LFJCC Mandelbaum Lecture Series

MANDELBAUM FAMILY LECTURE SERIES: Why Jewish Women Plotted to Assassinate the Czar in Russia in 1881 with Deborah Hertz

On March 1, 1881, a small band of radicals, including several Jewish activists, assassinated Czar Alexander II of Russia. Gesia Gelfman, then a 26 year old recruit, was one of the leading figures in the plot. In this talk Deborah Hertz brings Gesia Gelfman to life, exploring her upbringing in a wealthy family and her decision to run away from family and hometown the night before an arranged marriage. Her life story illuminates the quandary of semi-educated young women in Russia at the close of the nineteenth century and how joining a dangerous left sect seemed to them more attractive than the traditional wife and mother roles in Jewish society at the time..