Russian revolution

Aos 1, unit 3

Russian empire formatation and demographic

• The Russian Empire was declared by Peter the Great in 1721

• It was a very ethnically and linguistically diverse nation, with nationalist hostility very prevalent between different ethnic groups

• The majority of people were serfs (indentured peasants), though by 1890, there were more in the cities due to an industrial boom.

• Imperial Russia was led by the Romanov dynasty, who had been in power since 1613. The Tsar’s power was autocratic and was supported by the Russian Orthodox Church.

Empire demographics and geography

• the first census in 1897, showed the population to be 126 million

• There had been a huge population boom in the late 19th/early 20th century.

• 4/5 of the population were peasents, who lacked formal education and had a low standard of living

• the middle class were somewhat more comfortable and enjoyed more social mobility, they were also called the ‘intelligentsia’.

• the nobility and ruling class made up just 12% of the population but controlled the vast majority of wealth and land

the early romonovs

• The Romanov dynasty began in 1613, when Michael Romanov was made tsar, the first leader enjoyred autocratic power by he was popular with the people

• Peter the great (1682-1725) initiated modernisation across Russia

• His reign however featured many wars and conflicts and the burders fell first to the peasents through taxes and conscription

• catherine the Great expanded the empire and encouraged the intelligentsia classes to flourish

late Romanov family

• In responce for his fathers death, Alexander III was a tough ruler

• He limited the power of the zemstvos and engaged in a ‘Russification’ campaign to build a nation composed of a single nationality, language, and religion, all under one form of administration.

• He had an erratic, often short sighted approach to foreign policy - he signed the Triple Entente Treaty in 1894.

• Nicholas II was also distraught by the death of his father, telling his cousin ‘What is going to happen to [...] Russia? I am not prepared to be tsar.’

• Nicholas’ wife, Alexandra, was very influential over her more mild-mannered husband. Though passive, Nicholas was a strong advocate for autocracy

• He was a patriotic family man. However, he was a ‘wretchedly bad judge of character’ (Hite) and was very out of touch with the people’s needs.

Tsar politics

• Richard Pipes attests that the tsarist regime was ‘an artificial construction without organic unity, held together by wires all of which converged in the person of the monarch’

• centrals to the tsars power were the concepts of divine right and autocracy. The tsar’s word was law, unlimited exc, leg and judicial power

• the fundamental laws of the empire (1832) oulined this, stating ‘god himself commands his supreme power to be obeyed’.

• The government was made up of three key bodies - the State Council of Imperial Russia, the Cabinet of Ministers and the Senate. None could question or overrule him.

• The State Council of Imperial Russia were advisors to the tsar.

• The Cabinet of Ministers had portfolios of responsibility such as infrastructure, police, trade and so on.

• They generally worked independently rather than as a whole group.

• The Senate were responsible for turning the Tsar’s will into law.

• All of these representatives were picked from the noble class and were handpicked by the Tsar. This reduced their accountability and their legitimacy.

The Bureaucracy

• The civil service was introduced during the reign of peter the great to assist with the running of such a vast empire

• 14 levels of ranks were distinguished by uniform and were responsible for the administration and enforcement of the Tsar’s laws at a local level.

• There were considerable benefits to the role which made officials reluctant to push for reforms.

• Bribery and ‘proizvol’ (at the whim of the individual) were common. corrupt and inefficient

• Russia was divided in 96 local areas, which was overseen by a governor

• These governors reported directly to the tsar and were generally noble born themselves.

• The provincial government was responsible for the administration of public works, police, education and health in their local area

• The Provincial Governments were elected bodies that worked with the peasant zemstvos, but often favoured initiatives that benefited the wealthier classes.

Church

• The Russian Orthodox Church was made the official religion of the Russian Empire in 988. It came under the control of the Empire in 1721.

• The monastic vows of the Orthodox Church included a promise to ‘defend, unsparingly, all the powers, rights and prerogatives of [...] his Majesty’

• He appointed the Procurator of the Holy Synod. The Church reinforced conservative values and gave legitimacy to the tsar’s claim to divine right.

Police

• The Tsar’s will was enforced by two separate police forces. The first were the regular police force, in charge of law and order on the streets of Russia. There were not many police officers, so severe measures were employed to maintain control.

• The second was the Tsar’s secret police, the Okhrana. This group monitored political groups, suspected enemies of the state and agitators. Anyone found or suspected guilty of these were imprisoned or exiled. 

• Separate from the police, but also involved with maintaining control were the Cossacks. This was a militia group from the Black Sea. They were called in to quell protests or uprisings. 

Crisis before the revolution

• in 1891, russia was hit with a famine, most people died from malnutrition and other diseases rather than starvation its self, 350,000-500,000 died in the volga river region

• the effects of the famine were worsened mainly due to the inefficient response from the government, the us had to send aid to the region to prevent more deaths

• large disconnect between st. peterburg and rural areas

Western influence, terrorism

• wetsern ideas began to filter into Russia, great divide between westernised, educated nobility and the serfs

• uncertanty over the sucsession of the throne in 1895 emboldened nationalist groups like decemberists, who the french revolution had inspired, this led to a brutal crack down by Nicholas the first

• the growing influence of western ideals led to an increase of terrorism to counteract the strictness of the tsars

• But by the late 1870s, the terrorist rebel group Narodnaya Volya (The People’s Will) was formed. This group assassinated Alexander II in a brutal attack in 1881 in St Petersburg..

