Kogan-Bernstein, Lev Matveevich

Leo Kogan-Bernshtein was born in 1862 into a Jewish merchant family in Chisinau (parents - Matvey (Motl) Bernshtein-Kogan from Odessa and Dvoir (Dora) Bernshtein-Kogan). Studied in Odessa. As a student at St. Petersburg University, in the early 1880s he was a member of the People’s Central Central University Circle. February 8, 1881 interrupted the speech of the Minister of Education Saburov at St. Petersburg University with a speech against the ministry’s policy towards students. Kogan-Bernstein demanded the restoration of the student charter of 1864, and another student Pappiy Podbelsky slapped the minister ^[1] .

He led propaganda among workers in Saratov and Moscow. Arrested in April 1881 , exiled to Siberia . In Yakutsk, he married another exile - Natalya Osipovna Baranova (married - Kogan-Bernshtein, 1861 - 1927 ).

He participated in an armed uprising of political exiles in Yakutsk , which ended in a shootout between the exiles and the soldiers. Kogan-Bernstein, along with other exiles, was put on trial on charges of armed resistance and sentenced to death. ^[2] Severely wounded in a shootout with soldiers, Lev Matveevich Kogan-Bernstein could not stand on his own feet, and, as before, he was brought to the court and to the gallows on the bed

“May our last farewell be illuminated with hope for a better future for our poor, poor, beloved homeland! Never a single drop of power will be lost in the world — it will not be, therefore, human life for nothing! I will die with a clear conscience and consciousness that I remained faithful to my duty and my convictions to the end, but could there be a better, happier death? ”(Letter before death)

• Wife - Natalia Osipovna Kogan-Bernstein (in girlhood - Baranova). Her brother is Ilya Osipovich Baranov, a revolutionary populist.
  • The son of a Socialist - Revolutionary , a member of the Constituent Assembly, Matvey Lvovich Kogan-Bernstein ( 1886 - 1918 ), was arrested by the Bolsheviks in the front-line village of Black Zaton near Syzran and executed by a verdict of a military field court ^{[3] [4]} (according to the Little Soviet Encyclopedia, “tearing during the Czech-Slovak uprising with his party, when he returned to Russia, the White Guards were shot in the village of Black Zaton near Syzran as a member of the Constituent Assembly ” ^[5] ). His widow - translator from the Old French language , historian-medievalist, professor of Moscow State University Faina Abramovna Kogan-Bernshtein (née Arongauz, 1899 - 1976 ) - in 1925 she married the historian and philosopher Pavel Solomonovich Yushkevich ( 1873 - 1945 ), brother of the writer Sem Yushkevich and father of the historian of science Andrei Yushkevich .
• Brother - Zionist public figure, doctor Yakov Matveyevich Bernstein-Kogan ( 1859 - 1929 ); his daughter (niece of L. M. Kogan-Bernstein) is an Israeli actress, founder of the Hebrew theater in Palestine, Miriam Yakovlevna Bernstein-Kogan ( 1895 - 1991 ).
• Sister - doctor of medicine Anna Matveevna Bernstein-Kogan .
• Nephew - Soviet economic geographer Sergey Vladimirovich Bernstein-Kogan ( 1886 - 1959 ).

• In the memoirs of contemporaries .
• Letter to son .