One of the most prominent politicians of the 20th century was Vladimir Lenin, who transformed
Russia to become a one party socialist state governed by the Communist Party.
His actions during the February Revolution would oust the Tsar, and Lenin would then
return to Russia and play a leading role in the October Revolution in which the Bolsheviks’
overthrew the new regime.
He is considered one of the most significant figures of the 20th century, and he is still
seen today as a highly controversial and divisive figure.
But throughout his life he did experience a number of assassination attempts, including
one which was organised and carried out by a Ukrainian Jewish woman, who at the age of
28 would be executed for her attempt to kill Lenin.
Join us today as we look at the brutal execution of Fanny Kaplan, the Assassin of Lenin.
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Born Feign Haimovna Roytblat, Fanny Kaplan was born on the 10th February 1890, and very
little is known about her early life and background.
She was born into a Jewish family, and her father was a teacher and she had 7 brothers
and sisters.
She was sometimes referred to as Dora, and she was educated at home and then left home
to work as a Milliner in Odesa.
She then became part of the Socialist Revolutionaries, and joined a socialist group becoming a revolutionary.
But in 1906, at the age of 16 she was arrested in Kyiv.
There had been a terrorist bomb plot in the Ukrainian city, and she was captured after
a bomb her and her partner were working on exploded accidentally.
But because of this she was sentenced to life inside of a hard labour prison camp, and then
she was held inside of a number of prisons in Siberia, and she then lost her sight.
This would come back, but she was released on the 3rd March 1917, following the February
Revolution which destabilised the imperial government.
However because of the horrific treatment she was subjected to, Kaplan suffered from
headaches and migraines throughout her life, and also periods where she would go blind.
But around 1917, she would lost heart and motivation with Lenin, and there was conflict
between the Socialist Revolutionaries and also the Bolsheviks.
The Bolshevik’s had strong support, but they failed to win a majority in the November
1917 elections, and a Socialist Revolutionary was elected president in the following January.
The Bolsheviks supporting the Soviets ordered for the Constituent Assembly to be closed
down, and then the Bolshevik’s began to ban other influential political parties, including
the one Fanny Kaplan supported.
They turned on their Socialist Revolutionary allies who had been their main coalition partner
for some time, but then Kaplan began to work out how she could assassinate Lenin, as she
thought he was now a traitor to the Revolution.
On the 30th August 1918, Lenin spoke at the Hammer and Sickle which was a weapons factory
in southern Moscow.
But he did not know that there that day was a young woman who was planning to assassinate
him.
Fanny Kaplan was there near the exit of the building, and as Lenin left the building and
walked towards his car, Kaplan shouted out to him.
She called out his name, and Lenin turned towards her and Fanny Kaplan then fired three
shots at Lenin with her Browning pistol.
One of these bullets passed through his coat, and the other two hit him.
One went through his neck and punctured part of his left lung, and the bullet then stopped
near his right collarbone.
The other bullet was lodged in his left shoulder.
Quickly Lenin was taken away, and he was escorted to his living quarters at the Kremlin, and
he became paranoid that more assassins were waiting for him.
He believed that the hospitals were too dangerous for him, and he said he would not leave the
Kremlin, and ordered that doctors should be brought to him to treat him.
But this left them with a problem, as Lenin needed to be in a hospital to remove the bullet,
and they had to leave these in as he refused to go to a medical facility.
However Vladimir Lenin managed to survive, however his health would never recover from
the attack, and it’s believed that the effects of the shooting led to his strokes that left
him in his later life so incapacitate.
Thee eventually killed him, so if these bullets did cause his strokes, then chances are that
Fanny Kaplan’s execution attempt could have been considered successful.
There are a number of stories relating to her capture.
One is that following the three shots being fired, a woman who looked suspicious was detained,
and this turned out to be Kaplan.
However another account said she was arrested after several children identified her.
During her interrogation she said, "My name is Fanya Kaplan.
Today I shot Lenin.
I did it on my own.
I will not say from whom I obtained my revolver.
I will give no details.
I had resolved to kill Lenin long ago.
I consider him a traitor to the Revolution.
I was exiled to Akatui for participating in an assassination attempt against a Tsarist
official in Kyiv.
I spent 11 years at hard labour.
After the Revolution, I was freed.
I favoured the Constituent Assembly and am still for it" However she would not turn over
any accomplices.
A military commander would later turn state’s evidence against her, and said that Kaplan
had been a member of a Socialist Revolutionary plot to kill Lenin, and that she was regarded
as the Best person to carry out the attack.’
It was suggested in the years after that she was working with other people, and as she
was nearly blind someone else would have needed to help her.
None of the witnesses also saw her fire the gun, and it’s believed that many suspects
were arrested.
Interestingly also, the bullet removed from Lenin’s neck after his death was found to
have been fired from a weapon that may have been different to the one that Kaplan had.
However as she would not give over any accomplices, Fanny Kaplan was marked as a lost case, and
the Soviets had no other options than to order her execution.
In Alexander Garden, Kaplan was led out and there the commander of the Kremlin, a former
Baltic Sailor P.D Malkov and a group of Latvian Bolsheviks executed her.
On the 3rd September 1918, she was met by her executioners, and then they shot her in
the back of the head.
Following this they stuffed her body into a barrel, and set it on fire.
Yakov Sverdlov had given this order, and he was the same man who had ordered the execution
of the Tsar and his family.
Her remains were completely destroyed, and there were rumours that she did survive in
a Siberian labour camp, but this was not the case.
Fanny Kaplan was just 28 when she was executed inside of a park by government officials.
She was a woman who suffered following her imprisonment, and she did experience blindness.
There has been much debate about her role in the execution, and many believe that she
would have not been capable to shoot Lenin due to her eyesight.
But Lenin would live, however his health following the assassination attempt would never be the
same, and he would suffer with his health until the day he died.
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