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Trotsky Page 38

by Bertrand M. Patenaude


  “Lev Davidovich!”: Glotzer, 50.

  Zina was already mentally unstable…worshipped her father: Deutscher III, 117–21; Volkogonov, 348–53.

  “I am a good-for-nothing”…“You are an astonishing person”: Deutscher III, 120–21, 142.

  Soviet government deprived Trotsky: Volkogonov, 350–51; Deutscher III, 142.

  “Zina is terribly oppressed”: Volkogonov, 350.

  “Mama is tied down”…“gentle, quiet little boy”: Van, 35.

  “usual little cruelties”: Glotzer, 50.

  “I expect a letter from you”: Van, 37.

  turned on the gas taps: Deutscher III, 157–58; Volkogonov, 350–51.

  left instructions: Zina’s note, TEP 17339.

  “Poor, poor, poor child”: TEP 17340.

  something terrible had happened…“Two deep wrinkles”: Van, 35.

  open letter: Van, 35.

  “I will go mad myself”: Alexandra Sokolovskaya to Trotsky, January 31, 1933, TEP 12608.

  radical young activist…lovers had married: Deutscher I, 35–36, 47; Volkogonov, 8–16; Trotsky to Gérard Rosenthal, April 10, 1939, TEP 9828.

  Trotsky’s response: Van, 40; published in part for the first time in Istoricheskii arkhiv, No. 1, 1992, 36.

  “The two furrows”: Van, 41.

  “they should be shot”: Van, 42.

  Alexandra was arrested…They disappeared without a trace: fate of Trotsky’s family members: Volkogonov, 352–54, 366–67; Deutscher III, 228; Diary, 70, 160–61; on Trotsky’s brother, The New York Herald Tribune, February 26, 1938; “Genealogy of Trotsky’s Family,” Lubitz Trotskyana Net, http://www.trotskyana.net/Leon_Trotsky/Genealogy/genealogy.htm.

  tremendous load: Deutscher III, 144–45.

  despairing letters: Deutscher III, 145.

  volatile and often contentious: Deutscher III, 145; Poretsky, 261.

  “all Papa’s deficiencies”: quoted in Feferman, 310.

  “trouble with father”: Deutscher III, 146.

  Lyova remembered these Old Bolsheviks: Deutscher III, 281–83, 319–20.

  he became hysterical: Legacy, 21–22.

  “I became completely engrossed”: Writings, 10:174.

  “a labyrinth of sheer madness”: Deutscher III, 319.

  statement in a Paris newspaper: Writings, 10:387–88.

  reproaches of his son for delays: Deutscher III, 116, 144–45, 295–96.

  “I am a beast of burden”: Deutscher III, 310–11.

  “a ridiculously transparent pose”: Van, 92.

  Mark Zborowski: Volkogonov, 334–36; Deutscher III, 283–84; Broué, Léon Sedov, 126 et passim; Poretsky, 261–62.

  “sullen, frowning face”: Van, 99–100.

  waves lasting five or six days: Legacy, 22.

  “Étienne can be trusted absolutely”: Volkogonov, 336.

  “I never had any special suspicions”: Van, 99.

  Zborowski kept Moscow thoroughly acquainted: Volkogonov papers, reel 4; Broué, Léon Sedov, 210–11.

  “Stalin must be killed”: Zborowski reports, February 8, 1937, and February 11, 1938, Volkogonov papers, reel 2; Deadly Illusions, 282–84.

  defection of Ignace Reiss: see his widow’s memoir, Poretsky, Our Own People.

  upper reaches of the GPU: Deadly Illusions, 293–302.

  “Long live Trotsky!”: Deutscher III, 315.

  bullet-ridden body: Deutscher III, 315–16; Rosenthal, Avocat de Trotsky, 205–20; Broué, Léon Sedov, 184–93; Sneevliet to Trotsky, September 25 and 30, 1937, TEP 5204, 5206; Elsa Reiss [Poretsky] to Trotsky, September 30, 1937, TEP 4242.

  “He is able, brave, and energetic”: Deutscher III, 318; Broué, Léon Sedov, 211.

