Nikiforova, Maria Grigorievna. Fury of the Civil War Ataman Marusya Atamansha Marusya is a hermaphrodite

In the history of the revolutionary movement in Ukraine, the identity of Maria Nikiforova still causes fierce controversy.

Some historians claim that she was an unbalanced person who became famous for her cruelty. Others are inclined to believe that the Bolsheviks deliberately threw mud at her in order to distort the real history.

Gone are the days when Nestor Makhno was portrayed in films, literary works and in the memoirs of his contemporaries as a hysterical and vindictive man who terrified the area. Historical research has shown that this is not true.

However, many of Nestor Ivanovich’s associates still look like highwaymen. For example, in the famous television film “His Excellency’s Adjutant,” a certain Old Man Angel, played by Anatoly Papanov, appeared as a semi-literate bandit who was guided by the motto: “Beat the Reds until they turn white, beat the Whites until they turn red.” This cinematic image, of course, has nothing in common with the famous ataman Evgeniy Petrovich Angel.

But most of all the outright lies and the most disgusting rumors are mixed up around Maria Grigorievna Nikiforova, whose name once thundered throughout Ukraine.

Student of Auguste Rodin

She was born in 1885 in the city of Aleksandrovsk (present-day Zaporozhye) in the family of the hero of the Russian-Turkish War, staff captain Grigory Nikiforov. The only thing known for certain about her childhood and youth is that at the age of 18, Maria joined the militant organization of the Socialist Revolutionary Party and took part in numerous terrorist acts. In 1908, she was arrested and sentenced to twenty years of hard labor.

Photo: Bust of Maria Nikiforova by Auguste Rodin

There she came under the influence of anarchists - emigrants from Russia, and worked in the editorial offices of the anarchist newspapers "Forward" and "Voice of Labor", published in Russian. Under various pseudonyms, she published articles on the topic of the day and sharp feuilletons, in which her journalistic talent was clearly demonstrated. Maria also participated in the organization “Union of Russian Workers of the USA and Canada.”

After three years, Maria Nikiforova got tired of this routine. Being an active and decisive person, she went to Spain, where she led a detachment of Spanish anarchists. During a failed bank robbery, she was wounded and, using forged documents, transported to France for treatment. In Paris, Maria Nikiforova, as far as is known, did not expropriate banks for the needs of the revolution. But she took lessons from the great Auguste Rodin, and the elderly sculptor considered her one of his most talented students.

Anarchist Artemy Gladkikh claimed that he saw Maria Nikiforova in Paris, dressed in a men's suit. At that time, women who wore trousers without special permission from the police (nine such permits were issued in France throughout the 19th century, one of them to the writer George Sand) faced a large fine for violating public morals. Women were allowed to wear a man's suit only in two cases - if they rode a bicycle and were involved in equestrian sports. Maria Nikiforova had the right to wear riding breeches, since she studied at the officer cavalry school under a false name. According to some reports, in Paris she married a professional Czech anarchist revolutionary, Vitold Brzostek.

At the end of 1916, Maria Nikiforova received an officer rank and, as a military instructor, was sent to the Balkans, where hostilities were then unfolding. But upon learning that a revolution had occurred in Russia, Maria hurried to return to her homeland.

In April 1917, she arrived in Petrograd and, together with her friend Alexandra Kollontai, whom she had met in Paris, actively spoke at rallies, denouncing the Provisional Government, which, in her opinion, had usurped power in the country.

At the beginning of July, she went to Kronstadt, where she called on the sailors to storm the Winter Palace under the black banner of anarchy. However, the attempt of the Bolsheviks and anarcho-communists to carry out a coup ended in failure, Lenin hid in Razliv, Kollontai went to prison, and Maria Nikiforova returned to Aleksandrovsk.

Court of Revolutionary Honor

It took Maria Nikiforova a few months to create combat-ready “black squads” in Aleksandrovsk, Yekaterinoslav (now Dnepropetrovsk), Odessa, Nikolaev, Kherson, Melitopol, Yuzovka (now Donetsk), Nikopol and other cities. In the fall of 1917, it essentially controlled the entire south of Ukraine, which effectively became independent of Petrograd and Kyiv. Nikiforova herself called this the “second revolution,” designed to dismantle the state as an apparatus of violence. She acted not only in word, demonstrating extraordinary oratorical talent, but also in deed.

For example, in order to provide Nestor Makhno’s detachment with weapons, she carried out a brilliant operation to disarm an entire battalion of the Preobrazhensky Regiment. Having been trained as a French officer, Maria Nikiforova understood that it was necessary to ensure an uninterrupted supply of the Black Guard units not only with weapons, but also with food and fodder, otherwise they would begin to rob civilians. It was necessary to impose a large indemnity on bankers, merchants and landowners. It is known, for example, that she expropriated a million rubles from the Aleksandrovsky breeder Badovsky.

In response, the affected inhabitants bombarded Petrograd and Kyiv with complaints, in which they described the imaginary atrocities of the unbridled anarchist. In September 1917, by order of the commissioner of the Provisional Government in Aleksandrovsk, Maria Nikiforova was arrested and taken into custody. The next day, all enterprises in the city stopped working. The authorities were forced to release Maria, and the workers carried her in their arms from the prison to the building where the city council of workers, peasants and soldiers' deputies was located.

Before our eyes, Maria Nikiforova turned into a folk heroine, a symbol of the struggle for freedom and independence. Even her enemies admitted that she easily found mutual language not only with workers and intellectuals, but even with White Guard officers.

It should be especially noted that, being an ideological anarchist, she avoided violence. Now in some popular publications you can read that during the campaign in Crimea, Maria Nikiforova’s detachment distinguished itself by brutally killing officers and even plundered the Livadia Palace, but these are just rumors that are not documented. But it is known that as soon as Maria spoke at a rally in Feodosia, she was immediately elected to the executive committee of the county peasant council. In addition, she created a detachment of the Black Guard in the city. Maria Nikiforova was greeted just as cordially in other cities and villages of Crimea, where she promoted anarchist ideas.

In February 1918, Maria Nikiforova left the leadership of the Black Guard detachments and devoted herself entirely to propaganda work, explaining the principles of anarchism to the population. However, in the second half of February, troops of Germany and Austria-Hungary moved to Ukraine. Maria was again forced to lead a detachment that numbered 580 people, had two cannons, seven machine guns and an armored car. She and her fighters took part in heavy battles with the Germans, but the forces were unequal.

In April, Maria Nikiforova and her squad ended up in Rostov, where she was arrested by the Bolsheviks, who accused her of robbing civilians. Nestor Makhno turned for support to the commander of the Soviet troops in the south of Russia, Vladimir Antonov-Ovseenko, and he sent a telegram: “The detachment of the anarchist Maria Nikiforova, as well as Comrade Nikiforova herself, are well known to me. Instead of disarming such revolutionary fighting units, I would advise you to start creating them.”

The trial, which took place at the end of April, was held with open doors and was called the “court of revolutionary honor.” Nestor Makhno recalled: “We must tell the truth: the Bolsheviks are good masters at inventing lies and all sorts of meanness against others. They collected more data against Maria Nikiforova than was necessary.” However, five judges, among whom there was not a single anarchist, unanimously acquitted the revolutionary, and all charges against her were dropped.

“The devil was beautiful!”

Maria again led her detachment and successfully fought against the White Cossacks near Bryansk and Saratov, but behaved extremely independently and defiantly. Prominent Bolshevik S. Raksha recalled how Maria Nikiforova looked at that time: “She sat at the table and crushed a cigarette in her teeth. The devil was beautiful: about thirty, gypsy type, black-haired, with lush breasts that lifted her tunic high.” Another contemporary described her appearance in Voronezh in his diary: “A carriage is rushing down the street at breakneck speed. A young brunette sits casually in it, wearing a kubanka worn at an angle.”

Maria Nikiforova was critical of Soviet power, and did not hide it. It is not surprising that she soon found herself back in prison. Having learned about this, a group of former political emigrants turned to the Bolsheviks with a message: “We, former political emigrants who returned from France, are indignant at the evil, vile rumors spread by the bourgeois press about Comrade Maria Grigorievna Nikiforova. Knowing her from emigration, we are confident in her unconditional political honesty and personal selflessness: we consider keeping her in prison at a difficult moment harmful and inhumane.”

The meeting of the Revolutionary Tribunal in the Nikiforova case took place in January 1919. For “disorganizing and discrediting Soviet power,” she was sentenced to deprivation for six months of “the right to occupy responsible command posts in the RSFSR.”

Soon after the trial, Maria left Moscow. “Now she has surfaced again in Ukraine,” wrote the White Guard journalist Amfitheatrov-Kadashev, “again committing inhuman cruelties: near Melitopol, after an attack on a train, she personally shot 34 officers!” It was another lie: in Gulyai-Polye Maria Nikiforova was studying educational work, organized schools, nurseries and hospitals. At the end of April, Antonov-Ovseyenko visited Gulyaypole and sent a telegram to Moscow: “Nikiforova is not allowed to participate in military affairs, finding that her place is in affairs of mercy.”

However, the Bolsheviks, knowing Nikiforova’s active character, expected some other trick from her. Now a version is being put forward that she was involved in the explosion of the building of the Moscow Committee of the Russian Communist Party, which killed 12 people. But this happened on September 25, and Maria Nikiforova left Gulyaypole at the end of August and went to Crimea with her husband. The reason for her departure was her disagreement with the actions of Nestor Makhno, who began to flirt with Ukrainian nationalists.

In Crimea, she intended to organize a “third revolution”, creating an outpost of anarchism on the peninsula, but in September 1919 Nikiforova and her husband were arrested. The military court of the White Army, which took place in Simferopol, accused her of preparing an assassination attempt on General Slashchev and sentenced her to death penalty. Amfitheatrov-Kadashev said: “At the trial, Nikiforova behaved superbly: she completely calmly accepted the death sentence, saying: “What else can you do to me - just hang me up!” Saying goodbye to her husband, she actually cried.”

The death of Maria Nikiforova caused a new wave of a wide variety of rumors and gossip. False Marusyas appeared throughout Ukraine, posing as Nikiforova (her closest comrades called her Marusya), and the tricks of these Marusyas later began to be attributed to the great anarchist. There were even rumors that she had been seen in Paris, where she was engaged in subversive work on behalf of the OGPU.

And in 1926, the magazine “Katorga and Link” published a vile libel telling about Nikiforova’s stay in Novinskaya prison. A certain half-crazed convict suddenly remembered that Nikiforova was not a woman at all, since she never took off her outer shirt in front of other women and did not go to the bathhouse with everyone else. This rumor, despite its obvious absurdity, spread widely and is still in circulation.

As you know, Joan of Arc was subjected to a medical examination before her execution, which made it possible to refute similar rumors. The doctor also examined Maria Nikiforova before her execution, and if any pathologies were discovered, it would immediately become known, especially since the authorities feared a riot.

Most likely, the appearance of the libel was dictated by the Bolsheviks’ desire to discredit the anarchist, about whom legends had long circulated in the south of Ukraine. All her photographs were even destroyed, with the exception of the prison one. However, the Bolsheviks failed to completely erase the memory of this extraordinary woman.

Black shadow of the Revolution (M. G. Nikiforova)

B.I. Belyankin

The anarchist stole yesterday
Auntie's short fur coat.
Oh, that's what I taught him
Mister Kropotkin!
Sasha Cherny

What has not been and is not attributed to her! The reason for this is that she herself is a fair amount of mythomaniac, and timid and eager for horror legends contemporaries and ordinary people, and ideological opponents - both whites and Bolsheviks, who are ready to attribute any dirty trick inherent to them to the defeated dissident... As a result, even today it is quite scientific Publications and encyclopedias put all sorts of nonsense about it on their pages.

