On February 27, 1917, a bourgeois-democratic revolution took place in Russia, the tsar was removed from power. Rallies and meetings were held in Kazakhstan in support of the revolution.
Dual power arose in Kazakhstan. In March 1917, local bodies of the Provisional Government were formed everywhere - regional and district, and then volost, aul, rural, stanitsa executive committees. Representatives of the Kazakh national intelligentsia were appointed commissioners of the Provisional Government, A. Bukeikhanov, for the Turgai region. M. Tynyshpayev in Semirechye, M. Chokaev in Turkestan. The support of the Provisional Government were also regional and district Kazakh committees, and in Cossack villages - Cossack committees. Muslim and Tatar committees and kurultai were created in support of the Provisional Government.
In March 1917, the Bolshevik Social Democrats began active activity in the region, whose organizations operated in almost all regions and districts. The second real power in Kazakhstan became the councils, as bodies of people's power. R
The provisional government took timid steps to resolve the situation in Kazakhstan. On March 20, 1917, a special decree announced the abolition of all restrictions on the rights of Russian citizens based on religion or nationality.
63 Education in Kazakhstan of the political parties “Alash”, “Ush Zhuz”, etc.
In the spring and summer of 1917, workers, revolutionary democratic youth organizations, and political parties emerged in Kazakhstan.
On July 21-28, 1917, the First All-Kazakh Congress took place in Orenburg. It examined 14 issues: form of government; autonomy in Kazakh regions; land issue; people's militia; zemstvo; education; court; religion; women's question; preparation of deputies from Kazakh regions for the constituent assembly; All-Russian Muslim Congress “Shchura-i-Islami”; Kazakh political party; about the situation in the Semirechenko region; about sending Kazakhs to the Congress of Federalists of All Russia, as well as to the training commission. Constructive resolutions of national democratic content were adopted on all issues. At this congress, it was decided to create the Kazakh National Party "Alash".
The “Alash” program was compiled by A. Bukeikhapov, A. Baitursynov, M. Dulatov, I. Gumarov, T. Zhazhdibaev, A. Birmekanov. It consisted of ten paragraphs and was published in the Kazakh newspaper on November 21, 1917. The party program stated that Russia should become a democratic, federal republic. The subjects of the federation are “autonomous and govern themselves with equal rights and interests.” The state structure of Russia should include the Constituent Assembly and the State Duma. President, Council of Ministers. Elections of government bodies must be direct, equal, and secret. Autonomy of the Kazakhs on the principles of equality with other peoples of the federation. Democratic values were proclaimed: equality, personal integrity, freedom of speech, press and unions. Religion must be separated from the state. All peoples are equal before the court, the court of each people must be in accordance with customs. The Alash party set the task of creating troops to protect the people; social partnership, support for the poor; development of public education; solving the agrarian question. All this was supposed to be done on the basis of democratic, humane principles. The party's printed organ was the newspaper "Kazakh", published in Orenburg until January 1918, then it was replaced by the newspaper "Sary-Arka", and the magazine "Abai" was also published. The leader of the party was A. Bukeikhanov, the dog included representatives of the scientific and creative intelligentsia: A. Baitursynov, M. Tyiyshpasv, M. Zhumabaev, Sh. Kudaiberdiev, S. Toraigyrov, Kh. Gabbasov, Zh. and Kh. Dosmukhamedov and others.
Autumn 1917 - Ush-Zhuz party, Kazakh Socialist Party. The newspaper “Revolutionary Thought” (Omsk) on November 17, 1917 reported: “A group of Kyrgyz, dissatisfied with the program of the national Kyrgyz party “Alash”, organized by the famous cadet Bukeikhanov, organized a special socialist party “Ush-Zhuz”, the goal of the party is the unification of the Turkic Tatar tribe in Russia and the demand for a federal structure of the Russian Republic." The chairman of the party's Central Committee was Mukam Aitpenov, then Kolbay Togusov became. The newspaper "Ush-Zhuz" was the printed organ. The Ush-Zhuz party was a political association of petty-bourgeois democrats. As the political forces in Kazakhstan polarized, Ush-Zhuz began to align itself more and more with the Bolsheviks and opposed itself to the Alash party, and opposed the creation of the Alash-Orda. During the civil war in March 1919, the Soviet leader K. Togusov was executed, other leaders of Ush-Zhuz were also arrested and executed, the Party ceased to exist.
64. Establishment of Soviet power in Kazakhstan. The victory of the October armed uprising in Petrograd and the establishment of Soviet power in the center, as well as in large cities adjacent to Kazakhstan - Tashkent, Omsk, Orenburg, Astrakhan - were decisive for the transfer of all power to the hands of the Soviets in Kazakhstan. However, the establishment of Soviet power lasted for 4 months. The decisive role in the victory of Soviet power in the region was played by the soldiers of local garrisons, united in the Soviets of Soldiers' Deputies. The situation was aggravated by the stubborn resistance of the so-called military governments of the Ural, Semirechensky, Siberian and Orenburg Cossack troops. In most areas of the Syrdarya, Akmola regions and the Bukeev Horde, where the forces led by the Bolsheviks had a decisive advantage and supporters of the Provisional Government were unable to provide armed resistance, the Soviet government won peacefully. Although in the Turgai, Ural, Semipalatinsk and partly in the Semirechensk regions, things were different. From the end of 1917 to March 1918, Soviet power was established mainly in cities and large populated areas. In auls and villages, the process of establishing Soviet power continued until the outbreak of the civil war. Dzhangildin, Seyfulin, Imanov, Sutyushev, Utepov, Rozybakshev and others took an active part in the establishment of Soviet power.
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V.G. Korolenko
The fall of royal power
(Speech to ordinary people about events in Russia) 23
Korolenko V.G. “If only Russia were alive!”: Unknown journalism. 1917-1921 Comp. and comment. S. N. Dmitrieva. M.: Agraf, 2002.
The Israelites came to Rehoboam and said:
Your father has placed a heavy yoke on us, but you lighten the heavy yoke that he has placed on us, and then we will serve you.
And the king answered the people sternly and said:
The father has placed a heavy yoke on you, but I will increase your yoke: my father punished you with whips, but I will punish you with scorpions.
And the people answered the king and said, What portion have we in the house of David... according to our tents, O Israel! And Israel revolted from the house of David to this day.
