(en) Greece, ?THE DEMOCRATIC ASSOCIATION OF PEOPLE IN PATRAS AND THE NEWSPAPER ?HELLENIC DEMOCRACY? by DIMITRIS TROADITIS

In this article, Troaditis investigates the Democratic Association of People, that was 
actually the first anarchist organised collective appeared in Greece. A collective that 
obtained regular contacts with the Jura Federation and agreed with their positions. This 
was happened in 1875 in Patras, in Western Peloponnese, a city of a big importance, as it 
was one of the gates to the then Greece from Europe. Is was a significant harbour where a 
small but active proletariat ? especially consisted of the sultana-box makers and other 
workers- and where the anarchist ideas found a fertile soil to be developed further. ---- 
* Download the complete article here: Dimitris Troaditis ? The Democratic Association of 
People in Patras and the Newspaper Hellenic Democracy 
http://ithanarquista.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/dimitris-troaditis-the-democratic-association-of-people-in-patras-and-the-newspaper-hellenic-democracy.pdf

During the second half of the 19th century, Patras (in Western Peloponnese, Western
Greece) and Ermoupolis (capital of the island of Syros) were the two largest ports of
Greece and along with Athens were the first urban and commercial centres in the country.
During 1860s, an Italian community constituted the 10% of the local total population in
Patras playing an important role in the everyday life of the city. This migrant community
established during 1848-1850 by refugees, mostly socialists and anarchists, after the
collapse of the revolutionary movements of 1848-1849. But it seems that the bulk of
Italians left the city in late 1860 to early 1870 and only a small number of Italians
remained. Most historians argue that anarchist ideas have emerged in Greece, either by
the radical elements who resided in the Ionian Islands or by the occasional activity by a
few European anarchists and other revolutionaries, such as the Italian anarcho-socialist
Am?lcare Tsipriani and French revolutionary Gustave Flourans. Also, the events of the
Paris Commune of 1871 seem to have had a catalytic effect to the radical elements of
Patras particularly and the Western Peloponnese in general. So, apparently small groups
of friends or clubs, or secret discussion societies seem been formed.

We are in a period when in, on one side, the capitalist development started to emerge in
Greece through the inflow of foreign capital by which the first industrial units, banks 
and various companies created and, on the other side, an overall bad situation and 
disorderly was dominant, with the Raisin Issue especially in Western Peloponnese. Amongst 
those 1conditions anarchists and other revolutionaries of this period found a fertile 
ground to propagate and disseminate their ideas to the oppressed people of Patras and 
surrounding small towns villages. The social divisions and inequality have proved to be 
strong determinants in the development of anarchist and revolutionary ideas. Already in 
1864, in Patras, several revolutionaries incited their ideas, trying to rouse the people. 
Among them was someone named Theotokatos for who said that he incited at every opportunity 
the anarchist ideas, though there are no other details about him.

In early 1876, the Democratic Association of People formed in Patras. The most
important members of this Association were intellectuals and a few employees. They
were Dionysis Ampelikopoulos, a high school mathematician who had a knowledge of
anarchist, socialist and revolutionary tendencies of the period, Konstantinow Mpompotis,
a lawyer, Konstantinos Grimmanis, Alexandros Eymorfopoulos (son of the owner of the
printing company "Phoenix" and newspaper editor Panagiotis Evmorfopoulos), Ioannis
Asimakopoulos, George Paparritor, a rentier (who later worked with socialist Plato
Drakouli), Dimitris Spatharas, Panagiotis Sougleris and George Stratos. John Filios was
the link of the Association with revolutionary circles of Athens.

The members of the Association were meeting in a special place where there was a
remarkable library decorated with Paris Commune images. Along with the Association, a
circle of youngsters, mostly students, formed as well as the People?s School, a kind of
open university, after the initiative of liberals such as Andreas Rigopoulos, Vasilis
Kalliontzis and others.

Of the first actions of the Association was the publication of a newspaper and contacts
with revolutionary groups from around Greece and abroad. They established contacts
with anarchists of Bern in Switzerland, where by then were the headquarters of the First
International from which they asked to have regular contacts. The International
responded positively and sent in Patras the Minutes of the International Conference of
Bern, held during 26-29 October 1876.

2On October 22, 1876, in ?Bulletin of Jura Federation? had been stated that ?a specific
number of socialists from this country will send to Bern a document in which they set out
their ideas on the organisation of our work. They commissioned the reading of this
document to comrade Andrea Costa (Italian anarchist who later was one of the founders
of Italian Socialist Party), who resides in Switzerland. This will be the first time that
Greece will take part in a Conference of the International?.

The decisions of the Conference were sent to Patras? anarchists. In turn they sent a
message by which made known that they agree with them. Thus, they associated with the
International Bureau. The letter was published in ?Bulletin of Jura Federation?, dated 7
January, 1877.