Let's try to combine in our story everything, or almost everything, that was told about her by her contemporaries, by everyone who knew her personally or heard about her. Let's try to bring together the facts of her stormy biography. Let's try, where possible, to separate (or at least shade) the truth from speculation...

The versions of her biography vary greatly.

Her name was Maria Grigorievna Nikiforova. This is beyond doubt. And she was born in the Ekaterinoslav province in the city of Alexandrovsk. This is also indisputable. But further... Then she is the daughter of an officer who became famous in the Russian-Turkish war. Now she is a former dishwasher at a vodka factory, now she is a graduate of the Smolny Institute, now... All these “somethings...” were noted during her lifetime by Vladimir Amfiteatrov-Kadashev in his diary: “Maruska Nikiforova. There are whole legends about the latter. They assure: she is a general's daughter, taking revenge on her "circle" for something; or - illegitimate, who declared war on society in general - "the black shadow of the Revolution". All this is nonsense and nonsense. Maruska's biography is quite remarkable, but on the other hand: for a seventeen-year-old girl this is promising the creature had already been sent to hard labor for a semi-criminal, semi-political “ex”, of which there were many at that time (1910). Everything is noted correctly. The only mistake is in the date: in 1910, Marusya no longer committed any “ex”…

During the years of the first Russian revolution, Marusya, according to some, sympathized and joined the socialist revolutionaries; according to others, even then she was a convinced anarchist, and had been a member of the anarchist party since she was 16 years old.

From some sources it follows that for the terrorist acts of 1904-1905 she was sentenced to death, which was replaced by indefinite hard labor, which she served in Peter and Paul Fortress. If you believe the most common version, in 1910 she was transported to Siberia, and from there, like Bakunin once, she fled to America through Japan. From other, more reliable sources, it follows that she was tried in 1908 for participation in a terrorist act - the murder of a police officer - sentenced to 20 years of hard labor and served her sentence in the Moscow provincial women's prison.

It is known that in May 1909 Marusya was transferred from Butyrka to Novinskaya prison. The cell where she ended up contained mainly young revolutionary women: most of them belonged to the Socialist Revolutionary Party, but there were also Social Democrats, anarchists, and non-party members. Along with several criminals, there were about twenty people in the cell. By the time Nikiforova appeared, a group of prisoners were in full swing preparing to escape. Among the leaders of this group, the aristocratic beauty Natalia Klimova stood out - in the future a close friend, or rather, mistress of Boris Savinkov, in the past - the wife of the famous terrorist and bank robber, Socialist-Revolutionary Maximalist Sokolov-Medved. Being a maximalist Socialist-Revolutionary herself, she took part in organizing the bloodiest terrorist act in pre-revolutionary Russian history - the explosion of the dacha of Prime Minister P. A. Stolypin on Aptekarsky Island on August 12, 1906... Another activist of this group, also a maximalist Socialist-Revolutionary - Ekaterina Nikitina, left detailed memories of the preparation and implementation of the mass escape from Novinskaya prison. (By the way, young Vladimir Mayakovsky and his household also took part in preparing the escape. A significant part of the clothes for the fugitives were sewn by his family.) Below we will give several rather extensive quotes from Nikitina’s memoirs, which, in our opinion, give an idea of ​​​​the appearance of the nineteen-year-old Marusya. Nikitina recalled her arrival in the cell as follows: “We accepted her appearance as a disaster... A thin and gray face, shifting brown eyes, brown hair cut into brackets, a short stocky figure, sweeping convulsive movements, a broken, uneven voice - such a “political “like we haven’t seen before! When asked the usual questions: where from? Who does he know? For what case? - she lied immediately. And if she lies about the case, it’s a bad sign: criminal behavior, you can’t trust anything... The swagger of the new girl, her readiness to " poking" (we were all on "you"), attempts to hug, etc. - were met more than coldly. I must make a reservation that there were discrepancies here: most saw only an eccentric, loud girl who had adopted from the criminals their pathetic chic, hysterical excitability and frivolity. Others - and there were such a minority - clearly felt something ugly, hostile to common sense and unacceptable in the angular figure and especially in the old-looking and at the same time boyish, bloodless face." Some of the cellmates united in active hatred of Marusa, some treated her with suspicion, some with curiosity, some with pity. Nobody showed any sympathy for her. A request was sent out - what kind of Nikiforova is this? Soon, a certificate came from her defense lawyer at the trial, confirming that Maria Nikiforova was tried in the Starobelsky case, but was sentenced not to execution, as Marusya told her cellmates, but to hard labor, for 20 years, she behaved unevenly at the trial - sometimes defiantly, sometimes with tears ... Let us clarify that the so-called Starobelsk case consisted of the murder of a local police officer in 1907 by a group of revolutionary-minded youth. In ideological terms, the group (and from the point of view of the authorities and ordinary people - a band of robbers) united sympathizers with both the Social Revolutionaries and the anarchists. In addition to the murder of the bailiff in Starodub, the group attacked the house of the local priest. Nikiforova was one of the leaders of the “gang”; in these and other “enterprises” she acted dressed in a man’s dress and under the pseudonym “Volodya”. And then, as the song says, she was 17 years old... and she was attracted, no matter how you look at it, under the “mortal” clause...

But let's return to Moscow, to the cell of the Novinskaya prison, to the ladies who were wonderful in all respects, to the selfless revolutionaries who were preparing a risky undertaking - an escape to freedom. Nikitina recalls: “Obviously, something was hidden not only from the court, but in general... This means there was something to hide...” Let’s interrupt the quote. Nikitina, of course, is talking in hindsight - about “something was being hidden”, it was later, when it became clear what the matter was, that she had to look for explanations and reflect on her own blindness and naivety... But let’s continue the quote. So: “She was clearly hiding from us: she undressed under the blanket, did not wash, like the rest of us, in the toilet up to the waist, she jumped out into the corridor, making sure that everyone was sitting in the cell... etc. A vague suspicion of an incredible, impossible situation was wandering in my head. Then a note arrived from Butyrka prison from her co-prosecutor; very carefully he said that he knows Manya Nikiforova as a good and honest comrade, but there is one circumstance... “She will tell you herself”... Again a circumstance!... And I expressed my assumption :

This is not a girl, but a man, most likely a spy."

According to Nikitina, the rest of the cellmates suspected Marusya of the same thing. After consulting, we decided to interrogate. Marusya, who apparently had extraordinary artistic abilities and was not devoid of imagination, for some reason considered it beneficial for herself not to disappoint anyone and confirm suspicions about her gender. She wove three boxes for the one who interrogated her. She returned to her friends and shared what she had heard. Nikitina describes this heartbreaking episode as follows:

Indeed a boy, but a very special story, and not a provocateur at all, but participated in the murder of a bailiff, then disappeared in a woman’s dress, and was so arrested and convicted; he was in Chernigov, in solitary confinement, then in Butyrki - too, he knows so-and-so, and they know him, in general he is unhappy and asks, for God’s sake, to understand and have pity, he cries...

The camera gasped... It cannot be said that everyone clearly understood the situation: the majority were carried away by the romance of the incident and found our fears exaggerated. However, we started the discussion and decided the following: Manya will remain Manya, whether he is a boy or a man - we don’t care. We put her an extra bed by the window at the table... we forbid her from singing, jumping, screaming, going to the doctor, to the restroom when someone is there and, of course, to the bathhouse... They called Manka, reported all this to her and demanded an oath. She cried, blew her nose, promised... And the next day she sang at the top of her lungs in a strong boyish alto: “At the market in Poltavi...”.

So, naive women, as we see from Nikitina’s memoirs, were ready to believe in a lot... The main thing was that it was romantic and not banal... Although in Marusya’s “stories” some things were still true. For example, why I was sitting and where I was sitting. But no one was interested in the truth even after many decades. And from one biographical certificate to another, the circumstances of her life, apparently composed later by Marusya herself, migrate: her time in solitary confinement in the Peter and Paul Fortress (it turns out that she was there for several years!), and her sentence (three years earlier than her actually tried) to death, and transfer to Siberia, from where she fled to Japan, then to America and Western Europe... Marusya knew how to embellish! But we find out what really happened from the same Nikitina:

“The atmosphere in the cell was heating up. In addition, Manya made us very nervous. Of course, we had to introduce her to the possibility of escape, and she completely lost her head: she pestered everyone with questions and suggestions, showed her fighting techniques, did not take into account either time or place, not with other people's eyes... But there were eyes, and rumors spread throughout the prison: some strange woman was sitting with the political ones: the girl was not a girl, the man was not a man. And they were hiding her... I personally had little faith anymore, that this was a "man": not a single man could stand a week without proving himself, locked among 20 women, who were mostly young, careless and naive to the point of stupidity. Or rather, that this freak, hysterical, deceitful and cunning creation, and by what we know - aren’t Tarasova (the guard who participated in the preparation of the escape) and our assistants being watched in the wild? She could send a letter, whisper to the elder in the corridor, call to the office... And we, painfully experiencing everything these doubts, we tried not to take our eyes off her absurd figure even among criminals.”

Nikitina has a footnote at this point, and we will return to it later. For now, let us note that, despite all the bias of the memoirist and her undisguised disgust for Nikiforova, the story of the escape, that is, what Nikitina was a direct witness and participant in, is presented quite scrupulously and truthfully. As for the escape itself, it went quite successfully. On the night of July 1, 1909, 13 people escaped from Novinskaya prison. Three women, including, of course, Marusya, dressed up as boys, four as young ladies, one as a lady, one as a girl, two as women of the people. Nikitina herself, since she did not have enough clothes prepared in the wild (remember, by the Mayakovsky family; it’s curious who got the clothes sewn by the young man Volodya Mayakovsky - maybe Marusya?), somehow dressed herself in a dress made from “available” material for a pregnant woman. The climactic moment of the escape is described as follows (we will quote this excerpt in order to convince the reader that this happens not only in “cool” films):

“The lattice door at the end of the longitudinal wall of the room connected it with the office, so that anyone who approached it was visible to the guard matron, who was sitting at the table in the middle of the office. We knew this and made Helma up like a boss, dressed her in a black coat and a large hat Tarasova, walking ahead according to the regulations, unlocked the door for her, and she walked straight towards the sleepy Veselova. She raised her head towards her - at that moment Gelma grabbed her by the throat. Zina, Natasha, Nina rushed to help. A wild muffled scream, then a moo... A large, strong woman, gripped by senseless fear, began to thrash as if under a knife. A chair flew, a tangle of bodies spun on the floor. They calmed her down, begged her, threatened her - all in vain: she obviously could not stop and fell silent only when they bandaged her mouth.

At this time, I felt that Marusya, whose hand I did not let go, began to tremble, as if in a fever. "Now he'll scream!" - a terrible thought flashed. I turned to her in rage: “Marusya, I will kill you!” Stop shaking! Marusya took a breath of air, twitched, but stopped shaking. Manya, who was eager to fight all the time, finally ran away to the office..."

Above we talked about the footnote in Nikitina’s text. So, footnote:

“To finish with Maria Nikiforova, I’ll tell her further story: it turned out to be neither a boy nor a girl, but a complete and rare type of hermaphrodite - the more literate among us soon guessed this and called him (!) “It.” He was not a provocateur, but, of course, sexual deformity affected the entire psyche - hysterical, perverted and immoral. Abroad, where he ended up after escaping, he was oriented towards anarchists, lived strangely in men's and women's clothes, had corresponding novels, received some means. We all parted ways with him completely. In 1917 he returned to Russia...”

