Mikhail Frolenko

Mikhail Frolenko, of a retired sergeant major, was born in Stavropol in November 1848. He studied at the St. Petersburg Institute of Technology and in 1871 entered the Petrovskoe Agricultural Academy in Moscow.

Frolenko became involved in revolutionary politics and in 1873 he became a member of the Moscow branch of the Circle of Tchaikovsky. According to the The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979): "He went underground in 1874 and from 1875 to 1877 was aligned with the Southern Rebels. Frolenko helped V. F. Kostiurin escape in 1877 and V. Stefanovich, L. G. Deutsch, and I. V. Bokhanovskii escape in 1878. He took part in an attempt to free P. I. Voinaraliskii and in the digging of a passage under the Kherson Treasury in 1879."

In 1878, Frolenko became a member of Land and Liberty and attended the organization’s Lipetsk and Voronezh congresses. After the formation of the People’s Will, he was sent to tour southern Russia in search of recruits. Frolenko, a member of the Executive Committee, agreed with the decision to try to assassinate Tsar Alexander II. A directive committee was formed consisting of Frolenko, Andrei Zhelyabov, Timofei Mikhailov, Lev Tikhomirov, Vera Figner, Sophia Perovskaya and Anna Yakimova. Zhelyabov was considered the leader of the group. However, Figner considered him to be overbearing and lacking in depth: "He had not suffered enough. For him all was hope and light." Zhelyabov had a magnetic personality and had a reputation for exerting a strong influence over women.

Zhelyabov and Perovskaya attempted to use nitroglycerine to destroy the Tsar train. However, the terrorist miscalculated and it destroyed another train instead. An attempt the blow up the Kamenny Bridge in St. Petersburg as the Tsar was passing over it was also unsuccessful. Figner blamed Zhelyabov for these failures but others in the group felt he had been unlucky rather than incompetent.

In November 1879 Stefan Khalturin managed to find work as a carpenter in the Winter Palace. According to Adam Bruno Ulam, the author of Prophets and Conspirators in Pre-Revolutionary Russia (1998): "There was, incomprehensible as it seems, no security check of workman employed at the palace. Stephan Khalturin, a joiner, long sought by the police as one of the organizers of the Northern Union of Russian workers, found no difficulty in applying for and getting a job there under a false name. Conditions at the palace, judging from his reports to revolutionary friends, epitomized those of Russia itself: the outward splendor of the emperor's residence concealed utter chaos in its management: people wandered in and out, and imperial servants resplendent in livery were paid as little as fifteen rubles a month and were compelled to resort to pilfering. The working crew were allowed to sleep in a cellar apartment directly under the dining suite."

Khalturin approached George Plekhanov about the possibility of using this opportunity to kill Tsar Alexander II. He rejected the idea but did put him in touch with the People's Will who were committed to a policy of assassination. It was agreed that Khalturin should try and kill the Tsar and each day he brought packets of dynamite, supplied by Anna Yakimova and Nikolai Kibalchich, into his room and concealed it in his bedding.

On 17th February, 1880, Stefan Khalturin constructed a mine in the basement of the building under the dinning-room. The mine went off at half-past six at the time that the People's Will had calculated Alexander II would be having his dinner. However, his main guest, Prince Alexander of Battenburg, had arrived late and dinner was delayed and the dinning-room was empty. Alexander was unharmed but sixty-seven people were killed or badly wounded by the explosion.

The People's Will contacted the Russian government and claimed they would call off the terror campaign if the Russian people were granted a constitution that provided free elections and an end to censorship. On 25th February, 1880, Alexander II announced that he was considering granting the Russian people a constitution. To show his good will a number of political prisoners were released from prison. Mikhail Loris-Melikof, the Minister of the Interior, was given the task of devising a constitution that would satisfy the reformers but at the same time preserve the powers of the autocracy. At the same time the Russian Police Department established a special section that dealt with internal security. This unit eventually became known as the Okhrana. Under the control of Loris-Melikof, undercover agents began joining political organizations that were campaigning for social reform.

The People's Will became increasingly angry at the failure of the Russian government to announce details of the new constitution. They therefore began to make plans for another assassination attempt. Those involved in the plot included Frolenko, Sophia Perovskaya, Andrei Zhelyabov, Vera Figner, Anna Yakimova, Grigory Isaev, Gesia Gelfman, Nikolai Sablin, Ignatei Grinevitski, Nikolai Kibalchich, Nikolai Rysakov, Timofei Mikhailov, Tatiana Lebedeva and Alexander Kviatkovsky.

Isaev and Yakimova were commissioned to prepare the bombs that were needed to kill the Tsar. Isaev made some technical error and a bomb went off badly damaging his right hand. Yakimova took him to hospital, where she watched over his bed to prevent him from incriminating himself in his delirium. As soon as he regained consciousness he insisted on leaving, although he was now missing three fingers of his right hand. He was unable to continue working and Yakimova now had sole responsibility for preparing the bombs.

