Home > Dmitri Nechayev

Nechaev, a stunningly chrasmatic and ardently strident political activist-cum-scam artist, rose to fame through a series of stunts and well placed social connections. One such stunt involved spreading the rumour that he had been imprisoned in the Peter and Paul Fortress, and then later spreading the rumour, once he had become a cause celebre, that he had triumphantly escaped. It was said that even the Czar had fallen for the trick, and worried upon actually capturing Nechaev that he might escape again.

Nechaev's association with Bakunin produced the Revolutionary Catechism , and a great deal of embarrassment for Bakunin, who made the mistake of providing Nechaev with letters of introduction to his various connections. Nechaev went on to abuse these connections, and to turn them against Bekunin, and eventually, each other.

Following the murder of a political associate by Nechaev, he was eventually hunted down and captured, and imprisoned in the Peter and Paul Fortress, this time for real. Before long he had organized the prison guards into a revolutionary cadre, and the plan was in place to break him out. At the last minute, the plot was betrayed and the guards replaced. Nechaev would die a short while later.