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Georgy Ippolitovich Oppokov (russian: Гео́ргий Ипполи́тович Оппо́ков; also known as Afanasi Lomov) (28 January 1888 – 2 September 1937) was a prominent
Bolshevik The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...
leader,
Soviet The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nation ...
politician and the first People's Commissar for Justice of Soviet Russia.


Early career

Georgi Oppokov was born in
Saratov Saratov (, ; rus, Сара́тов, a=Ru-Saratov.ogg, p=sɐˈratəf) is the largest city and administrative center of Saratov Oblast, Russia, and a major port on the Volga River upstream (north) of Volgograd. Saratov had a population of 901,36 ...
, the son of a bank manager and member of the minor
nobility Nobility is a social class found in many societies that have an aristocracy (class), aristocracy. It is normally ranked immediately below Royal family, royalty. Nobility has often been an Estates of the realm, estate of the realm with many e ...
. He joined the
Bolsheviks The Bolsheviks (russian: Большевики́, from большинство́ ''bol'shinstvó'', 'majority'),; derived from ''bol'shinstvó'' (большинство́), "majority", literally meaning "one of the majority". also known in English ...
as a schoolboy, in 1903, and led a combat squad in Saratov during the 1905 revolution. In 1907-08, he was a member of the Moscow committee of the
Russian Social Democratic Labour Party The Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP; in , ''Rossiyskaya sotsial-demokraticheskaya rabochaya partiya (RSDRP)''), also known as the Russian Social Democratic Workers' Party or the Russian Social Democratic Party, was a socialist pol ...
. Arrested in July 1910, he was exiled to the
Arkhangelsk Arkhangelsk (, ; rus, Арха́нгельск, p=ɐrˈxanɡʲɪlʲsk), also known in English as Archangel and Archangelsk, is a types of inhabited localities in Russia, city and the administrative center of Arkhangelsk Oblast, Russia. It lies o ...
region for three years. Released in February 1913, under an amnesty to mark the tricentenary of the
Romanov dynasty The House of Romanov (also transcribed Romanoff; rus, Романовы, Románovy, rɐˈmanəvɨ) was the reigning imperial house of Russia from 1613 to 1917. They achieved prominence after the Tsarina, Anastasia Romanova, was married to ...
, he returned to Moscow, and was one of the founders of the metal workers' union. He was expelled from Moscow in 1914, and returned to Saratov, where he was arrested in April 1916, and deported to Irkutsk.


Post-revolutionary Career

After the February Revolution, in 1917, Oppokov returned to Moscow, and under the name 'Lomov' was elected a candidate member of the Central Committee of the Bolsheviks at the Sixth Party Congress in August 1917. As one of its youngest members, he was a keen backer of
Vladimir Lenin Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov. ( 1870 – 21 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin,. was a Russian revolutionary, politician, and political theorist. He served as the first and founding head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 to 19 ...
's call for a second revolution. On October 3, speaking on behalf of the Moscow Regional Party Committee, while Lenin was in hiding, he delivered a sharp rebuke to fellow members of the Central Committee for wavering on this issue. After the
Bolshevik Revolution The October Revolution,. officially known as the Great October Socialist Revolution. in the Soviet Union, also known as the Bolshevik Revolution, was a revolution in Russia led by the Bolshevik Party of Vladimir Lenin that was a key moment ...
in November 1917, he was appointed People's Commissar for Justice, but surrendered this post when the Bolsheviks entered into a brief coalition with the
Left Socialist Revolutionaries The Party of Left Socialist-Revolutionaries (russian: Партия левых социалистов-революционеров-интернационалистов) was a revolutionary socialist political party formed during the Russian Rev ...
. He was also a Bolshevik candidate in the 1917 Russian Constituent Assembly election, being fielded in the Arkhangelsk constituency. In December he was appointed a member of the Supreme Economic Council (Vesenkha). From January 1918, Lomov was a supporter of the Left Communists, led by Nikolai Bukharin, who opposed the Brest-Litovsk Treaty, proposing instead to fight a 'revolutionary war' against Germany. On 23 February, along with Bukharin and others, he resigned from all his posts to campaign against the treaty, but his resignation was not accepted, and in March, he was re-elected a candidate member of the Central Committee. In March 1918 he was ousted from his leading position win Vesenkha, but was later placed in charge of its timber administration, and was responsible for timber supplies throughout the
Russian Civil War , date = October Revolution, 7 November 1917 – Yakut revolt, 16 June 1923{{Efn, The main phase ended on 25 October 1922. Revolt against the Bolsheviks continued Basmachi movement, in Central Asia and Tungus Republic, the Far East th ...
. In 1921-23, he was based in Siberia, as a member of the economic council. In 1923, he was appointed head of the Oil Syndicate. Abandoning his former allegiance to the left, he supported
Joseph Stalin Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin (born Ioseb Besarionis dze Jughashvili; – 5 March 1953) was a Georgian revolutionary and Soviet political leader who led the Soviet Union from 1924 until his death in 1953. He held power as General Secretar ...
against
Leon Trotsky Lev Davidovich Bronstein. ( – 21 August 1940), better known as Leon Trotsky; uk, link= no, Лев Давидович Троцький; also transliterated ''Lyev'', ''Trotski'', ''Trotskij'', ''Trockij'' and ''Trotzky''. (), was a Russian ...
in the rift that followed Lenin's death, and having been dropped from the Central Committee, he was returned as a full member in December 1927. In 1931-34, he was deputy head of
Gosplan The State Planning Committee, commonly known as Gosplan ( rus, Госплан, , ɡosˈpɫan), was the agency responsible for central economic planning in the Soviet Union. Established in 1921 and remaining in existence until the dissolution of ...
. In February 1934, he was appointed a member of the bureau of the Central Control Commission.