During this period Frolenko married Tatiana Lebedeva to help them in the plots against Tsar Alexander II. According to Cathy Porter: "Frolenko and Tatiana moved to Tula, where they were married. For the first few days in Odessa they had remained on formal 'terms with each other, although the situation demanded that they keep up a show of marital intimacy for the benefit of their neighbours. In the week they spent together however they learnt to overcome their mutual distrust. Tatianaa emerged not as a sentimental idealist but as a modest worker, with a subtle sarcastic sense of humour, a passion for poetry and remarkable powers of endurance. She was not a tender woman, but she seems to have impressed everyone with her intense loyalty and integrity. Frolenko now no longer appeared to her as a heartless manipulative terrorist. They grew passionately fond of one another, and vowed to work together whenever possible. Shortly after their marriage they returned to the capital together."

The Okhrana discovered that their was a plot to kill Alexander II. One of their leaders, Andrei Zhelyabov, was arrested on 28th February, 1881, but refused to provide any information on the conspiracy. He confidently told the police that nothing they could do would save the life of the Tsar. Alexander Kviatkovsky, another member of the assassination team, was arrested soon afterwards.

The conspirators decided to make their attack on 1st March, 1881. Sophia Perovskaya was worried that the Tsar would now change his route for his Sunday drive. She therefore gave the orders for bombers to he placed along the Ekaterinsky Canal. Grigory Isaev had laid a mine on Malaya Sadovaya Street and Anna Yakimova was to watch from the window of her flat and when she saw the carriage approaching give the signal to Mikhail Frolenko.

Tsar Alexander II decided to travel along the Ekaterinsky Canal. An armed Cossack sat with the coach-driver and another six Cossacks followed on horseback. Behind them came a group of police officers in sledges. Perovskaya, who was stationed at the intersection between the two routes, gave the signal to Nikolai Rysakov and Timofei Mikhailov to throw their bombs at the Tsar's carriage. The bombs missed the carriage and instead landed amongst the Cossacks. The Tsar was unhurt but insisted on getting out of the carriage to check the condition of the injured men. While he was standing with the wounded Cossacks another terrorist, Ignatei Grinevitski, threw his bomb. Alexander was killed instantly and the explosion was so great that Grinevitski also died from the bomb blast.

Nikolai Rysakov, one of the bombers was arrested at the scene of the crime. Sophia Perovskaya told her comrades: "I know Rysakov and he will say nothing." However, Rysakov was tortured by the Okhrana and was forced to give information on the other conspirators. The following day the police raided the flat being used by the terrorists. Gesia Gelfman was arrested but Nikolai Sablin committed suicide before he could be taken alive. Soon afterwards, Timofei Mikhailov, walked into the trap and was arrested.

Thousands of Cossacks were sent into St. Petersburg and roadblocks were set up, and all routes out of the city were barred. An arrest warrant was issued for Sophia Perovskaya. Her bodyguard, Tyrkov, claimed that she seemed to have "lost her mind" and refused to try and escape from the city. According to Tyrkov, her main concern was to develop a plan to rescue Andrei Zhelyabov from prison. She became depressed when on the 3rd March, the newspapers reported that Zhelyabov had claimed full responsibility for the assassination and therefore signing his own death warrant.

Perovskaya was arrested while walking along the Nevsky Prospect on 10th March. Later that month, Mikhail Frolenko, Nikolai Kibalchich and Grigory Isaev were also arrested. However, other members of the conspiracy, including Vera Figner and Anna Yakimova, managed to escape from the city. Perovskaya was interrogated by Vyacheslav Plehve, the Director of the Police Department. She admitted her involvement in the assassination but refused to name any of her fellow conspirators.

The trial of Zhelyabov, Perovskaya, Kibalchich, Rysakov, Helfman and Mikhailov, opened on 25th March, 1881. Prosecutor Muraviev read his immensely long speech that included the passage: "Cast out by men, accursed of their country, may they answer for their crimes before Almighty God! But peace and calm will be restored. Russia, humbling herself before the Will of that Providence which has led her through so sore a burning faith in her glorious future."

Sophia Perovskaya, Andrei Zhelyabov, Nikolai Kibalchich, Nikolai Rysakov, Gesia Gelfman and Timofei Mikhailov were all sentenced to death. Gelfman announced she was four months pregnant and it was decided to postpone her execution. Perovskaya, as a member of the high nobility, she could appeal against her sentence, however, she refused to do this. It was claimed that Rysakov had gone insane during interrogation. Kibalchich also showed signs that he was mentally unbalanced and talked constantly about a flying machine he had invented.

On 3rd April 1881, Zhelyabov, Perovskaya, Kibalchich, Rysakov and Mikhailov were given tea and handed their black execution clothes. A placard was hung round their necks with the word "Tsaricide" on it. Cathy Porter, the author of Fathers and Daughters: Russian Women in Revolution (1976), has pointed out: "Then the party set off. It was headed by the police carriage, followed by Zhelyabov and Rysakov. Sophia sat with Kibalchich and Mikhailov in the third tumbril. A pale wintry sun shone as the party moved slowly through the streets, already crowded with onlookers, most of them waving and shouting encouragement. High government officials and those wealthy enough to afford the tickets were sitting near to the scaffold that had been erected on Semenovsky Square. The irreplaceable Frolov, Russia's one and only executioner, fiddled drunkenly with the nooses, and Sophia and Zhelyabov were able to say a few last words to one another. The square was surrounded by twelve thousand troops and muffled drum beats sounded. Sophia and Zhelyabov kissed for the last time, then Mikhailov and Kibalchich kissed Sophia. Kibalchich was led to the gallows and hanged. Then it was Mikhailov's turn. Frolov was by now barely able to see straight and the rope broke three times under Mikhailov's weight." It was now Perovskaya's turn. "It's too tight" she told him as he struggled to tie the noose. She died straight away but Zhelyabov, whose noose had not been tight enough, died in agony.

