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Leon Trotsky's Real Name: Lev Davidovich Bronstein
Leon Trotsky's real name was Lev Davidovich Bronstein.
Leon Trotsky, a leader of Russia's October Revolution in 1917 and later Soviet commissar of foreign affairs and of war, was born Lev Davidovich Bronstein (also spelled Bronshtein) on November 7, 1879 (October 26, Old Style), in Yanovka, Ukraine, then part of the Russian Empire. His father was a Jewish farmer.
Arrested in January 1898 for revolutionary activity, he spent four and a half years in prison and Siberian exile. In 1902 he escaped with a forged passport bearing the name "Trotsky," and he adopted it as his revolutionary pseudonym. "Leon" is the Western form of Lev.
After Lenin's death, Trotsky lost the power struggle to Joseph Stalin and was banished from the Soviet Union in 1929. On August 20, 1940, in Coyoacán, Mexico, Stalinist agent Ramón Mercader struck him with an ice pick; he died the next day.
FAQ
Where did the name Trotsky come from?
It was the name on the forged passport he used to escape Siberian exile in 1902.
How did Trotsky die?
He was killed in Mexico in 1940 by Ramón Mercader, an agent generally believed to be acting on Stalin's orders.