Osip Solomonovich Minor (; ; 8 December 1861 – 24 September 1932) was a Russian revolutionary and member of the

Socialist-Revolutionary Party The Socialist Revolutionary Party (SR; ,, ) was a major socialist political party in the late Russian Empire, during both phases of the Russian Revolution, and in early Soviet Russia. The party members were known as Esers (). The SRs were ag ...

. Minor was born in

Minsk Minsk (, ; , ) is the capital and largest city of Belarus, located on the Svislach (Berezina), Svislach and the now subterranean Nyamiha, Niamiha rivers. As the capital, Minsk has a special administrative status in Belarus and is the administra ...

(now in

Belarus Belarus, officially the Republic of Belarus, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Russia to the east and northeast, Ukraine to the south, Poland to the west, and Lithuania and Latvia to the northwest. Belarus spans an a ...

, then part of

Minsk Governorate Minsk Governorate was an administrative-territorial unit (''guberniya'') of the Russian Empire, with its capital in Minsk. It was created from the land acquired in the partitions of Poland and existed from 1793 until 1921. Its territory covered th ...

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire that spanned most of northern Eurasia from its establishment in November 1721 until the proclamation of the Russian Republic in September 1917. At its height in the late 19th century, it covered about , roughl ...

). His father was Rabbi Solomon Minor, and many of his ancestors had been rabbis as well.

Revolutionary politics

Minor became involved in revolutionary politics while studying at the University of Moscow. He joined the party of '

People's Will Narodnaya Volya () was a late 19th-century revolutionary socialist political organization operating in the Russian Empire, which conducted assassinations of government officials in an attempt to overthrow the autocratic Tsarist system. The org ...

' in the early 1880s. In 1883 he was arrested for the first time, and again in 1885. In 1887 he received a sentence of ten years hard labour in Siberia. On 22 March 1889 he participated in a prisoners' uprising in

Yakutsk Yakutsk ( ) is the capital and largest city of Sakha, Russia, located about south of the Arctic Circle. Fueled by the mining industry, Yakutsk has become one of Russia's most rapidly growing regional cities, with a population of 355,443 at the ...

and was condemned to death by hanging, but the sentence was commuted to hard labour for life. In 1896 he was released but forbidden to live in European Russia. That restriction was eased in 1898; he was merely forbidden to live in

St. Petersburg Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea. The city had a population of 5,601, ...

or Moscow.

Vilna revolutionary movement

Around 1900 he settled in Vilna (now

Vilnius Vilnius ( , ) is the capital of and List of cities in Lithuania#Cities, largest city in Lithuania and the List of cities in the Baltic states by population, most-populous city in the Baltic states. The city's estimated January 2025 population w ...

in Lithuania). He became active in the revolutionary movement in Vilna, but gravitated toward

Narodnik The Narodniks were members of a movement of the Russian Empire intelligentsia in the 1860s and 1870s, some of whom became involved in revolutionary agitation against tsarism. Their ideology, known as Narodism, Narodnism or ,; , similar to the ...

circles rather than to the

Marxist Marxism is a political philosophy and method of socioeconomic analysis. It uses a dialectical and materialist interpretation of historical development, better known as historical materialism, to analyse class relations, social conflic ...

Bund Bund, BUND, or the Bund may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * ''Der Bund'', a German-language newspaper published in Bern, Switzerland * Shanghai Bund (TV series), ''Shanghai Bund'' (TV series), a 2007 Chinese television remake of the 19 ...

because they seemed to him to be more revolutionary. He was affiliated with the mainly Jewish Socialist-Revolutionary Workers' Party for the Political Liberation of Russia, organised by

Mark Natanson Mark Andreyevich Natanson (; party name: Bobrov; 25 December 1850 ( N.S. 6 January 1851) – 29 July 1919) was a Russian revolutionary who was one of the founders of the Circle of Tchaikovsky, Land and Liberty and the Socialist-Revolutionary P ...

PSR

In 1901, Minor travelled abroad and assisted in the unification of various Socialist-Revolutionary groups in the

(PSR). He returned to Russia and worked for the PSR in various capacities and participated in the

Revolution of 1905 The Russian Revolution of 1905, also known as the First Russian Revolution, was a revolution in the Russian Empire which began on 22 January 1905 and led to the establishment of a constitutional monarchy under the Russian Constitution of 1906, t ...