What follows is a completely mythologized version of Marusya’s subsequent biography, which we omit. According to the once famous anarchist writer Andrei Andreev, who knew Nikiforova well, the left Socialist Revolutionary Betra Babina fully confirms the fact that Marusya was a hermaphrodite. The same is confirmed by the materials of the investigative case opened against Marusya by the Cheka in the summer of 1918. It contains the testimony of the anarchist Artemy Gladkikh, who was interrogated in the case of the atrocities of the Marusya detachment. He claims that he knew Marusya in Paris when she bore the name Volodya. Andreev also admitted that he had heard from people who knew her closely in Paris that in those years she had undergone one of the first operations in the world to transplant hormonal glands and she had completely turned into a woman (the operation was apparently successful, because Marusya later she got married)...

As for our heroine’s life abroad, or more precisely, in Paris, there are few reliable facts (rather than rumors). Some sources indicate that after her escape she lived in France, where she studied sculpture and drawing with Rodin and at the same time continued to work in anarchist organizations Western Europe. Others say that she lived in France, England, Germany, Switzerland, spoke many European languages ​​fluently, and was an active participant in socialist congresses. There is also quite reliable information that in Paris Marusya finally joined the organization of anarchist-communists created by Apollo Karelin... Some characterize her as an obstinate, rebellious nature, by conviction an anarcho-terrorist, as a good speaker and organizer of expropriation and terror.. . Someone claims that in France “she was brought under political arrest, and here she ended up in French hard labor for good deeds: again, armed robbery (Amphiteatrov-Kadashev was told about this in Rome by a certain Giatsintova, who was allegedly in a hard labor prison in Marseilles together with “Maruska”, the only difference being that Giatsintova was a victim of a miscarriage of justice, and “Maruska served her time rightly.” - B.B.), and in 1917 Maruska’s term in hard labor ended, and she rushed to Russia...” Someone writes that during the First World War, Nikiforova, under the name Volodya, enrolled in the Foreign Legion (in 1914), graduated from an officer school in Paris and received the rank of officer.

Most likely, Marusya actually acquired some drawing skills abroad, for it is known that at the end of 1918 she worked in Moscow in the Proletkult. But more on that later... What is more significant is that in emigration she, apparently, met V.A. Antonov-Ovseenko. This acquaintance turned out to be very useful and had important consequences for Marusya.

After February Revolution Marusya returned to Russia, where she immediately plunged headlong into the whirlpool of revolutionary events. No one doubted the fervor of her anarchism. By the way, Marusya was a participant in the first congresses of the Soviets...

First of all, she allegedly went to Ukraine to the Pologi station in Aleksandrovsky district, where her mother lived, and on the ruins of an anarchist group created a strong terrorist organization in the south of Russia. In May 1917, she expropriated a million rubles from the Alexandrovsky factory owner Badovsky (it is possible that this episode did not refer to May, but to July or September 1917). During the July events of 1917 in Petrograd, Nikiforova led the capital's delegation of anarchists to Kronstadt, where she tried to persuade the sailors to revolt in order to support the armed uprising of the local proletariat that allegedly began in Petrograd. Her performances were a notable success and found sympathy and response in the sailor audience. Some believe that it was her agitation that contributed to the participation of a significant number of sailors and soldiers of the Kronstadt garrison in the July events in Petrograd.

In August 1917, Nikiforova again left for Ukraine. In Gulyai-Polye, where she often visited, she met the local anarchist Nestor Makhno. From Makhno’s memoirs it is known that “on August 29, the anarchist from Aleksandrovsk M. Nikiforova held a peasant rally” (under his, Makhno’s, leadership). During the rally, Marusya tried to arrest the former Gulyai-Polye police officer, but Makhno allegedly stopped this initiative.

At the beginning of September, Makhno was still hesitating, wondering how best to carry out an agrarian revolution, but Marusya, who had appeared in Gulyai-Polye the day before, demanded immediate action. Nikiforova, who later played a supporting role under Makhno for a long time, at that time enjoyed much greater fame than Makhno himself... She brought down a hail of reproaches on him for gradualism, conciliation and departure from the rebellious just cause.

The following story from a participant in the described events dates back to the same period:

“Once in a club we were arguing whether or not Makhno should be at the head of the Gulyai-Polye organizations. Suddenly Marusya Nikiforova came to us with some three anarchists. She spoke out against the group and Makhno, accusing us of wanting to lead the village and preaching little the ideas of anarchism and weakly oppressed the landowners and the trading bourgeoisie.

“We must use direct violence against the bourgeoisie to destroy the foundations of the bourgeois revolution and fight against Ukrainian chauvinism,” she said. - We need to raise funds for literature, we need to seize weapons.

But where to get weapons? - we asked. Marusya proposed to disarm part of the Preobrazhensky regiment, stationed not far from Gulyai-Polye. We agreed.

On September 10, 1917, about 200 of us left by train for Orekhovo. We had no weapons, with the exception of ten rifles and the same number of revolvers we took from the police. At Orekhovo station we cordoned off the regiment's warehouses (supply) and found rifles in the workshop. Then they surrounded the headquarters in the town. The commander managed to escape, and Marusya shot the lower officers with her own hands. The soldiers surrendered without a fight and willingly laid down their rifles, and then went home.

Marusya left for Aleksandrovsk, and we returned with weapons to Gulyai-Polye. Now it wasn't scary.

Suddenly, a comrade arrives from Aleksandrovsk, I don’t remember his last name, and says that the other day Marusya Nikiforova was arrested by the district commissar Mikhno. Without hesitation, we called him on the phone and asked if it was true. He replied that he arrested her because she imposed an indemnity on the breeder Badovsky and promised, if we did not obey him, to arrest us too.

It was clear that Mikhno Nikiforova was not going to release her. It was necessary to force him, therefore, to go to him.

Mikhno, having learned that we were moving to Aleksandrovsk, released Nikiforova, which he informed us about by telegraph (...).

Part of our “Black Guard”, having elected Savva Makhno as its commander, under the general command of Nestor, on January 4th, went to the aid of the Aleksandrovsky workers and the anarchist detachment of Marusya Nikiforova. Marusya then worked with the Bolsheviks in the revolutionary headquarters, which consisted of left-wing socialist revolutionaries and Bolsheviks, where N. Makhno was also invited, electing him chairman of the military-revolutionary investigative commission."

Already in the fall she is the organizer and commander of the Black Guard. Marusya is the ideologist of the “motiveless” destruction of state institutions, not excluding (after the October Revolution) Soviet ones. Already before 1918, she was known in Ukraine for her atrocities... Whether this is true or not, until the end of 1917, Marusya, who, we note once again, enjoyed much greater fame at that time than Makhno, was apparently mainly in the territory of eastern and southern Ukraine, where she carried out active anarchist work. (According to other sources, at the end of the year she worked as a nurse. Which is doubtful.) Marusya’s combat activity most likely began with the formation of a battery at the end of December 1917 in Elizavetgrad (now Kirovograd). This battery grew into the "1st free combat detachment for the fight against counter-revolution" headed by her.

The detachment's first major undertaking was the capture of Aleksandrovsk (now Zaporozhye) in January 1918. Then Elizavetgrad and Znamenka were captured. The “1st free combat detachment for the fight against counter-revolution” was part of the units of the newly created Red Army under the command of Antonov-Ovseyenko. Some later interpreters like to point out that Marusin’s detachment poorly obeyed the latter’s orders. But that wasn't the problem at all. In the same way, many sources only say that the capture of this or that city by Marusya’s detachment was necessarily accompanied by robberies, terror, and various kinds of outrages... Less common are sources pointing to the high fighting qualities of her detachment, the iron discipline in it...

Marusya’s activities as commander of the “1st Free Combat Detachment” quickly began to become overgrown with rumors and legends: either she robs pastry shops, cafes and gorges on cakes, or she expropriates lingerie stores... Vladimir Amfiteatrov-Kadashev heard this about her: “She barely reigned Sovdep, how in the Kherson province (Maruska’s birthplace; by the way, she is not the daughter of a general at all, of course, but just a girl from a petty-bourgeois family) a “free Cossack detachment of anarchists” arose, led by Maruska. The girl is beautiful, certainly dashing, she, dressed in half-male suit, in a short skirt, in high boots, with a revolver in her belt, galloped on horses, arousing delight in the various rogues who made up her gang. Initially, she was based in Elizavetgrad with the firm intention of thoroughly cleaning out this rich city. Fortunately, the workers of a huge factory " Elworth “were not allowed to do this; in the war that arose between them and Maruska, the workers turned out to be the winners, so she had to hastily retire to the east, robbing Aleksandrovsk along the way, where she became famous for requisitioning all the silk stockings in the city in her favor.”

In the spring of 18th, Nikiforova’s detachment operated in various cities of Ukraine and Russia - from Odessa to Rostov-on-Don. “So, in Elizavetgrad during the establishment of Soviet power, the presence of Nikiforova’s well-armed detachment helped the Red Guards take power almost bloodlessly,” - after stating this fact, the authors of ideologized and mythologized notes about Marus (there are no others!) proceed to state the following with the help of the adversative union “however ": "However, soon the "Free Combat Squad" ("1st free combat detachment to combat counter-revolution." - B.B.) began destroying stores and distributing goods to the population. Only decisive opposition from local authorities and the population cities stopped robberies"... If Marusya is an ideologist of "motiveless destruction...", if she is an ideological anarchist, then "however" is inappropriate here. And about the “decisive opposition... of the urban population” - everything is also not so clear. We will provide better word Antonov-Ovseenko - although his attitude towards Nikiforova is contradictory, he presents the factual side of the matter more correctly than others.

“The growing disintegration of the Muravyov rear (M.A. Muravyov - at that time Commander-in-Chief of the Southern Front - B.B.) was greatly facilitated by the actual outrages committed by some of the partisan detachments. These detachments, mostly called anarchist, were composed of various adventurers and dark elements of the cities and towns of the Right Bank, were engaged in unrestrained requisitions, raped and simply robbed. One of these detachments of 40 people, outrageous at Dolinskaya station, caused a special expedition to be sent against them from Yekaterinoslav. The outrages of the anarchist detachment of Marusya Nikiforova (from the Gulyai-Polye region ) in Elizavetgrad were one of the reasons for the success of the uprising organized in the city by the White Guards and Petliura agents... The counter-revolution was helped, to the extent of their debauchery, by some anarchist elements.”

It seems that the picture being drawn is clear. But then Antonov-Ovseenko provides the following data: “It turned out that Muravyov himself sent a train of anarchists under the command of Marusya Nikiforova, who terrorized the population from Elizavetgrad to Yekaterinoslav, to help Belenkovich (commander of Soviet forces in the Elizavetgrad area - B.B.). .. Everywhere there was talk about robberies and executions. Belenkovich was also accused of collaborating with the anarchists. The Black Hundreds rebelled and drove Belenkovich out of the city... When Belenkovich retreated, the bourgeoisie completely saddled the workers and peasants and put forward the slogan “down with anarchy.” They were convened from all villages soldiers who were told that they were going to fight against Marusya, and enthusiasm became noticeable in the ranks... At the Khirovka station, the Haidamaks’ offensive was repulsed, Marusya Nikiforova’s detachment especially distinguished itself. There were many casualties on both sides, half the city was destroyed."

“Both those and other reports about Marusa Nikiforova,” summarizes Antonov-Ovseenko, “were true: she had brave guys, but they were completely dissolute.” Further, according to the facts cited by Antonov-Ovseenko, the events developed as follows. On March 11, “Elizavetgrad residents scattered appeals from airplanes, saying that power in the city belonged to the workers and that they should not succumb to provocations and go against Nikiforova’s robberies... By March 13, Elizavetgrad was again occupied by us...”

