Szymon Petlyura (10 May 1879-25 May 1926) was the second Chairman of the Directory of the People's Republic of Ukraine from 1919 until his assassination in 1926 by Sholom Schwarzbard during the Russian Civil War. The leader of the White Army's resistance to the Bolsheviks in the 1920s, he was an ally of Poland and was a freedom fighter who tried but failed to protect Jews. He was slain by five shots from Schwarzbard in Paris, who held Petlyura responsible for a 1919 pogrom that left his family dead.
Biography[]
Petlyura was born to a Cossack family in Poltava in the Russian Empire Province of Ukraine. He planned to become an Orthodox priest but instead joined the Ukrainian Revolutionary Party in 1895 and in 1903 he was arrested for anti-government propaganda. In 1917, after the February Revolution overthrew Nicholas II of Russia, Petlyura attended the First All-Ukrainian Congress of Soldier Deputies in Kiev and on 28 June was made Secretary for Military Affairs.
He was captured once more in 1918 when the Ukrainian State, an anti-socialist government, seized power in the Hetmanate Putsch but later participated in a counter-revolution and in February 1919, he succeeded Volodymyr Vynnychenko as the Chairman of the Directory (President) of the People's Republic of Ukraine.
As the leader of the fledgling republic, Petlyura saw much fighting when the Russian Civil War began in late 1918 against the Bolshevik Communists, Anton Denikin's White Army, and Rumania. During this time, Petlyura gained criticism for his forces' treatment of Jews. He was called a freedom fighter who sought to protect Jews and a fierce anti-communist fighter, but was held responsible for pogroms. Petlyura was afraid to punish officers who led these pogroms because he did not want to lose support, and could not achieve his goal of preventing anti-Jewish violence, which left him as an unpopular figure among Ukraine's large Jewish population.
Petlyura allied with Poland in the Russo-Polish War of 1921, and assisted in their counterattack against Russian forces that overwhelmed Ukraine and much of Poland. However, he did not regain independence and lived the rest of his life in exile in countries such as Poland, Switzerland, and France.
Death[]
Sholom Schwarzbard, a Jewish poet from Ukraine, held Petlyura responsible for a pogrom in 1919 that left his family dead. Schwarzbard met Petlyura in the Rue Racine as he walked and asked if he was "Mr. Petlyura". Petlyura raised his walking cane, and Schwarzbard responded by shooting him five times with a pistol and twice more while he was floored. A policeman asked if "that was enough", and when Schwarzbard responded positively, the policeman took his revolver from him. Schwarzbard claimed to have killed a "great assassin" and was overcome with joy when the policeman said that Petlyura had died; Schwarzbard threw his arms around the man's neck and hugged him.
Schwarzbard was acquitted of the charges, having been accused of being a Soviet agent, although he was an anarchist who wanted to take revenge for his family's termination.