  “le dernier refuge”…“Ton Vieux”: Trotsky to Lyova, November 18, 1937, TEP 10237; Trotsky to Chers amis [Lelia Estrin and Mark Zborowski], November 18, 1937, TEP 7710.

  alcoholic and depressed…“lost all faith”: Zborowski report, July 23, 1937, Volkogonov papers, reel 2.

  he and his colleagues were stumped: Sudoplatov, 82–83.

  “Both of them have aged terribly”: Hansen to Rose Karsner, February 17, 1938, TEP 11760.

  small automatic pistol: Hansen, “With Trotsky in Coyoacan,” xxxiii.

  “Slovenliness bordering on treachery”…“excuses and promises”: Trotsky to Lyova, February 15, 1937, TEP 10198.

  “money to buy postage stamps”: Deutscher III, 297.

  “outright crime”: Trotsky to Lyova, January 21, 1938, TEP 10244.

  Lyova’s last letter: Deutscher III, 320.

  brick, plaster, lime, and sand: Hansen to Reba Hansen, February 14 and 17, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:8.

  The OM was seated at a small table: Hansen, “With Trotsky in Coyoacan,” xxxiii.

  his affecting tribute: Writings, 10:166–79.

  rejoined the rest of the household: Hansen to Reba Hansen, May 23, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:11.

  “our beloved daughter”: Trotsky to Jeanne Martin, March 10, 1938, Writings, 10:257–58.

  testament he produced in great haste: Camille [Rudolf Klement] to Trotsky, February 18, 1938, TEP 2035; Alfred Rosmer to Trotsky, February 16, 1938, TEP 4487.

  Jeanne abducted Seva: Broué, 876–77; Deutscher III, 326–28.

  “his banging window shattering glass”: “Joe’s notes on Trotsky,” Hansen papers, 40:7.

  “You are with my enemies”: Van, 120–21.

  take Lyova’s place: Deutscher III, 329–30.

  penetrate Trotsky’s household: Volkogonov, 445.

  Chapter Six: Prisoners and Provocateurs

  twenty trained men: Van, 18–19. On Blumkin, see Legacy, 111; Christopher Andrew and Oleg Gordievsky, KGB: The Inside Story (HarperPerennial, 1991), 155; Kolpakidi, 119; Andrew & Mitrokhin, 40; Poretsky, 146–47.

  “hire an assassin for a few dollars”: Lyova to Trotsky and Natalia, December 7, 1936, TEP 4863.

  “question of life and death”…“they use in American banks”: Lyova to Trotsky [January 1937], TEP 4870.

  authorized selected local Trotskyists: Van, 105, 133; Broué, 848.

  Bernard Wolfe: Alan Wald, “Bernard Wolfe (1915–1985),” Glotzer papers, box 40.

  disassembling and then reassembling the Luger: Bernard Wolfe, Memoirs of a Not Altogether Shy Pornographer (Doubleday & Company, 1972), 33–35.

  events in Spain: Craig II, 639–45; Antony Beevor, The Spanish Civil War (Peter Bedrick Books, 1983).

  Stalin had a complicated political agenda: Kolpakidi, 130–41; Andy Durgan, The Spanish Civil War (Palgrave, 2007), 66–70, 91–92.

  May Days, Barcelona: Beevor, 187–91; Durgan, 92–97.

  Erwin Wolf: Trotsky to George Novack and Felix Morrow, September 25, 1937, TEP 9431; Writings, 9:508–12.

  George Mink: Mink profile in Solow papers, box 11, “Spies” FBI, 2:33–34; Vernon L. Pedersen, “George Mink, the Marine Workers Industrial Union, and the Comintern in America,” Labor History, Vol. 41, No. 3, 2000; Kern, 57; Venona Secrets, 106–10; Broué, 926; Whittaker Chambers, Witness (Random House, 1952), 302–3; Hansen to Reba Hansen, May 4, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:11.

  Blue House was on high alert: Hansen to James Cannon, October 26, 1937, TC 23:3; Trotsky to Jack Weber, December 1, 1937, TEP 10800; Harry Milton to Trotsky, October 11, 1937, TEP 3161.