(III book of Kings XII. 3--10)
I
Introduction
I live in Poltava, and here I had to live through 1905, when, after popular unrest, a manifesto on the convening of the State Duma was issued, and this year, 1917, when news came about the Tsar’s abdication of the throne and a revolution broke out in Russia. Already in 1905, I saw that ordinary people, who read little newspapers and did not know how to understand them properly, often completely did not understand what was happening throughout Russia at that time. The people caught all sorts of vague and untrue rumors and were ready to trust all sorts of instigators. They said that the workers, bribed either by the Japanese or the British, were to blame for everything. Even priests in churches were ordered to talk about this, but subsequently the government itself was forced to refute this fabrication. In the Southwestern region, where there are many Jews, the “turmoil” was attributed to the Jews, who allegedly wanted to appoint their own king. In general, they told a lot of lies. At that time, many tried to explain to the common people the meaning of the events that took place and the significance of the manifesto of October 17, 1905. Many books have been published. They said, among other things, that for the rights that the tsar promised in the manifesto, among all peoples - some earlier, others later - there was a great struggle, and, once having received them, not a single nation I never refused them or gave them back. Such promises to the people cannot be given to the wind. He who sows such wind will reap a storm. And this turned out to be true: the tsar did not keep his promise and did not want to rule in difficult times together with those elected from the people, that is, with the State Duma. He dissolved the State Duma on February 26, and a few days after that he lost the throne. And again, many residents of the city outskirts, residents of distant villages, villages and farmsteads do not know what the matter is, where it came from and where it will lead Russia. For them, these events are like a distant thunderstorm: somewhere it thunders, somewhere lightning blazes and the earth trembles... And ordinary people ask in alarm: where did the thunderstorm come from, what happened there in the capitals, can the earth be without a king? and who will rule now? And again alarming rumors appear, bad people begin to blame everything on the workers alone or on the Jews: everyone can see that everyone has risen up against the tsarist government: generals, officers, soldiers, workers, townspeople and even many tsarist officials. Behind Petrograd, Moscow moved, and behind Moscow, the whole earth. The king, who did not keep his promises, leaves. The Russian land remains and takes its destiny into its own hands. I want to tell you in the future how and why this happened, but since it began and has its roots in our past, you will have to look back at least briefly 24.
House of the Romanovs. The shaft separating the kings from the people. Peter the Great and Alexander II. People's hopes. Walkers to the kings
A little over 300 years have passed since the house of Rurik ceased to exist in Russia. There were no legitimate kings. The Poles, with whom Russia was then at war, settled in Moscow. The people themselves then had to defend the state and restore order. The people's militia defeated the enemy, and a Zemsky Sobor was convened in Moscow to restore order. The people believed that the turmoil of that time occurred only because the legitimate royal line had ceased: the kings began to change and argue about power. And everyone thought that if the hereditary royal power was firmly established, then everything would go well. Therefore, the Zemsky Sobor elected Mikhail Fedorovich from the House of Romanov as tsar, and since then the people themselves no longer interfered with the government, expecting everything from the legitimate tsars. More than a hundred years after this, the Swedish diplomat Marian, who came to Russia, wrote the following about it: “There are not so many dissatisfied in the world as in Russia, where the government does not care at all about the welfare of the people and where the powerful oppress the poor and helpless with such impunity. The dissatisfied There is darkness both in the capitals and throughout the empire, although complaints are heard only in conversations between loved ones." Anna Ioannovna reigned in Russia at that time, and her favorite Biron ruled all affairs. His reign is memorable for its extreme harshness and injustice. For every word against him, for attempts to complain or for simple grumbling, people were imprisoned, tortured, and executed. The people starved, endured and remained silent. Marian says that the queen did not know anything and, what is worse, did not want and could not know. She was completely inaccessible to her people. “No complaints reach her. She surrounded herself with a high rampart." This was written in 1738. Much water has flowed under the bridge since then, but a high rampart, because of which the voice of the people did not reach the kings, invariably surrounded the throne of the Romanovs. Everyone knows this; Russian writers talked a lot about it and called this shaft between the Tsar and the people the “mediastinum.” This mediastinum is temporary workers, favorites, close associates, ministers, high officials and noble nobility. Russian literature has always fought against them as much as it could. The great poet Lermontov wrote about them: You, standing in a friendly crowd at the throne, Executioners of freedom, conscience and honor! You stand under the canopy of the law, Before you is judgment and truth-- everyone keep quiet! The common people also knew this and said with a sigh: “It’s high to God, it’s far from the king!” But the Russian people were a dark and simple-minded people; the Tatar yoke delayed his enlightenment and state development for a long time. It did not have the kind of institutions that other nations already had. He did not dare to speak freely about the rule of the kings and did not blame them for anything. In his songs, he called the kings “Hope - the sovereign” and kept waiting: someday a king would appear who would figure out to move apart the rampart surrounding him, remove bad advisers and come out to all the people. And then happiness will come for Russia. With each change of reign among the people, this hope came to life: this new king will be the real people's king, who will listen to the voice of his people and will reign in truth... But this dream of royal truth invariably deceived. The new king soon also found himself surrounded by the same rampart. The old favorites were replaced by new ones, but the new ones also ruled in the old way. True, all of even illiterate Russia knows the names of Peter the Great and Alexander II. Peter realized that Russia could not remain in darkness and ignorance any longer, and with a strong hand he moved it along the path of enlightenment. The name of Alexander II is forever associated with the liberation of peasants from serfdom. But Peter the Great was a stern and cruel man and, not sparing himself, did not spare his people either. The luxurious buildings of the new capital he founded stand on the bones of tens of thousands of people whom he mercilessly drove to work from all over the world. In general, he exalted Russia as a state among other nations and laid the foundation for enlightenment, but, more occupied with wars, he did not do as much for his people as was necessary. At the beginning of his reign, Alexander II seemed like a real people's king. He freed the peasants, gave Russia new courts and introduced elected zemstvo and city institutions. But he did not complete this matter. He made the zemstvo institutions unilaterally class-based with little representation of peasants, and almost only homeowners and merchants were included in the city Dumas. Then, in addition, he himself seemed to be afraid of what he had done. From the second half of his reign, he began to spoil and belittle the works of his own hands. Soon the wall that Marian spoke about, the “mediastinum” that Russian writers wrote about, closed again and finally separated the “tsar-liberator” from his people. The people did not immediately believe it. Anyone who remembers the 70s and early 80s of the last century knows how many men went to the Tsar with requests then. The people had faith in the king who freed them. He did not want to believe that this king was separated forever from the people, that he too had disappeared behind the rampart. Whole clouds of village walkers, like moths to the flame of a lamp or like seabirds to a lighthouse lantern, rushed to St. Petersburg. There they were not allowed to the royal palace, they were caught and sent in stages. In my youth, I personally met such exiled men from the Walkers in exile. Among them was one, Fyodor Bogdan, a peasant from the Radomysl district of the Kyiv province, who managed to cunningly break through during the review in Moscow and submit a request to Tsar Alexander II himself. Nothing came of this, and Bogdan ended up in exile in the forests of the Vyatka province. And he told me: “When I was sitting in my village and plowing the land, I thought that all the good people were sitting at home and calmly going about their business, and only bad people were in prison.” And since they drove me for my faith in the tsarist truth into prisons and stages, it seems to me that all the good people are now in prisons and stages. I saw everyone here: men, students, workers, and one member of the zemstvo council. Not thieves or swindlers, just as I am not a thief or a swindler. The whole earth wants the truth, yes, apparently, it was hidden again. And he no longer had faith in the king. Five other similar walkers listened to him, and they also did not have this faith. In general, then a great quarrel began between the best Russian people and the best tsar from the House of Romanov. Everyone knows how sadly Alexander II died. Rumors spread among the people that he was killed by landowners because he had taken away their serfs. But this is not true. In the second half of his reign, he removed from himself all the former advisers who worked with him on the matter of liberation. They told him that he couldn’t stop halfway, he had to carry on the work of liberation further. But he did not listen to them and brought closer to himself the enemies of the liberation movement, who tried their best to bring back what they could from the old. The king, who had done a lot of good in his youth, wanted to stop the great people who were moving forward towards freedom, partly at his call. He killed many good people who wanted to continue his work, and he himself died. Be that as it may, he still did a great job, and, despite the great mistakes of the second half of his reign, his name is forever associated with the liberation of the peasants, with new courts and elected zemstvo and city institutions.
