Yakov Naumovich Drobnis (

Russian Russian(s) may refer to: *Russians (), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *A citizen of Russia *Russian language, the most widely spoken of the Slavic languages *''The Russians'', a b ...

: Яков Наумович Дробнис; 6 March 1890 – 1 February 1937) was a

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, ...

revolutionary who supported

Leon Trotsky Lev Davidovich Bronstein ( – 21 August 1940), better known as Leon Trotsky,; ; also transliterated ''Lyev'', ''Trotski'', ''Trockij'' and ''Trotzky'' was a Russian revolutionary, Soviet politician, and political theorist. He was a key figure ...

. He was a defendant at one of the Moscow Show Trials.

Early life

Drobnis was born in

Hlukhiv Hlukhiv (, ; ) is a small historic List of cities in Ukraine, city on the Esman River. It belongs to Shostka Raion of Sumy Oblast of Ukraine. Population: It is known for being a capital of the Cossack Hetmanate after the deposition of Ivan M ...

, in Chernihiv province, in the Jewish

Pale of Settlement The Pale of Settlement was a western region of the Russian Empire with varying borders that existed from 1791 to 1917 (''de facto'' until 1915) in which permanent settlement by Jews was allowed and beyond which the creation of new Jewish settlem ...

in Ukraine. Born to a large Jewish family of shoemakers, he became an apprentice shoemaker after leaving primary school, but ran away to

Astrakhan Astrakhan (, ) is the largest city and administrative centre of Astrakhan Oblast in southern Russia. The city lies on two banks of the Volga, in the upper part of the Volga Delta, on eleven islands of the Caspian Depression, from the Caspian Se ...

at the age of 13. As a Jew, he was not allowed to remain and was deported back to Hlukhiv, where he met a shoemaker who had deported from

Baku Baku (, ; ) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Azerbaijan, largest city of Azerbaijan, as well as the largest city on the Caspian Sea and in the Caucasus region. Baku is below sea level, which makes it the List of capital ci ...

for political activity that introduced him to other revolutionaries. He joined the Hlukhiv branch of the

Russian Social Democratic Labour Party The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP), also known as the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party (RSDWP) or the Russian Social Democratic Party (RSDP), was a socialist political party founded in 1898 in Minsk, Russian Empire. The ...

(RSDLP) in 1906. He was arrested and held in prison for six weeks for taking part in a strike. He was arrested again in January 1908, and charged with membership of the RSDLP. This time, he was held for ten months awaiting trial, then sentenced to five years in prison. On his release, he moved to

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 ...

, where he was arrested, for the third time in January 1915 and deported to

Poltava Poltava (, ; , ) is a city located on the Vorskla, Vorskla River in Central Ukraine, Central Ukraine. It serves as the administrative center of Poltava Oblast as well as Poltava Raion within the oblast. It also hosts the administration of Po ...

, where he joined the local Bolshevik organisation.

Russian Revolution

After 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 ...

, Drobnis was elected to the Poltava

Duma A duma () is a Russian assembly with advisory or legislative functions. The term ''boyar duma'' is used to refer to advisory councils in Russia from the 10th to 17th centuries. Starting in the 18th century, city dumas were formed across Russia ...

, and helped create the Poltava

Soviet The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

. When the soviet was smashed by Ukrainian nationalists. Drobnis arrested, and threatened with execution, but released after the Poltava Duma intervened. In 1918, after the

Bolshevik Revolution The October Revolution, also known as the Great October Socialist Revolution (in Soviet historiography), October coup, Bolshevik coup, or Bolshevik revolution, was the second of two revolutions in Russia in 1917. It was led by Vladimir L ...