• This led to ‘The Reaction’, a period of harsh crackdowns against any form rebellion - censorship and repression by the Okhrana eventually forced political groups underground.

Russification

• the size of the russian empire meant that there were many groups of ethnic groups in russia, they were largely left alone by the regime provided they abided by the laws of the state.

• However, the tsarist government became concerned as ‘Great Russians’, people with Russian nationality and language accounted for less than half of the population. This could lead to nationalist groups agitating for independence in certain regions.

• Alexander III expanded and strengthened a cultural assimilation policy known as ‘Russification’, which originated in the 1770s. This program imposed the Russian culture and values on the peoples in the empire. Thousands of Poles, Latvians, Lithuanians, Finns and others were forced to learn or use the Russian language.

• A fervent anti-Semite, Alexander encouraged if not ordered the harassment of Russia’s five million Jews, banning them from some areas and prohibiting their participation in local elections.

Reforms

• foreign investment in the russian economy for mines and oil feilds, was heavily encouraged by sergei

• foreign food imports were very limited and heavily taxed

• The Russian rouble stabilised and was comparable against ‘the gold standard’ which made investment in Russia even more attractive.

• Investment in the railways during the ‘Great Spurt’ was key to Witte’s plan.

• Construction for the Trans-Siberian Railway began in 1891 and it was designed to connect east and west of the Empire.

• The project would enable migration from the isolated central and eastern regions, boosting the growing industrial workforce.

Challenges to reforms

• The project was extremely expensive and made more difficult by the existing poor infrastructure. The railway remained unfinished in 1914 when WWI broke out.

• depsite the economic growth in the great spurt, the impact on the cities was rough

• The main cities were not prepared for the massive influx of people (St Petersburg grew from 50%, to 1.5 million by 1900,

• Accomodation was hard to find, with up to 16 people sharing an apartment, usually all strangers to each other.

• The new manufacturing industry had very little regulation or supervision - workers were exploited, put in dangerous conditions and had no protection for their rights

Outbreak of war

• The origins of the Russo-Japanese War go back to 1905

• the two nations had been fighting over manchuria for years

• Russia had struck a deal with China to continue the railway contructions through manchuria, but then annexed the area in 1903

• japan tried to avoid the conflict by declaring clear ‘spheres of influence’ over Korea and Manchuria. Russia rejected this deal.

• Nicholas II did not take japan as a serious threat

• However, Japan had been outpacing Russia for decades. Their navy was small, but one of the best in the world. The Emperor signed the Anglo-Japanese (1902) to ensure Britain would not come to Russia’s aid in the event of war.

• In February 1904, diplomatic relations between Japan and Russia were broken off completely. Admiral Togo sent a naval fleet to Chemulpo, where Russian ships were stationed.

Siege of port Arthur and military humiliation

• a six-month siege at the strategic town of Port Arthur, resulting in the Japanese sinking most of the Russian Asiatic fleet

• The Japanese also took around 20,000 Russians as prisoners-of-war. The loss of Port Arthur, Russia’s only military stronghold in the region, was both strategically decisive and politically humiliating.

• Russia’s baltic fleet had been deployed early on in the war

• the world’s press monitored their every move and every bungle made along the way (including mistaking a British fishing trawler for a Japanese warship in disguise).  The Japanese had plenty of time to prepare for their arrival.

• Eight long months after setting sail, the 28 battleships arrived in May 1905 at Tsushima. It was defeated in less than 24 hours. The Russian navy was almost entirely destroyed

land war

• Russias land army did not fare well, the army fought against the the Japanese over two and a half weeks in February 1905 in Mukden, inland.

• 340,000 Russian men were sent to battle against 270,000 Japanese. 90,000 Russians were killed and 22,000 taken captive.

• More rounds of ammunition were fired in ten days than in the entire Franco-Prussian War of the 1870s. At the time, it was the biggest battle the world had ever seen.

• in june 1905 word of the disaterous battle of tsushima had reached the small Black Sea fleet of the Russian navy.

Potkemin

• On 27 June 1905, Potemkin was off the Ukrainian coast when many refused to eat the borscht made from rotten meat

• The ship's second in command threatened to shoot crew members for their refusal. He killed a member of the crew, Valenchuk, for speaking out, which triggered the mutiny where officers were killed and the ship sailed around the bleack sea

• the ship then docked in odessa where they had been protests and disturbances for two weeks prior to the mutiny, the crew socialised with the crowds until martial law was declared.

• The Cossacks dispersed the crowds with force. Some people were shot and some jumped or fell into the water and drowned. There were  casualties of 2,000 dead and 3,000 seriously wounded. The mutiny petered out soon after.

