Hirsh Lekert

Hirsh Lekert (born 1880 in Onuškis, in the Troksky Uyezd of Vilna GovernorateNachman Ben-Yehuda, "Political assassinations by Jews: a rhetorical device for justice", SUNY Press, 1993, pg. 106

/ref> died June 10, 1902 in VilniusJeffrey S. Gurock, "American Jewish history, Volume 3, Part 1", Taylor & Francis US, 1998, pg. 323

/ref>) was a Jewish socialist activist and member of the Bund.

Life

Lekert, an illiterate shoemaker, was active in the Bund since his youth. On May 24, 1900 he led a group of people in an attack on a police station in Vilnius and released three arrested workers. He was caught and exiled to Yekaterinoslav. He escaped in 1902 and came to Vilnius.

On May 18, 1902 he carried out an unsuccessful assassination attempt of the governor of Vilnius, General Victor von Wahl.Hirsz Abramowicz, Eva Zeitlin Dobkin, Dina Abramowicz, Jeffrey Shandler, David E. Fishman, Yivo Institute for Jewish Research, "Profiles of a lost world: memoirs of East European Jewish life before World", Wayne State University Press, 1999, pg. 141

/ref> When von Wahl, who had previously been a mayor of St. Petersburg, was made governor of the city, the Bund had organized demonstrations against him. Later von Wahl was responsible for repressive measures directed at Vilnius's workers, and the Bund in particular. Von Wahl ordered the arrest and flogging of a number of Jewish and Polish workers who had taken part in the May Day parade in 1902.Dovid Katz, "Words on Fire: The Unfinished Story of Yiddish", Basic Books, 2007, pg. 260

/ref> Because of the practices of his administration, plots for his assassination began to be formed soon after his arrival. Lekert, together with several other Bund members began watching von Wahl's movements, bought weapons and trained in forests outside of Vilna.

However, most of the formal plans fell through and Lekert's attempt was made without any preparation. Lekert, who was working as a shoemaker at the time, fired a pistol twice at the governor as von Wahl was exiting the circus show, wounding him in the leg and arm. Lekert was immediately arrested, beaten, then transferred to the city's prison.

Under pressure from the Minister of the Interior, Vyacheslav von Plehve, Hirsh Lekert was tried by a military court. He was convicted and sentenced to death by hanging. At his trial, Lekert, despite the advice of a local rabbi, refused to ask for forgiveness and gave an eloquent speech on the dignity of the Jewish worker.

The sentence was carried out on June 10, 1902. Subsequently, Hirsh Lekert became a folk heroEzra Mendelsohn, "Class struggle in the pale: the formative years of the Jewish workers' movement in Tsarist Russia", CUP Archive, 1970, pg. 131

/ref> to some in the workers' movement. Several dramas in Yiddish and many poems were written as a tribute to him. The most well known of these is the poem by Abraham Suckewer "די לערערען מיראַ" (''Di Lererin Mira'' - The Teacher Mira).Hirsz Abramowicz, Eva Zeitlin Dobkin, Dina Abramowicz, Jeffrey Shandler, David E. Fishman, Yivo Institute for Jewish Research, "Profiles of a lost world: memoirs of East European Jewish life before World", Wayne State University Press, 1999, pgs 132+

/ref>

References

External links

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Lekert, Hirsh
1880 births
1902 deaths
People from Trakai District Municipality
People from Troksky Uyezd
Lithuanian Jews
Bundists
Failed assassins
1902 crimes in Europe
People executed by the Russian Empire
Executed Lithuanian people
People executed by the Russian Empire by hanging
People executed for attempted murder