  GPU defector Ignace Reiss: [Jan Frankel] to Friend, October 25, 1937, TC 23:3. Harry Milton: Trotsky to James Cannon, October 3, 1937, TEP 7510; Albert Glotzer to Trotsky, November 3, 1937, Glotzer papers, box 3. “Gosh! Are you hit?” George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia (Beacon Press, 1955), 185–86.

  organizing a hunger strike: Milton to Martin Abern, May 19 and May 21, 1937, TEP 15057, 15058.

  generous contribution to the legend: Time, May 2, 1938.

  “gangsterist activity”: Trotsky to Milton, November 6, 1937, Glotzer papers, box 2.

  preempted Milton’s appointment: Jan Frankel to Natalia Trotsky, November 15, 1937, TC 26:14; also James Cannon to Trotsky, November 10, 1937
, TEP 489; Trotsky to Cannon, November 14, 1937, TEP 7514; Hansen to Cannon, November 14, 1937, TC 23:3; Jack Weber to Hansen, November 28, 1937, TEP 7166.

  “the O.M. is extremely restive”: Harold Isaacs to Comrades, July 3, 1937, Hansen papers 69:64.

  “Milton, Stone matter”: Trotsky to Jack Weber, December 1, 1937, TEP 10800.

  the new man be an experienced driver: Jan Frankel to Harold Isaacs, June 30, 1937, attached to Isaacs to Comrades, July 3, 1937, Hansen papers, 69:64.

  “Fifty million Americans drive autos”: Cannon to Bernard Wolfe, August 11, 1937, TEP 6237.

  Cannon failed to understand: Trotsky to Sara Weber, August 17, 1937, TEP 10822.

  Hansen was born in the farming town: Hansen bio online on Lubitz Trotskyana Net, http://www.trotskyana.net/Trotskyists/Bio-Bibliographies/bio-bibliographies.html; Sara Weber to Trotsky, August 25, 1937, TEP 5887.

  The Dodge got a hearty reception: Hansen to Cannon, September 30, 1937, TC 23:3; Hansen, “With Trotsky in Coyoacan,” viii-ix.

  the Old Man could be very difficult: Hansen to Flo, October 18, 1937, Hansen papers, 5:26.

  towering historical figure…“friendly terms with a volcano”: Hansen to Sara and Jack Weber, October 21, 1937, TEP 12490.

  Fernández family in the suburb of Tacuba…“He will never learn!”: Van, 116.

  “gave me hell”…“The driver is good”: Hansen to Reba Hansen, October 11, 1937, Hansen papers, 18:5.

  “hairskin shaves from death”: Hansen to Reba Hansen, June 27, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:12.

  “She kept crying as we drove along”: Hansen to Reba Hansen, September 16, 1940, Hansen papers, 19:4.

  Trotsky behaved like a revisionist: Hansen to Reba Hansen, October 1, 1937, Hansen papers, 18:4.

  “I never heard him make a remark about the food”: Van, 16.

  “To dress up, to eat”: Van, 61.

  two types of meals…“lost somewhere in the clouds”: Hansen to Reba Hansen, May 23, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:11.

  “coldness, silence, oppression”: Hansen to Reba Hansen, November 8, 1937, Hansen papers, 18:5.

  visit to the doctor: Hansen to Reba Hansen, January 21, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:7.

  Trotsky’s friendly jesting: Van, 17; Hansen to Reba Hansen, January 21, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:7.

  “no laughter but of mockery”: Eastman, Heroes, 249.

  “a good deal like a prison”: Hansen to Reba, January 21, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:7.

  Natalia, who was high-strung: Hansen to Reba Hansen, February 6, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:8.

  warmer climes of her native Tampico: Hansen to Reba Hansen, December 8, 1937, Hansen papers, 18:6.

  incident involved Van’s wife: Van, 116–17; Hansen to Reba Hansen, December 8, 1937, Hansen papers, 18:6; Feferman, 151–53.

  Fernández family in Tacuba…“Damn, can they dance”: Hansen to Reba Hansen, December 13, 1937; and May 17 and June 12, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:6, 18:11, 18:12.

