Organizer of Presnya’s workers’ fighting squads
“We are ending our struggle… we are alone in this world.”
Zinovy Litvin-Sedoy was a Bolshevik revolutionary from the working class of the Russian Empire who became a practical organizer through factory work, arrests, and exile. During the 1905 Moscow uprising he commanded the Presnya fighting squads, directing barricade defence and the organization of armed workers. His memoirs acknowledged the uprising’s unfavorable conditions while insisting that workers themselves had decided to fight and had carried the struggle. After 1917 he worked in Soviet transport administration and education.
Activities and affiliations
Career Timeline
- 1893Entered the revolutionary movement
- 1897Joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party
- 1905Commanded the Presnya fighting squads in Moscow
- 1906Participated in the Sveaborg sailors’ uprising
- 1917–1918Worked in the Kyiv Soviet and the party organization of an aviation unit
- 1919–1921Worked in the Central Administration of Military Communications and the People’s Commissariat of Transport
- 1921–1939Directed Moscow’s cotton-textile technical school named for the December uprising
- 1939–1947Lived in retirement
Related historical events
Defending Presnya and the limits of the uprising
During the Moscow uprising of December 1905, Litvin-Sedoy helped organize the defense of Presnya as a member of its fighting committee and commander of the workers’ squads. In his memoir, he wrote that party organizations in Presnya failed to keep pace with the uprising and supplied little guidance about developments in other districts or what to do next. Factory workers built barricades and gathered weapons, establishing defensive lines across Presnya by December 10. He counted about 250 weapons, including assorted pistols and hunting rifles; the squads had 350 to 400 fighters, with a relief force bringing the total to 700 to 800. The Prokhorov factory canteen served as headquarters, where armed shifts were assigned and ammunition and meals distributed.
He opposed a comrade’s proposals for premature attacks and concentrated the forces on guard duty and defense, seeking to preserve them for a more serious moment. Government forces, however, brought in reinforcements and used artillery and machine guns to surround and bombard Presnya; the Schmidt factory caught fire. After ordering the surviving fighters to withdraw, Litvin-Sedoy was slightly wounded while escaping. Lenin’s 1906 assessment likewise argued that uprising organizations had lagged behind the rapidly growing movement: instructions to build barricades came late, and the workers’ demands for more decisive action went unanswered. Litvin-Sedoy attributed defeat to inadequate political work among the masses, party organizations falling behind events, and workers’ and peasants’ lack of preparation. His memoir is an account of field command and organizational weaknesses, and its figures and detailed chronology should be read as his recollection.