Impact of the war

• the war with Japan was meant to be positive and morale-boosting but instead was the opposite

• in july 1904, plehav the ministor for interior, was assassinated as a result of his support for the russo war

• He was replaced by Prince Mirskii, who had a much more liberal approach to politics. Mirskii relaxed censorship, abolished corporal punishment and restored some of the powers of the zemstvos.

• His attitude was that the state and people must trust one another to function effectively. This approach inspired hopes in political circles, however he urged people to not publicly for for a constitution and to still meet in secret

Calls for a constitution

• In september 1904, many political groups met in the conferance

• Groups such as the Union for Liberation and the Socialist Revolutionaries (SRs) formed a united front against autocracy.

• Prince Mirskii presented these plans to Tsar Nicholas in December. Nicholas was incensed and declared to Sergei Witte “I shall never, under any circumstances, agree to the representative form of government because I consider it harmful to the people whom God has entrusted to my care.”

Putilov steel works

• Between 1903 and 1904, wages had decreased by ¼ and terrible working conditions, coupled with poor harvests and food shortages, led to work agitation.

• In January 1905, there were 120,000 industrial workers on strike in St Petersburg. They had gone out on strike after 4 workers had been fired from the Putilov Steelworks factory in December 1904

• The Assembly of Russian Factory Workers was founded by a ‘renegade priest with police connections’ (Fitzpatrick) named Father Georgiy Gapon, who organised a partitian and march for the workers who were fired for being associated with group

• Gapon wrote letters to Mirskii and the tsar himself, explaining his intentions and the route of the march. The date was set for Sunday 9th January, 1905.

March and partition prep

• On January 8, Gapon met with the Minister for Justice who later met with Prince Mirskii, the police department and the head of the St Petersburg regiment

• Troops were deployed around St. Petersburg, the people hoped to offer the partition to nichloas directly, however he had already left the city

• The petition, drafted in respectful terms by Gapon, made clear the problems the workers faced and called for improved working conditions, fairer wages, and a reduction in the working day to eight hours

• it got 150,000 signatures

• The majority of Russian workers retained their traditional conservative values of Orthodox faith in the autocracy, and therefore in their eyes, the tsar was their representative who would help them if he was made aware of their situation. God appointed the tsar, therefore the tsar had an obligation to protect the people and do what was best for them.

Bloody sunday

• At 10 am on 9th January, 150,000 people marched peacefully towards the Winter Palace. Figes describes the crowd as forming ‘something more like a religious procession than a workers’ demonstration’.

• Father gapon led the protest at 10am on the 9 january carrying a crusifix and a banner that said do not shoot, 150,000 protesters followed him singing and holding portraits of the tsar, symbolising their hope that their ‘Little Father’ would help them with their plight.

• a few warning shots fired into the crows by the troops before the Cossack cavalry charged forward into the crowds. The people fled as hundreds were killed by being shot or trampled. The official government figure was 96. More recent estimates are between 500 to 1000.

Bloody sunday reactions

• The events sparked a strong backlash in russia, Nicholas II was blamed for the event, he was given the nickname ‘Bloody Nicholas’

• He was dubbed the people's executioner by socialist revolutionaries

• in st petersburg 400,000 were on strike in january alone

• 800,000 more joined them across the empire, in moscow 3000 uni students attended a rally where nichloas’s portraite was burnt, in march all higher education was closed

• Grand Duke Sergei Alexandrovich, the tsar’s uncle and brother-in-law and the former governor of Moscow has victem of a socialist bomb attack in his carrage

• Mutinies, like on the Potemkin in the Black Sea, further rattled the monarchy, whose ‘fate hung by a thread’ (Service). Troops arriving home from Manchuria mutinied on their journey home, seizing control of the Trans-Siberian Railway.

Terrorism and workers

• Terrorism spread following bloody sunday

• the tsarist regieme was unable to regainrural controll as regional governments were ineffective and corrupt and there fore unable to deal with the 1905 challenges

• Minority groups, like Jews and Georgians, which had been repressed for years, seized the opportunity to launch independence campaigns. 

• in march nicholas agreed to a state duma with consultatives power, but it was not enough

• the svaing grace of the monarchy was the scattered nature of the protests

• oposition groups coninued to grow

• The unions of key industries organised themselves in a national alliance, called the Union of Unions. This connected the intelligentsia with the ordinary working people. Calls for voting rights and a Constituent Assembly grew increasingly louder.

• in major cities workers formed ‘soviets’

• In St Petersburg, It contained about 500 delegates elected by 200,000 workers in almost a hundred different factories. By the end of 1905, there were almost 80 soviets across the Empire.

the 1905 October revolution/ october manifesto

• by october russia was at a stand still, vast industries had workers largely on strike

• Sergei Witte wanted substancial reforms

• Together with the Minister for Education, Alexei Obolensky, Sergei Witte drafted the October Manifesto in the hopes of appeasing the masses.

