Rosa Luxemburg is murdered
The Marxist activist falls victim to a far-right militia in Berlin
Three days before the armistice formalising the end of hostilities of the (irst 9orld 9ar on |0oXember , Polish-born Marxist Rosa Luxemburg left her prison Eell in $reslau present da[ 9roE aY Her immediate aim was to instigate a socialist revolution in Germany; yet instead she would fall victim to a far-right backlash that ended in her assassination just weeks later.
Luxemburg’s release from prison coincided with Germany being plunged into chaos by Kaiser Wilhelm II’s abdication and the proclamation of a republic from the windows of the Reichstag in Berlin by her erstwhile comrades in the 5oEial &emoEratiE 2art[ $aEM in , she had been dismayed by the party’s support for Germany’s entry into the war, which she attacked as a betrayal of socialist values.)
Alongside Karl Liebknecht and other revolutionary socialists, Luxemburg founded the Spartacus League – named in honour of the slave who had led an uprising against 4ome in the first Eentur[ $% 6heir anti Yar pamphlets and calls for mass unrest led to their imprisonment in
+n late , inspired b[ eXents in $olshevik Russia, Luxemburg and Liebknecht called for the transfer of power to workers and soldiers’ soviets (councils). To help make this a reality, the pair founded the Communist Party of Germany.
+n ,anuar[ , thousands oH striMing workers brought Berlin to a standstill. The German communists seized control of the situation, occupying important government and communications buildings. Through editorials in the communist newspaper,
The Red Flag, Luxemburg called for a violent takeover by the working class. Meanwhile, the republiEos oʛEials, deEamped in 9eimar,
mobilised Freikorps, paramilitary groups of disgruntled ex-soldiers with a visceral revulsion to leftwing politics, to crush the so-called ‘Spartacist Revolt’.
Freikorps troops captured Luxemburg and .iebMneEht in $erlin on the eXening oH |,anuary. After being tortured, Luxemburg was guided to a car waiting to take her to prison. Before she could enter, one of her captors bashed his riʚe butt on her head and another shot her dead. Luxemburg’s body was dumped into the Landwehr Canal where it Yas reEoXered fiXe months later
In what is believed to be one of the last things she Yrote, a defiant .uZemburg had sEoʘed pn1rder reigns in $erlin o ;ou stupid henEhmen ;our nordero is built on sand Tomorrow the revolution will already ‘raise itself with a rattle’ and announce with fanfare, to [our terror + Yas, + am, + Yill be q