Seventh Congress Second International Stuttgart German Empire typhus Geneva Georgi Plekhanov Black Hundreds Baku protection rackets Bolshevik
In Baku, Stalin secured Bolshevik domination of the local RSDLP branch and edited two Bolshevik newspapers, Bakinsky Proletary and Gudok ("Whistle"). In August 1907, he attended the Seventh Congress of the Second International — an international socialist organisation — in Stuttgart, German Empire. In November 1907, his wife died of typhus, and he left his son with her family in Tiflis. In Baku he had reassembled his gang, the Outfit, which continued to attack Black Hundreds and raised finances by running protection rackets, counterfeiting currency, and carrying out robberies. They also kidnapped the children of several wealthy figures to extract ransom money. In early 1908, he travelled to the Swiss city of Geneva to meet with Lenin and the prominent Russian Marxist Georgi Plekhanov, although the latter exasperated him.
