Nicholas II Trivia

Question 1

When did Nicholas’ reign start and end?

Answer 1

1894 - 1917 (abdicated)

Question 2

What were Nicholas’ first 10 years as tsar known as?

Answer 2

Personal rule

Question 3

Why were Nicholas’ first 10 years known as the Personal Rule?

Answer 3

He ignored the Great Famine resistance and strikes rise.
During his coronation 1440 people were crushed at Khondynka at the prospect of free food and vodka.
He ignored calls for the All-Zemstvo (National Assembly)

Question 4

What did Nicholas claim he would do at the beginning of his reign?

Answer 4

• ‘Maintain the principle of autocracy…firmly and unflinchingly’
• Maintain orthodoxy so the church retained power.
• Continue Russification

Question 5

When was Nicholas’ coronation?

Answer 5

1896

Question 6

Who were the ‘Black Hundreds’?

Answer 6

Nationalist gangs, devoted to the tsar, church and motherland, emerging from 1900 and supported by clergy, landowners and government officials, they played a major role in crushing the 1905 revolution.

Question 7

Why were the years after 1894 a time of such unrest in Russia?

Answer 7

The failures in dealing with the Great Famine in 1891-92, which was just leaving the Zemstva and voluntary organisations to deal with it.

Question 8

How was the Okhrana used more in response to a new wave of rebellious students?

Answer 8

Students who were seen as rebellious were expelled, exiled or drafted into the army and, when necessary, subjected to military force.

Question 9

What is the All-Zemstvo?

Answer 9

National Assembly

Question 10

What were some major causes of the 1905 revolution?

Answer 10

• Russo-Japanese war
• Bloody Sunday
• Mass urban Migration
• Marxist ideas
• Industrial strikes e.g Putilov iron and steel works and St. Petersburg General Strike

Question 11

When was the Russo-Japanese war?

Answer 11

1904-5

Question 12

What were the impacts of the Russo-Japanese war?

Answer 12

• Baltic fleet sunk
• Factories closed
• Unemployment rose and cost of living up by 300%

Question 13

When were ‘the years of the red cockerel’?

Answer 13

1902-07 because of the numerous instances of arson in that time against landowners.

Question 14

What date was Bloody Sunday and what led up to it?

Answer 14

January 9th 1905, Father Gapon’s petition demanded: improved working conditions, fairer wages, and a reduction in the working day to 8 hours. Other demands included an end to the Russo-Japanese war and the introduction of universal suffrage.

Question 15

Who was appointed to deal with peasant disturbances?

Answer 15

Pyotr Stolypin

Question 16

What happened on Bloody Sunday ?

Answer 16

Troops shot 200 peaceful protestors in St. Petersburg.

Question 17

How were peasant uprisings in the countryside dealt with?

Answer 17

Peasants were flogged, arrested and exiled or executed. Stolypin’s necktie (the gallows)

Question 18

How many did the number of industrial strikes increase by between 1894 to 1904?

Answer 18

17,000 in 1894 to 90,000 in 1904

Question 19

Why did Russia lose the Russo-Japanese war?

Answer 19

• They had to run the war 6000 miles away from their capital.
• They had an unorganised and very weak military.

Question 20

What was the problem with mass urban migration due to industrialisation?

Answer 20

Bad living conditions in towns.

Question 21

What was the 1905 revolution?

Answer 21

A series of uncoordinated opposition events on the whole lacked true reolvutionary ideology behind them.

Question 22

Name some of the important events that occurred during the 1905 revolution.

Answer 22

4 February: Grand Duke Sergei killed (Tsar’s uncle).
14 May: Russian fleet wiped out at Tsushima.
June: Countryside disturbances rising. Peasants seized land, grain and animals; burned landlord’s property; illegally cut timber; refused to pay tax or rent.
14 June: Potemkin mutiny.
29 August: The Treaty of Portsmouth.
12-18 October: Kadet Party formed.
13 October: St. Petersburg Soviet formed.
17 October: October Manifesto.
October: General strike in St.Pet and Moscow.
By 26 October, over 2 million workers were on strike.

Question 23

How was order (sort of) restored? 1905

Answer 23

• October Manifesto
• Violence
• Army loyalty

Question 24

What promises were made?

Answer 24

• The October Manifesto promised state Duma and civil liberties.
• November Manifesto promised to halve redemption payments by January 1906, and abolish them by January 1907.

Question 25

What are some examples of violence? 1905

Answer 25

• Army and Black hundreds crushed resistance.
• October 1905 - April 1906: 15,000 executed.

Question 26

When was the first Duma? What was it called? Who dominated it? Important information?

Answer 26

• May - July 1906.
• The ‘Duma of National Hopes’
• The deputies elected to the Duma were overwhelmingly radical-liberal. Kadets majority, peasant-based Trudoviks had over 1/3.
• The most radical parties boycotted: extreme left e.g Bolshevik’s, SRs and the extreme right wing e.g Union of Russian People.
• Incredibly critical of the Tsar and his minsters. Led to Witte’s resignation. They proposed the radical ‘address to the throne’ which requested: abolition of the State Council, the transfer of ministerial responsibility to the Duma, the compulsory seizure of the lands of the gentry without compensation, universal male suffrage, the abandonment of the emergency laws, the abolition of the death penalty and the reform of the civil service.
• Vyborg mutiny. 200 delegates.

Question 27

When was the second Duma? What was it called? Who dominated it? Important information?

Answer 27

• February - June 1907.
• Trudoviks were still majority party.
• In response to the hard-line repression of the First Duma the more extreme left-wing parties stood for election to the second Duma. The Second Duma was more oppositional than its predecessor and was referred to as the ‘Duma of National Anger’. Stolypin struggled to get any support for his policies including his agrarian reform - he resorted to passing legislation with Tsarist emergency powers. Stolypin spread rumours that the Duma was conspiring to assassinate the Tsar, led to arrests and its dissolution. He also illegally altered the voting system to give the gentry increased voting weight.

Question 28

When was the third Duma? What was it called? Who dominated it? Important information?

Answer 28

• November 1907 - June 1912.
• The results of Stolypin’s changes to the franchise was a far more submissive Duma dominated by the moderate Octobrists and the Rightists.
• They agreed approximately 2,200/2,500 government proposals.
• There was still some opposition under the gentry regarding Stolypin’s laws about primary education, naval staff and local government policies.
• Suspended twice in 1911 before finally being dissolved in 1912.

Question 29

When was the fourth Duma? What was it called? Who dominated it? Important information?

Answer 29

• November 1912-1914
• Largely ineffective, new extremely pro-Tsarism PM Kokovstov ignored the Duma.
• Internal division.

Question 30

How did Pobedonostev influence N II’s rule?

Answer 30

Opposition to Westernisation, support for Russification.

Question 31

Which groups benefitted from Nicholas’ policies the most?

Answer 31

Newly emerging Kulaks were allowed to prosper.
Nobles too.
The loyalty of both was expected in return.

Question 32

How did the number of doctors change?

Answer 32

17,000 in 1897, 28,000 in 1914

Question 33

What did State Capitalism mean for the railway?

Answer 33

70% government ownership.

Question 34

What parts of Russia were annexed and given to Japan after defeat?

Answer 34

Manchuria and Korea.