In modern studies, the events of the March days of 1918 in Elizavetgrad are presented as follows. A commission was formed in the city to regulate relations with the anarchist detachment, which invited the “1st free combat detachment” to leave the city. Nikiforova was forced to comply with this demand, since the Military Revolutionary Committee located in the city by that time already had significant armed forces at its disposal. After the start of the German offensive, in connection with the beginning of the evacuation of Soviet institutions and troops from Elizavetgrad, the right-wing Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks from the local Soviet managed to unite their forces and create the Provisional Committee of the Revolution. The troops of this committee under the slogan: “All power to the Constituent Assembly!” defeated the Red Guards, and then when Nikiforova’s detachment (250 people, 1 gun, armored car) appeared in Elizavetgrad, even more fierce fighting began in the city. The Provisional Committee of the Revolution attracted a significant part of the population to its side, “terrifying” them with the robberies and pogroms committed before by Marusya. Marusya attracted a sailor armored train to her side. The result was 86 killed and 140 wounded. In addition, Marusya herself was wounded. (On the same days, Marusya’s detachment arrested a teenage high school student, the future poet Arseny Tarkovsky. The interrogation carried out by Nikiforova ended successfully for the future poet: they were treated to sweets and released...)

Let’s supplement the picture of the events in Elizavetgrad with Belenkovich’s story, presented by Antonov-Ovseenko: “Marusya and her detachment were engaged in rallies and unauthorized requisitions in Elizavetgrad. Belenkovich, according to Muravyov’s instructions, invited her to go to the front. She complied with the order... and the mood in the city improved (so no less because of the flight of the Revolutionary Committee, which was trying to take the treasury money out of the city, power passed into the hands of “democratic self-government”, based on the “Union of Front-line Soldiers” and “self-defense.” - B.B.)... Unexpectedly, at the semaphore Marusya Nikiforov; passing through turned to Znamenka "to purchase the necessary supplies." The car with her was fired upon in the city, Marusya was wounded. Her "brothers" began shelling the city (fire was opened from two armored cars, including on the building of the Elizavetgrad Council - the first execution in history " House of Soviets", which was also produced using heavy armored vehicles!... - B.B.) Belenkovich managed to stop this shooting. In negotiations with the city government, he obtained a promise to maintain neutrality and facilitate the surrender of weapons by irregular units, subject to sending our troops to front. Our troops have been dispatched. In response, the city government organized a secret military headquarters, which moved white detachments to the station to capture the station and Belenkovich... Hearing the shooting, I turned towards Elizavetgrad and Marusya... Up to 400 people fought on our side. (...) Up to 6,000 whites advanced, under the leadership of former officers. Ours were crushed. Nikiforova's detachment is half exterminated..."

Most interpreters agree that Nikiforova, fighting on the side of the Soviets at that time, eventually turned most of the population against Soviet power with her actions, and that this happened not only in Elizavetgrad, but also in other cities of Ukraine, where Marusya’s detachment visited.

This is how the anarchist Chudnov remembered her: “She was a woman of about thirty-two or thirty-five, of average height, with a wasted, prematurely aged face, in which there was something of an eunuch or a hermaphrodite, her hair was cut into a circle. A Cossack beshmet sat deftly on her with gazyrs. A white papakha is put on askew."

During the retreat, she became close to the Left Socialist Revolutionaries, as she was retreating to Taganrog along with the detachment of the Left Socialist Revolutionary Ivan Rodionov. Another left Socialist Revolutionary, People's Commissar of Justice Steinberg, colorfully wrote about the German offensive in Ukraine in his memoirs: “Along the lines railways Separate trains with almighty passengers, armed to the teeth, rushed by; stations, post offices, telegraphs, and direct wires were seized at any whim. Legends were created around these flying Dutchmen, who sometimes seemed to be resurrected groups of Landsknechts. Only Marusya Nikiforova, a brave and cruel commander, like a meteor, flying from point to point, emptying stores of women's and other outfits for her needs, acting under the protection of machine guns and armored cars, humiliating the Soviets, will make you stop with pain and bitterness in the future on this fragment of Russian revolution"…

After a series of battles with the Germans and the Haidamaks, in which Marusya participated together with Soviet troops (at the end of March, the “1st Free Combat Detachment” took part, in particular, in the operation to capture the Apostolovo railway station and in the attack on Dolgintsevo), her The detachment arrived in Taganrog in early April (according to other sources - in the second half of April) 1918. It should be noted that the rapid spring offensive of the German army on the territory of Left Bank Ukraine did not allow the Nikiforov detachment to undertake anything serious. Even an attempt, jointly with Makhno, who was not yet very famous at that time, and, conversely, with the then famous commander Petrenko, to save Gulyai-Polye from capture led to nothing.

This is how N. I. Makhno describes this episode in his “Memoirs”:

“Maria Nikiforova’s detachment approached the Tsarevokonstantinovka station. I told her about what had happened in Gulyaypole (the arrest of comrades and members of the revolutionary committee (...)). She immediately called the commander of the Red Guard detachment, a certain sailor Polupanov (...) to the office. Nikiforova invited him to return to Tsarekonstantinovka in order to jointly lead an offensive on Gulyai-Polye (...). Nikiforova and Petrenko (commander of the Siberian detachment) decided to return to Pologi and occupy Gulyai-Polye by force in order to free all the arrested anarchists and non-party revolutionaries in it, as well as to bring out the deceived armed forces of the peasants, if they wish, or take away the weapons so that they do not fall to the Germans (...).

I expressed the opinion that it was too late to attack Gulyai-Polye. The Germans had apparently already occupied it. But it is impossible to knock them out of Gulyai-Polye with our troops (...). Comrades Nikiforova and Petrenko, although they laughed at me, calling me not understanding anything about their strategy and not knowing the combat capability of their detachments, were forced at that very moment and hastily to transfer the locomotives of their trains from the Pologo direction towards the Volnovakha station, and they stopped even talking to me about Pologi and Gulyai-Polye.

To my question: “What kind of fever are you experiencing? That you have probably received any alarming information about this area?” - Nikiforova announced to me that the Germans occupied the Pologi and Verkhniy Tokmak stations and cut off the anarchist detachment of Comrade Mokrousov along the Verkhniy Tokmak - Berdyansk line.

“If you want,” Nikiforova added to me, “then get into my carriage. I am now ordering the train to move further in the direction Volnovakha - Yuzovka.” Immediately, in a low voice, apologetically, half laughing, she told me: “You are absolutely right, with the offensive on Gulyai-Polye We were late, all approaches to it were already occupied by German troops."

Meanwhile, having learned about the unauthorized pogroms and executions carried out by Marusya in Elizavetgrad and Aleksandrovsk, the Ukrainian Bolshevik government, which was in Taganrog at that time, ordered Nikiforova to be arrested and her detachment to be disarmed.

“I contacted some members of the Federation of Taganrog Anarchists, as well as other friends, and took up the case of the commander of one of the anarchist detachments, Maria Nikiforova, which was sensational in those days in Taganrog...

Lenin and Trotsky became completely unbridled, destroyed anarchist organizations in Moscow, and declared a campaign against the anarchists (...). The Ukrainian Bolshevik-Left Socialist Revolutionary authorities hastened to act against the detachment of the anarchist Nikiforova, who found themselves together with their Red Guard detachments in Taganrog.

The Ukrainian government ordered a detachment under the command of the Bolshevik Kaskin (actually the left Socialist-Revolutionary A. Kaska. - B.B.) to arrest the anarchist Maria Nikiforova, and to disarm her detachment. Kaskin's soldiers arrested Maria Nikiforova before my eyes in the building of the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets. When she was taken out of this building in the presence of the notorious Bolshevik Zatonsky, Marusya Nikiforova turned to him for clarification: why was she being arrested? Zatonsky hypocritically denied: “I don’t know why.” Nikiforova called him a vile hypocrite."

An investigative commission was created, which included two representatives of the Taganrog Bolshevik organization, two representatives of the Taganrog Federation of Anarchists and one representative of the Central Executive Committee of Ukraine. Let us note the validity of Makhno’s remark that Nikiforova’s arrest coincided with the destruction of anarchist organizations in Moscow and other cities by the Bolsheviks.

Because of the Bolsheviks’ attempt to disarm Marusya Nikiforova’s detachment, which, by the way, like many other formations with different party affiliations, came to Taganrog to rest at the height of the fighting, Nestor Makhno had his first conflict with the authorities. He described in detail everything that happened after Marusya’s arrest:

“Nikiforova’s detachment did not disperse and did not go to serve in the detachment of the Bolshevik Kaskin. He persistently demanded an answer from those in power where they hid Maria Nikiforova and why they disarmed him.

This demand was joined by all those retreating from Ukraine to Taganrog and the Taganrog anarchists. The Taganrog Committee of the Party of Left Socialist Revolutionaries will support the anarchists and fighters of Nikiforova’s detachment... At the same time, many telegrams protesting against the actions of the authorities or simply sympathizing with Nikiforova and her detachment arrived in Taganrog from the front from Bolshevik, Left Socialist-Revolutionary and anarchist groups who had proven themselves in battle units and their commanders.

The Ekaterinoslav (Bryansk) anarchist armored train under the command of the anarchist Garin arrived in Taganrog to express its revolutionary protest to the authorities who had gone behind the back of the revolutionary front...

This state of affairs prompted the central government to collect false data against Maria Nikiforova and her detachment, data that allegedly incriminated her in the plunder of Elizavetgrad when she occupied it in March 1918, expelling Ukrainian chauvinists from it. Thus, a criminal case was created against her.

On the twentieth of April, the revolutionary trial of Maria Nikiforova took place. The trial took place with open doors and had the character of a court of revolutionary honor.

The central government recruited a lot of witnesses against Nikiforova from the fugitives, trying by hook or by crook to pin a criminal offense on her and execute her. But the court was truly revolutionary, impartial and, most importantly, politically and legally, for the most part, completely independent of the provocation of government hired agents...

As a result of the proceedings, the court decided that there were no grounds to try Nikiforova for the robbery of Elizavetgrad. The court decided to immediately release her from custody and, having returned to her and her detachment the weapons and equipment taken by Kaskin’s detachment, provide her with the opportunity to form a train and go to the front, especially since she and her detachment are striving for this.”

Makhno also notes in his memoirs that he wrote a leaflet on this matter, “which exposed the Central Ukrainian Soviet government and commander Kaskin of falsifying the case against Nikiforova and hypocritically vile attitude towards the Revolution itself.”

So, the investigative commission justified Nikiforova’s actions, decided to release her and cancel all measures taken against the “1st Free Combat Detachment.” This decision was also influenced by the fact that Antonov-Ovseenko positively characterized the actions of the anarchists against the Austro-German troops. The commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Red Front, Antonov-Ovseenko, wrote in a telegram sent to Taganrog:

“The detachment of the anarchist Maria Nikiforova, as well as Comrade Nikiforova, are well known to me. Instead of disarming such revolutionary combat units, I would advise starting to create them.” (Later, however, Antonov-Ovseenko, not without irony, dubbed Marusya Nikiforova an “energetic and stupid” warrior...)

Despite the commission’s decision being positive for Marusya, it caused protests among soldiers and workers. The general meeting of soldiers of the First Revolutionary Battalion of the Ukrainian Soviet Forces decided: “Consider the decision of the investigative commission in the case of Maria Nikiforova hasty and the investigation incomplete... Demand the immediate appointment of a new investigative commission.”

Only the approach of German troops prevented Nikiforova’s work from being completed. The resolution of the Presidium of the Executive Committee on disarmament turned out to be unfulfilled also because the anarchist detachments of the Black Guard represented an impressive force. In addition, dozens of other squads and detachments of the Black Guard, retreating from Ukraine, arrived to help local anarchist detachments.

Meanwhile, the “1st free combat detachment for the fight against counter-revolution” headed to Rostov-on-Don. The anarchists literally terrorized the local population of the city, and on the eve of the surrender of Rostov-on-Don to the Germans they began to destroy “capital”: they piled up stocks, bonds and various securities taken from banks in the square and began to burn them. Here and in Novocherkassk, according to interpreters of those events, anarchist detachments were engaged in robberies, searches and arrests of innocent people.