• The October manifesto promised:
  - Civil liberties such as freedom of speech, conscience, association and assembly
  - Formation of a State Duma with elected representatives from every demographic
  - Universal male suffrage
  - The confirmation that no law could be passed or enforced without the consent of the State Duma.

Reaction to the manifesto

• The recation was mixed

• the St Petersburg Soviet, staged an armed uprising - in which 1000 people died - the workers association lost considerable influence in the city

• Industrial workers felt that the October manifesto did address most of their concerns - namely economic and work reforms.

• Peasants were also focused on more immediate issues, and thus it seemed that ‘the tsarist regime survived remarkably unscathed’ (Lynch).

Back tracking the october manifesto

• By 1906, the tsar backtracked regarding the Duma. He told his minister for war that ‘I created the Duma, not to be directed by it, but to be advised.’ 

• The Tsar also backtracked on his promise for universal suffrage - instead, in December 1905, a law was passed permitting men over the age of 25 to vote indirectly.

• Only landowners with estates over 200 hectares were eligible for direct voting.

Fundamentalist laws

• the tsar declared the fundamentalist laws on the 23rd of April 1906

• This document reiterated Nicholas’s autocratic, supreme power - all laws required his approval in order to be passed

• Under the Fundamental Laws, the tsar retained control over foreign affairs, the military, states of emergency. Essentially, the tsar has revoked all of the concessions he had promised just 6 months prior. 

Octoberists

Kadets

Socialist revolutionaires

Mensheveks

Bolsheviks

First duma elections

• Despite Nicholas’s reluctance, election for the duma in march 1906 and ended in april

• Unions and political parties were legalised during this time, however most political clubs (including the SRs and SDs) boycotted the elections.

• Unaligned peasants made up 38% of the seats, while 37% was held by Kadets (Constitutional Democrats) - a few more radical representatives were also elected.

First duma

• The first nationally-elected representative body in Russia’s history opened on 27th April 1906.

• Nicholas showed his contempt for the duma from the onset, his first item of businessthe construction of a new laundry and greenhouse at a university in Estonia.

• The outraged Duma ignored the petty agenda and began debating issues of land reform, military funding and constitutional change. It urged Nicholas to rescind or amend the Fundamental Laws, which he flatly denied.

• The Kadets and unaligned peasants formed a coalition, and issued an ‘Address to the Throne’ - pursuing rights for the people

adress to the throne

The demands of the duma included:
- Freedom to strike
- Freedom to publicly assemble
- The abolition of capital punishment
- Abolition of the State Council of Imperial Russia
- Reform to the Civil Service
- Ministerial responsibility to the Duma
- Universal, direct voting
- Universal, free education
- Redistribution of land to the peasantry
- Equitable distribution of taxation burden

Nicholas’s responce

• In Nicholas’ eyes, these demands were unacceptable and insulting. He dissolved the Duma after only 73 days.

• He installed Pyotr Stolypin, extremely tough and able to quash rebellion and radicalism as Interior Minister

• however as the duma prepared to leave, they urged others to defy the tsar by not paying taxes

Stolypin land reforms and sucsess

• Stolypin developed land reforms to create independent peasant landowners and form a loyal class of "kulaks."

• results were mixed some provences were more equipt for these changes than others, leading many from eastern provences to find work in the cities, futhuring over crowding

• However, he did manage to pacify the peasantry

• he introduced many reforms to stablise the tsardom, such as mandatory primary education, land rpices become more affordable and medical aid was available in hard to reach areas

stolypin as minister for interior

• He streamlined the military tribunals, where cases could be processed without investigation.

• Between August 1906 and April 1907, 1144 people were executed by the military courts, and 2000 were hung by the civilian courts

• He strictly enforced censorship of the press, conducted arrests and surveillance of university campuses. Anyone found to be plotting against the tsar met their fate with ‘Stolypin’s necktie’. 

Second Duma

• for the 2nd duma the SD and the SR participated, making it much more divided ideologically

• The second Duma went beyond calls for change to outright anti-tsarist tirades. The Duma’s 18 Bolshevik deputies regularly made blistering attacks against the tsar, his ministers and other conservative elements. Some of these were written by Lenin himself.

• The government tolerated this until June 1907 when Stolypin dissolved the Duma. He later ordered the arrest of its Menshevik and Bolshevik deputies, accusing them of sabotaging the legislature.

Third duma

• on the eve of the third duma, stolypin made reforms to the duma’s electoral system

• Voting in districts where there had been a lack of ‘civic development’ was suspended, drastically reducing the number of deputies from the peasantry and urban workforce

• The new laws meant that only 3.5 million Russians out of a population of around 130 million were eligible to vote.

• 44% of the deputies were noble born, meaning that the new Duma was conservative and compliant

lena goldfield massacre

• in 1911 Stolypin was assassinated by a radical

• meanwhile along the lena river

• thousands of miners were working in a goldmine that was not as profitable as predicted

• Workers endured conditions “incompatible with human dignity” (Kerensky)  in 16 hour shifts.

