Evgen Gvaladze (May 13, 1900 - October 15, 1937) was a Georgian

Georgia (country)

Georgia is a sovereign state in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the southwest by Turkey, to the south by Armenia, and to the southeast by Azerbaijan. The capital of...

 jurist, journalist and politician, and one of the leaders of the anti-Soviet national-liberation movement in Georgia of 1921-1937.

He was born in a small village of Sveri near the mining town of Chiatura

Chiatura

Chiatura is a city in the Imereti region of Western Georgia. In 1989, it had a population of about 30,000. It is inland, in a mountain valley on the banks of the Kvirila River, and since 1879 has been a major centre of manganese production in the Caucasus. There is a rail link to transport...

, Imereti

Imereti

Imereti is a province in Georgia situated along the middle and upper reaches of the Rioni river. It consists of the following Georgian administrative-territorial units:#Kutaisi #Baghdati region#Vani region#Zestafoni region...

 (Western Georgia), into the family of a Georgian nobleman (aznauri

Aznauri

Aznauri was a class of Georgian nobility; the term that was first applied to all nobles, but in the later Middle Ages narrowed to designate the petty nobles....

), retired cavalry officer Artem Gvaladze (1862-1918). Gvaladze was a descendant of David II

David II of Imereti

David II , of the Bagrationi Dynasty, was King of Imereti from 1784 to 1789 and from 1790 to 1791.He was the son of George IX of Imereti, who had briefly ruled in 1741. After the death of his cousin, King Solomon I, he became a regent but prevented the rival princes David and George from being...

, King of imereti in 1784-1790.

Having graduated from the Tiflis Gymnasium

Gymnasium (school)

A gymnasium is a type of school providing secondary education in some parts of Europe, comparable to English grammar schools or sixth form colleges and U.S. college preparatory high schools. The word γυμνάσιον was used in Ancient Greece, meaning a locality for both physical and intellectual...

 in 1920, he joined the National Army of the Democratic Republic of Georgia

Democratic Republic of Georgia

The Democratic Republic of Georgia , 1918–1921, was the first modern establishment of a Republic of Georgia.The DRG was created after the collapse of the Russian Empire that began with the Russian Revolution of 1917...

 in July, 1920 and took part in the battles against the invading Red and Turkish armies

Red Army invasion of Georgia

The Red Army invasion of Georgia also known as the Soviet–Georgian War or the Soviet invasion of Georgia was a military campaign by the Soviet Russian Red Army against the Democratic Republic of Georgia aimed at overthrowing the Social-Democratic government and installing the Bolshevik regime...

 in Kojory-Tabakhmela (near Tbilisi) and Batumi

Batumi

Batumi is a seaside city on the Black Sea coast and capital of Adjara, an autonomous republic in southwest Georgia. Sometimes considered Georgia's second capital, with a population of 121,806 , Batumi serves as an important port and a commercial center. It is situated in a subtropical zone, rich in...

 in February-March, 1921. On February 20, 1921 Gvaladze was decorated with the Cross of "Tetri Giorgi" ("White Giorgi").

After the Bolshevik

Bolshevik

The Bolsheviks, originally also Bolshevists , derived from bol'shinstvo, "majority") were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party which split apart from the Menshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903....

 takeover of the Georgian government, he was demobilized. In 1926 Gvaladze graduated from the Department of Law of the Social-Economic Faculty of the Tbilisi State University

Tbilisi State University

Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University , better known as Tbilisi State University , is a university established on 8 February 1918 in Tbilisi, Georgia. TSU is the oldest university in the whole Caucasus region...

 (TSU). Since April, 1921 he was involved in the underground activities of the Georgian Menshevik Party to which he was a member in 1917-1923.

In 1926-1932 Gvaladze was a member of the Board of the Defending Lawyers of Georgia, and lectured at the Pedagogical Institute in Gori

Gori, Georgia

Gori is a city in eastern Georgia, which serves as the regional capital of Shida Kartli and the centre of the homonymous administrative district. The name is from Georgian gora , that is, "heap", or "hill"...

 from 1935 to 1937. His articles were systematically published in the Georgian press of 1916-1928. In 1921-1930 Gvaladzes journalistic papers were published in the Georgian emigrant press also ("Tavisupali Sakartvelo", "Tetri Giorgi", etc. Pseudonym

Pseudonym

A pseudonym is a name that a person assumes for a particular purpose and that differs from his or her original orthonym...

s: "G.", "Geno", etc.). In spite of continuing social activity under the Soviet government, he never abandoned his political positions and led, from 1926, the underground conspirative

Conspiracy (political)

In a political sense, conspiracy refers to a group of persons united in the goal of usurping or overthrowing an established political power. Typically, the final goal is to gain power through a revolutionary coup d'état or through assassination....

 group of the Georgian national political organization Tetri Giorgi

Tetri Giorgi (organization)

Tetri Giorgi has been a name of several political and paramilitary organizations as well as non-political foundations operating in Georgia or by Georgians abroad. It is derived from the cult of Tetri Giorgi, one of the Georgian identities of St...

. Earlier, on May 26, 1922, on the fourth anniversary of the independence of Georgia, he was one of the organizers of the first mass anti-Soviet demonstration in Tbilisi and was arrested by the GPU

State Political Directorate

The State Political Directorate was the secret police of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and the Soviet Union from 1922 until 1934...

. In 1922, he joined an underground anti-Bolshevik bloc of the Georgian political opposition known as the Committee for Independence of Georgia

Committee for Independence of Georgia

The Committee for the Independence of Georgia or the Parity Committee was an underground anti-Soviet organization active in the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic in the early 1920s. It is commonly known as "Damkom"...

 and represented it in the Kakheti

Kakheti

Kakheti is a historical province in Eastern Georgia inhabited by Kakhetians who speak a local dialect of Georgian. It is bordered by the small mountainous province of Tusheti and the Greater Caucasus mountain range to the north, Russian Federation to the Northeast, Azerbaijan to the Southeast, and...

 district where he was involved in preparation of an armed rebellion in August 1924. He was arrested on September 5, 1924, but was released due to a declared amnesty in March 1925. On August 10, 1937, during the Great Purge

Great Purge

The Great Purge was a series of campaigns of political repression and persecution in the Soviet Union orchestrated by Joseph Stalin from 1936 to 1938...

, he was rearrested along with his associates from the "Tetri Giorgi" group and shot in Tbilisi on October 15, 1937.