Maria Nikiforova

Maria Nikiforova was born in 1885 in Oleksandrivsk, now Zaporizhzhia, in Ukraine. She left home at the age of 16 and became involved in the anarchist movement. She participated in several expropriations and bombings against the tsarist regime and was arrested and sentenced to death in 1907, but later commuted to life imprisonment. She escaped from prison and fled to Japan, then to the United States, Spain, and France. She married a Polish anarchist named Witold Brzostek and joined the French Foreign Legion during World War I. She returned to Ukraine after the 1917 Revolution and formed an anarchist combat detachment known as the Black Guards. She fought against the forces of the Russian Provisional Government and the Ukrainian People's Republic, and later sided with the Ukrainian Soviet Republic. She led her troops in capturing several cities and territories from the enemies of the revolution. She was known as an atamansha, a female chieftain, and was respected and feared by her allies and foes alike. She was also a close friend and ally of Nestor Makhno, the leader of the anarchist army known as the Makhnovshchina. When Ukraine was invaded by the Central Powers, she was forced to flee to Russia, where she was arrested and tried by the Bolsheviks for insubordination and disobedience. She was released after a hunger strike and returned to Ukraine, where she joined the Makhnovshchina again. She resumed her terrorist activities and planned to assassinate the leaders of the White movement, Anton Denikin and Alexander Kolchak. However, she was captured by the Whites in Crimea and executed by firing squad on September 16, 1919. She was 34 years old.