Nestor Makhno

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Lore & Background

Nestor Makhno was born into a poor peasant family in Huliaipole, then in the Katerynoslav Governorate of the Russian Empire. His father died when he was ten months old, and Makhno began working at age seven, tending livestock. He attended a local secular school from age eight but was forced to work the fields full-time by age ten. He joined the revolutionary movement during the 1905 revolution, first distributing propaganda for the Social Democratic Labor Party before affiliating with the Union of Poor Peasants, a local anarchist communist group. After a series of expropriations and attacks, he was arrested in August 1909. On 26 March 1910, a district court-martial sentenced him to be hanged, but his sentence was commuted to a life sentence of hard labor due to his young age. He spent seven years in prison, where he contracted tuberculosis and studied anarchist theory under Peter Arshinov.

Reader's Guide

Makhno's significance lies in his leadership of the Makhnovshchina, a mass peasant movement that attempted to establish anarchist communism in southern Ukraine from 1918 to 1921. During the Russian Civil War, he sided with the Soviet Russian Bolsheviks against the Ukrainian nationalists and White movement, but his alliances with the Bolsheviks did not last. He rallied Bolshevik support to lead an insurgency, defeating the Central Powers' occupation forces at the Battle of Dibrivka. His troops briefly integrated with the Bolshevik Red Army in the 1919 Soviet invasion of Ukraine, but split over differences on the movement's autonomy. Makhno rebuilt his army from the remains of Nykyfor Hryhoriv's forces in western Ukraine, routed the White Army at the Battle of Perehonivka, and captured most of southern and eastern Ukraine. After the Bolsheviks turned on him in August 1921, he was wounded and fled to Romanian internment camps, then Poland and Europe, eventually settling in Paris with his wife and daughter. There he wrote memoirs and articles for radical newspapers, playing a role in the development of platformism. He later became alienated from the French anarchist movement. Anarchists have cited him as an inspiration during his life and into today.

Did You Know?

• Makhno's death sentence on 26 March 1910 was commuted to life in prison because he was considered too young to be executed.
• While in Butyrka prison in Moscow, Makhno met the anarchist communist politician Peter Arshinov, who took him on as a student.
• After his release in 1917, Makhno found himself physically off-balance without the shackles he had worn for eight years and needed sunglasses after years in dark prison cells.
• Makhno was elected chairman of the Huliaipole Peasants' Union on 29 March 1917, just days after returning from prison.
• He died of tuberculosis at age 45 on 25 July 1934 in Paris.

Roots in Poverty and the Seed of Revolt

Born on 7 November 1888 in Huliaipole, then in the Katerynoslav Governorate of the Russian Empire, Nestor Makhno was the youngest of five children born to Ivan and Evdokia Mikhnenko, former serfs who had been emancipated in 1861. After Makhno's birth, Ivan went to work as a coachman for a wealthy industrialist when the family's small plot of land could not feed them. He died when Makhno was only ten months old, leaving behind his impoverished family. Makhno was briefly fostered by a more well-off peasant couple but returned to his family of birth. At only seven years old, he was put to work tending livestock. He started to attend a local secular school when he turned eight but grew to skip school to play games and ice skate. His family's extreme poverty forced the ten-year-old to work the fields full-time, which led him to develop a 'sort of rage, resentment, even hatred for the wealthy property-owner'. In 1902, he observed a farm manager and the landlord's sons physically beating a young farmhand. An older stable hand named Bat'ko Ivan attacked the assailants and led a spontaneous workers' revolt, then left Makhno with words that would inspire a rebellious spirit: 'if one of your masters should ever strike you, pick up the first pitchfork you lay hands on and let him have it...'

From Prison to the Makhnovshchina

When the 1905 revolution broke out, the sixteen-year-old Makhno quickly joined the revolutionary movement. He distributed propaganda for the Social Democratic Labor Party before affiliating with his hometown's local anarchist communist group, the Union of Poor Peasants. Despite increased political repression, the Union continued to meet weekly. Makhno was initially distrusted by other members due to his apparent penchant for drinking and getting into fights. After six months, he had thoroughly educated himself on the principles of libertarian communism and became a formal member. The Union initiated a campaign of 'Black Terror' against large landowners and local Tsarist police, carrying out expropriations against local businessmen. Suspected of being involved in these attacks, Makhno was arrested in September 1907 but released without charges due to a lack of evidence. After the assassination of a police informant by the Union, police arrested Makhno in August 1909. On 26 March 1910, a district court-martial sentenced him to be hanged, but his sentence was commuted to a life sentence of hard labor due to his young age. He spent seven years in prison, where he contracted tuberculosis and studied anarchist theory under Peter Arshinov. Released during the February Revolution of 1917, he returned to Huliaipole in March 1917 and was elected chairman of a local Peasants' Union on 29 March. He oversaw the expropriation and redistribution of large estates to the peasantry. Between 1918 and 1921, this local initiative grew into the Makhnovshchina, a mass peasant movement for anarchist communism that radiated from Katerynoslav and Huliaipole across what is now the Zaporizhzhia Oblast.

Alliances, Betrayals, and the War for Southern Ukraine

In the Russian Civil War, Makhno sided with the Soviet Russian Bolsheviks against the Ukrainian nationalists and White movement, but his alliances with the Bolsheviks did not last. He rallied Bolshevik support to lead an insurgency, defeating the Central Powers' occupation forces at the Battle of Dibrivka and establishing the Makhnovshchina. In 1919 his troops briefly integrated with the Bolshevik Red Army in the 1919 Soviet invasion of Ukraine, but split over differences on the movement's autonomy. Makhno rebuilt his army from the remains of Nykyfor Hryhoriv's forces in western Ukraine, routed the White Army at the Battle of Perehonivka, and captured most of southern and eastern Ukraine, where they again attempted to establish anarchist communism. Makhno's army fought the Bolshevik re-invasion of Ukraine in 1920 until a White Army offensive forced a short-lived Bolshevik-Makhnovist alliance that drove the Whites out of Crimea and ended the Southern Front of the Russian Civil War. The Bolsheviks immediately turned on Makhno, wounding him and driving him westward in August 1921.

Exile, Writing, and a Legacy That Outlived Him

After his expulsion from Ukraine in August 1921, Makhno passed through Romanian internment camps, Poland, and Europe before settling in Paris with his wife and daughter. In exile he wrote memoirs and articles for radical newspapers, playing a role in the development of platformism. He later became alienated from the French anarchist movement. His family continued to be persecuted in the decades following his death of tuberculosis at the age of 45 on 25 July 1934. Anarchists have cited him as an inspiration during his life and into today.