• Wages had been slashed, but food prices at the gold mine had stayed incredibly high for extremely low quality products.

• 2500 went on strike, but were fired upon by soldiers - 500 were killed.

• strike continued after with 80% of miners leaving the gold fields
  

Fourth duma

• the most conservative and faced most cahllenges as following the lena gold field massacre the people’s revolutionary fervour re awakened

• In the two years it was in office, there were over 9000 workers strikes involving 3 million workers across Russia.

• The Duma was closed in August 1914 when Russia entered the Great War. However, some deputies continued to meet in secret. 

  
  

Initial war failures

• Russia’s entry into the Great War was met with celebration and optimism.

• when the war broke out there were 6.5 million men enlisted in the army but only 4.6 millon rifles

• Russian officers were ill-equipped for their positions - the Minister for War, General Sukhomlinov, demanded soldiers use bayonets, useless against the technological developments of the Great War

• The first attack the russians engaged in was the battle of tannenburg on augest 28, Over four days, 70,000 Russians were killed and 100,000 captured.

• The Germans lost fewer than 15,000 men in this engagement.

• Similarly, the Battle of the Masurian Lakes cost 60,000 Russian lives. 110,000 were taken as prisoners of war.

• Both of these battle plans had been intercepted by Germans ahead of time, as they had been transmitted over radio without codes or concealment, further highlighting the Russian military’s ineptitude for modern warfare.

• By 1915, the situation for the Russian military became even worse, 23 million Russians were ‘lost’ to German occupied land. An estimated 800,000 Russian soldiers had died, yet the Russian army had failed to gain any significant territory, resulting in dwindelling support

The tsar as commander in chief and other failures

• Nicholas decided relieve Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich as Commander in Chief of the Russian Armed forced in September 1915, He had no practical involvement in strategic warfare and commanding armed forces in combat

• The Tsar’s command of the military had little impact on strategy: he rarely intervened or countermanded the decisions of his battlefield generals.

• What it did do was to link the tsar with his generals, associating him personally with every military failure. He abandoned Russia at a time of domestic crisis.

• The Army was grossly under-equipped. 25% of soldiers were sent to the front with instructions to pick up the weapons of fallen troops.

• Many conscripts were peasants with little knowledge of warfare or how to handle weaponry.

• Organisation of the military was a crucial weakness - commanders and generals had personal grudges against each other and did not share information willingly. This contributed to failed battle plans.

• Transportation of food and supplies was inadequate - soldiers could go long stretches without food or uniforms. The railway network was left incomplete as the workers had been conscripted to the war.

• The hungry, undertrained soldiers willingly allowed themselves to be captured as POWs rather than fight. The POW rate was 4.5 to 1 death by the end of 1916, and 6:1 by the end of 1917.

Impacts of the war on the workers

• after the war broke out in 1914, the russian people were mobilised to support the effort, comitte swere organised to caring for the wounded and coordinate supplies being sent to the front line

• however these organizations were incredibly inefficient and obstructed by red tape. Adding to the problems, the conscription of millions produced a labor shortage and resulted in declining food production

• Russia’s already inadequate transportation system was under more strain, as engines, carriages and personnel were used to move soldiers and equipment to and from the frontline. This heavy use of the poorly maintained railway infrastructure caused it to deteriorate and fail. By mid-1916, an estimated 30% of Russia’s railways was unusable.

Impacts of WW1 in food production

• This had a significant effect on food shipments across the country, which was felt most keenly in the cities, which relied on these incoming shipments. Major cities needed in excess of 12,000 railway wagons of food each month. In January 1917, it received just 6,556 wagons.

• due to sergai witts economic reforms the rubel had been previously stale the war, however forced russia to increase tax and borrow from foreign powers

• The government resorted to printing excess paper currency, which in turn led to inflation. By late 1916, inflation was almost 400%.

• The war took up all of Russia’s time, effort and energy. Other projects and living standards declined sharply. The middle class’s savings were wiped out by the inflation. Food shortages led to rationing, despite a bumper crop in 1915 and 1916.

• Peasants hoarded the grain they produced, as local governments tried to requisition the produce to send to the war. A bitterly cold winter in 1916-17, combined with fuel shortages created hostility and discontent. The people were very unhappy.

Political consequences of ww1

• In 1915, the more moderate members of the Duma decided to continue meeting, despite being ‘closed during the war’. One of these members was Alexander Kerensky, a Socialist Revolutionary.

• They connected with the committees and councils established to coordinate the war effort and called for reforms, including to change the Imperial Council of Ministers to those who would work with the committees effectively

• Any Minister who sided with the Progressive Bloc was quickly dismissed by the Tsarina.

• In 1912, letters were leaked where the Tsarina wrote to Rasputin that all she wanted was to ‘sleep forever on your shoulder, in your embrace’

• The German-born queen was already the target of scurrilous rumours about her disloyalty to Russia. Some accused Alexandra of selling Petrograd’s food supplies to the Germans through an intermediary

• Alexandra was undoubtedly incompetent and far too willing to accept and implement Rasputin’s advice

• He used his influence over the tsarina to benefit his friends and and drinking partners

• The Siberian preacher would suggest a Ministerial sacking or appointment to the Tsarina, who would encourage her husband to endorse it.

