Foundation of the Free Russian Press

Foundation of the Free Russian Press 

an organization of Russian political émigrés in London. It was founded in June 1891 to publish and disseminate revolutionary literature and other literature banned in Russia. The founders, including S. M. Kravchinskii, F. V. Volkhovskii, N. V. Chaikovskii, and L. E. Shishko, constituted the fund’s administrative committee.

The foundation had its own printing press and a warehouse for storing its publications, which were in Russian, Ukrainian, Polish, and other languages. Beginning in 1892, more than 30 books and pamphlets were published by the foundation, including Underground Russia (1893) by Kravchinskii, Primer of the Social Sciences (parts 1–3, 1894) by V. V. Bervi-Flerovskii, Memoirs of a Revolutionist (1902) by P. A. Kropotkin, and One Hundred Years (parts 1–2, 1897), a collection of materials about the revolutionary movement in Russia by V. L. Burtsev and other authors. From 1893 to 1899 the foundation published the periodical Letuchii listok (Flying Leaflet, nos. 1–46).

The foundation’s administrative committee maintained ties with the Liberation of Labor, with revolutionary organizations in Russia, and with an English society that advocated freedom in Russia. The Foundation of the Free Russian Press ceased to exist in the early 20th century.

REFERENCES

Svodnyi katalog russkoi nelegal’noi i zapreshchennoi pechati XIX v., vols. 1–9. Moscow, 1971.
Taratuta, E. A. 5. M. Stepniak-Kravchinskii—revoliutsioner i pisatel’. Moscow, 1973.

E. A. TARATUTA