The Bern Congress ratified collectivism as a key element of the propaganda of the
International, and the Democratic Association of People agreed with it. Thus, the
Association through the International established contacts with Italian anarchist groups
and magazines, such as ?Il Plebe? from Milan and ?Il Martello? from Bologna, where
their members send letters and news. Having strongly sided with the decisions of the
Bern Conference, Democratic Association decided also to proceed with the anarchist
side.

Having, however, noted that these anarchists of Patras had established contacts with
individuals and groups from the Ionian islands, Cyclades and the rest of Peloponnese, we
should say that they rather exchanged views and had resulted in the establishment of a
federal organisation named Democratic People's League. And this is why when in May
1877 they began publishing the newspaper ?Hellenic Democracy? aiming to be the
instrument of Democratic People's League. (But because of persecution, as we shall see,
the newspaper published just a single issue). Moreover, radical socialist Panagiotis Panas
was in contact with the Association since almost their foundation and, indeed, he
published the news of the founding of the Federation on the issue of 22 March 1877 of
one of his newspapers ?Rigas?.

3However, in May 1877 we have the publication of ?Hellenic Democracy?, but not as an
instrument of the Federation, rather as an instrument of the Democratic Association of
People. The newspaper published the Statutes of the Democratic People?s and an analysis
on this, an article of the French communard Arnold for the then sixth anniversary of the
Paris Commune, another article on the Oriental Question in which they called upon the
peoples and various ethnicities of Eastern Europe to revolt against the Ottoman and
Tsarist rule, and a story about the uprising of Benevento, translated from the Italian ?Il
Plebe?. (In April 1877, Carlo Cafiero, Errico Malatesta and other anarchists occupied the
villages Letino and Gallo in Benevento province of Italy, in an attempted uprising which
was suppressed). In the forefront of the newspaper raised the slogan ?Revolution is a law
of progress?.

It is important also to note here the option to write in plain and understandable language.

This language placement at a time when Giannis Psycharis (a writer) and the movement
of demoticism had not appeared yet, ranks them (probably) amongst the pioneer
demoticists. It is believed that, because libertarian socialist Nicholaos Konemenos lived
those days in Patras, possibly members of the Association have read his work on the
language issue (published in 1873) or have been contacted him through the circle of
radical socialist Panagiotis Panas. Since 1869, N. Konemenos lived in Patras as a Consul
of Turkey (which was a rather decorative position), a position which, however, prohibited
such contacts by him.

The publication of ?Hellenic Democracy? caused a sensation and raised serious concerns
amongst the closed society of Patras. When it became known that the authors and editors
of the new newspaper were the sons of really familiar conservative families of the city, a
big part of the mainstream press tried to ridicule them. ?A rug published, a children's
newspaper by 6-7 kids?, wrote newspaper ?Achaia?. ?It is about 7-8 youngsters and
everyone is laughing with them?, wrote newspaper ?Filodimos?. Other newspapers such
as ?Minos? and ?Forologoumenos?, asked for a punishment for the editors.

But they were not only the closed Patras? society and the local Press who worried about.
4Almost simultaneously with the publication of the newspaper the central authorities in
Athens officially began the persecution of the members of the Association and, indeed, in
a systematic way. So, following government instructions, the prosecutor G. Lyberakis,
ordered the prosecution and the investigator St. Mpalmpis began in investigative work.
Police raided the house where the Association based and arrested D. Ampelikopoulos, K.
Mpompotis, K. Grimmanis, A. Eymorfopoulos, Spatharas and Asimakopoulos who
remanded in custody. Those arrested were not denied their ideas, failed, however, to
reveal names, partners, and anything else associated with the Association and its
activities. They said they were bound by an oath not to reveal anything.
Almost the whole mainstream Press came against them, except the newspaper ?Toxotis?
of A. Papagiannakopoulos. Their case reached the Parliament, where actively defended
them the radical MP, Pokkos Choidas. Also, one of their most ardent defenders was
Panayiotis Panas, through the columns of his newspapers ?Ergatis? (?Worker?) and
?Rigas? (which was the organ of the Democratic Society ?Rigas? members of which
except Panayiotis Panas and Rokkos Choidas, were liberals Alexis Olympios, Tassos
Stypis, Georgios Filaretos and others).

The arrested sent a letter from inside the prison in Jura Federation and also another 
letter published in 10 June, 1877, the ?Bulletin of Jura Federation?.

