated to US 1912 Affiliation: Communist Party of America
Joined the Communist Party of America in Buffalo in November 1919. According to immigration authorities, “He appears to be a dangerous radical and, in addition, he is immoral, as will be seen from the testimony he is living with a woman without being married to her.” (In fact, he and his wife Pauline Brya had been legally married in a civil ceremony.) Arrested January 1920, he was deported to Russia February 26, 1921.