Alexander III
His son no longer resembled his father in any way. They told him that now it was no longer possible to govern without knowing the needs of the people, and that it was necessary to call in elected officials from the entire people. But he listened to other advisers, who convinced him that his father died precisely because he gave freedom. In general, Alexander III brought the worst, most hated advisers closer to himself, locked himself in the Gatchina Palace, rarely showing himself even in St. Petersburg, and left it to the ministers to destroy everything good that remained from the reforms of Alexander II. He reduced the number of peasant electors in the zemstvo, introduced zemstvo chiefs, worsened the new courts, distributed people's money to the former landowners and nobility, resumed the shameful corporal punishment for the peasants and outright hated public education. On the reports, he wrote in his own hand: “The trouble is that men send their children to the gymnasium.” His Minister of Public Education Delyanov issued a monstrous order that the gymnasium authorities asked students whether their parents were rich, whether they occupied a good apartment and how many servants they had. This is so that the children of the poor are removed from the gymnasiums and the “cooks’ and peasants’ sons” are not allowed there. And the tsar approved these orders with his own handwritten resolutions. The people soon lost all hope for this king, and even the walkers no longer tried to reach him. He hid from the people behind the blank walls of his palaces, was interested only in the lives of nobles and courtiers, and surprised everyone with his ignorance and inattention to the most important events of Russian life. It is known, for example, that in 1891-1892 Russia suffered a great famine, the likes of which had not happened since the time of Boris Godunov. Already in the previous two years there was a crop failure, which repeated in the third. In my book “In the Year of Hunger” 25 I cited the reviews of one priest about this terrible disaster. He wrote: “As a priest and preacher of the gospel truth, I will say the following: trouble after trouble comes, the harvest in the field has perished, the grain has rotted under the blocks of earth, the granaries are empty, there is no bread. Cattle groan and fall, herds of oxen walk sadly, sheep languish. Millions of trees in the forests were burned. There was a wall of fire and columns of smoke all around... The voice of the prophet Zephaniah is heard: I will destroy everything from the face of the earth, says the Lord: I will destroy people, livestock and animals, I will destroy birds and fish." The ministers tried to hide this great disaster and deny help to the people. But the elected people in the zemstvos spoke with one voice, so they still had to recognize the people’s enormous misfortune; they had to give out tens of millions for food and seeding. But this was done too late, and many people died of hunger and disease. After famine came cholera. It came from Persia, reached us through Astrakhan and began to move along the Volga. The governors were almost entirely completely incapable people, mama's boys, who were appointed not to serve the people, but only to give them salaries. The governor of Baku fled from cholera to the Caucasus Mountains. Saratovsky, when people began to worry, hid on the ship. The governor of Astrakhan did the worst thing: he sent patrol ships to the sea and ordered to detain all steamships approaching from Persia and the Caucasus coast and not let them into the Volga. But at the same time he did not send either fresh water or bread. Thus, more than 400 ships and barges with people, healthy and sick, were detained at sea. The sick were dying, the healthy were thirsty and hungry, but there was no help. Finally, one day a steamer appeared from Astrakhan. Everyone looked with hope that it was carrying bread and water, but when the ship came closer, it turned out that it was carrying... coffins! (I described all this in the article “Quarantine on a 9-foot roadstead” 26.) It was only the inability and stupidity of the provincial authorities, but the people became confident that the doctors were deliberately ordered to starve people. When, finally, it was no longer possible to keep such a mass of ships at sea and they were allowed into the Volga, the exhausted people rushed up the river and spread the news of their torment and coffins instead of bread everywhere. Then cholera riots began to sweep city after city. The dark people believed the evil fiction that doctors, on orders from higher authorities, were deliberately killing the people. They rushed to set fire to hospitals, beat nurses, paramedics and doctors who worked at the risk of their lives for the benefit of the same people. Afterwards came the pacification and military trials of the rebels. Moreover, in Saratov alone, more than 20 people guilty only of darkness were sentenced to death. The military courts found out the shameful behavior of the governors and decided to report this to the highest authorities. It seemed that at least after this the king would know how his proteges had distinguished themselves. All of Russia expected that the Volga governors would be brought to trial. But after a while, everyone, on the contrary, read the tsar’s orders with surprise: the Baku governor, who fled to the mountains, and the Astrakhan governor, whose orders caused a riot, and the Saratov governor, who hid like the last coward on the ship, so that the police barely found him there, -- received awards. This showed the whole country that not only quiet prayers, but even loud cries and groans of the people cannot penetrate through the rampart with which the kings are surrounded; the tsar read only the false reports of the ministers and acted on them. And it just happened that it was during this dark time that 10 years passed since the coronation of Alexander III, ten years of his supposedly “prosperous reign.” All the best people in Russia understood well what prosperity this was, but their lips were clamped, and official Russia was all lying, and therefore congratulations came from everywhere. The Tsar himself came to Moscow to personally receive the greetings of the capital. Representatives of the nobility gathered in the Governor General's Palace. The king came out to them, and the first words with which he began his speech were the following: - Thank God, ten years passed safely. People present at this royal reception said that these words about “well-being” amazed even the highest nobility. Those present looked at each other: does the Russian Tsar really consider hunger, cholera, riots and executions of his subjects to be prosperity? The next day, official telegrams carried this Tsar’s speech to all corners of the Russian land. They were read in starving provinces, read on the Volga, read everywhere where there were literate people in cities and villages. And everyone learned that the people’s misfortune was beyond the tsar’s ear, that he judged the life of his fatherland only by reports from the palace and police guards. No one personally bothered him in his palace, which means Russia is happy!..