Their case became also international and there was some pressure on the then Greek
government by different perspectives, so they all been released in late July 1877 after
paying a guarantee. Their trial never happened. According to local working class Marxist
historian Dimitris Kougioufas, the financial guarantee paid by Theodoros Kolokotronis,
son of Gennaios Kolokotronis and grandson of the famous Theodoros Kolokotronis (a
hero of the 1821 Revolution against Ottoman Empire). (For the history, we must note that
Theodoros Kolokotronis was born in 1829 and died in 1894. He studied at the Military
Academy and a military school in France, where he was influenced by revolutionary
ideas. With the nickname Falex wrote the story of his grandfather linked the events of the
Revolution of 1821 with those of the Paris Commune of 1871). Nevertheless, because
5they classified as ?dangerous anarchists? were put under surveillance.
Also, the lawyer Vasilis Kalliontzis, was one of those opposed the anarchists of the
Democratic Association, and he published a statement in the newspaper ?Toxotis? in 15
April 1877. For the history, we note that Vasilis Kalliontzis in 7 November 1872, started
the publication of the newspaper ?Hellenic Revolution?, subtitled ?All for each, each for
all? and through which proclaimed liberal ideas of MP and writer, Andreas Rigopoulos,
who had personally met Karl Marx. The newspaper stopped its circulation in 10
November 1875 published 64 issues. It re-appeared again in April 1879, and reprinted in
22 February, 1886, published 174 additional issues. Later in the 1890s Vasilis Kalliontzis
was associated with the anarchist collective and newspaper ?Epi ta Proso? (?Forward?)
but we cannot claim that he was a dedicated anarchist, he rather just helped in 
translatingdocuments. In 1897 he published a part of the work of Andreas Rigopoulos,
entitled ?Political Struggle. Literary and political works of Andreas Rigopoulos published 
by his friend Vasilis Kalliontzis?.

Returning to the anarchists of Democratic Association, when they released from prison,
not all of them continued their activities. Konstantinos Grimmanis in the 1880s worked
with the newspaper ?Peloponnese?. Alexandros Eymorfopoulos became a publisher and
started a patriotic newspaper called ?Epi ta Proso? (which is the same newspaper that in
the 1890s changed hands, went to anarchist Giannis Magkanaras and during 1890s
became the mouthpiece of the same name anarchist collective). Those who continued
their action were Dionysios Ampelikopoulos, lawyer Konstantinos Mpompotis and
George Paparritor. In 1882 Mpompotis elected secretary of Achaikos Association (a
cultural league in Patras) and gave lectures on human rights published also in the
newspaper ?Ergatis?. Paparritor took part in establishing of a socialist circle led by 
Plato Drakouli in 1885 in Athens. The same circle involving the very young then anarcho-
socialist Stavros Kallergis, radical MP Rokkos Choidas, and socialists Georgios Hairetis
and Heracles Giarmas.

Dionisis Ampelikopoulos was the only who continued the correspondence with anarchist
6groups and foreign publications until at least early 1880s, sending responses and news,
most of which were published in the ?Bulletin of Jura Federation?. But those contacts
were lost due to the progressive decline of the national federations-branches of the
International, mainly driven by the suppression after a transnational European agreement
in the 1870s, which Greece attended amongst other countries.
The issue of ?Bulletin of the Jura Federation? of 26 August 1877, published a letter by
Dionysis Ampelikopoulos, with the information that had been formed anarchist groups in
Messini, Filiatra, Aigio and the island of Kefalonia, which together with the already
existing groupings of early anarcho-syndicalist tendencies of the island of Syros and
Athens, directed towards the establishment of a Federation. The reality of course proved
different as such a Federation never formed.

According to a letter by Dimitris Karampilias (one of the most significant anarchist in
Patras in the 1890s) to Giannis Kordatos (a leading marxist historian) in the second half
of the 1940s, Dionysis Ampelikopoulos -who originated from the island of Kefalonia-
worked as a mathematician in a high school of Messolongi when in 1874, three years
before the establishment of the Democratic Association, returned to Patras to work in
another high school there replacing someone G. Zalouchos who was accused of
pedophilia and kicked out. On his return, according to D. Karampilias, ?begins the
socialist movement, as he was one of the leaders, and the soul of the Democratic
Associaltion of the People?. According to contemporary marxist historian and academic
Panagiotis Noutsos, in 1884 Ampelikopoulos was hired ?on the services of the
Municipality of Patras on wage? responsible for assisting the dried grape producers
(because except Mathematics Ampelikopoulos studied Agronomy as well). From 1904 he
used to work in a Poultry School of Kallithea. However, there are no further information
available about D. Ampelikopoulos, as his tracks have since been lost.

Later, Elias Synodinos (1845-1906), who in the last quarter of the 19th century had a
strong presence in Patras as a public orator, poet, journalist and lawyer, used his verse
and satirical poetry against the Democratic Association of People in his satirical weekly
7newspaper ?Kentra? which he was published for a short time. In the same newspaper he
also presented a totally anti-anarchist and anti-socialist political perspective.

*Article taken from No God-No Master
http://ngnm.vrahokipos.net/index.php/translations/119-the-first-organised-anarchist-presence-in-greece