56

p The Bolsheviks throughout the area realised that it was a matter of life and death and decided on a united course of action. The rule in Narym was that each exile had the right to an audience with Ovsyanikov, the local police officer, once a week and now they gave him not a moment’s peace. Personal needs were forgotten—an unending stream of exiles went to him with one request: bring back Sverdlov.

p Ovsyanikov applied to the Governor of Tomsk Province and in February Sverdlov was sent back to Narym, where his health rapidly improved and he set himself to work again. On 23 February he wrote:

p ’I have been here for about two weeks. I intended to lock myself away with lots of books but I couldn’t do it. There are so few educated people here and my social conscience is too strong—I yielded to my comrades’ persuasion and pestering to give lectures on political economy. And now I have taken it on myself to arrange open discussions on fascinating topics such as current events, the election campaign and so on. I will read the opening papers.’

p Immediately on his return he began to improve the colony’s contact with the outside world, so as to keep the exiles abreast of developments inside and outside the Party. They eagerly seized on all Party news, passionately debated Lenin’s articles as they arrived in Narym and were engrossed in the proceedings of the Sixth All-Russia RSDLP Conference, which took place in Prague in January 1912.

p The Conference discussed a wide range of issues and elected a wholly Bolshevik Central Committee, chaired by Lenin, which was to give the Party firm and militant leadership. As its ranks were often depleted by arrest, it was allowed extensive rights to coopt new 57 members, which is how Sverdlov joined the Central Committee. Towards the end of 1912 he was also appointed to the Russian Bureau of the Party, which had been established by the Conference to supervise operations in Russia under the direct guidance of the Central Committee.

p By closely questioning each new Bolshevik arrival, Sverdlov kept himself constantly informed on the situation at the grass roots. He advised every Bolshevik escapee where to go, for he knew which groups were most seriously undermanned.

p Sverdlov had intended to escape since his first days in exile— this I know because at the end of 1911 I was thinking of going with the baby to join him, but when I wrote to him about it, I received this reply:

p ’Of course I want to be with you soon... It’s my dream but dreaming and doing cannot always go together... There is a feeling of animation in the air. I am ready for action, and if my dream comes true it will not be because you come to me... Please don’t make arrangements to come this way just yet.’ (Punctuation is in the original—Author’s note.)

p It was obvious that he was not meaning to stay in Narym much longer and it was clear to me why. He was absolutely right about the change in the atmosphere: Stolypin’s reactionary reign  [57•1  was coming to an end, the Russian working class was again rising against tsarism, and the Party had been galvanised by the Prague Conference. How could Sverdlov sit counting the years in the backwoods of Narym at a time like that?

p In early April 1912 a terrible tragedy in Siberia’s Lena gold fields rocked the country. The army, on instructions from the gendarmes, fired on a thousand unarmed workers who were going to negotiate with the mining administration. Over 500 people were killed or wounded. News of this foul act quickly spread throughout the country, triggering off mass strikes, meetings and demonstrations. It reached Narym at about the same time as Moscow and Petersburg, during the preparations for the May Day demonstrations.

The exiles had decided to hold their demonstration in Narym itself, as it was the largest settlement in the area. Though not the first demonstration there, it was to be the best organised. Sverdlov, with Valerian Kuibyshev, had done a lot of the spadework, but he realised that to take part would be too risky. He asked to be sent to Kolpashevo,

58 so as not to give the authorities the slightest grounds for returning him to Maksimkin Yar and left a few days before May Day.

p Carrying their red banners, the exiles marched to the edge of town, where Kuibyshev gave a rousing speech to a large crowd of exiles and locals. The air of excitement was such that the guards did not dare to interfere, but the arrests began a few days later. Sverdlov was also arrested. He protested that he had not even been there and was told that he could have masterminded it from a distance.

He was held in Tomsk prison for several months, not returning to Kolpashevo until August 1912. At about that time Stalin arrived in Narym and they met for the first time. It was a short-lived acquaintance, however, as Stalin escaped at the end of the month. Sverdlov had every intention of following him.