, he was a founder and member of the Central Committee of the Ukrainian Communist Party. He was caught organising

guerilla Guerrilla warfare is a form of unconventional warfare in which small groups of irregular military, such as rebels, partisans, paramilitary personnel or armed civilians, which may include recruited children, use ambushes, sabotage, terrorism ...

detachments to fight against the government of

Symon Petliura Symon Vasyliovych Petliura (; – 25 May 1926) was a Ukrainian politician and journalist. He was the Supreme Commander of the Ukrainian People's Army (UNA) and led the Ukrainian People's Republic during the Ukrainian War of Independence, a pa ...

and was sentenced to be shot. He escaped, but was wounded, and had to hide out until the arrival of the Red Army. He was wounded and captured again while fighting against the

White White is the lightest color and is achromatic (having no chroma). It is the color of objects such as snow, chalk, and milk, and is the opposite of black. White objects fully (or almost fully) reflect and scatter all the visible wa ...

army commanded by General Denikin, but escaped. In 1920–22, Drobnis was chairman of the executive of the Poltava Soviet. During this period, he was kidnapped by bandits who held him hostage in a cellar until the Red Army secured his release. In this period, he supported the

Democratic Centralist Democratic centralism is the organisational principle of most communist parties, in which decisions are made by a process of vigorous and open debate amongst party membership, and are subsequently binding upon all members of the party. The con ...

opposition group, led by Timofei Sapronov and Vladimir M. Smirnov. He was recalled from Ukraine in 1922, because of his involvement with the Democratic Centralists, and worked the government of the Russian Federation for year, then in 1923–27, for Administrative and Financial Commission of the USSR government. Drobnis signed the Declaration of the Forty-Six in 1923, and backed Trotsky in the split that opened up within the Communist Party after the death of its founder,

Vladimir Lenin Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov ( 187021 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin, was a Russian revolutionary, politician and political theorist. He was the first head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 until Death and state funeral of ...

. In 1924, Drobnis was passed a letter written by a fellow oppositionist named Pililenko, who called for mass recruitment to the left opposition, and reputedly advocated creating a breakaway political party. He showed it to V.M.Smirnov. When the party authorities found out, Pililenko was expelled, and Drobnis received a severe reprimand. He was expelled from the communist party in December 1927. In 1929, he was arrested and deported to Siberia, but in 1930 he renounced the opposition and was reinstated as a party member.

Arrest and execution

Drobnis was arrested again on 6 August 1936. On 23 September, there was an explosion in a mine in

Kemerovo Kemerovo ( rus, Ке́мерово, p=ˈkʲemʲɪrəvə) is an industrial types of inhabited localities in Russia, city and the administrative center of Kemerovo Oblast, Russia, located at the confluence of the Iskitimka River, Iskitimka and Tom ...

, in Siberia, close to where he was employed in 1934–36 as an assistant director of the Kemerovo Chemical Works. Though it was probably an accident, the

NKVD The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (, ), abbreviated as NKVD (; ), was the interior ministry and secret police of the Soviet Union from 1934 to 1946. The agency was formed to succeed the Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU) se ...

treated it as sabotage, and forced Drobnis to confess his role in planning the explosion. He appeared as a witness when the director and eight others employed at the mine were put on trial in

Novosibirsk Novosibirsk is the largest city and administrative centre of Novosibirsk Oblast and the Siberian Federal District in Russia. As of the 2021 Russian census, 2021 census, it had a population of 1,633,595, making it the most populous city in Siber ...

on 19–22 November. In January 1937, he appeared as a defendant alongside Yuri Pyatakov,

Karl Radek Karl Berngardovich Radek (; 31 October 1885 – 19 May 1939) was a revolutionary and writer active in the Polish and German social democratic movements before World War I and a Communist International leader in the Soviet Union after the Russian ...

and others at the second of three major Moscow show trials, where he confessed to having organised the explosion on Trotsky's orders, and pleaded with the court: "If you find it in the least possible to save me from shameful death, and, after putting me to the severest test, permit me to return to the ranks of the class from which I came, I shall regard it as my great and sacred duty fully to justify this gift.". He was sentenced to death on 30 January 1937, and shot two days later. Drobnis was posthumously rehabilitated and reinstated in the Communist Party in 1988.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Drobnis, Yakov 1890 births 1937 deaths People from Hlukhiv People from Glukhovsky Uyezd Ukrainian Jews Soviet Jews Bundists Russian Social Democratic Labour Party members Old Bolsheviks Group of Democratic Centralism Left Opposition Ukrainian Trotskyists Soviet Trotskyists Jewish socialists Trial of the Seventeen Great Purge victims from Ukraine Jews executed by the Soviet Union