Nikolai Ochrimuk (or Ochrymuk)

Born: 1896, Rakitnica, Grodno, Russia (present-day Belarus)
Nationality: russian
Ethnicity:
Occupation: Laborer
Migration: Immigrated to US 1914
Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers

A member of the URW in Newark. He was arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919 and deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.

Source: INS file 54709/337.

Julius Ohsis

Born: 1890, Riga, Russia (present-day Latvia)
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity: Latvian
Occupation: Carpenter
Migration: Immigrated to US 1911
Affiliation: Communist Party of America

Joined the Socialist Party of America in 1915 and the Communist Party of America in 1919. He told authorities he served as financial secretary of the Lettish Communist Party Branch in Baltimore, though historian Vernon L. Pedersen described him as the “branch head.” Arrested during the second Palmer Raids in January 1920, he was deported along with his wife Kate on February 1, 1921.

Sources: INS file 54859/541; FBI file OG 8000-385964; Vernon L. Pedersen, The Communist Party in Maryland, 1919-57.

Kate Ohsis (a.k.a. Katy; née Namin)

Born: 1896, Libau, Russia (present-day Latvia)
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity: Latvian
Occupation:
Migration: Immigrated to US 1913
Affiliation: Communist Party of America

Married Julius Ohsis in Chicago in 1917 and belonged to the Lettish Branch of the Communist Party in Baltimore. Arrested during the second Palmer Raids in January 1920, she was deported along with her husband February 1, 1921.

Sources: INS file 54859/542; FBI file OG 8000-385963; Vernon L. Pedersen, The Communist Party in Maryland, 1919-57.

Erofey Okoletenko (a.k.a. Nathan Duboff; Nick Dubov)

Born: 1895, Kyiv, Russia (present-day Ukraine)
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity:
Occupation:
Migration: Migrated to US 1914
Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers

Joined the URW in Detroit in 1916. Arrested January 21, 1919 following a jail term for “disorderly conduct and loitering,” he escaped custody June 5, 1920 but later surrendered at Ellis Island on the advice of attorney Isaac Shorr. He was deported February 1, 1921, supplied by the U.S. government with a fraudulent passport issued by the anti-Communist Ukrainian Diplomatic Mission.

In 1923 he traveled to Mexico and reentered the United States, where he was arrested for illegal entry. In 1924 he was again deported via Switzerland, but was turned away at the Russian border and returned to the U.S. ON August 23, 1924 he was deported once more, and returned to U.S. again in September 1924 after being not being permitted to enter Switzerland. Finally he was “paroled in his own custody” (i.e. set free).

Source: INS file 54709/673; Kansas State News, August 29, 1924; The American Flint, November 1924.

Adolf Olehnovich (a.k.a. Adam)

Born: c. 1882, Russia
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity: Polish
Occupation: Laborer
Migration: Immigrated to US 1910
Affiliation: Communist Party of America

Belonged to the Russian Branch of the Communist Party in Racine, Wisconsin. He was deported to Russia February 26, 1921.

Source: INS file 54859/171.

Isidor Oleynik (a.k.a. Theodore Oleynik)

Born: c. 1886, Volhyn, Russia (present-day Ukraine)
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity:
Occupation: Laborer
Migration: Immigrated to US 1913
Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers

His wife and child remained in Russia while he emigrated. He worked at Ford Motor Works and served as treasurer of Detroit’s Russian People’s Home, and belonged to the Union of russian Workers. Deported February 26, 1921.

He was refused entry at Libau along with several others because of his anarchism and coauthored an “Open Letter to the Russian Premier Lenin” in protest. Last reported to be stranded in Danzig.

Source: INS file 54709/502; Free Society (New York), October–November 1921.

Harry Olshansky (a.k.a. Harvey; Herasim)

Born: c. 1895, Samarkand, Russia (present-day Uzbekistan)
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity:
Occupation: Tailor
Migration: Immigrated to US 1910
Affiliation: Communist Party of America

Lived in Detroit, where his wife and six children resided, four of them US-born. He belonged to Detroit’s Russian Branch No. 2 of the Communist Party and was deported to Russia March 18, 1921.

Source: INS file 54859/627.

Nikolai Omelianchuk (a.k.a. Nicholas)

Born: 1892, Tułowice, Russia (present-day Poland)
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity:
Occupation: Laborer
Migration: Immigrated to Canada 1913; then to US April 1919
Affiliation:

Entered the United States without inspection and was arrested two days later in Detroit after a group of Russian radicals disrupted a lecture by anti-Soviet Russian revolutionary Catherine Breshkovsky. He denied radical ties and was instead charged with illegal entry and being “likely to become a public charge” due to his suffering from influenza. He was deported January 22, 1921.

Source: INS file 54616/172.