Nicholas II
In 1894, Alexander III died. His son Nicholas II ascended the throne. And again in Rus' the eternal hopes came to life. They said that the young king was a kind and benevolent man. It was reported that, while receiving various deputations from Crimea while passing through, he spoke about unity “with all classes” and about “the entire Russian land” (and not about just the nobility). On November 14, the young king married a Hessian princess, a German. On this occasion, they again said that there were no police in St. Petersburg during the celebrations. There were only troops, mounted gendarmes and janitors. This delighted the people so much that the tsar was greeted and seen off with joyful cries, and he had the opportunity to make sure that the Russian people still believed in the tsars and hoped for him personally. And this popular hope protected him better than the ranks of the police, hated by the people. Although there is a saying: good glory lies, bad glory flees, but it did not apply to kings. About them, no matter what they do, the bad truth is silent, and laudatory lies spread freely. And again, throughout the cities and villages, to distant villages, hopes for royal truth began to arise. They said that the young king walked unguarded through the streets, entered into conversations with ordinary people and students, that he would not allow the rampart to surround him, like all kings. They started talking about this in zemstvos and city Dumas. The zemstvo had its own concerns. The zemstvo is an all-class institution, and although it was dominated by nobles and rich landowners, there were also men and elected r nye from small owners. But the zemstvo did not have the right that the court had n government, - report to the sovereigns about the people's needs and complaints directly, bypassing senior officials. And now, at zemstvo meetings, the best zemstvo people started talking about this injustice and were preparing to ask that the zemstvo be given this right. The Tver provincial zemstvo assembly was the first to plan to petition for this. They drew up an all-submissive address, it was read and accepted by the assembly, and only 8 zemstvo leaders went against it. But the local governor hastened to protest the resolution of the meeting and did not allow the address to be included in the report to the tsar. The Zemstvo people decided to send the address to the highest name through the Minister of the Court, Count. Vorontsova-Dashkova. But he also did not agree to introduce him and answered; that the address is returned to the same Tver governor without consideration. It was impossible for an all-class institution to make its way to the king with a modest request. It ran into the same bureaucratic mediastinum everywhere. And the young king was already surrounded by a rampart. There was only one hope left. In January, a reception was scheduled for a deputation from the entire land with congratulations on the occasion of the royal wedding. During the congratulations and the serving of bread and salt, the Zemstvo residents decided to again repeat their requests and hopes set out in the address. But senior officials also prepared and took their own measures. Then Pobedonostsev 27 was still alive, the worst of the advisers of the previous reign, and now he had completely taken possession of the new tsar... This became visible already in November 1894: the police again began to pacify any free movement in the old way. The students became worried. Everyone was talking about the fact that arrests and deportations without trial, which had long been disgusting to the entire people, had begun again. But Russia was accustomed to hope, and although many long ago understood the essence of autocracy and laughed at these hopes, they still lived, and society was waiting for something. On January 19, 1895, representatives of classes and institutions came to St. Petersburg from all over and at the appointed hour they came to the royal palace with bread and salt, with complacent congratulations and hopes. Everyone knew that this moment would be decisive, that the new king would say some important decisive word. And he said it. At 12 o'clock the door opened and the king walked out into the hall filled with courtiers, deputies from classes and institutions. The king was excited and held his cap in his hands. Having walked about 20 steps, he stopped and began to speak unsteadily and looking into his cap, where he had a piece of paper with a written speech. Subsequently they said that the speech was written by Pobedonostsev and put in his cap so that the young tsar would not lose his way. At the end of his speech, he almost shouted in a nervous and excited voice. And in this cry of the young tsar, all of Russia heard the answer of the highest officials to the modest request expressed by the Tver zemstvo people. What did they ask for? Oh, they didn't ask for much! Here is an exact excerpt from their address: “Your Imperial Majesty! On significant days the beginning of your service to the Russian people zemstvo greets you with greetings of loyal subjects. We cherish hopes that from the height of the throne the voice of the people's needs will be heard... That the laws will be executed steadily, both by the people, as well as government officials for the law must stand above the random types of representatives of this power... And finally, We are waiting, Sovereign, for opportunities and rights for public institutions express your opinion on issues concerning them, so that the expression of needs and thoughts not only of representatives of the administration could reach the height of the throne(i.e. bureaucrats), but also the Russian people." And that's all! These are the humble requests the all-class zemstvo made to the Russian Tsar in 1895. But senior officials saw this as a great danger for themselves. They did not like that the address talked about the Tsar’s service to the Russian people. They inspired the king that the entire fatherland should serve him, and not he the fatherland. What seemed even worse to them was the demand that they, the officials, also carry out the laws, and the worst thing was that elected people could report at least only about local affairs directly to the tsar, in addition to them. This would mean, they thought, that the mediastinum would be eliminated and the true voice of the earth would reach the tsar... And so the old courtier suggested to the tsar the answer to the Russian land. The Tsar's speech was published in all newspapers. He ended it like this: “...I know that recently the voices of people have been heard who are carried away meaningless dreams on the participation of zemstvo representatives in internal governance matters. Let everyone know that I... will guard the beginning of the autocracy as firmly as my unforgettable late parent guarded it." It should be noted that at that time no one had yet encroached on the autocracy and the request of the zemstvo people was that not only officials and only the nobility had the right to appeal to the sovereign with requests and complaints. And this humble plea was called meaningless dreams. That is, the young Russian tsar announced to all of Russia that he would still remain the king of the nobility and bureaucracy alone, and did not want to listen to the voices of all other classes. The impression from this speech was so unexpected that, approaching with bread and salt, one deputy dropped the offering on the ground immediately after the reception, they went to the Kazan Cathedral to serve a prayer service: thank God, everything will remain as before. ours. But it was just a handful. All the zemstvo people, even the best of the nobles, left the royal reception with bitterness in their hearts, with insult in their souls. And the news of how Russian spread throughout St. Petersburg, and then throughout Russia. the tsar received his subjects, subjects who brought him bread and salt, and how he, like a student, read from a piece of paper what was suggested to him by the evil spirit of the royal chambers - Pobedonostsev. So, the end of hopes, the end of childish hopes! Russia was told frankly that its hopes for the Tsar were only a dream, and, moreover, a meaningless dream, which those who fought against the autocracy, who suffered prisons and exiles for this, had long known. Now many people have joined them, who hitherto still believed in the old fairy tale. I lived then on the Volga, where there were many Old Believers, people well-read in the Holy Scriptures. And one of them, recalling the biblical story of Rehoboam, spoke to the audience on the ship. - Yes, now the Russian people will say, as the Israelis said to Rehoboam: “We have no part in the house of the Romanovs.” But among the simple and dark people, hope still lived, and many hard lessons were needed to destroy it. The reign of Nicholas II did not skimp on these lessons. They went to the Russian people terribly hard, through long suffering that led Russia to the brink of destruction.