Gesia Gelfman remained in prison. According to her friend, Olga Liubatovich: "Gesia languished under the threat of execution for five months; finally her sentence was commuted, just before she was to deliver. At the hands of the authorities, the terrible act of childbirth became a case of torture unprecedented in human history. For the delivery, they transferred her to the House of Detention. The torments suffered by poor Gesia Gelfman exceeded those dreamed up by the executioners of the Middle Ages; but Gesia didn't go mad - her constitution was too strong. The child was born live, and she was even able to nurse it." Soon after she gave birth her daughter was taken from her. Gelfman died five days later on 12th October, 1882.

Frolenko, Anna Yakimova, Grigory Isaev, Tatiana Lebedeva and sixteen other party members were arrested and tried. Although they were all found guilty, because of the international protests by Victor Hugo and other well-known figures, they were not sentenced to death. Instead they were sent to Trubetskov Dungeon. As Cathy Porter has pointed out: "Those sentenced in the Trial of the 20 were sent to the Trubetskov Dungeon, one of the most horrible of Russian prisons. Few survived the ordeal; torture and rape were everyday occurrences in the dungeons, through whose soundproofed walls little information reached the outside world.... After a year in Trubetskoy, during which most of the prisoners had died or committed suicide."

Anna Yakimova had her baby in the prison and had to watch over him night and day to protect him from rats. In 1883 she and Frolenko's wife, Tatiana Lebedeva were transferred to the Kara Prison Mines. The journey north, which was on foot, lasted two years, was hardly better than life in Trubetskov Dungeon. As it was clear that her baby would not survive the long journey, Yakimova gave it away to "some well-wishers who had come out to greet the prisoners with messages of support and tears of sympathy"

The women joined other revolutionaries such as Catherine Breshkovskaya and Anna Korba at Kara. Anna was twenty-five years old by the time she reached the prison mines. Tatiana, three years older, was in a poor state of health and was described as a "semi-blind, shaven-headed, prematurely aged cripple". Despite being cared for by Korba, who was a qualified doctor, she died, aged 34, in 1887.

Frolenko remained in prison until the 1905 Russian Revolution. He was freed in October 1905 and went to live in Gelendzhik, where he contributed to the journal Byloe. Frolenko moved to Moscow in 1922, where he became a member of the Society of Former Political Prisoners and Exiles and served on the editorial board of the journal Katorga Issylka. He joined the Russian Communist Party in 1936.

Mikhail Frolenko died in Moscow on 15th February, 1938.

Primary Sources

(1) The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979)

The son of a retired sergeant major, Frolenko graduated from the Stavropol’ Gymnasium in 1870. He studied at the St. Petersburg Institute of Technology and in 1871 entered the Petrovskoe Agricultural Academy in Moscow. In 1873 and 1874 he was a member of the Moscow branch of the Chaikovskii circle; he carried on propaganda among the workers and took part in the “going to the people” movement in the Urals. He went underground in 1874 and from 1875 to 1877 was aligned with the Southern Rebels. Frolenko helped V. F. Kostiurin escape in 1877 and la. V. Stefanovich, L. G. Deutsch, and I. V. Bokhanovskii escape in 1878. He took part in an attempt to free P. I. Voinaral’-skii and in the digging of a passage under the Kherson Treasury in 1879.

In 1878, Frolenko became a member of Land and Liberty and attended the organization’s Lipetsk and Voronezh congresses. After the formation of the People’s Will, he served on its Executive Committee and took part in attempts to murder Emperor Alexander II in November 1879, near Odessa, and on Mar. 1, 1881. He was arrested on Mar. 17, 1881, in St. Petersburg and in the Trial of the 20 was condemned to death, a sentence that was commuted to hard labor for life.

(2) Cathy Porter, Fathers and Daughters: Russian Women in Revolution (1976)

Frolenko and Tatiana moved to Tula, where they were married. For the first few days in Odessa they had remained on formal terms with each other, although the situation demanded that they keep up a show of marital intimacy for the benefit of their neighbours. In the week they spent together however they learnt to overcome their mutual distrust. Tatianaa emerged not as a sentimental idealist but as a modest worker, with a subtle sarcastic sense of humour, a passion for poetry and remarkable powers of endurance. She was not a tender woman, but she seems to have impressed everyone with her intense loyalty and integrity. Frolenko now no longer appeared to her as a heartless manipulative terrorist. They grew passionately fond of one another, and vowed to work together whenever possible. Shortly after their marriage they returned to the capital together.