On May 6 or 7, V. Trifonov was on the same train with Marusya coming from Rostov. His son, famous writer Yuri Trifonov writes about it this way:

“On the same locomotive was the “famous” Marusya Nikiforova, the head of a detachment of anarchists, a young drunkard (?!) and a psychopath. Until recently, a student of the Smolny Institute (?!), and now a famous ataman, loved to ride around Rostov in a white Circassian coat with gazirs and a white a shaggy hat. Her detachment was disheveled by the Germans; only a few soldiers rode with her..."

Around this time, impostors began to appear every now and then on the territory of Central and Southern Russia, posing as the legendary Marusya. Detachments of such “Marus” acted in accordance with the legends attributed to the real Marus. From Voronezh to Rostov-on-Don, “Marusya” and her gangs robbed and killed with impunity. Allegedly, after Rostov-on-Don, traces of Nikiforova are found in Voronezh. The following portrait of an anarchist chieftain belongs to this period: “A carriage is rushing along the street at breakneck speed. A young brunette, casually lounging in it, sits in it in a kubanka, dressed at a rakish angle, next to him, hanging on the step, is a broad-shouldered guy in red hussar leggings. The brunette and her bodyguard are hung weapons. There's so much to see here! Sabers, a Mauser in a wooden holster, hand grenades..."

It is known, however, that after Rostov-on-Don Marusya’s detachment moved towards Tsaritsyn. Petrenko’s friendly detachment was also moving there. By that time, a conflict was growing between Petrenko and the Bolshevik authorities, including in the person of Sergo Ordzhonikidze, over the valuables expropriated by Petrenko’s detachment (the gold reserves of the Donetsk-Krivoy Rog Soviet Republic - several trainloads of gold). Two trains, loaded to the brim with gold and soldiers, drove up to Tsaritsyn, where Petrenko started an uprising... Marusya, naturally, sided with her comrade in arms. “A week later, having reached Tsaritsyn,” as the same Y. Trifonov notes, “Marusya took part in the frantic anarchist riot that Petrenko raised...” (elsewhere in Trifonov: “... that same night Tsaritsyn became besiege and bomb the famous Marusya Nikiforova").

And here is how Sergo’s wife, Zinaida Ordzhonikidze, described the Tsaritsyn episode:

“Early in the morning, our armored train arrived in Tsaritsyn. It was just dawn. Suddenly a cannonade began nearby. It was Petrenko’s bandits who rebelled, arriving on the first two echelons, which we were unable to catch up on the way.

Sergo got into the car and drove to the scene of the collision. The brutal bandits categorically refused to lay down their arms and declared war on Soviet power. They teamed up with anarchists from Marusya’s gang, which I had seen before in Rostov: she, accompanied by drunken robbers, rode around the city on horseback in a white Circassian coat and a white shaggy hat.

Red Army troops took up positions in the cemetery. A real battle began, in which Sergo took an active part..."

Only untrained detachments of Red Guard workers remained loyal to the Soviets, and Petrenko and Marusya commanded one of the most combat-ready formations of the Ukrfront... The Tsaritsyn rebellion was like two peas in a pod like the Elizavetgrad story: direct fire from large-caliber guns from echelons hit the city center, where all institutions of Soviet power were located. But in the end Petrenko was surrounded, he surrendered, and was shot. Ordinary Petrenkovites and Marusya were not touched. If you believe the newspaper "Izvestia of the Soviets of the Moscow Region", the detachment of the "famous anarchist Marusya" was disarmed in Tsaritsyn at the end of May 1918. The newspaper wrote the following about Marusya’s fighters: “When they appeared in some city, they freely indulged in robbery, drunkenness, arbitrary searches and requisitions. The entire city in which they managed to settle was in the most terrible situation. They disrupted normal life and often attacked workers. Something terrible was happening in the cities during Maruska’s stay there. The drunken bacchanalia, terror, debauchery spread by Mrs. Nikiforova defies description.” And V. Amfiteatrov-Kadashev, who fed mainly on rumors, wrote about her in his diary: “Then she hung out under the Bolsheviks in the Don and Kuban, after the capture of Tuapse she fled to the mountains - and her trace disappeared.”

In fact, in June 1918, Marusya was arrested in Saratov, by decision of the Saratov Council, she was brought to Moscow and imprisoned for several months in the Butyrka prison (in one of the versions of her short biography the following information is given: “in the summer-autumn of 1918 Nikiforova commanded her " Druzhina" on the Voronezh - Bryansk - Saratov fronts. In September 1918, she was arrested by decision of the Saratov Council "for illegal actions", taken to Moscow.."). Nikiforova was released from custody in September on bail of Apollo Karelin, a member of the Central Election Commission, one of the leaders of Russian anarchists, and Antonov-Ovseenko, the commander of Soviet troops in Ukraine. A group of political emigrants who returned from France also interceded for her, among whom was Witold Brzostek, an anarcho-communist, an employee of the Commissariat of Trade and Industry (formerly a famous Polish anarchist - “anarcho-terrorist”). Soon after her release, Marusya marries Brzostek. According to the memoirs of Andrei Andreev: “Bzostek, loving this woman (Marusya) tenderly, sometimes carried him in his arms around the room”...

While awaiting trial and sentencing, she began working, as we have already said, at Proletkult, or rather, she went there to study painting. Maximilian Voloshin’s first wife, Margarita Sabashnikova, recalled with horror how “Commissar Brzostek” showed up in Proletkult. According to her, art should be grateful to Marusya for the fact that she eventually decided to leave her career as an artist... At the same time in Moscow, Marusya participated in the Congress of Anarchists and was elected to the secretariat (secretary of the All-Russian Federation of Anarchists).

Nikiforova's trial took place in January 1919. The Moscow Revolutionary Tribunal in its indictment (the well-known Katanyan was the prosecutor at the trial) indicated that “M. Nikiforova, without the knowledge of local Soviets, carried out requisitions in many cities of commissariat products, private stores and societies, imposed indemnities on landowners for large amounts, took away weapons and tools left by the Haidamaks. When the Soviets protested, she threatened them, surrounded the Soviet building with machine guns, and arrested members of the executive committees. Her detachment shot the military commander; for failure to follow orders, she sentenced the chairman of the Elizavetgrad Council, etc., to death."

Member of the Central Committee of Ukraine Pyatakov, who formed a commission on behalf of the Ukrainian government to examine the case of Nikiforova, testified that the latter “very often disorganized the defense against the Germans and White Guards, that by her actions she forced many communists to fight against her, was engaged in robberies and is simply a bandit operating under flag of Soviet power."

To some extent, the anarchists also agreed with the court's conclusions. One of them in the newspaper “Anarchy” wrote about Marusya: “The fame of her detachment thundered all over the front and the glory was bad... Without a doubt, Marusya sometimes did something non-anarchistic, but this was partly explained by the fact that finding a line where discipline was not would be to the detriment of freedom, it would be very difficult and, I would say, even impossible.”

The military tribunal found Maria Nikiforova guilty "of discrediting Soviet power through her actions and the actions of her detachment in some cases: in disobedience to some local Soviets in the field of military operations." The tribunal decided to consider the accusation of robbery and illegal requisitions illegal, since it was based on rumors that were not confirmed (“hysterics appeared who, calling themselves by her name, committed crimes”). Considering M. Nikiforova guilty of two counts, the tribunal found her deserving of leniency (the silver items found in her staff car could have belonged to one of the fighters in her squad) and sentenced her “to deprivation of the right to hold responsible positions for six months from the date of the verdict ".

The tribunal handed down such a lenient sentence taking into account Nikiforova’s merits in the struggle for Soviet power and against the Germans. In addition, the court did not have strong evidence on the facts of robbery. And requisitions of goods were not something out of the ordinary at that moment; detachments formed by the Bolsheviks, the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, and anarchists obtained provisions using such methods.

Karelin, who took bail for Nikiforova, described her at the trial as “an idealist in the best sense of the word” (by the way, Marusya received money for living during her stay in Moscow from the same Karelin). He called her “selfless” and argued that she would not take a penny for herself: “Everything she had, she gave all of herself even to unfamiliar comrades. She gave her last... I rather admit that the Communist Party will accept the program "Union of the Russian People", than I will believe that Comrade Nikiforov will take for himself at least a penny of the stolen money." Karelin claimed that she was an enemy of all expropriations, that she was an absolute teetotaler, and that her phrase: “We must disperse the Soviets, because they contain only Jews” was the height of absurdity...

Soon after the trial, Marusya left the capital. “Now she has resurfaced in Ukraine,” Amfitheatrov-Kadashev records the rumors, “and is again committing inhuman cruelties: near Melitopol, after an attack on a train, she personally shot and killed 34 officers! Next to her is Makhno, also a convict who was a people’s teacher.” In reality, everything was somewhat different.

In the rebel army of Father Makhno, who fought against Denikin’s troops on the side of the Soviets, Marusya worked in the Makhnovist “capital” - Gulyai-Polye - with schools, hospitals, and kindergartens. She was not allowed to participate in the leadership of combat detachments, since Makhno decided not to allow her to do military work. This was probably also influenced by the decision of the military tribunal in Moscow.

If Makhno removed Marusya from military affairs, then only the intervention of brute force could excommunicate her from the podium. She continued to use the stand under any conditions. Makhnovist Chubenko subsequently claimed that the anarchist Maria Nikiforova, who arrived in the area, made an unfavorable impression on the rebels, trying to impress them with a report on the Bolshevik repressions, which resulted in her being sentenced to six months of suspended sentence. “When Makhno,” recalls Chubenko, “arrived in Gulyaypole, his first duty was to demand that the 2nd district congress be convened. The famous anarchist Marusya Nikiforova came to the congress, who asked to speak out of turn (...), since she only that she arrived from Moscow (...), was under arrest and that she was sentenced to 6 months probation. Of course, this was not clear to the peasants and Red Army soldiers, and many of them protested, saying that they were waiting for something practical, but she tells us a fairy tale about a white bull. In such cases, Makhno liked to support the peasants, and therefore told the congress that if Nikiforova was tried by the communists, then she deserved it: “And our job (...) is to fight and beat the whites, and not to dismantle "who is right and who is wrong."

On the 20th of April 1919, the commander of the Ukrainian Front, Antonov-Ovseenko, visited Gulyaypole for inspection purposes. Makhno introduced the distinguished guest to the members of the Gulyai-Polye executive committee and its headquarters. “Right there,” recalled the front commander, “the political commissar of the brigade, and an old friend Marusya Nikiforova.” The inspection of the Makhno brigade was superficial - Antonov-Ovseenko did not have time to see or feel much, just like in the division of Grigoriev, who was also fighting on the side of the Soviets at that time. But the commander knew Makhno longer, Makhno was clearer. Walking around the formation of the regiment being formed in Gulyai-Polye, Antonov-Ovseyenko noted to himself: they were dressed haphazardly, but they looked cheerful... After a staff meeting, Makhno showed the commander his favorite village: three schools, “children’s communes”, hospitals, where there were not a thousand wounded one professional, experienced doctor. Schools and kindergartens (“...no matter how funny it is,” writes one of the researchers) were headed in Gulyai-Polye by Marusya Nikiforova, “the prima anarchist of 1918, whom Makhno removed from conducting military operations.”

“In the evening,” the commander of the front continues his memoirs, “there was another huge rally. Speeches by the commander of the front, Makhno and Marusya Nikiforova. All speeches were under the slogan: “With all our might against the common enemy - the bourgeois generals.” In a statement to the Chairman of the Ukrainian Government X. Rakovsky, Antonov -Ovseenko, in relation to Makhno, specifically notes: “He does not allow Marusya Nikiforova into military affairs, finding that her place is in matters of “mercy.”

