Sergey Stepnyak-Kravchinsky

• Name — Sergei Stepniak • Born — 13 July 1851 • Birthplace — Novy Starodub, Kherson Governorate, Russian Empire • Died — 23 December 1895 • Place of death — Bedford Park, Chiswick, England

Kravchinskii, the son of an army doctor of Belarusian descent and a Ukrainian noblewoman, was born on in Novy Starodub, Aleksandriya uezd, Kherson Governorate, Russian Empire (now in Ukraine). He received a liberal education, and when he left school, he went on to attend the Military academy and graduated from the Mikhailovsky Artillery Institute before joining the Imperial Russian Army. He reached the rank of second lieutenant before resigning his commission in 1871.

• Illustration — Stepniak in 1870 Kravchinskii's sympathy lay with the peasants, among whom he had lived during his boyhood in the country, which led him to develop democratic, and later revolutionary opinions. He joined the Circle of Tchaikovsky, a group of like-minded Narodnik philosophers and political activists whose ultimate goal was the "liberation of the people." Stepniak became a member of the original St. Petersburg branch of the Circle, where he joined thirty other men and women of education, including Pyotr Kropotkin As a member of this Circle, he began secretly to sow the sentiments of democracy and the ideals of the Narodniks among the peasants. To this end, he participated in a precursor to the Going to the People, when members of the Narodnik movement disguised themselves as peasants and laborers to spread the idea of revolution. Stepniak, accompanied by another member of the Circle, Dmitry Rogachev, appeared in a Tver village as woodcutters in the autumn of 1873. In November, they were tracked down by the rural police, but escaped at first, swearing to each other that they would dedicate their lives to the people. The Circle was broken up and his teaching would cease soon after, ending with his arrest in 1874.

Kravchinskii succeeded in making his escape, possibly being permitted to regain freedom on account of his youth, and immediately began a more vigorous campaign against autocracy. His sympathetic nature was influenced by indignation against the brutal methods adopted towards prisoners, especially political prisoners, and by the stern measures which the government of tsar Alexander II adopted in order to repress the revolutionary movement. In late 1874 Kravchinskii moved to Switzerland, where he engaged in correspondence with Pyotr Lavrov, sharing with his idea of creating a popular magazine to be read by the village population. He later toured various European countries, meeting various dissidents from the Russian Empire, including Serhiy Podolynsky, a fellow native of Ukraine. In 1875, Kravchinskii left Geneva and went to the Balkans and joined the rising against the Turks in Bosnia in 1876, serving as an artilleryman; he used that experience to write a manual on guerrilla warfare. Kravchinskii dreamt of settling in Serbia after the end of the war, but the lack of revolutionary aims among the Balkan liberation movement forced him to abandon those plans. In 1877 he joined the anarchist Errico Malatesta in his small rebellion in the Italian province of Benevento. Arrested by Italian authorities after the failure of the uprising, he was threatened with death penalty, but regained his freedom as a result of a royal amnesty. Kravchinskii returned to Russia in 1878, joining Zemlya i volya (Land and Liberty). Along with Nikolai Morozov and Olga Liubatovich edited the party journal.

Stepniak was killed by a train at a railway crossing at Woodstock Road, Chiswick, London, where he resided, on 23 December 1895. At the time of his untimely death, Kravchinskii had been preparing the publication of a new novel. In the previously cited memorial essay on Stepniak written by Russian anarchist Peter Kropotkin he explained the tragic manner of his death: Sergei Stepniak was killed by a train, about three hundred feet away from his house. He left his house about 10.30 in the morning, in order to visit a gathering of friends and comrades in Shepherd's Bush (London). A few bricklayers who knew him well saw him go by. He was absorbed in a book, which he read while walking. He had to cross a single track of a branch line, between Hammersmith and South Acton. The place was very dangerous; one has to cross the track hastily and very carefully. At first glance one would think he could make it in a single leap, but in reality one has to make about seven steps across the track, in order to be out of danger. The sharp turn prevents the pedestrian from noticing the oncoming of a train. When the engineer saw Stepniak crossing the track, he sounded the whistle; but before Stepniak had time to turn his head, the train knocked him down, killing him instantly. His body was cremated at Woking on 28 December and the cremated remains deposited at Kensal Green Cemetery. In the same memorial essay cited above, Kropotkin (who apparently was in attendance) describes the memorial ceremony: The following Saturday the cremation of his body took place. Hundreds of his friends came to his house and walked to the Ravenscourt Park cemetery. At the Waterloo station, from where the train leaves for Wauking [sic], thousands of workingmen assembled with their banners, representing the societies and Labor Unions of various parts of London. Opposite the station, in a downpour of rain, speeches were held by English, Russian, Italian, German and Armenian friends, who were often interrupted by the loud sobs of the assembled. The manifestation was both magnificent and heart-breaking. I have seen funerals large in numbers, but I have never seen a funeral with so much deep grief and sorrow as was manifested by the mourners at the funeral of Sergei Stepniak. When the terrible accident happened, he was only 43 years of age, full of strength and courage, full of hope and belief in the future. [...] Hundreds of letters and telegrams received at his funeral, attested to his value to the Russian Revolutionary movement. He was its central figure.

His person became the inspiration for the main hero of Ethel Voynich's The Gadfly, and his publications influenced the works of Leo Tolstoy, Emile Zola and Vladimir Lenin. During the Soviet times, a museum dedicated to Kravchinskii functioned in his native village. One of the streets was named after him in the Ukrainian city of Kirovohrad (now Kropyvnytskyi).