Biography
Anna Leisman was a Latvian-American labor and Communist activist imprisoned at Auburn under New York State criminal-anarchy law. A contemporary obituary dates the beginning of her sentence to August 1922. She was released after Governor Alfred E. Smith pardoned her in February 1923 and died shortly afterward. The March 24, 1923 Worker memorial reports her death on March 1, ten days after release. The precise release day remains unresolved.
1920s custody-date review: Release after Governor Smith's pardon is documented in February 1923; the exact day remains unresolved. This was a New York State criminal-anarchy case, not the generic federal Espionage/Sedition charge previously displayed. The March 17 obituary explicitly dates the beginning of her sentence to the preceding August; the March 24 memorial reports death March 1, ten days after release. February is retained without calculating a release day. The old January release narrative is superseded, and the unsupported twelve-month duration is removed. The obituary also says nine months served, which conflicts with its August start; that total is not adopted. She died after release, not in custody.
Sources: Laura Weinrib, Journal of Free Speech Law (2025), page 706 and note 140; The Worker, March 17, 1923, page 3, obituary; The Worker, March 24, 1923, page 2, memorial notice. Photographs and initial arrest dates remain unresolved.
The obituary reports her death ten days after pardon release and attributes it to weakness from exposure in prison. She was 43, had lived in the United States eleven years, and belonged to the Workers Party, United Hat Makers and Latvian organizations. The defense said police substituted Communist May Day leaflets for the meeting advertisements she was distributing. The article’s nine-month service claim conflicts with its August 1922 sentence beginning; no exact service total is adopted. Her death occurred after release, not in custody.
The memorial notice dates Leisman’s death to March 1, ten days after release from Auburn Prison, and attributes pneumonia vulnerability to cold, inadequate clothing, air and food in prison. It records twenty years of revolutionary activity in Latvia and America. Relative release chronology is retained without manufacturing an exact discharge date; death was after custody.