Wong Tai On (a.k.a. Ong Wu Tai; Lee Tai Cen)

Born: China, year unknown
Nationality: Chinese
Ethnicity:
Occupation: Student; restaurant worker
Migration:
Affiliation: IWW; anarchist

Attended Columbia University and worked as a waiter in New York’s Chinatown. In 1918 he joined the United Chinese Association, an anarchist-led union chartered under the IWW, and helped lead a Chinese waiters’ strike in late 1918–early 1919. Arrested January 16, 1919 on assault charges that were dropped, then on weapons charges that were also dropped, he was nevertheless held for deportation and expelled to China March 1, 1919.

Sources: INS file 54490/2; INS file 54519/2; New York Call, February 9, 1919; Rebel Worker (New York), February 15 and May 15, 1919.

Fred Onischuk

Born: 1894, Kyiv, Russia (present-day Ukraine)
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity:
Occupation: Autoworker
Migration: Migrated to Canada 1913; then to US 1916
Affiliation: Communist Party of America

A member of the Communist Party in Detroit. Arrested January 1920 and held at Fort Wayne, he “voluntarily departed” to Russia via Canada October 16, 1920.

Source: INS file 54859/714.

Porfiry Onishchenko (or Onishsenko)

Born: 1886, Chernihiv, Russia (present-day Ukraine)
Nationality:
Ethnicity:
Occupation: Steelworker
Migration: Migrated to Canada 1913; to US 1915
Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers

Onishchenko joined the URW in Buffalo in July 1918 and served as branch secretary and on various committees. Arrested during the first Palmer Raids in November 1919, he was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.

Source: INS file 54709/327.

Aleksandr Opotsky (a.k.a. Aleksandr Antonov)

Born: 1896, Grodno, Russia (present-day Poland)
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity:
Occupation: Laborer
Migration: Immigrated to US 1913
Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers; IWW

Joined the URW in McKees Rocks, Pennsylvania in 1917 and served as a delegate for the IWW’s General Recruiting Union. Arrested in Pittsburgh in April 1919, he told interrogators “I believe in no government of any kind,” and instead “I favor the system of [Peter] Kropatkin [sic].” He was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.

After reportedly being imprisoned in seventeen Soviet prisons, he emigrated to Argentina sometime before 1921 with help from comrades abroad.

Sources: INS file 54616/135; FBI file OG 367935; Delo Truda, December 1937–February 1938.

Markus Naumovich Oradovsky (a.k.a. Marcus Oradovsky)

Born: 1895, Odessa, Russia (present-day Ukraine)
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity: Jewish
Occupation: Sailor; laborer
Migration: Immigrated to US 1916
Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers

traveled through Europe and South America before entering the United States without inspection in 1916. He helped organize a spring-makers’ union in Brooklyn and led a strike before joining the URW in 1918. He became secretary and editor of the URW paper Khleb i Volia and secretary of the Soviet of Workers’ Deputies of the United States and Canada. Arrested July 2, 1919, he declared, “I consider myself a citizen of the whole world.” He was deported on the Buford on December 21, 1919.

1920 reportedly imprisoned for his anarchist views, and in January 1921 Alexander Berkman reported that Oradovsky “Says they [i.e. the Bolsheviks] won’t let him work.” Later that year he signed a statement of the Union of Russian Anarchist Workers Repatriated from America which critically supported the Bolshevik dictatorship as a temporary necessity. His name is included on lists of victims of Soviet repression, but no further details have been found.

Source: INS file 54616/115-A; Paul Avrich, Anarchist Voices: An Oral History of Anarchism in America; Victor Serge, Anarchists Never Surrender: Essays, Polemics, and Correspondence on Anarchism, 1908–1938; Alexander Berkman Papers, International Institute of Social History, Amsterdam; https://ru.openlist.wiki/%D0%9E%D1%80%D0%B0%D0%B4%D0%BE%D0%B2%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B8%D0%B9_%D0%9C%D0%B0%D1%80%D0%BA%D1%83%D1%81_%D0%9D%D0%B0%D1%83%D0%BC%D0%BE%D0%B2%D0%B8%D1%87_(1894); http://visz.nlr.ru/person/book/vi/16/40.

Rosa Oradovsky

Born: 1894, Smolensk, Russia
Nationality: Russian
Ethnicity: Jewish
Occupation:
Migration: Immigrated to US 1910
Affiliation: Union of Russian Workers

Became an anarchist around 1911 and joined the URW in New York. After the deportation of her common-law husband Markus, she petitioned to be deported as well and affirmed under oath her belief in anarchism and revolutionary overthrow of government. She was deported February 2, 1921 aboard the SS Estonia.

During the journey to Russia she served on a committee representing deportees in negotiations for better shipboard conditions, and threatened to take over the ship by force.

Source: INS file 54616/115A; Boston Post, March 6, 1921; New York Times, April 2, 1921.