On May 14, 1895, the coronation of Nicholas II and his young wife took place. Tsars are always crowned in Moscow. And this time the celebration also took place in the Assumption Cathedral. The people rejoiced as before, shouted “Hurray” and filled the streets, as if God knows what kind of happiness was in store for them. And the king wanted to give his people a gift to celebrate. A celebration was organized on the huge Khodynka field, and the people were informed ahead that, in memory of the triumph, the good tsar and his queen had prepared mugs with royal monograms and portraits for distribution to their loyal subjects. And hundreds of thousands of people from the city of Moscow and visitors from other cities and villages poured into this empty bait. It was known that the highest management of the holiday was entrusted, in addition to the City Duma and even the former police officers, to the close favorites of the new tsar, and they gave orders without asking experienced people, arrogantly, confidently and stupidly. The day turned out to be good, festive. People poured out, apparently and invisibly, so that it became scary to look at this sea of people, swaying like a real ocean. A special crush took place near the wooden booths where the royal gifts were displayed. They were waiting for a signal to rush to these booths, and while waiting, the crowd swayed without thought or will, like ears of corn in the wind. Eyewitnesses said that already in advance horror was seizing from a premonition of trouble; some were already falling, children were screaming, the women were feeling sick. The most prudent tried to get out of the crowd. But the entire crowd was gripped by a kind of madness—the desire to receive the Tsar’s ten-kopeck coin in order to bring it home in triumph and place it in the red corner under the icons. And so, the signal was given. The crowd rushed to the booths. The rear ones pressed on e rare Those in front could not get into the tight passages. They were pressed to the corners about G Radiated to the walls, bent in half on the barriers and crushed. They rang out e human screams. Blind horror began. Whoever fell did not get up - he was trampled, without looking or thinking, to death... The crowd, not knowing where to go O gave up, rushed from side to side. People crushed each other... By the way, they rushed in one direction, where there was a ditch, unfenced by anything. Pushed from behind, people fell on top of each other and suffocated. When this celebration with royal gifts ended, there were many corpses in the square. They were laid out in rows. Relatives recognized their own here, and over Khodynka, over the places adjacent to it, over all of Moscow, crying, groaning, despair arose... Thus ended the royal holiday with gifts to the good people of Moscow. They expected that a strict investigation would be launched, that it would be established through whose fault this great misfortune happened. Of course, this will not bring back the dead, but the people’s feeling would find some satisfaction in the knowledge that the tsar was also upset and angry at the inattention and carelessness of the stewards responsible for the deaths of so many people. But, just like his father after the cholera riots, the real culprits were not found. The king did not want to upset the stewards, whom he knew and knew, and they received their rewards. The courtiers said: “How kind our king is. He did not want to upset the stewards on these joyful days.” But the “good king” did not see and did not want to hear the grief and despair of those thousands of ordinary people who lost their wives or husbands, brothers or children on the royal holiday, and there was no one to boldly tell him about it. The Khodynka disaster cast a dark shadow on the beginning of a new reign. Superstitious people saw in it a prophetic omen and a bad omen. But people who did not believe in omens also shook their heads when reading about the ongoing court celebrations. Yes, they said, this is a bad sign: like his father, the new tsar looks only through the eyes of nobles and nobles and because of them does not see or hear Russia. And then the new reign was called “bloody.”
Japanese War. Unrest. Petersburg sends the last walkers to the Tsar. Strike of 1905. Manifesto of October 17th
The Japanese War is still remembered by everyone. At the initiative of Nicholas II, an international meeting was convened in The Hague 28, where various nations accepted measures against possible wars, but soon our tsar himself violated the peace and started a war unnecessarily and without purpose. And again this was due to the interests of the courtiers and nobility. Some noble gentlemen secured large timber contracts for themselves on the Yalu River, beyond our eastern Siberian border, in a foreign land, and brought in workers and soldiers and Cossacks dressed as workers. This was very beneficial for them, but it could threaten war, as it irritated their close Japanese neighbors. Some people warned the king about this, pointing out the danger of war. But he again expressed his “kindness” to Chamberlain Bezobrazov and his companions, who asked to support a cause that was beneficial to them. In addition, senior officials told the Tsar that the people demanded changes, and even the peasantry (in 1902) in many places was agitated, demanding land. But a victorious war can humble the people for a long time and delay their demands... And then a war began that killed hundreds of thousands of Russian people in a distant land that was unnecessary for Russia. It also turned out that the bureaucratic administration had brought all matters to a complete breakdown: the fortresses that appeared ready on paper were not ready, the quartermasters stole, the military commanders quarreled among themselves, the ships turned out to be old and bad, and Russia suffered defeat after defeat. Dissatisfaction with the tsarist government was widespread among the people. It was felt that the autocracy was being shaken. His opponents are no longer only among educated people, but also among the masses. This, of course, was noticed before, and the government took its own measures. It carried out its agitation against the agitation of opponents of the tsarist power, for which it started workers' Societies, where bribed speakers proved to the workers and ordinary people that they should continue to rely only on the tsar and should not believe his opponents. Such a Society was founded first in Moscow, and then at the beginning of 1904 in St. Petersburg. It arose at the initiative of the police and the priest Gapon 29 and bore the name “St. Petersburg Society of Factory and Factory Workers.” One of the goals of this Society was to distract workers from the criminal propaganda of opponents of the tsarist government. The head of this Society was priest Georgy Gapon, a native of the Poltava province. He was considered quite trustworthy. He was patronized by the highest clergy and some ministers, and he received complete freedom of communication with wide circles of workers, who signed up en masse for the new Society. At first the bosses liked it. Gapon was an excellent speaker. The workers cried when he spoke of their plight, and became delighted, like children, when he advised them to rely on the Tsar. The crowd eagerly hung on his every word. His speeches fell on grateful soil; he awakened that deep-rooted faith in kings, which from time immemorial nested in the hearts of the common people, and turned people's hopes to where they turned according to the habit inherited from their fathers and grandfathers. And the police did not interfere with this. The number of listeners to Gapon and other speakers grew with terrible speed. Factory workers and their wives gathered at the meetings, and ordinary people, simple-minded and poor, who huddled in the outlying neighborhoods, came. And all these crowds caught their own hopes in the words of the speakers. The meetings became so crowded that there was nowhere for an apple to fall, and the excitement of revived hopes grew throughout the entire crowd. The police did not calculate, however, that there was also a great danger in this: The hope of the people can be fanned into such a flame that it is then difficult to extinguish. The agitation of the Gaponovites, which seemed “well-intentioned” from the boss’s point of view, sowed the wind from which a storm arose. The people believed and made their conclusions: “If so, if all our hope is in the king, then let’s go to our “Hope the Sovereign” and tell the whole