• This “ministerial leapfrogging” destabilised an already floundering government.

start of February revolution

• In January 1917, 150,000 people demonstrated to commemorate the anniversary of Bloody Sunday. This, combined with the food and fuel shortages crippling the city, spiralled into city-wide strikes that stretched into February.

• The winter of 1916-17 was particularly harsh, further delaying delivery of food and fuel to the cities. The fuel shortages got so bad that the Putilov Steelworks, was shut down. Thousands of dismissed workers took to the streets.

• By the start of 1917, Moscow and Petrograd were receiving just one-sixth of their usual food deliveries.

• In February, government ministers responded by rationing bread. This triggered an increase in unrest, protests and looting. By the end of the month, almost 200,000 people were on strike in the cities.

• The tsar and his family had stayed at Tsarskoe Selo for Christmas - Nicholas decided to return to the front on February 21st

• The strikes should have rang alarm bells for the tsarina, however she dismissed it as “a hooligan movement”

• On February 23, thousands of women took to the streets to mark International Women’s Day

• They were joined by 100,000 workers. The next day, the size of the crowd doubled and the crowd took on a distinct anti-tsarist and anti-war sentiment.

Tsars response to the February revolutiom

• these marches alarmed the duma presdiant Mikhail Rodzianko, who wrote letters to the tsar over the situation

• Nicholas orderd the disillusion of the duma and for Petrograd garrison to disperse the crowds, instructing General Khabalov to fire on any crowds who disobeyed these orders

• The duma refused to disperse, continueing to meet and eventually, it also formed a provisional committee of 12 men. This committee was asked to create plans for a temporary national government.

• Elsewhere in the city, the Petrograd Soviet, which had been dormant since 1905, decided to reform. They pledged to represent the interests of workers, soldiers and sailors.

• there was a substantial power balance between the tsar, the provincial government and the petrograd soviets. The tipping point for the revolution came when the Petrograd garrison refused to carry out the tsar’s orders

• in the Petrograd garrison, all 160,000 soldiers had been in cramped barracks designed to house 20,000

• As conscripts, they were mainly working class or peasants, and had empathy for the people of Petrograd. One sergeant called troups calling “to arms! To arms! They are killing innocent people, our brothers and sisters!”

• One platoon, which was orderd to fire on demonstrators, chose instead to shoot its commanding officer. The mutiny of the soldiers deprived the tsar of any military authority in the city.

End of tsardom

• On February 28th, the Tsar’s Council of Ministers stepped down, with many fleeing the city

• The Proclamation of the Provision Government was issued on the same day, that they would be “a more durable organisation of executive power”

• Nicholas then wanted to return to russia, and on March 2nd, Nicholas was met in his railway car by a delegation from the Duma which insisted on nothing less than his abdication.

• nicholas then attempted to cede power to his son, but after finding out he wouldnt be able to stay with him, Nicholas collapsed into tears and cried “I cannot be separated from him”

• he then attempted to give the title to Mikhail, but when informed that the provisional government could give no protection to Mikhail he refused the crown.

Provisinal governments reforms

• On March 2, following the tsar’s abdication, the Provisional Committee renamed itself the Provisional Government, introducing reforms:

  • Recognition of trade unions

  • 8 hour day introduced

  • Tsarist police replaced by the ‘people’s militia’

  • Okhrana abolished

  • Political prisoners freed

  • Capital punishment abolished

  • Mutinous soldiers pardoned for February actions

  • Freedom of speech, assembly and press introduced

  • Universal suffrage for all future elections

  • Democratic local government

  • Preparations for the Constituent Assembly elections began

Petrograd and provisional power balence

• Whilst the provisional government had power in theory, their real power resided within the Petrograd which was supported by the civilians

• On March 1st , Soviet Order 1 was issued, declaring the Petrograd Soviet in charge of the military

• the balance of power between the Petrograd and the provisional government became known as the dual authority

• As Kerensky later put it, the Soviet possessed “power without authority” while the Provisional Government had “authority without power”

• over the next 8 months, the PG stalled on holding elections to perfect the voting system, however this ammount of time, meant that they were unable to confirm their legitimacy which the Bolsheviks capitalised on immediately.

Lenin’s return

• Lenin was in Switzerland when the February Revolution broke out, and was desperate to get back to Petrograd

• he then made a secret deal with the Germans to get safe travel back to Finland Station on April 3rd

• Immediately after returning, Lenin called the PG a ‘parliamentary bourgeois’ and rejected the idea of any cooperation.

• in his return, he issued 10 directives for the bolsheviks and its followers, titled the april thesisand formed the foundation of the Bolsheviks’ campaign against the Provisional Government.

