[1] Antonov was born in to the family of a minor nobleman and employee of the Saratov district court.
[2] With the beginning of the October Revolution, he participated in the establishment of Soviet power in Saratov, led the detachments of the Red Guards.
In 1919 he was Chairman of the executive committee of the Kursk Provincial Council and a member of the board of the NKVD of the RSFSR, member of the Revolutionary Tribunal of the 13th Army of the Southern Front and organizer of the revolutionary committees on the Southern Front.
[3] From January 1920 he was Chairman of the Donbass Provincial Revolutionary Committee and in 1920-1921 Antonov-Saratovsky was People's Commissar of Internal Affairs of Ukrainian SSR and was authorized to combat Makhno's detachments.
In 1924, he was involved in the Commission of the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee of thexon the development of basic laws and also participated in the development of the foundations of the judiciary and legal proceedings in the USSR and the Union republics; in 1925 he was included in the Commission of the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR for the consideration of the draft Code of Basic Labor Laws.