truth about the people’s needs and the people’s grief.” It was no longer possible to stop this thought, which broke through like a storm from the depths of the people’s souls. It grew, strengthened and soon grew into a definite intention: the population of the working outskirts decided to once again send their walkers to the tsar, as peasant Rus' had once done. Only now, instead of individual envoys, tens of thousands of people had to move to the royal palace. “If it is true that the king is the father, and we are his children, then let him accept us and listen to us.” In St. Petersburg, everything that happened at workers' meetings was known. Everyone was talking about it, everyone was captivated and excited, it raised terrible alarm in everyone. People who had long believed in the tsarist power, its longtime opponents, the so-called unreliable ones, revolutionaries, students tried to keep the workers, appeared at their meetings and said: “Come to your senses, don’t go to the tsar. It’s useless. He won’t accept you, he won’t want to listen. You will be greeted with shots and bayonets." But the workers did not believe. They said: “You are the king’s enemies. You are not his children. We believe him and we will go to him as to a father, with our wives and children. We will not have weapons, but a priest with a cross will go ahead, and we will carry icons. It cannot be that the Father Tsar would allow his unarmed children to be shot." Then the hottest people, from the youth and students, seeing that they could not hold back the workers, seized by a fiery faith in the Tsar, wanted to join their procession, scheduled for January 9 (1905). “If they shoot, let them shoot at us too.” But the workers' leaders did not agree. They wanted it to be clear that there were no royal opponents here, but only simple people, believing and obedient. The night of January 9th passed in St. Petersburg in terrible anxiety. Many did not sleep that fateful night, and when it became known that the next morning the workers would nevertheless move towards the palace, the most respected public figures and writers decided to turn to the ministers and convince them to allow the people to see the king and under no circumstances shoot at an unarmed woman. crowd. They went to Minister Witte and other ministers, woke them up at 2 am and began to beg them to prevent the shedding of blood. But they achieved nothing; they themselves soon ended up in the Peter and Paul Fortress. The next morning, a huge movement of working people began from the outskirts to the city center, to the place where the Winter Palace flaunts over the Neva. Alexander II once lived in this palace. Here he appeared during the days of the liberation of the peasants and spoke to the people from the balcony. Since ancient times, peasant walkers have been making their way here with longing and hope; Fyodor Bogdan once wandered here, hiding a petition in his bosom and waiting for an opportunity to present it to the Tsar himself. Now thousands of people with their hopes were slowly moving here. They believed: they will come to the palace. The king will come out to them. They will surround him like children surround their father. He will listen to them, and they will finally see that dreamed-about people's king, whose image floated for centuries before the mental gaze of their fathers and grandfathers and great-grandfathers... The entire capital waited with trepidation for what would happen when these dreams collided with harsh reality. On the outskirts, the police tried to stop the moving workers, but they managed to break through or bypass these barriers. They dispersed, bypassed the outposts and converged again in the city. And now huge crowds began to appear and grow on the streets of the city. Among them there were indeed women and children... Priests walked ahead, carrying icons... And these people joyfully told everyone that they were going to their king, with hope for the royal truth... Then what their friends predicted to the workers happened. Troops were stationed in different places on the northern, southern, western and eastern sides of the palace, at long distances from it. Thus, the royal palace was, as it were, surrounded by a chain of bayonets, and after a while, on command, it was surrounded by smoke, gunfire and blood. .. The worst predictions of the enemies of the royal power came true. Previously, solitary walkers were met with prison and stages. Now, when all the working people of the capital came to the tsar, they responded by shooting... The independent press was forbidden to write anything about this other than false official information. But the press did not carry out this order, and true news, despite censorship, soon broke through to the pages of newspapers and magazines. The Government Bulletin reported that 76 dead and 233 wounded were taken to hospitals, but other newspapers wrote about a thousand or more killed. There were many more wounded men, women and children. Thus, the “bloody Tsar” Nicholas II Romanov repeated the Moscow Khodynka in St. Petersburg. In Moscow, the people paid the price for their careless pursuit of royal gifts. But there, on the other hand, there was only frivolity and negligence. In St. Petersburg, the blood of the people was shed deliberately, by order; the people paid for their childish faith in the royal truth. These were the last marches of the Russian people to the Tsar. Government newspapers wrote that on January 9, rebels bribed by the British and Japanese died. But it was impossible to deceive anyone with this. On January 9, it was not rioters or seditionists who were killed. On this day, the childish faith of the simple-minded people in their kings was killed. This faith has never been resurrected in the capital since that fateful day. And all of Russia, by the end of the unfortunate war, understood where the autocracy was leading the country and that it was time to give up empty hopes on the walkers, it was time to stop the vain search for royal mercy. What is needed is not walkers, not humble petitioners for the needs of the people, but permanent elected representatives from the entire people, who must issue laws and monitor their implementation, and the king is obliged to listen to them, as the authoritative voice of the people 30. Because of this, unrest began throughout the country. They especially intensified towards the end of the war and then expressed themselves in the memorable strike of 1905. Railway workers immediately joined her, and traffic stopped throughout Russia, as if by magic. The trains seemed to have fallen asleep at the small stations where the strike caught them. Unheated locomotives stood on sidings; on the rails from horizon to horizon neither train nor smoke was visible; Mail delivery stopped, and on October 12, the telegraph also fell silent, as postal and telegraph employees joined the railway workers. Factories and trams stopped in cities. All life in the great country stopped. Russia has become like the sleepy kingdom described in a fairy tale. The common people did not immediately and everywhere understand the significance of this strike. Again they talked about the Japanese, the British and the Jews. In some places they were worried because the cessation of movement disrupted normal life. But now the meaning of the strike is clear to everyone. Labor Russia told the tsar: “You can exile, execute, pacify, crush freedom-loving people.” It’s not a smart thing to call the aspirations of the people meaningless dreams, to respond to them with prisons, stages, shots. But know that with bayonets you will not plow our vast fields, you will not put into operation hundreds of thousands of factory machines, you will not teach children the necessary sciences, you will not restore movement in the space of a great country from the Baltic Sea to the Great Ocean. For now, you can destroy and ban anything, but you cannot create anything without the working people. It was so clear that even this king, blind and deaf to the voice of the people, was afraid. Having recently called the modest request of the Zemstvo residents senseless dreams, on October 17, 1905, he issued a manifesto, which called on those elected by the people to legislate and govern the country. Then, as in a fairy tale, the enchanted kingdom woke up: the locomotives started smoking again, the trains started moving, the telegraph started working, the flywheels and drive belts started moving in the factories. What the king’s orders and bayonets could not do, hope for freedom did...