Ten days after Antonov-Ovseenko’s visit, L.B. Kamenev arrived in Makhno’s army, sent at Lenin’s suggestion to Ukraine to solve the problem of the accelerated movement of food cargo to Moscow. Nikiforova begged Kamenev to send a telegram to Moscow with a request to reduce the sentence by half.

Kamenev’s secretary described his patron’s stay in the “threatened area” as follows:

“The expedition train, well armed with machine guns and soldiers, arrived in Gulyaypole early in the morning of May 7. The train was met by Marusya Nikiforova, Makhno’s adjutant Pavlenko, Verebelnikov (Boris Veretelnikov) and another Makhnovist staff officer. The conversation began with the loyal outpourings of Marusya Nikiforova, and soon turned to the topic of the Cheka and requisitions.

Kamenev. Your rebels are heroes, they helped drive out the Germans, they drove out the landowner Skoropadsky, they fight with Shkuro and helped take Mariupol.

Pavlenko. And they took Mariupol.

Kamenev. So you are revolutionaries.

Marusya Nikiforova. Even offensive, well, really.

Kamenev. However, it is a fact that often your units requisition bread intended for starving workers. (...)

Voroshilov grinningly asks Marusya Nikiforova for whom she requisitioned entire lingerie shops in Kharkov in broad daylight. The Makhnovists are smiling. Marusya waves her hand and blushes. “They find fault with all sorts of nonsense,” she says, “they don’t delve into the essence of things.”

“I was the first,” says Marusya, “to bring troops into Yekaterinoslav, I disarmed 48 people. You can tell legends about the Makhnovists, I’ll tell you to the end...” It’s hard to get Marusya to stop listing her exploits...

Before leaving, Kamenev sent the following telegram to Moscow:

"To the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. To Serebryakov. For military merits, I propose to reduce by half the sentence of Marusya Nikiforova, who was sentenced to six months of deprivation of the right to hold responsible positions. Telegraph the decision in Gulyai-Polye, Nikiforova and me."

(Marusya Nikiforova hinted about this herself. Those close to Makhno whispered to Kamenev that Marusya was not allowed into Makhno’s headquarters).

Meanwhile, relations between the leaders of the Makhnovist movement and the newcomer anarchists were becoming increasingly tense. The culmination was the conflict at the rally on May 1, where Makhno attacked them and even pulled Nikiforova, who accused the Bolsheviks of betraying the revolution, from the podium. The uncompromising nature of many urban anarchists contradicted the realistic views of the movement's leaders, who preferred compromise in relations with the communists...

Then Nestor Makhno spoke out against Soviet power, and a number of anarchists, including Nikiforova, who allegedly did not agree with this decision of the father, left the Makhnovists. However, the real motives for Marusya’s departure from Gulyai-Polye are not entirely clear. It is known that Marusya, removed from real command, put together something like an “anti-Bolshevik lobby” at the Makhnovist headquarters, which included the chief of staff, a right-wing maximalist, former Cossack officer Yakov Ozerov, and the head of the operations department of the headquarters, her longtime acquaintance, the left Socialist Revolutionary Ivan Rodionov... Memoirists and historians interpret the separation of Makhno and Marusya in different ways, while some details do not fit together.

Soon after Kamenev’s departure there was a strong breakthrough by the Shkurovites,” recalls Chubenko, “and we had to surrender position after position and, having no connection with the left flank, where the headquarters of the 14th Army was located, we had to surrender Gulyaypole. And so, when Gulyai-Polye was surrendered, Makhno and all his associates were declared outlaws (...). Makhno sent me to Greater Tokmak so that I could submit reports to the new supply chief who had arrived (...). When sending me away, Makhno gave me an order that if the reports were not submitted correctly, he would shoot me. This was said so that the Soviet government would not say that we took the money and did not account for it (...).

When I handed in my reports, Makhno was at the front, and at that time the anarchist Marusya Nikiforova arrived and began asking me how much money I had. I told her that I had 3 million money, which Makhno did not order me to give to anyone. She answered me that she must receive this money and send it to Moscow for an underground organization of anarchists (...), that she has 30 anarchist terrorists here at the Bolshoi Tokmak station, and she will not take me into account, but what if I If I don’t give it, she will make an expropriation. With these words, she left the carriage, where there was a cash register with money. I immediately approached the station duty officer and ordered that in 15 minutes he send my carriage with one locomotive to the Fedorovka station, which is located 50 versts southwest of Bolshoi Tokmak. And so it was done.

On the second day, Makhno arrived from the front (...). When I arrived in Greater Tokmak, Makhno began to scold me about why I left (...). I began to tell him (...) that Marusya Nikiforova wanted to expropriate me. That’s why I left Big Tokmak, because there were 30 terrorists with her, and I was alone. They can come and collect money at any time. Makhno listened to me and said: “For such a thing Nikiforov should be shot, because this money is needed in order to raise an uprising in the rear of the whites, because the communists will not be able to.”

At that moment, Marusya Nikiforova entered and began to tell Makhno that he should give her this money, since she needed it for underground work in Moscow. Makhno, without saying a word, began to scold her with vulgar language and, snatching a revolver, wanted to shoot her. But she obviously had a presentiment of this, because she too was ready with a revolver in her hand. They argued for a long time, and then she began to ask Makhno to at least give these people who were with her travel expenses. At first Makhno didn’t want to give it, but then he took a wad of 1000 sheets of Nikolaev currency worth 5 rubles (...), threw it out the window to the people standing near the window and said: “Here you have this money, and don’t let me see you here. Where are you going?” If you want, go there (...). We know what kind of terrorists you are. You can eat ready-made bread and that’s all.” And he kicked Marusya Nikiforova completely out of the carriage and didn’t give her a penny.

Other sources tell the same story differently. Some say that Makhno went to Greater Tokmak and held a rally on the way there, calling on the rebels and the population to support him by opposing the Bolsheviks. But they did not listen to him well, and he and his detachment entered Greater Tokmak, where he had some success, both among the population and among the red battalion. Here he met with Marusya Nikiforova, who by that time had organized a group of 60 anarchist terrorists who were in the Makhnovist counterintelligence, Cherednyak and Shuba detachments. She urgently asked for money for the underground cause, but Makhno refused her, they almost fought, and in the end Makhno gave the group 250 thousand rubles.

From other sources it follows that when a group of militants from Chernyak’s counterintelligence broke away from Makhno’s army, who intended, having divided into three groups, to commit a series of terrorist acts - blow up the Kharkov checkpoint, kill Kolchak and Denikin - they demanded 700 thousand rubles. And Makhno gave the amount they demanded.

It is known that in fact, the group was divided into three detachments and dispersed from the Fedorovka station in three directions. One - 20 people led by Nikiforova - left for Crimea, from where he was supposed to move to Rostov and blow up Denikin’s headquarters; another - 25 people led by Kovalevich, Sobolev and Glagzon - left for Kharkov to free the arrested Makhnovists, and in case of failure - to blow up the Extraordinary Tribunal, and the third - led by Chernyak and Gromov - left for Siberia to blow up Kolchak's headquarters.

Part of the Kharkov group later surfaced in Moscow among the “underground anarchists.” This happened after Kovalevich’s detachment from Kharkov decided to go to Moscow, in which they saw all the “evil”. IN a short time he organized his own printing house and distributed pogrom appeals signed “All-Russian Organization of Underground Anarchists.” These militants were preparing to blow up the Kremlin and expropriate banks in Moscow, Tula, St. Petersburg, Bryansk, Ivanovo-Voznesensk and other cities.

Nikiforova’s role in the activities of the so-called underground anarchists, who committed an explosion in the building of the Moscow Committee of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) on Leontyevsky Lane on September 25, 1919, remains not entirely clear. As a result of this terrorist act, the purpose of which was to eliminate V.I. Lenin, 12 people were killed, including the secretary of the Moscow Committee of the RCP (b) V.M. Zagorsky, and 55 communists were wounded, including such prominent Bolshevik leaders as A.F. Myasnikov, M. S. Olminsky, M. N. Pokrovsky, Yu. M. Steklov, E. M. Yaroslavsky and others. As a result of the investigation into the circumstances of the case, it turned out that the “underground anarchists” led by D. A. Cherepanov used Nikiforova’s Moscow apartment. However, whether this was an accident or whether Marusya knew about the impending terrorist act remains a mystery (among the leaders of the anarchist underground, whom the security officers failed to arrest, there was a certain “senior anarchist Volodya”...).

The Siberian detachment either got lost somewhere, or traveled beyond the Urals and took part in the insurgent movement in the rear of Kolchak.

Nikiforova ended up in Crimea in the summer of 1919, perhaps to prepare on-site terrorist attacks against the white command, or maybe she was going to get from there with her husband V. Brzostek to Poland. According to some reports, she turned to Crimean anarchists for financial help. She was soon captured by white counterintelligence in Crimea and hanged in Sevastopol (August - September 1919). According to other sources, at the end of July, she and her husband were identified and hanged in Sevastopol by General Slashchev, and her detachment from Crimea allegedly moved to the Caucasus and took part in the Green movement.

The version recorded in the diary of V. Amfiteatrov-Kadashev sounds quite convincing: “Maruska Nikiforova was hanged in Sevastopol. It turns out that she did not have time to jump out of Crimea when it was occupied by volunteers and lived in hiding somewhere on Korabelnaya with her new husband. According to her According to her, she no longer got involved in any politics. One day, she was recognized on the street by two boys who had previously participated in her gangs, and now were soldiers of the Good Army. The desire to curry favor, as well as anger at Maruska for the fact that she once ordered them to be flogged, forced guys to track her down and report her to the authorities. At the trial, Marusya behaved superbly: she completely calmly accepted the death sentence, declaring: “What else can you do to me - just hang me up!” She also calmly greeted the execution. Saying goodbye to her husband (he was sentenced to eternal penal servitude), she, however, began to cry, but then she restrained herself, cheerfully stood on the bench, and put a noose around her neck..." Andrei Andreev also recalls that Marusya Nikiforova behaved with great dignity at the trial and earned the respect of the whites with her heroism . Before the execution, her courage did not leave her, and she exclaimed: “Long live anarchy!”

After the liberation of Crimea, the remains of the “heroic underground fighter Marusya,” as reported in the press, were solemnly reburied by the Soviet government...

From other, already completely dubious sources, it follows that she was arrested, dressed in officer's clothing, in Kyiv back in June 1919, and only then in Sevastopol by a military court she was sentenced to death by hanging.

Later, conversations began to appear that Maria Nikiforova was neither shot nor hanged by the whites, but returned to Moscow and there, having been recruited by the Cheka, she was allegedly sent on appropriate missions to France...

The image of the daring anarchist chieftain Marusya was so imprinted in the people's memory that rumors about pogroms and robberies committed by her appeared in 1920-1921 during the peasant uprising under the leadership of the Socialist-Revolutionary A. S. Antonov in the Tambov province. However, upon verification, it turned out that under the name Marusya was hiding a certain Maria Kosova, who led one of Antonov’s combat groups, distinguished by approximately the same actions as the “1st free combat detachment”... In the last three months of the Makhnovshchina (summer 1921 ) in the area of ​​action of Makhno’s detachments, a certain Marusya allegedly also operated, who then connected with him, and after Makhno left for Romania, she disappeared somewhere, as if she sank into the water...

Concluding our story, we note that if she had not been hanged by the Whites, she would have been spent by the Reds, albeit a little later - the relentless idealism that pushed Marusya to adventures would never have come to court in the state of victorious Bolshevism. But the “motiveless terror” of which she was a practitioner, interpreted in her own way, became an integral part of the regime. But without Marusya.

Part 3:

Victor Belash in the late 20s.