  “heavy, powerful, accurate, sure action”: Hansen to Reba Hansen, October 13, 1937, Hansen papers, 18:4.

  barking and howling of the neighborhood dogs: Hansen to Reba Hansen, March 2, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:9.

  recruitment of a full-time guard: Van to Jan Frankel, February 4, 1938, TC 23:4; Hansen to Cannon, February 5, 1938 (twice), TC 23:4; Rose Karsner to Hansen, February 8, 1938, TEP 6653; Cannon to Hansen, February 14, 1938, TEP 6211; Van to Jan Frankel, February 16, 1938, TC 23:4.

  authorized the hiring of the new guard: Van to Jan Frankel, February 22, 1938, TC 23:4.

  garrison of three comrades: Jan Frankel to Van, February 22, 1938, TC 23:4.

  gas masks: Van to Jan Frankel, February 22, 1938, TC 23:4.

  The “Trial of the 21”: Cohen, Bukharin and the Bolshevik Revolution, 372–81; Deutscher III, 332–33; Jean-Jacques Marie, Trotsky: Révolutionnaire sans frontières (Payot & Rivages, 2006), 506–8, 549.

  war room: Hansen to Reba Hansen, March 2, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:9.

  “It all seems like a delirious dream”: Writings, 10:201.

  Dewey himself now denounced: The New York Times, March 4, 1938.

  “a too easy victory to the G.P.U.”: Trotsky to Margaret de Silver, March 31, 1938, TEP 7673.

  Hank Stone, the first chief of the guard: “Henry Malter dit Hank Stone (1908–1986),” Cahiers Léon Trotsky, No. 28, December 1986; Cannon to Trotsky, November 10, 1937, TEP 489; Jan Frankel to Natalia, November 15, 1937, TC 26:14.

  hammer and nails: Stone to Jan Frankel, April 7 and April 16, 1938, TC 23:5.

  “cobwebs inside the barrel”…“buying bananas”: Stone to Jan Frankel, April 7, 1938, TC 23:5.

  $100 per month: Stone to Jan Frankel, May 17, 1938, TC 23:5.

  Minneapolis became a Trotskyist stronghold: Farrell Dobbs, Teamster Rebellion (Monad Press, 1972); Charles Rumford Walker, American City: A Rank-and-File History (Farrar & Rinehart, 1937).

  “big meaty fellow”: Hansen to Reba Hansen, May 15, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:11.

  absence of six teeth: Hansen to Reba Hansen, March 30, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:9.

  first indication of trouble: Stone to Jan Frankel, March 16, 1938, TC 23:5.

  “women’s work”…“go jump in a lake”: Stone to Jan Frankel, April 8, 1938, TC 23:5.

  bread without butter: Hansen to Rose Karsner, April 4, 1938, TEP 11764.

  “potatoes and gravy”: Hansen to Reba Hansen, May 23, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:11.

  Edith offered to cook: Hansen to Reba Hansen, April 21 and 22, 1938, Hansen papers 18:10; Stone to Jan Frankel, May 17 and May 21, 1938, TC 23:5.

  “The Mink”: Time, May 2, 1938. Mink’s photo: Van to Pearl Kluger, April 21, 1938, TC 23:5.

  “une maison de bourgeois”: Van to Jan Frankel, May 30, 1938, TC 23:5.

  Trotsky would erupt: Van to Jan Frankel, May 2, 1938, TC 23:5.

  Hank’s demoralization was now complete: Stone to Jan Frankel, May 17, 1938, TC 23:5.

  the goodbye was sad…Chris Moustakis: Hansen to Reba Hansen, June 12, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:12.

  elaborate alarm system: Stone to Jan Frankel, May 31, 1938, TC 23:5.

  effect of the floodlights: Hansen to Reba Hansen, May 11, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:11.

  two cedars and a pine: Hansen to Reba Hansen, February 6, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:8.

  more permanent structure made of bricks: Hansen to Reba Hansen, May 11, 1938, Hansen papers, 18:11.

  “getting fed up with the entire matter”: Sara Weber to Rose Karsner, August 8, 1938, TC 23:6.

  Rudolf Klement: Deutscher III, 330–31; Sara Weber to John G. Wright [Joseph Vanzler], July 17, 1938, TEP 12568; Hansen to Rose Karsner, July 21, 1938, TC 23:5; Writings, 11:24–25, 137.

  theft of Trotsky’s archives: Broué, Léon Sedov, 172–74; Deutscher III, 283–85.

  a tense meeting to sort the matter out: Volkogonov, 426; Poretsky, 250–54.

