Chernov V. M. (1873-1952), Socialist Revolutionary

Categories / Social Life/Personalia
CHERNOV Viktor Mikhailovich (1873-1952) was a political figure, sociologist, and publicist. On graduating from Derpt Gymnasium (1892) he entered the Faculty of Law of Moscow University, and participated in revolutionary circles. In 1894, he was arrested, delivered to St. Petersburg, and imprisoned in St. Peter-and-Paul Fortress and in the House of Temporary Confinement. In 1895, he was exiled to the town of Kamyshin, from where he was first transferred to Saratov, then to Tambov. In 1899, he legally left for abroad and contributed to St. Petersburg journal entitled Russian Wealth. At the beginning of the 1900s, he was one of the founders of the Party of Socialists Revolutionaries, its major theorist and ideologist. In 1905, he returned to St. Petersburg and initiated the creation of a legally published newspaper Son of the Native Land and managed the publication. Chernov also initiated the creation of a number of other editions; in 1906, he participated in the creation of the Labour group in the first State Duma. In 1907 Chernov left for Finland, then he emigrated. In 1912-14, he was de facto in charge of Vows Journal. At the time of World War I of 1914-18 he took the central left position, he encouraged the socialists to become the third force, to recreate the Communist International and to make the governments sign the just peace treaty without any annexations or contributions. In April 1917, he returned to Petrograd, and was elected a member of the Executive Committee and assistant to the head (deputy director) of Petrograd Soviet, then an assistant to the Head of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and a honoris causa head of Central Executive Committee of the Soviet of Peasants' Deputies. In May-August 1917, he served as Minister of Agriculture in the Provisional Government. His attitude to the Bolshevik Coup of October 1917 was harshly negative. He led the Constitutional Assembly and after its dispersal he left for Moscow, then to Povolzhye. Chernov was a member of a number of anti-Bolshevik governments; he encouraged the Party of Socialist Revolutionaries to play the role of the third force fighting for democracy against the dictatorship of the Whites and the Reds. In September 1920, he left Russia for good. In the 1930s, he favoured the creation of the united anti-fascist front of socialists and communists. In 1940, he left for the USA, where he died. Chernov is the author of works on the problems of sociology, political science, theory of socialism, memoirs The Notes of the Socialist-Revolutionary, book 1, Berlin; Moscow; Petrograd, 1923; The Birth of Revolutionary Russia, Paris; Prague; New-York, 1934; At the Eve of the Storm, New-York, 1953).

References: Колесниченко Д. А. Виктор Михайлович Чернов // Россия на рубеже веков: Ист. портреты. М., 1991. С. 296-334; [Ерофеев Н. Д.]. В. М. Чернов // Политическая история России в партиях и лицах. М., 1993. С. 205-227.

G. S. Anoprieva, N. D. Erofeev. Chernov Viktor Mikhailovich
Колесниченко Д. А. Виктор Михайлович Чернов // Россия на рубеже веков: Ист. портреты. М., 1991
[Ерофеев Н. Д.] В. М. Чернов // Политическая история России в партиях и лицах. М., 1993 St. Peter and Paul fortress
St. Peter and Paul fortress
House of Preliminary Detention, prison
Russkoe Bogatstvo (The Russian Wealth), journal, 1876-1918
Syn Otechestva (Son of the Fatherland), journal
State Duma
Provisional Government of 1917