Viktor Belash, an Azov Cossack, a native of the village of Novo-Spasovka, is Makhno’s chief of staff. In the film, this character appears under the name Chernysh. I don't know why. Belash was born in 1893, at the time of his appearance with Makhno he was 25 years old. In the film, as has become customary, Belash-Chernysh is twice as old. The real Belash is one of the most prominent figures in Makhno’s entourage. A locomotive driver by profession, an anarchist with pre-revolutionary experience, still just a young man, Belash managed to command a regiment of the Reds before Makhno appeared, and when he went to Dad, he first headed the operational department, and then became chief of staff, showing who knows where the enormous talent of a military tactician came from. Most of Makhno's military operations were developed by him. Belash was the most important supporter of the unification of the Makhnovists with the Bolsheviks on any terms and an opponent of any terror. During the next break, in June 1919, Belash at a meeting of commanders even insisted on the removal of Makhno (who was not going to put up with the Bolsheviks) from command and was supported by some of the commanders. After the Makhnovists switched to a guerrilla war against Soviet power in 1921, Belash and a group of his supporters separated from Makhno and tried to make their way through the Caucasus to Turkey to help Ataturk. Belash's detachment was defeated by the Reds, and he himself was taken prisoner, seriously wounded. In 1923, he was released under the guarantee of Russian and foreign anarchists (at that time this was still possible). After his release, he plunged headlong into underground work, conducted anarchist agitation, and managed to organize several workers’ strikes. Lived in Kharkov and Krasnodar. He was arrested more than once. In 1937, he was beaten to death during interrogation by the NKVD. During his imprisonment, Belash wrote a voluminous study on the history of the Makhnovist movement (later edited and supplemented by his son) - one of the most interesting and reliable on this topic.

Anarchist Marusya Nikiforova.

In general, during the civil war there were so many different Marus-atamanches and Marus-anarchists that there was a fair amount of confusion in the personalities. However, Maria Grigorievna Nikiforova is an absolutely real and historical character. In the series she appears under the following circumstances - Ekaterinoslav is occupied by the Makhnovists. Makhno walks along one of the streets and sees some bandits robbing a lingerie store. Going inside, he sees the notorious Marusya Nikiforova, who, among other things, tells Makhno how she worked as a dishwasher and was subjected to daily sexual violence, and that until she was 25 she didn’t wear underwear and didn’t know what it was, so “Let me take something.” Want".

All this data was not invented by the filmmakers themselves; they are often found in the literature about Nikiforova, but the degree of their reliability is questionable. Most likely, these are Nikiforova’s own fantasies. Rumor lists her as a general's daughter and a graduate of the Smolny Institute. She was definitely not of worker-peasant origin, but it was unlikely that she was of general origin, and she simply had no time to study at Smolny. At the age of 16, Maria becomes an active anarchist, and at 17 she receives 20 years of hard labor for the murder of a policeman. The most interesting thing is that Marusya was detained by the police as “anarchist Volodya,” and a medical examination showed that Nikiforova is a rare type of hermaphrodite. Cellmates recall that Nikiforova never undressed or washed herself in public, and was distinguished by criminal habits, psychopathy and lesbian inclinations. Apparently, the peculiarities of the sexual structure left a heavy imprint on Marusya’s psyche. She escapes from hard labor and is transported abroad, where she lives until the February Revolution (I suspect that Nikiforova had no problems with her underwear there). There is information that during the emigration Nikiforova met with Lenin and was friends with Kollontai, but how true this is is unclear. But it is known for certain that Nikiforova was friends with Antonov-Ovseenko, and this subsequently saved her from execution. In France, Nikiforova, again under the name Volodya, studied for some time at an officer's school. People who knew her in emigration remember her as educated person with a penchant for drawing and knowledge of several languages. At the beginning of 1917, she appeared in her native Aleksandrovsk and became a frequent visitor to Gulyai-Polye, where she met Makhno. Their first joint operation is the disarmament of one of the battalions of the Preobrazhensky Regiment. Despite the fact that the weapons were given to the anarchists without resistance, Nikiforova could not deny herself the pleasure and personally shot all the officers of the battalion.

Further more. Nikiforova creates a “Free Combat Detachment to Combat Counter-Revolution.” This detachment rushes around the south of Russia and Ukraine, from Odessa to Taganrog, everywhere marked by incredible robberies and equally incredible atrocities. Rumor ascribes to her three times what was actually accomplished, and the frightened Bolsheviks put Nikiforova in Taganrog prison and arrange a trial over her. However, the intercession of many anarchists, as well as her longtime acquaintance Antonov-Ovseenko, saves Marusya from execution. She is released, she again gathers her detachment, and having finally found herself in Rostov and the surrounding area (they mention that Nikiforova’s detachment stormed a Rostov bank and set up a huge bonfire of banknotes, banknotes and bills in the adjacent square) she runs with the Reds from Rostov to Tsaritsyn , fleeing from the advancing German units.

This is how Yuri Trifonov describes it in his documentary story “Glimmer of the Fire”:

“On the same locomotive was the “famous” Marusya Nikiforova, the head of a detachment of anarchists, a young drunkard and psychopath. Not long ago, a graduate of the Smolny Institute, and now a famous chieftain, loved to drive around Rostov in a white Circassian coat with gazyrs and a white shaggy hat - she rode quiet, sober, in a soldier's overcoat. Her detachment was disheveled by the Germans; only a few soldiers rode with her.”

And here is how the famous writer E. Radzinsky describes her arrival in Tsaritsyn (by the way, you can immediately see where her legs come from):

"But that same night, the remnants of bandits led by Petrenko and the famous chieftain Marusya burst into the city. Marusya (Maria Nikiforova) was a student of the Smolny Institute. Now, instead of languid friends, this cocaine addict in a white Circassian coat and shaggy hat, insane in lust and cruelty, was surrounded by drunken foolishness. But this time, too, the bandits failed. Atamansha Marusya was shot right in the street..."

Nikiforova, in fact, together with another anarchist Petrenko, raised a rebellion in Tsaritsyn, but they did not have time to shoot her - she disappeared. She was detained in Saratov, tried in Moscow, and again the intercession of Antonov-Ovseenko allowed Marusa to avoid execution. Sentenced to a suspended sentence, Marusya flees to Ukraine to Makhno. Makhno sent her to work in kindergartens and schools, not even allowing her to come close to combat operations. Marusya began to plot against Makhno. Nikiforova's supporters called on the Makhnovists to turn their weapons against the communists. Nestor respected Nikiforova as an anarchist, but this was beyond his patience. At one of the rallies, Makhno pulled Nikiforova off the podium by the scruff of the neck. Having given Marusya a certain amount of money to organize the assassination attempt on Denikin, Makhno expels Nikiforova and her cronies from his army. Marusya, however, uses only part of the funds to prepare the assassination attempt on Denikin. The other part, apparently, is preparing an assassination attempt on Lenin. A group of Marusya supporters is sent to Moscow. Both attempts end in failure. Marusya herself is arrested by the Whites in the Crimea and publicly hanged after the trial (Marusya herself puts a noose around her neck, shouts “Long live anarchy” and knocks the bench out from under her feet), and an explosion in Leontyevsky Lane in Moscow takes away the lives of a dozen communists, but Lenin and Dzerzhinsky does not appear at the scene of the assassination attempt and remains alive. Marusya’s involvement in the explosion in Leontyevsky Lane has never been proven, although a certain “senior anarchist Volodya” is listed among the main organizers. After the Reds occupied Crimea, Marusya’s ashes were solemnly reburied as the remains of a “fighter for the revolution.”

Well, that's probably all. I don’t want to say at all that the topic is exhausted, but rather, I’m tired of it.

Maria Grigorievna Nikiforova was born in 1885 in the city of Aleksandrovsk (present-day Zaporozhye) in the family of a staff captain, hero Russian-Turkish war and recipient of many military awards. Marusya told Nestor that she had been raped.

By official version, Maria Grigorievna Nikiforova was born in 1885 in the city of Aleksandrovsk (present-day Zaporozhye) in the family of a staff captain, a hero of the Russian-Turkish war and a recipient of many military awards. However, Marusya later told (in particular to Nestor Makhno) that in her early youth she had to work as a laundress, and that at that time she was raped. Why the daughter of a retired staff captain had to work as a laundress, nanny, and dishwasher at a vodka factory is not known. Although, according to some historians, Marusya ran away from home at the age of 16 and earned her own living - but this version is not supported by any documentary evidence. At the age of 18, Maria joined the Socialist Revolutionary Party and became interested in the theory of individual terror. This was the era of the great terrorists - Gershuni, Azef, Savinkov, Kalyaev. But in 1904, Marusya became acquainted with the ideas of anarchism - and they seemed closer and dearer to her. A society based on private property must be destroyed. The state as an instrument of violence has no right to exist. Marusya interpreted these truths in her own way. She joined the most radical wing of anarchists - the so-called “bezmotivniki”. The “bezmotivniki” threw bombs and shot not only at major officials and politicians - the objects of their hunt were simply wealthy people, the bourgeoisie, representatives of the middle strata of the population, the intelligentsia and even workers - as the main force helping capitalists make money. The most famous terrorist attacks involving Marusya were the explosion of Libman's cafe and a haberdashery store in Odessa, as well as the explosion of a first-class carriage on a train near Nikopol. A little later, the explosion of a bomb thrown by Marusya killed the administrator of one plant, and the plant itself was stopped for two weeks. In 1907, the police were on her trail in Kherson. Marusya tried to commit suicide by detonating a bomb, but there was no explosion. Marusya appeared in court. She was accused of a number of expropriation acts and four murders. For these charges, she received a sentence of 20 years of hard labor with preliminary serving of the sentence in the Peter and Paul Fortress. This is where we encounter the first mystery of Marusya Nikiforova. Her cellmate in Novinskaya prison, Ekaterina Nikitina, recalled: “A very young, angular woman, short, stocky, with a buzz cut and shifty brown eyes. A worn-out boyish face, in which, despite her youth, there was something senile. Such political type we haven't seen it yet. She told her fellow inmates that she had been sentenced to death for the murder of a bailiff, which, due to her youth, was commuted to 20 years of hard labor. She behaved strangely. She alternately called herself an anarchist and a Socialist-Revolutionary, but she herself did not even understand the basics of revolutionary theories. I haven’t read any books.” Soon the prisoners began to prepare their escape. They didn’t particularly trust Marusa, so in order to find out about her, they sent a note to the outside world, and also asked her “comrades” in the Butyrki trial. The answer came: they confirmed from the outside that they knew Marusya as an honest and decent comrade, although she lied about the death penalty. The opinions of political convicts regarding Marusya were divided. Some wanted to demand that the administration transfer her to another cell. Others - older and more compassionate - offered to take her with them to escape. But then “special circumstances” began to appear in Marusya’s behavior, which were hinted at by her accomplices. In the cell they began to suspect that she was a man, there were several reasons for this: firstly, she never took off her outer shirt in front of other women, and secondly, she never went to the bathhouse with everyone else. In the same cell sat Natasha Klimova, an aristocratic beauty, common-law wife the famous dashing terrorist and bank robber, Socialist-Revolutionary Maximalist Sokolov-Medved, who later became the mistress of Boris Savinkov. And so Maruska and her love began to flock to this luxurious woman, cry, suffer, and throw up scenes of jealousy. Prominent terrorist Fanya Itkind, who was sitting in the same cell, said that if the information is confirmed that Marusya is a man, then she herself will personally “crash” her.

Historians are still arguing about who the woman named Marusya Nikiforova was. And was she really a woman? And what was her fate? Very short life. There are a lot of mysteries...