  “I am sending you 103 letters”: Dmitri Volkogonov, Trotskii: Politicheskii portret, Vol. 2 (Novosti, 1994), 274–75.

  Zborowski regularly supplied Moscow: Volkogonov, 358–61, 370–73, 378–80; Volkogonov papers, reel 2; Broué, Léon Sedov, 210–11.

  “we have dreamed about getting hold of it”: Volkogonov, 448.

  September 6 in Reims, France: Étienne and Paulsen to International Secretariat, February 22, 1938, TEP 15642.

  Trotsky was incensed at Sneevliet: Trotsky to International Secretariat, September 30, 1937, TEP 8052; Trotsky to Comrades, September 30, 1937, TC 12:18; Trotsky to Elsa Reiss [Poretsky], October 13, 1937, TEP 9783; Trotsky to Sneevliet, December 2, 1937, TEP 10422; Writings, 9:448–51, 459–60, 492–95; 10:146–47, 150–52.

  staff member at the Soviet embassy: Walter Krivitsky, In Stalin’s Secret Service, 2nd ed. (Harper & Brothers, 1939), 253.

  Sneevliet’s misgivings came to focus on Zborowski: Deutscher III, 316.

  Walter Krivitsky: Kern, 147 et passim; Poretsky, 220 et passim.

  “There is a dangerous agent in your party”: Poretsk
y, 252–53.

  Krivitsky was wary of the Trotskyists: Deutscher III, 317.

  Trotsky, the man, was a formidable figure: Jan Frankel to Trotsky, July 12, 1939, TEP 1279.

  Père Lachaise cemetery: Kern, 155–56.

  He used his position as “Sonny’s” successor: Étienne and Paulsen to International Secretariat, February 22 and June 24, 1938, TEP 15642, 15643; Étienne and Paulsen to Trotsky, November 11, 1937, TEP 879; Deutscher III, 329–31.

  outraged at the “slanderer”: Deutscher III, 329; Trotsky to International Secretariat, March 12, 1938, TEP 8058.

  most devoted comrade: Étienne to Natalia [February 1938], TEP 13396.

  “This is to your credit”: Volkogonov, 445.

  “to get to the OLD MAN”: Volkogonov, 444; Volkogonov, Trotskii, 307.

  his letter to Van: Marie, Trotsky, 503.

  Trotsky received a letter: TEP 2321, TC 13:40.

  helped confirm Sneevliet in his suspicion: Etienne and Paulsen to Trotsky, November 11, 1937, TEP, 879; Deutscher III, 330–31.

  suspicions about Serge: Elsa Reiss [Poretsky] to Trotsky, November 7, 1938, TEP 4245.

  “The sooner, the more decisively”: Trotsky to Dear Friends, December 2, 1938, TEP 7729.

  a letter arrived at the Blue House: TEP 6137; TC 13:63; Deutscher III, 331–32.

  “extremely confidential, extremely important”: TEP 8105; TC 12:25.

  Alexander Orlov: Deadly Illusions; on the NKVD purges in Spain: Andrew & Mitrokhin, 73; Kolpakidi, 138; Deadly Illusions, 268, 279–80, 287–89; Andrew and Gordievsky, KGB: The Inside Story, 158–60.

  The fatal summons: Deadly Illusions, 301.

  listed all the secrets he could reveal: Deadly Illusions, 308–12, 430.

  Trotsky published the ad: Socialist Appeal, January 14 and February 4, 1939.

  mysterious correspondent was Krivitsky: Trotsky to Vanzler [John G. Wright], January 21, 1939, TEP 10927.

  Cannon’s secretary was an informant for the GPU: Venona, 262–63.

  “Long live Trotsky!”: Legacy, 112.

  Ramón Mercader: Kolpakidi, 156–57.

  Chapter Seven: Fellow Travelers

  “Looking as mischievous as an art student”: Van, 132.

  Breton was the leader of Surrealism: Polizzotti, Revolution of the Mind.

  published a laudatory review…Planet without a Visa: Polizzotti, 245–47, 399–400; Broué, 898.

 

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