SR Combat Organization veteran who chaired the first-convocation VTsIK in 1917
Arrested in 1907 and sentenced to eight years of katorga, he was settled in Usolye, Irkutsk province, where he joined the anti-war internationalist 'Siberian Zimmerwaldists.'
Born in Moscow into a Jewish tea-merchant family, he followed his elder brother Mikhail Gots into the Socialist Revolutionary Party and joined its Combat Organization in 1906. Arrested in 1907 and sentenced to eight years of katorga, he was settled in Usolye, Irkutsk province, in 1915. Back in Petrograd in 1917, he led the SR faction in the Petrograd Soviet and was elected chairman of the VTsIK at the First Congress of Soviets. Opposing the October Revolution, he led the Committee for Salvation of the Homeland and Revolution; at the 1922 SR trial he was the main defendant and received a death sentence, commuted in 1924, followed by exile to Ulyanovsk in 1925. Rearrested in 1937, he was sentenced to 25 years in 1939 and died in 1940 in a Krasnoyarsk labour camp.
Activities and affiliations
Career Timeline
- 1906Joined the SR Combat Organization; participated in terror planning
- 1907Arrested; sentenced to 8 years hard labour (katorga)
- 1915–1917Settlement in Usolye, Irkutsk; joined the Siberian Zimmerwaldist group
- 1917.03–06SR faction leader in the Petrograd Soviet; Executive Committee member
- 1917.06–10Chairman of the VTsIK (1st All-Russian Congress of Soviets)
- 1917.10–1918Chairman, Committee for Salvation of Homeland and Revolution; led the junker uprising
- 1918–1920Organized SR armed detachments; fought on two fronts against Bolsheviks and Whites
- 1922Main defendant at the SR show trial; sentenced to death, commuted
- 1925–1937Exiled to Simbirsk (Ulyanovsk); economic planning work
- 1937–1940Rearrested during the Great Purge; sentenced to 25 years on 20 June 1939; died in 1940 in a Krasnoyarsk labour camp
Related historical events
- 1914–1918First World WarAnti-war internationalistIn exile at Usolye, he joined the Siberian Zimmerwaldists in anti-war internationalist activity.
- 1907–1919The collapse of the Second InternationalSiberian ZimmerwaldistIn Usolye, he joined the Siberian Zimmerwaldists in anti-war internationalist activity.
- 1917.02–07The February RevolutionSoviet leader who defused the April CrisisTogether with Skobelev, he persuaded the demonstrating soldiers at the Mariinsky Palace to return to their barracks on 20 April 1917.
- 1917.10–1918.01The October RevolutionLeader opposing the October RevolutionOpposing the October Revolution, he led the Committee for Salvation of the Homeland and Revolution.
- 1918–1922The Civil War and Foreign InterventionSR armed-detachment organiser opposing the BolsheviksDuring the Civil War, he organised SR armed detachments and fought both the Bolsheviks and the Whites.
The 1922 SR Trial: Death Sentence and Commutation
The 1922 SR Trial: Death Sentence and Commutation
Gots was arrested in Moscow on 19 May 1920 and held in Butyrka prison. On 24 February 1922 the GPU Presidium placed him among the SRs to be charged with anti-Soviet activity, and at the SR trial of July and August 1922 he stood as the main defendant of the first group. English Wikipedia notes that the trial is sometimes described as the first 'show trial' in Soviet Russia and became a cause celebre among Western socialists. Theodor Liebknecht, brother of Karl, acted for the defence; Peter Kropotkin appealed personally to Lenin to spare the defendants' lives; Karl Kautsky wrote pamphlets, and American trade unionists demonstrated for the SRs' release. The Bolsheviks countered with mass demonstrations demanding the death penalty and with disruptions in the courtroom.
Gots and eleven co-defendants were sentenced to death, but execution was suspended and, on the account the open list records, they were kept as 'hostages'. The sentence was suspended on 8 August 1922 and replaced on 11 January 1924 by five years' deprivation of liberty under a decision of the Presidium of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. That commutation did not free him: in May 1925 he was sent into a three-year exile in Ulyanovsk.
Release never came. The record continues with a 1937 arrest, a sentence of 25 years on 20 June 1939 and death in a camp in 1940, and shows no documented rehabilitation. Russian Wikipedia gives the place of death as Kraslag at Nizhny Ingash, Krasnoyarsk Krai, while itself flagging that information as needing verification, and other records state the place of death only as 'in confinement'.