Vera Markovna Karelina

Vera Markovna Karelina (née Markova; ; 1870–1931) was a Russian labour activist and revolutionary, one of the leaders of the Georgy Gapon's Assembly of Russian Factory and Mill Workers of St. Petersburg and the Bloody Sunday procession. Early years Vera Markovna Markova was born in 1870 and given to the St. Petersburg Foundling Hospital at an early age. For a time, she lived with poor peasants in near Yamburg, and attended the village school, however at the age of fourteen she returned to the orphanage and was assigned to technical work. In 1890, she left the orphanage to work as a weaver in a cotton mill. Beginnings of the labour movement Karelina became involved in the Russian labour movement at the age of 20, when she joined a workers' circle led by Fyodor Afanasev. The circle was part of the Brusnev group, one of the first socialist organisations in Russia. The circle organised lessons from intellectuals such as Leonid Krasin and Stepan Radchenko, read illegal literature, discussed economic issues, and studied Marxism. In 1891, Karelina set up her own circle of women weavers as part of the Brusnev group.