was never proven. Quite on the contrary, as a true anarchist he believed in equal rights for all nations. Some parts of his army attempted pogroms, but these paled in comparison to the attacks organized by the Bolsheviks or the White Army. Once in the village of Verkhny Tokmak Nestor was met by a banner saying: “Kill the Jews, Save the Revolution, Long Live Bat’ka Mahkno.” Makhno found the author and ordered him shot.

Multiple forces were fighting on the territory of Ukraine at the time, tens of thousands of people were shot, tortured, beheaded and raped by the German army, the Whites (counter-revolutionary Russian forces), the Reds (the new revolutionaries), self-organized private armies, partisan gangs... Makhno fought them all. There were many claims of extreme atrocities committed byhis army, with particular hatred reserved for the aristocracy, monarchists, White Army officers and the clergy. All of them were executed without mercy. Once Makhno ordered a priest be killed by burning him alive in a steam-train engine. Later, after the split with the Bolsheviks, Red Army commanders and commissars also faced the same fate of summary executions, and only conscript men from the Red Army were let go as “proletarian brothers” with the choice of either joining the Makhno army or returning home.

In December 1918 the Makhno army, with the support of the Bolshevik forces, took Ekaterinoslav, the largest city of the Russian south at the time. The armies’ marauders looted the city. Makhno addressed the residents with the words, “I, on behalf of all partisans of