Arrest and Death

In June 1937, one of Lomov's colleagues in Gosplan wrote to Stalin denouncing him as someone who had been friendly with Bukharin. Stalin forwarded the note to
Vyacheslav Molotov Vyacheslav Mikhaylovich Molotov. ; (;. 9 March Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates">O._S._25_February.html" ;"title="Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates.html" ;"title="nowiki/>Old Style and New Style dates">O. S. 25 February">Old_Style_and_New_Style_dat ...
asking "What to do?". Molotov responded: "I'm for arresting this bastard Lomov immediately." He was arrested on 25 June, and shot on 2 September 1937.


Family

Lomov's wife, Natalya, was arrested on 17 July 1937 and sentenced to eight years in a labour camp for not reporting her husband's 'criminal activities'. She was released early, in 1940, but rearrested in 1941 and sentenced to 10 years in the labour camps, then arrested for the third time in 1949. She was 'rehabilitated' in December 1954. Their daughter, Nina, a student at the Moscow Institute of Foreign Languages was arrested at the age of 20, in June 1939, and sentenced to three years in a labour camp.


Personality

Simon Liberman, a
Menshevik The Mensheviks (russian: меньшевики́, from меньшинство 'minority') were one of the three dominant factions in the Russian socialist movement, the others being the Bolsheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries. The factions eme ...
who worked for the timber trust described Lomov as "an honest, direct man with old-fashioned ideas about the comradeship of the revolutionary circles and about the morals of the revolution itself" adding: Lomov/Oppokov was posthumously rehabilitated in 1956. The circumstances of his arrest were revealed by the former head of the
KGB The KGB (russian: links=no, lit=Committee for State Security, Комитет государственной безопасности (КГБ), a=ru-KGB.ogg, p=kəmʲɪˈtʲet ɡəsʊˈdarstvʲɪn(ː)əj bʲɪzɐˈpasnəsʲtʲɪ, Komitet gosud ...
,
Alexander Shelepin Alexander Nikolayevich Shelepin (; 18 August 1918 – 24 October 1994) was a Soviet politician and security and intelligence officer. A long-time member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, he served as First Depu ...
, in his speech to the 22nd Congress in 1961.


Notes


External links


Georgy Oppokov Archive
at marxists.org {{DEFAULTSORT:Oppokov, Georgy Ippolitovich 1888 births 1938 deaths Politicians from Saratov People from Saratovsky Uyezd Russian nobility Old Bolsheviks Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union members People's commissars and ministers of the Soviet Union Russian Constituent Assembly members Central Executive Committee of the Soviet Union members Left communists Left Opposition Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine (Soviet Union) members Great Purge victims from Russia Soviet rehabilitations Soviet Ministers of Justice