Breaking promises. Reaction. Tsar-landowner. Russia is a patrimony. Rasputin
The misfortune of kings is the constant insincerity and deceit of promises given in moments of fear before the popular movement. When the strikes subsided, the tsar and his associates began to think about how to return the former unlimited power and the previous order. I will not go into detail about what everyone still remembers. The first State Duma met in May. First of all, she turned to the king demanding an amnesty for political crimes. The king refused. The Duma also demanded the destruction of field courts, which sentenced dozens to death. The ministers responded by executing 8 people at once, who, in addition, according to the general vote, were convicted innocently. That was the beginning. Although it was obvious that the tsar, who supposedly shared full power with popular representation, was no longer an autocratic tsar, he did not renounce this title, and the only bishop, Antonin of Narva, who in his diocese excluded the word “most autocratic”, fell into disgrace. If the State Duma had not been prevented from working since 1906, how much could have been done during this time, how much could have been resolved on the most important issues of Russian life. The First Duma, although assembled on the basis of an imperfect electoral law, was still the best and most independent. Therefore, the tsar dissolved it and decided to assemble a second, and then a third, in which he further reduced the representation of peasants, workers and generally broad sections of the people. They came up with all sorts of means to get more nobles into the Duma, d government priests and officials. To do this, they did not stop at threats, violence and lawlessness. People whom the people believed were exiled without at and the consequences. In addition, above the State Duma there was also the State n nal Council, consisting of senior dignitaries, some not even elected, but appointed A expected by the tsar himself, in which the majority was secured for the ministers. This Council delayed all the best laws developed by the State Duma and slowed down its work. That is why over these 11-12 years the Duma has done so little for the people. It was drafted incorrectly and was still prevented from working. Finally, the 4th Duma was convened. It seemed that she should already be completely submissive to the king and his ministers. Autocracy returned in full force. The Romanovs always looked at Russia as their patrimony. No wonder one of them said that he was the first landowner. His estate was all of Russia. Ministers are simple bailiffs who carry out only the will of the master. And, just as in the old days on serf estates, the bailiffs, flattering and bowing to the owners, turned them around as they wanted, so in Russia the kings’ confidants and favorites turned them around. Under Nicholas II this reached unprecedented proportions. Everyone knows the name Rasputin. It thundered not only throughout Russia, but throughout the world. And no wonder. He was a Siberian peasant, illiterate, but very cunning, cunning and dexterous. He had a special ability to influence women. Through some clergy and court ladies, he made his way into the palace and managed to convince the queen of his special power to heal diseases. Little by little, he not only infiltrated the royal palace, but also mastered the will of the queen, who looked at everything through his eyes. And the weak-willed king obediently followed her. And then the unprecedented and almost incredible happened. The crafty, semi-literate rogue began to manipulate the destinies of Russia and even appoint ministers. An old proverb says that the heart of a king is in the hand of God. But this, however, did not prevent the fact that the heart of Anna Ioannovna was only in the hands of Biron, the heart of Catherine - in the hands of successive favorites, with whom she enslaved the people by hundreds of thousands, the heart of Alexander I - in the hands of the ferocious Arakcheev, who tortured his serfs and soldiers of military settlements, the obscurantist Pobedonostsev controlled the heart of Alexander III... And under the last Romanov, things came to the point that many said: - Now our reign is not Nicholas II Romanov, but Grigory I Rasputin.
The Great War. The demand of the Ministry of Trust and the fight against the State. Duma. Assassination of Rasputin by the Grand Dukes
In such a situation of complete anarchy and domination of random people, Russia and its government were caught in the greatest war the world has ever seen. For us, this was no longer the Japanese war, which thundered on the distant Siberian outskirts. Now the enemy was at our very borders. Therefore, Russian society, when the war had already broken out, engulfing almost all of Europe and threatening to spread to other parts of the world, reacted to it differently than to Japanese society. Zemstvos and cities united into unions, they were supported by the State Duma, and it soon became clear that public institutions provide irreplaceable assistance to our army and that it is impossible to wage a war without them. But here a formidable question arose before all of Russia: the army is fighting on the borders, elected institutions are trying to help it in the rear, setting up hospitals, nutrition centers, delivering food and ammunition, organizing work in factories and factories. What did the tsarist government do? It had always been afraid of elected institutions and now interfered with public work, constrained the activities of unions, persistently arrested and exiled workers who were elected to military-industrial committees to assist in defense matters. Both the State Duma and the whole country loudly demanded that the Tsar replace his first minister Stürmer and Protopopov, 31 who was promoted to minister by Rasputin, and that another council of ministers be formed from people whom Russia trusts will not betray her. They must give an account of all their actions and what the king did on their advice. Having lost the trust of the State Duma, they must resign. According to the law, the king was not responsible to anyone for anything. It was so necessary that at least his advisers should be held accountable for the bad advice they secretly gave d the leaders of the people whispered to the king. The Tsar did not want to hear about such a responsible ministry. He wanted to appoint and remove his mayors in the old way only at his own will, and this meant that intrigues, bribery and the struggle for power around Rasputin would continue. The fruits of this order were already evident. Sukhomlinov was the Minister of War at the beginning of the war. The latter's close associate was Colonel Myasoedov, 32 a former gendarme, provocateur and detective. Even before the war, the current Minister of War, and then deputy Guchkov, 33 stated openly that Myasoedov was bribed by a foreign power and was telling it our military secrets. But Sukhomlinov did not want to remove Myasoedov and, when the war began, he gave him an important assignment in the army. And the Russian troops suffered heavy defeats in East Prussia, and it was obvious that someone had conveyed important news to the enemies. It soon became clear that Myasoedov was indeed a long-time German spy. He was caught in this, and he was hanged with such haste, as if the authorities were afraid that he would tell something unnecessary. Everyone remembers how our army retreated from the Carpathians, without guns, without shells, almost without weapons, fighting off the advancing Germans almost with their bare hands. After this, the tsar was finally forced to remove Sukhomlinov, but still did not want to change the rest of the ministry. The Duma made the most modest demands. She asked that the Tsar, by his authority, appoint a “Ministry of Trust” from people known to the Duma and the people with whom they could work. Nicholas II did the opposite: he began to persistently remove precisely those ministers who were still working in agreement with the Duma and public institutions. Thus, the Minister of Public Education, Gr. Ignatiev and Polivanov, who replaced Sukhomlinov. It was clear to everyone that they were removed only because they agreed to work with the State Duma. And in this again the hand of the Tsarina’s party and Rasputin was visible. Thus, the autocracy entered into an open struggle with popular representation. The Duma was postponed every now and then. They wanted to show her that if she didn’t humble herself, they would disband her completely. But when the Duma died down, the voice of the Russian land was heard: from all zemstvo assemblies, from all congresses there were statements of sympathy for the State Duma and its demands. And when the Duma met again, it was obvious that it did not intend to reconcile. After one of these dissolutions, the Fourth Duma spoke in such decisive language as the tsars were not yet accustomed to, and the chairman of the Council of Ministers, Sturmer, was directly accused of treason at a meeting on November 1 last year. The entire Duma, with the exception of the extreme right, supported Miliukov, who spoke about this. The most moderate deputies made angry speeches, and even in the submissive Council there were echoes of popular indignation. It was so impressive that even at court they saw the danger threatening the throne of Nicholas II. They started talking about the “dark forces” that crowded around the king and queen, even some ministers and court nobility. Members of the royal family were worried, seeing that Nicholas II was blindly heading for the collapse of the entire dynasty. The great princes spoke and wrote about this to the king. But the king, as always, was deaf and blind to the rumbles of the beginning of the national thunderstorm and to the frightened voices of his loved ones. True, he removed Stürmer, but Rasputin still ruled. It seemed to the princes that all evil was only in Rasputin and that if he were removed, the danger would disappear. And on December 17 last year, in the house of Prince Yusupov, who was married to the Tsar’s own niece, a shot was heard during a feast. It was Rasputin who was killed by close relatives of the Tsar, taken out in a car and lowered into an ice hole on the Nevka. In this way, the party of the great princes, concerned about the fate of the royal house, tried to eliminate the cause of the great temptation. And, of course, the princes were mistaken - it’s not about Rasputin alone, but about the order in which one person ruled the country as an irresponsible ruler. And when, in addition, such a ruler turned out to be a weak and stupid person, then the work of autocracy was over. Nicholas II had to honestly fulfill the promises made in 1905. The Tsar had time to make a choice between his ministers and Russia. He chose the ministers and the old order. Now the people had to choose between the tsar and the freedom of the fatherland. The people chose their homeland and freedom.