• lenin called for no cooperation with the ‘bourgeois parliament’

• He demanded the ‘confiscation of all landed estates’ and ‘immediate union of all banks in the country’ to be controlled by the Soviet

• He demanded that Russia exit the ‘predatory imperialist war’ immediately

• He also had two slogans, All Power to the Soviet and Peace, Land and Bread. although he was controversial to begin with his stance eventually gave Lenin enough support to launch a challenge of the Provisional Government

The war question

• for the provisinal government, their biggest problem was the question of war, if they continued in the war the situation would deteriorate futhur, if they left there could be long term consiquences

• some belived is was their national duty ot protect their allies and others belived that suurendering would jepodise russia’s international standings

• as the war was not going well, Russia’s bargaining position was weak.

• Any deals would likely see Germany make extensive demands of Russian territory and resources. Others believed the war question should be decided by the new Constituent Assembly.

• Provisional Government’s first foreign minister, Pavel Milyukov, wrote to the allies in mid april 1917 declaring Russia's commitment to the war, that russia would ‘fully carry out the obligations’ to achive ‘lasting peace’

• His telegram was leaked to socialists and the press, Its publication triggered large public demonstrations in Petrograd.

• The Bolsheviks were amongst the loudest , even attempted to coordinate the riots into a putsch. Miliukov and Guchkov (Minister for War) were forced to resign - Prince Lvov invited two members of the Petrograd Soviet to join the PG.

• to please protesters, the pg declared that the war would be defencive to achive peace without annexations

• however, Kerensky, now the Minister for War, ordered an ambitious new offensive against the Austro-Hungarians in Galicia.

• however the Russian army was fatigued by three years of war, still poorly led and under-resourced and pushed to the brink of mutiny by anti-war propaganda

• The soldiers began to desert the front lines - more than 170,000 simply left their posts.

• Despite some successes in the campaign, the German counterattack was too strong for the weary Russian troops. There were 40,000 casualties and several million square miles of territory lost

• due to this loss of moral, kerensky attempted to give speeches, however it was no use as whole regiments mutinied against their officers.

• General Brusilov was replaced by General Kornilov, and Prince Lvov resigned as Prime Minister, and kerensky was made prime minister

July days

• The continued war effort, despite its devastating costs, began to rouse suspicious in the cities.

• The 1st Machine Gun Regiment (past of the Petrograd Garrison) was ordered to the frontline as part of the June Offensive, However, many locals suspected that the real motivation was to destabilise the Petrograd Soviet’s power base.

• On July 2, Trotsky addressed many of the 1st Machine Gun Regiment and criticised Kerensky and the June Offensive - he demanded that power be handed directly to the Petrograd Soviet.

• This inspired riots and demonstrations across the city the next day

• Despite the enthusiasm of the rioters, only half of the Machine Gun Regiment joined into the demonstration

• Regardless, there were still 20,000 sailors of the Kronstadt naval base and 20,000 from the Putilov Steelworks, who carried Bolshevik slogans on placards

• he mob assembled outside the Tauride Palace, the meeting place of the Petrograd Soviet. The crowd anticipated a declaration from the Soviet that it had assumed power. It never came.

Lenins response july days

• outside the agitated group chanted for lenin expecting the Bolshevik leader to order the overthrow of the government

• He appeared but left a restrained and anti climatic response

• The deflated mob soon broke up and scattered across the city. Many resorted to heavy drinking, looting and vandalism

• When government reinforcements arrived in Petrograd from the front a day later, they were able to crush the uprising without much opposition. Around 700 people were killed, most of them Bolsheviks or Bolshevik sympathisers

• More than a thousand Bolsheviks were arrested, and the Pravda newspaper banned. Raids on the HQ revealed the Bolsheviks were, in part, funded by the Germans. 

Kornilov days

• In August 1917, miscommunication between Kerensky and General Kornilov threatened the Provisional Government in a way it had not experienced before

• Kornilov wanted to remove the power of the socialists all together - Kerensky feared this would lead to, at best, civil war; at worse, a return to the monarchy.

• Kornilov met with several wealthy Russians on board a train to discuss how government authority might be strengthened and radical socialism crushed.

• Claiming to have Kerensky’s approval, Kornilov said it was his intention to march troops into the capital, arrest the Bolsheviks, disperse the Soviet and restore order.

• He promised his loyalty to the future Constituent Assembly

• When Kerensky heard rumours about Kornilov’s plotting in Moscow, he contacted the general by telegram to confirm his intentions

• he belived Kornilov to be planning a coup and a mediation session took place, but only ‘heightened Kornilov’s suspicions about Kerensky [...] while feeding Kerensky’s anxiety’ (Wade)

• the session did not solve the mis-communications, Kornilov believed that Kerensky had offered him the position of dictator, while Kerensky interpreted it as Kornilov was demanding the role as dictator.

• After this, Kerensky returned to Petrograd and called an immediate cabinet meeting, who resigned their roles to give Kerensky temporary dictatorial powers. 

Soviet mobilizes

• Desperate to protect the city, Kerensky turned to the Soviet for help. The Soviet was able to prevent any planned advance via its delegates and organisers in military units under Kornilov’s command.

