Averin was born in 1884 or 1885 near Rognedino in the Roslavlsky Uyezd of the Smolensk Governorate of the Russian Empire (today Rognedinsky District, Bryansk Oblast, Russia) in a poor peasant family. In 1903 he joined the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party and in 1904 sided with Bolsheviks. Averin was uneducated and worked as a mechanic. His revolutionary career, he started in Yekaterinoslav where in October 1905 Averin headed a factory committee of RSDLP. During World War I in 1915 Averin was arrested and exiled to the Irkutsk Governorate. He was released in April 1917 on amnesty due to the February Revolution in Russia and returned to Yekaterinoslav.