Excitement about bread. Repetition on January 9th. The troops take the side of the people. Abdication of the Tsar
It was impossible to delay any longer. During this time, everything fell into a terrible state. Famine began in the capital. Women stood for hours at a time in order to get a piece of bread for the family; some workers also had to either work hungry or be left behind. People were losing patience and starting to worry. The police resorted to the usual methods of pacification. The last voices addressed the tsar with a warning about the need to quickly yield in order to establish common work before it was too late. The chairman of the State Duma, some generals, and princes wrote to him about this. But the ministers still assured that with the Russian people, given their love for kings, you can do whatever you want: they will never deviate from their devotion to the tsars. And unrest over bread must be pacified by force. Everything is ready for this, as it was on January 9, 1905. The police were armed with machine guns, which were placed in courtyards, in the attics of houses, even in the bell towers of some churches: it was necessary to strike a blow that would bring terror not only to Petrograd, but to the whole of Russia. It was necessary to intimidate the people and continue to rule based on fear. On February 25th, on Sunday, when a lot of people were walking on the main street of Petrograd - Nevsky Prospekt, some with red flags, some simply curious and walking in a festive manner - shots were heard from one end of Nevsky, from the Admiralty . The audience rushed in the opposite direction, but after a while shots were heard from the Sign; they fired along the street, which in many places was stained with the blood of unarmed people. The street is empty. The government seemed to have won another easy victory. A few more tons A any pacification, and the old autocracy will be established again. But the blind and deaf tsar forgot that 12 years passed over Russia not in vain, that the Petrograd working masses are no longer the same as those who came to him on January 9, 1905 with icons and humble requests, and the troops, even the guards regiments, are no longer the same , which once flooded the streets and squares of Moscow with the blood of the insurgent people. True, the soldiers once again obeyed the command, and the fatal shots were fired at the unarmed. Thus, blood has already been shed between the army and the people and the beginning of enmity and discord, useful for the oppressors, has begun. Someday all the details of these days will be described. Now we only know that, having returned to their barracks, the soldiers did not sleep all night, experiencing painful movements of conscience. Probably, people came to them who reproached them for shedding brotherly blood and explained the true state of affairs. The next morning the commander appeared, lined up the soldiers and congratulated them on their “victory.” Perhaps at the same time he promised rewards, perhaps he called for new glorious deeds. And at the same time I did not feel that I myself was on the threshold of death. The soldiers, who had been shooting at the crowd yesterday, rushed at him, and he was killed. The soldiers ran out into the street and began to call other regiments to revolt against the bloody king and his government. And on the same night, a royal decree was signed on a new dissolution of the State Duma. But the Duma realized that if it dispersed, it would be a betrayal of the people's cause, and decided not to obey the dissolution. She formed a committee from her deputies, which soon formed a provisional government. This morning was decisive for Russia. The elected Duma stood against the tsar, who betrayed his promises and wanted to return the old autocracy. The rebel parts of the garrison supported her, and so did the people. Who will the rest of the troops follow? One could expect that if at least some units took the side of the old government, then the capital would be drenched in fraternal blood to the delight of the enemy... But this did not happen: one regiment after another with officers, with unfurled banners and music, approached the Tauride Palace, but not to disperse disobedient deputies, but to defend the provisional government. It became obvious that the scale of the autocracy’s crimes against the people had become full: beyond Petrograd, Moscow was abandoned from the Tsar, and behind it, all of Russia. Apart from the police and gendarmes, no one rose to his defense. The ministers were arrested and imprisoned first in the Tauride Palace, and then transferred to the Peter and Paul Fortress, where they await trial for their crimes against the people. Everyone understood that the great disobedient hour had come in Russia, and the very first breath of the people's storm swept away the tsarist power without a trace. The supporters of Nicholas II tried in vain to move some regiments from the front to the rebellious capital. They either did not go, or, having arrived, immediately fraternized with the people and rebel comrades. The king tried again to attract the people with promises. He had already agreed to remove his ministers and give a responsible ministry. But events told him: it’s too late! The country does not believe the promises that you so dishonestly broke in 1905. On March 2, Nicholas II abdicated the throne for himself and his son. He transferred his power to Grand Duke Mikhail Alexandrovich. But Mikhail Alexandrovich also refused to accept power without the consent of the constituent assembly, since it was obvious that the rebel people would now not submit to any of the Romanovs. Thus ended the reign of this house. Three hundred years ago, with the ringing of bells and the cries of the people, the first Romanov entered Moscow. Now, with the same jubilation of the entire people, Russia has deposed the last representative of this house, and power is again in the hands of the people. Then there was a Zemsky Sobor, now there is a constituent assembly that will establish the future form of government of the Russian state. What will be the decision of the Zemsky Sobor, at which Russian citizens are called upon to speak out with their full voices? The tsarist government led Russia to the brink of destruction. This historical moment will decide our fate for many decades, perhaps for centuries. It takes a lot of wisdom to stop disagreements within the country, dangerous disputes over power and civil strife. It is necessary for Russia to stand with one soul and one heart on the side of its independence. She has already declared to the whole world that she does not seek conquest for herself, that she is ready to extend her hand to make peace. But as long as the homeland is threatened with invasion and the death of its young freedom, it must stand in full readiness to repel the great danger. The royal power no longer has a share in this great and difficult national undertaking. There will be no share in a happy future after the storm. Russia believed in tsars for too long, hoped in vain for too long. The last Romanov weaned her away from these naive hopes, and now from all over our homeland, from cities and villages, from capitals and villages, there seems to be a common unanimous cry: “Long live the people's government!.. Long live the democratic republic!” 34