• Meanwhile in Petrograd, Soviet troops – many of them Bolshevik Red Guards – were given arms and ammunition, in order to guard the city limits from an impending assault.

• At the insistence of the Soviet, several Bolshevik organisers, including Leon Trotsky, were also released from prison.

• Hearing this and fearing Kerensky had been taken hostage, Kornilov mobilised his troops. In the end, there was no attack but Kornilov was arrested and jailed. 

Bolshevik popularity

• Between April and September 1917, the Bolsheviks slowly became more popular with the proletariat class.

• As the Provisional Government seemed to be comparabl to the monarchy, the idea of “all power to the Soviet” seemed like the public’s only chance of gaining“peace, land and bread.”

• Slowly, more Bolshevik members were elected to the Petrograd Soviet, and Lenin knew the time was close

• Moscow Municipal Elections:

  June 1917: Bolsheviks held 11.7% of seats

  September 1917: Bolsheviks held 49.5% of seats

  
  

October plans

• Lenins was so sure he was the only party that could bring about the true revolution in June, he told the First All Russian Congress of Soviets (a meeting of ALL soviets from across Russia), that the Bolsheviks were the only viable alternative to a Dual Authority.

• Lenin argued that ‘history will not forgive us if we do not take power now!’. He was concerned that waiting would push the people’s loyalties towards other socialist groups

• On October 10, the Bolshevik leadership met to discuss plans for a seizure of power. Trotsky convinced him to wait until late October, when the Second All Russian Congress of Soviets was due to take place

• however there was division in the Bolshevik ranks Kamenev and Zinoviev defied Lenin by publishing a letter in the socialist newspaper “Novaia Zhizn” (New Life). 

• They claimed the Bolsheviks had “no right to stake the whole future on the card of an armed uprising’, publisisng lenin’s plan to a coup

The milrevcom

• For many months, the Petrograd garrison had been waiting to be transferred to the Northern Front. Many interpreted this as an act by Kerensky to destabilize the Petrograd Soviet

• In mid-October, the call finally came.

• The Petrograd Soviet moved to defend the city itself, by establishing a Military Revolutionary Committee (Milrevcom), led by 5 men from the Soviet on October 16. 3 members of this committee were Bolsheviks, including Trotsky as chairman.

• The Milrevcom vowed that any perceived threat to the Soviet or itself would be met with decisive measures.

• Very late on the 23rd of October, Kerensky ordered troops loyal to the government to take action against the milrevcom

• Armed with arrest orders for Trotsky and other Milrevcom members, they raided buildings where Bolshevik propaganda was being produced, destroying newspapers and seizing or sabotaging their printing presses

• Telephone lines to the Bolshevik headquarters were cut, however, Trotsky and the Milrevcom interpreted the government’s move as the first step in a right-wing counter-revolution: “A treasonous against the Petrograd Soviet  is being planned!”

The bolsheviks mobelise

• In the morning of 24th October, the Red Guard and Milrevcom soldiers took over the checkpoints Kerensky’s troops had set up.

• Trotsky ordered the capture of strategic buildings like railway posts and offices, with minimal fighting

• By the morning of the 25th, the Bolsheviks had control of the State Bank, the post offices, the electricity station and the railway lines

• At the same time as this was happening, Lenin returned to the Smolny (the Bolshevik HQ), after weeks in hiding

• Kerensky too was making his way to the frontline, in a desperate mission to recruit troops to defend the government

• However, the most significant prize, the Winter Palace, was still protected by 3000 Provisional Government troops - juniors, cadets, reservists and Cossacks.

• Lenin was desperate to secure power before the Second All Russian Congress of Soviets, scheduled for the evening of the 25th so Hasty plans were drawn up over night to attack the Winter Palace

Winter palace

• Despite the grandeur of many Communist depictions of the event, in reality the capture of the Winter Palace was characterised by confusion and chaos.

• The assault was planned for the night of the 25th of October, 1917. The sailors from the Kronstadt naval base showed up three hours late, even though they were the ones assigned the role of signalling the start of the attack

• The order finally came at 9.45pm. Sailors fired a blank shell from the cruiser Aurora, a signal to begin the assault

• The militia and cadets inside the palace compound had little appetite for the fight: many abandoned their positions and either fled the scene or joined up with their attackers

• Provisional government ministers were arrested at 2:00am, four hours after the assault started

The Second All Russian Congress of Soviets

• The Second All Russian Congress of Soviets officially opened at 10:30pm on the 25th of October.

• the meeting soon divulged into a flurry of speeches from Mensheviks and moderate SRs, condemning the Bolsheviks for seizing power illegally. 

• After furious debate, the Mensheviks and other moderates walked out of the congress in protest, leaving the Soviets almost entirely in Bolshevik hands

• The next morning, on the 26th of October 1917, very little appeared to have changed for the people of Petrograd. The second Congress of Soviets resumed in the evening, this time with Lenin in attendance

• He addressed those present, telling them they now ruled Russia on behalf of the working masses

• The congress then debated and passed the first Soviet decrees on peace and land