Sascha Schapiro

Alexander "Sascha" Schapiro (, ; – 1942), also known by the noms de guerre Alexander Tanarov, Sascha Piotr, and Sergei, was a Jewish Russian anarchist who fought in both the Russian Civil War and the Spanish Civil War. Born to a wealthy family, Schapiro renounced the privileges of his upbringing and became affiliated with anarchists in his teenage years. After the dawn of the Russian Revolution, Schapiro aligned himself with the Revolutionary Army of Ukraine, and he fought alongside Nestor Makhno and Maria Nikiforova until the defeat of the anarchists at the hands of the Red Army in the Russian Civil War.

Following the suppression of anarchism in the Soviet Union, Schapiro escaped to Germany, living in Berlin prior to the rise of Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. After the rise of German fascism, Schapiro left for Spain and fought alongside the anarchists in the Second Spanish Republic. Upon the victory of the Spanish fascists and Francisco Franco, Schapiro escaped and attempted to hide in Nazi-occupied France, but he was quickly found by the Vichy authorities and handed over to the Nazis. Schapiro was subsequently murdered in the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp in 1942.

While living in Berlin, Schapiro was in a relationship with fellow anarchist and journalist Johanna Grothendieck. Grothendieck gave birth to Schapiro's son Alexander Grothendieck in 1928. Alexander Grothendieck would go on to become one of the most famous and renowned mathematicians of the 20th century.

Early years and Russian revolutions Born into a Hasidic family in the predominantly Jewish border town of Novozybkov, Russia in 1889, Alexander Schapiro grew up identifying more with the impoverished proletariat than with his own well-to-do family. He befriended the anarchist revolutionaries Lev Chernyi and Maria Nikiforova and became a leading figure in a cadre of heavily armed anarchists fighting in Ukraine associated with Nestor Makhno's Insurgent Army.