. In 1909, Evno Azev, head of the PSR's 'Combat Organisation' and an agent of the

Okhrana The Department for the Protection of Public Safety and Order (), usually called the Guard Department () and commonly abbreviated in modern English sources as the Okhrana ( rus , Охрана, p=ɐˈxranə, a=Ru-охрана.ogg, t= The Guard) w ...

(secret police), betrayed Minor and had him arrested again, but by 1913 Minor had escaped from Siberia and was in

Geneva Geneva ( , ; ) ; ; . is the List of cities in Switzerland, second-most populous city in Switzerland and the most populous in French-speaking Romandy. Situated in the southwest of the country, where the Rhône exits Lake Geneva, it is the ca ...

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

, working with the organisation of Russian Socialist-Revolutionaries Abroad. He seems to have returned to Russia but was captured. He was freed by the

February Revolution The February Revolution (), known in Soviet historiography as the February Bourgeois Democratic Revolution and sometimes as the March Revolution or February Coup was the first of Russian Revolution, two revolutions which took place in Russia ...

of 1917.

World War I

During the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

Minor took a Defencist position, which put him at odds with the PSR leader

Viktor Chernov Viktor Mikhailovich Chernov (; 19 November 1873 – 15 April 1952) was a Russian revolutionary, politician, and theorist who was a principal founder and leader of the Socialist Revolutionary Party (PSR). As the party's chief ideologist, he deve ...

and with his old associate Natanson. In 1917 Minor became president of the Moscow City Duma. He opposed the

Bolshevik The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...

October Revolution The October Revolution, also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution (in Historiography in the Soviet Union, Soviet historiography), October coup, Bolshevik coup, or Bolshevik revolution, was the second of Russian Revolution, two r ...

and supported attempts to set up an anti-Bolshevik democratic government.

Later years

Minor left Russia in 1919. He settled in Paris, remained active in the community of Russian exiles and edited the journal ''Volia Rossii'' (''Russian Will''), together with V. M. Zenzinov and V. I. Lebedev. In 1921 he was one of the authors of an exposé of the

Kronstadt rebellion The Kronstadt rebellion () was a 1921 insurrection of Soviet sailors, Marines, naval infantry, and civilians against the Bolsheviks, Bolshevik government in the Russian port city of Kronstadt. Located on Kotlin Island in the Gulf of Finland, ...

and its suppression by the Bolsheviks, ''The Truth about Kronstadt''. Minor also served as chairman of the Society for Assistance to Exiles and Political Prisoners in Russia. Among his close friends was

Ilya Fondaminsky Ilya Isidorovich Fondaminsky (; February 17, 1880, — November 19, 1942), was a Russians, Russian author (writing under the pseudonym ''I. Bunakov'') and political activist. In the 1910s he was one of the leaders of the Socialist Revolutionary ...

('Bunakov'), a veteran SR who later converted from Judaism to Orthodox Christianity and was murdered in the

Auschwitz Auschwitz, or Oświęcim, was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) during World War II and the Holocaust. It consisted of Auschw ...

concentration camp in 1942. He wrote his memoirs, ''Eto Bylo Davno'' (''It was Long Ago''), covering the pre-war period; they were published posthumously in 1933.

References

*Minor, O.S., ''Eto bylo davno: Vospominaniia soldata revoliutsii''. Paris, 1933. *''Sotsialisticheskiy Vestnik'', 19 (1932), 16 *Chernov, V.M., 'Yidishe Tuer in der Partey Sotsial Revolutsionern' New York, 1948, pp. 246–58. *Slutsky, Y., 'Minor, Osip S.', in: ''Jewish Virtual Library''. Online at: https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/judaica/ejud_0002_0014_0_13949.html. *Hildermeier, M., ''Die Sozialrevolutionäre Partei Russlands.'' Cologne, 1979. *Slonim, M., 'Reminiscences on the Revolution .' In: ''Cahiers du Monde russe et soviétique.'' (1977) Vol. 18 No. 18-4. {{DEFAULTSORT:Minor, Osip 1861 births 1932 deaths Politicians from Minsk People from Minsky Uyezd Belarusian Jews Narodnaya Volya Socialist Revolutionary Party politicians Revolutionaries of the Russian Revolution Jewish socialists Russian Constituent Assembly members