ABSTRACT
Shortly after Koba’s arrival in Sol’vychegodsk, he sent a letter to one of Lenin’s supporters in Paris, Issak Shwartz, addressing him as ‘Comrade Semeon’ and signing it ‘K.S.’ and in parentheses ‘Ivanovich’. As Koba anticipated, his letter was read and copied by the Okhrana.1 On 24 January 1911 Koba sent a letter to a Moscow Bolshevik, Vladimir Bobrovsky, stating, ‘I end my exile in July of this year. Ilyich [Lenin] and Co. are enticing me to one of their centers, without waiting for the end of the term (a legal person has more leeway), but if there is a great need (I am waiting for their answer), then, of course, I’ll take off.’ Koba was intentionally candid in providing his full name and address: ‘Sol’vychegodsk, Vologodskaya Gubernia, Political Exile Iosif Dzhugashvili.’2 This was because he wanted the Okhrana to know that he was the author of this letter. He also lied: at this point ‘Ilyich and Co.’ knew nothing of Koba’s intention to go to one of the ‘centers’.