The cellmates eventually decided that the most prominent and elderly convict should have called Marusya for a frank conversation and found out what gender she was. Such a conversation took place, and the elder of the cell, Anna Pavlovna, throwing up her hands, said: “Indeed, a man, or rather a boy. Name is Volodya. But the story is completely special: he participated in the murder of a bailiff, then hid in a woman’s dress and was convicted in a woman’s dress. I was in solitary confinement in Chernigov. Then he marched to Moscow and everywhere he was mistaken for a woman. In general, the unfortunate person asks him to understand and for God’s sake have pity. Crying."

The camera gasped! It’s clear, although he lies a lot, it’s obviously boyish... You can’t send him away to the criminals - they’ll immediately report him, leave him in the cell - he’ll ruin both them and himself, because he behaves more stupidly than stupid. In the end, they decided that Manya will remain Manya, they don’t care who she is - a boy or a man. They will put her in an extra bed by the window, prohibit her from singing, jumping, going to the doctor and to the restroom when someone is there, and she will have to leave the cell only accompanied by authoritative political prisoners. When Manka was informed of the decision, she cried, blew her nose, and after a while began singing at the top of her lungs in a strong boyish alto, “At the Poltava River.”

This testimony is very valuable. There is other evidence that Marusya Nikiforova was in fact either a transvestite or a hermaphrodite.

The escape from Novinskaya prison, in the preparation of which young Vladimir Mayakovsky participated, was successful. However, Marusya was arrested again and sent to Siberia. There she organized a secondary escape, reached Vladivostok, from there, using forged documents, to Japan, and then to the USA, where she worked for some time in the editorial offices of anarchist newspapers. Here her journalistic gift was revealed - she wrote articles on the topic of the day and sharp feuilletons.

In 1913, Marusya moved to Europe, living in Spain and France. In Paris, she took sculpture and painting lessons from Auguste Rodin. Old Rodin considered her one of his most talented students. Anarchist Artemy Gladkikh claimed in 1918 that he saw Marusya in Paris, and sometimes she went to men's suit, posing as Vladimir Nikiforov. He also claimed that in Paris Marusya had undergone sex reassignment surgery and transplantation of female hormonal glands. Although at the beginning of the twentieth century this information was something from the realm of science fiction.

At least in 1914, Marusya, as a woman (and the only woman), joined the French Foreign Legion and studied at an officer school. In 1916, she was sent to Greece, to the Thessaloniki area, to fight the Turks. But with the beginning of the revolution in Russia, Marusya deserted and, having made her way through several front lines, appeared in Petrograd in April 1917.

Here she was greeted as a heroine - the revolution granted amnesty to all political prisoners. She spoke at rallies, calling on the people not to stop at the revolutionary successes achieved and to complete the holy work of the anarchist revolution. In July, after the Provisional Government dispersed the demonstration of leftist forces, Marusya had to flee Petrograd. Her closest friend Alexandra Kollontai went to prison. Marusya herself returned to her homeland, to Aleksandrovsk, which is under the jurisdiction of the Central Rada.

Marusya was perceived as the recognized leader of the anarchist movement in southern Ukraine. She created workers' Black squads in Aleksandrovsk, Yekaterinoslav, Odessa, Nikolaev, Kherson, Kamensk, Melitopol, Yuzovka, Nikopol, Gorlovka. As historian Viktor Savchenko writes, “these detachments began to disorganize and terrorize government agencies The Provisional Government of Republican Russia, and from November 1917, the young power structures of the Ukrainian people's republic. To arm and supply the Black Guard Free Fighting Squad, Marusya expropriated one million rubles from the Aleksandrovsky factory owner Badovsky. Marusya donated part of the money to the Alexander Council as a gift. Her detachment also requisitioned a lot of money from the landowners of the Ekaterinoslav province.”

In September 1917, Marusya was arrested by order of the Commissioner of the Provisional Government in the city of Aleksandrovsk. The next day, all enterprises in Aleksandrovsk stopped working. The authorities were forced to make concessions. Marusya was simply carried out of prison in their arms. She turned into a folk heroine!

At the same time, she meets Nestor Makhno, the new leader of the anarchists. If Marusya was a product of the urban anarchist element, then Makhno was a peasant anarchist. And very soon Makhno’s organizational talents began to dominate Marusya’s authority. Although the anarchist leaders did not have serious contradictions. Moreover, some biographers of Makhno claim (without citing sources) about an alleged affair between Marusya and Nestor.

Again, as Viktor Savchenko writes, “with her “Black Guard” detachment, Marusya participates in the establishment of Soviet power in Crimea, in battles with detachments of the Crimean Tatars. The Black Sea sailors passed a resolution on the total extermination of the bourgeoisie and moved from words to deeds. More than 500 people were brutally killed in Sevastopol and Feodosia alone. Together with Japaridze’s anarchist detachment, Nikiforova’s detachment broke into Yalta. The Livadia Palace was looted and several dozen officers were shot. Next, Marusya’s path lay in Sevastopol, where, according to her information, eight anarchists languished in a local prison, who were arrested for throwing bombs into the crowd from a hotel balcony. The Sevastopol Bolsheviks, fearing a clash with Marusya’s detachment, released those arrested without waiting for the chieftain’s arrival. It is interesting that Marusya, who appeared in Feodosia for a few days, was immediately elected to the Executive Committee of the district peasant council and managed to organize a local anarchist detachment of the Black Guard. And already on January 28, 1918, Nikiforova’s detachment arrived in Elisavetgrad (Kirovograd) to establish Soviet power. At that time, there was a Ukrainian reserve regiment and a cavalry hundred of the Free Cossacks of Ukraine (900 soldiers in total) in the city. The anarchists, together with a detachment of Bolsheviks, dispersed the local garrison of the Central Rada and arrested representatives of the Ukrainian authorities. Marusya herself shot the local military commander, Colonel Vladimirov, for refusing to give the anarchists the keys to military warehouses. Residents of the district Elisavetgrad will long remember the “vigilantes” of Marusya, who terrorized the city for several days, robbing and killing the “bourgeois”.

In Elisavetgrad, Marusya came into conflict with the local council and, with the support of her friend, the Bolshevik sailor Polupanov, ordered the council to be shot from cannon. This was the first time parliament was dissolved in this manner. Later, this method of combating parliamentarism will become a reliable and proven means.

In Ekaterinoslav (Dnepropetrovsk), which was raided by Marusya, shops and shops were destroyed. She herself robbed mainly confectionery shops and lingerie stores. How is it with Vysotsky? “A woman is like a woman - and why please her?”

In April 1918, under attacks from German and Austrian troops, Nikiforova and her Black Squad had to retreat outside of Ukraine. In Taganrog she was arrested by the Bolsheviks. Marusya was accused of looting, cruelty and robbery. The prosecutor demanded that Nikiforova be shot. The court was headed by Vladimir Zatonsky. After the anarchists present threatened an uprising, the court acquitted Marusya.

And it began to operate again - now on Russian territory. Voronezh, Bryansk, Saratov, Rostov... Here and there, cheerful Marusya appeared. R. Roshal wrote: “A carriage is rushing down the street at breakneck speed. Lounging carelessly in it, a young brunette sits in a kubanka, dressed dashingly on one side, next to him, hanging on the footrest, is a broad-shouldered guy in red hussar leggings. The brunette and her bodyguard are festooned with weapons.”

At the end of 1918, the Bolsheviks arrested Marusya again. She spent some time in Butyrka, and later appeared in court, which banned her from holding command positions for a period of six months. Despite this, she secretly organized - with the support of the Ukrainian Bolsheviks, primarily Vladimir Antonov-Ovseenko - a partisan cavalry detachment. But at the very beginning of 1919, this detachment, having carried out several operations against supporters of Simon Petlyura, joined the army of Nestor Makhno in full force.

At the beginning of June 1919, relations between Makhno and the Bolsheviks broke down. The anarchists were outlawed, and some of the representatives of the Makhnovist headquarters, led by Ozerov, were shot. At the same time, Marusya breaks off relations with Nestor Ivanovich. She demanded radical action against the Bolsheviks, Makhno considered this madness and took a wait-and-see attitude. As a result, Makhno threw Marusya out of his armored train and threw a wad of 100 (or even 500) thousand rubles at her.

Marusya immediately moved on to forming groups that were supposed to organize revolutionary terror. The first group, led by Marusya herself and her husband, the Polish anarchist Witold Brzostek, was supposed to go to Moscow to liquidate Lenin and Trotsky. The second group - led by Max Chernyak - went to Siberia to organize the assassination of Admiral Kolchak.

In Moscow, Marusya created the All-Russian Insurgent Committee of Revolutionary Partisans, which included more than 40 people - mostly anarchists. She began to carry out expropriation actions, thus collecting more than 4 million rubles (“For the world revolution,” she explained). The plans included the destruction of the entire leadership of the Bolshevik Party, as well as the explosion of the Kremlin.

September 25, 1919 in the building of the Moscow Committee of the RCP (b) in Liteiny Lane (this building now houses the Embassy of Ukraine in Russian Federation) a plenum of the Moscow Committee of the RCP (b) was to take place. Lenin and Trotsky were scheduled to speak at the plenum. After the start of the plenum, a deafening explosion occurred. 12 people died, including the leader of the Moscow Bolsheviks, Zagorsky. Nikolai Bukharin and Emelyan Yaroslavsky were wounded. Lenin and Trotsky were simply late for the opening of the plenum and remained unharmed.

During the attempt to blow up the Kremlin, almost the entire anarchist organization was exposed. Many members of the underground group were arrested. Marusa and her husband managed to escape from Moscow to Crimea.

Here Nikiforova began planning an assassination attempt on General Denikin. She wanted to blow up the commander of the white troops along with his headquarters, and then go to Poland to organize an anarchist revolution. But - according to the official version - some White Guard identified her, and Marusya was arrested. In September 1919, she and her husband, Witold Brzostek, were hanged in the courtyard of a Sevastopol prison - and the husband was executed for not informing the authorities about his wife. However, not a single document remains indicating the execution of Marusya.

There is another version: that Marusya secretly went to work for the Cheka and was sent first to Poland and then to France. In 1919-1920, to create reliable legends of this kind, agents were provided with false obituaries in the press. Perhaps the obituaries of Marusya Nikiforova in the anarchist press are also a cover? At the very least, there is unconfirmed evidence that it was Marusya Nikiforova who prepared Schwartzbard for the murder of Simon Petliura. This version was quite common between the First and Second World Wars.

Nikiforova Maria Grigorievna (? – 08 or 09.1919). Anarchist. Native of Aleksandrovsk. Dishwasher at a vodka factory. For anarchist terrorist attacks in 1904–1905. sentenced to death, commuted to indefinite hard labor. She served her time in the Peter and Paul Fortress. In 1910 she was transferred to Siberia, from where she fled to Japan. From Japan she moved to America, lived in France, England, Germany, Switzerland. She spoke many European languages ​​fluently. An active participant in socialist congresses, an obstinate, rebellious nature. By conviction, she is an anarcho-terrorist. A good speaker and organizer of expropriation and terror. In 1917 returned to the station Canopies of Alexandrovsky district, where her mother lived. From the ruins of the anarchist group, she created a strong terrorist organization in the south of Russia. In May 1917, she expropriated a million rubles from the Aleksandrovsky factory owner Badovsky. Organizer and commander of the “Black Guard”. The ideologist of the “motiveless” destruction of state institutions, not excluding Soviet ones. In Ukraine it was known until 1918 for its atrocities. The wife of the famous Polish anarcho-terrorist Brzostek. Participant in the first congresses of Soviets and the Makhnovist movement. Hanged in Simferopol (August - September 1919) by a white general. According to other information: in August or September 1919, she was identified on the street in Simferopol and arrested by white counterintelligence. In September or October 1919, the Sevastopol Military Court sentenced her to death. Hanged.

Materials from the site http://www.makhno.ru/ were used

Read further:

Makhno Nestor Ivanovich(1888-1934), practical anarchist.

Makhno and the Makhnovists(biographical index).